You’re here because you want to know how to start your online marketing strategy. As a real estate person, you can no longer deny that your target market uses the Internet more frequently to search for houses, buy properties, and reach out to your competitors because you’re not there to help them.
There’s a shortcut: look for a full-service ad agency that can care for your online marketing needs. They can customize strategies according to your objectives and budget. But as a client and a business owner, you also should possess at least basic knowledge of how to do it.
Here’s a template you can use:
1. Website
Sure, you can market your business on social media, but the likes of Facebook and LinkedIn can only do so much. If you want to cement your position online, you need a website.
But this isn’t just any random set of pages you can design on Wix or WordPress. It needs to be real-estate-oriented. How do you do it? Here are some tips:
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Begin with NAP
NAP stands for name, address, and phone. These are the basics your potential clients need to know if they want to reach out to you.
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Include a search bar
If your property is listed on the MLS, you need to ensure visitors can easily find it. This means having a search bar to enter their desired location and property types.
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Use keywords
In addition to making your site more organically discoverable by search engines, optimizing pages with relevant keywords can help your business appear in SERPs and encourage users to click and learn more.
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Optimize images
Having a real-estate site means you need lots of property photos, floorplans, and interior shots. Make sure they’re optimized for high SEO rankings by adding tags like description, city/state name (for US sites), and relevant keywords.
2. Local Marketing
Real estate professionals sell to specific demographics and geographical locations. In other words, you don’t need to be everywhere. Instead, it pays to be more location-driven. The marketing strategies are more targeted, so you will likely get more value from your spending.
Here are some ideas on how you can make it work for your business:
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Create neighborhood-specific landing pages
If you’re focused on a neighborhood like San Francisco’s Upper Market, make sure that any site visitors coming from the city’s downtown area know what they need to do.
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Identify and acquire authoritative links
You don’t need to hire someone to create fake URLs containing false information about your business. Source local publications like real-estate blogs and find out if they are willing to link back to you.
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Create an event page on Facebook
If you’re hosting an open house, make it more likely for people within your target market (e.g., San Francisco’s wealthy and working couples) to find out about it by creating a Facebook event.
3. Visual Marketing
Autotune and dubstep aside, real-estate marketing can be a lot more fun. Visual marketing, in particular, is one of the most effective ways to get an edge on your competitors because it lets you stand out from the clutter.
Here’s how you can make it work for your business:
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Make infographics
Infographics are more than just pretty pictures. They also make your writing and content stand out to site visitors.
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Use video and podcasting
Video marketing is so powerful that studies show B2B companies that use it get 40 percent more weekly views than those who don’t. Similarly, if you’re hosting Twitter chats where potential clients can ask questions, make sure you record these.
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Create a virtual tour
If you sell properties with unique features or amenities, it pays to have a free Google Hangouts video tour of the house.
4. Social Media Marketing
Of course, what will your real-estate site be without social media? This is why you mustn’t just create your profiles. You also need to engage with people on them, too.
Here are some of the best ways to do it:
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Use social listening tools
Tools like Hootsuite or Sprout Social are platforms that help you monitor conversations about your business, your industry, and your competitors on various social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
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Post content regularly
Posting once a day (or even once a week) isn’t enough. You need to post content that’s relevant, useful, and engaging.
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Do guest blogging
One of the best ways to get your social media pages known is by writing on other related blogs or publications that are already authoritative and well-followed in your field. That way, you get access to their followers, and they get access to links back to your site.
The real estate market is so competitive that you’ll need all the help you can get. Fortunately, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel to keep your website ahead of the competition. Try these four marketing strategies and watch how it transforms your business.
