Real Estate Marketing & Beyond
Internet marketing for real estate agents can be one of your best opportunities to build your brand and expand your client reach, but there's an art to it.
There's no point in investing in internet marketing (or any type of marketing) if you won't see a return on your investment, which means you need to set clear goals and expectations before you start spending. Here's how you can position your internet marketing to get the best ROI possible:
Your job as a real estate professional is to sell homes, which means you're likely to gauge your internet marketing's success by an uptick in the number of homes you sell, right?
Almost.
Unless you are listing homes and properties that buyers can place in a digital shopping cart and check out with their credit card, your internet marketing will not give you a direct return on your investment.
Instead, think of digital marketing as a piece of your overall strategy. People may discover your agency online. Your ad might trigger recall in their minds. Your constant sharing of articles on social media might help them form a positive opinion about your agency.
These things aren't easily measured on their own. Instead, break down your ROI analysis into smaller stages:
For example, if you are using a content-based internet marketing strategy, you could first look at how many people view/share/comment on each blog post. From there, you can see how your group of followers grow over time as you generate more content. Then, measure that growth against the number of new clients you earn.
There are seemingly infinite ways real estate agents can market themselves and their agencies online, but not all of them will help you earn the ROI you expect. Here are a few suggestions to get you started.
Content, such as blog articles and industry news, can help position you as the leader in your area by showing prospects you're competent at what you do. You can start your own blog or hire a freelancer. It's also a great way to build your backlinks that can help drive more traffic to your website.
The most effective way realtors can use social media is to brand yourself. Share your value-driven content; respond to comments and reviews; establish your community-focused image - these actions remind people why you're the best choice for real estate needs.
Beware: social media can prove to be a time suck if you aren't careful.
Online reviews are the new word-of-mouth marketing. Studies show that 88% of people trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation from a friend or family. You can ask satisfied clients to leave you a review on Google or your social media pages. However, never pay for a professional review. People and Google are getting smarter at detecting phony reviews, and its impact can do more harm than good if you're caught.
Regardless of how you invest in internet marketing, make sure you plot a course of how your investment will eventually give you a return.
You may have seen other real estate agents posting listings on social media, sharing articles, or popping up in paid search engine ads - truthfully, those can all be excellent ways to market your agency online. But copying what others are doing may not give you the ROI you expect.
The most important thing to remember with any internet marketing strategy is that your long-term results won't happen overnight. Rather, you need to measure the ROI of smaller goals before you gauge how they affected your larger goals.
