Real Estate Marketing Tools &Tips from Real Estate Virtual Assistant, Megan E Barber
In the Facebook blog, it was announced just last week that Facebook has officially reached 1 Billion monthly active users. That is quite a number! As a lover of stats and infographics, I wanted to show you today this great one I stumbled upon on Pinterest recently, illustrating some of the numbers on Facebook.
Source: blog.katapult-studios.com via REVA on Pinterest
I find Generational differences in their communications and buying behavior super fascinating. When it comes to real estate marketing in the current times, how to market to and speak to different generations is very important. They each have their own communication style and comfort level with technology that you must take into account.
This fabulous infographic that originally came from Smith and Associates, displays the differences perfectly!
What separates Rich Real Estate Agents from the Poor Real Estate Agents? Check out this awesome infographic and survey from Active Rain. Lots of striking information in this, definitely worth checking out.
Believe it or not, there are only 11 weeks left in 2011! We are firmly in the 4th quarter and have you examined your progress on your 2011 business plan? Are you flying blind without one? Well whatever your answer, there is no time to waste. The time to implement is now if you want 2012 to get off to a great start.
Some say that if you start your business January 1st 2012, you are already behind. Real estate is a lag industry and things can take 60-90 days of implementation to see any results. So if you don’t start until January, you may not see any results for several months (especially in this slow economy).
The best marketing advice I’ve ever received is to ramp up your marketing efforts and activities in the 4th quarter so you can see your results once the new year hits and get it off to a fabulous start. If you wait too long, you may find it harder to reach your business or revenue goals because you were waiting for leads to convert and get those marketing results to appear. Market for next year starting NOW!
Starting now, there are probably a few things you can be doing differently, or at least get started on, that can get your 2012 started off right. For example, you can:
It is the perfect time to examine your current business plan (if you have one) refine it, in start implementing NOW so you can have a fabulous 2012. So take some action! I want you to start it off with a bang!
Have some marketing ideas you can implement now to get next year off to a great start? I would love to hear them! Please leave me a comment below!
Old school vs. the new school. Traditional marketing methods vs. Social media marketing. Ways of the past vs. the wave of the future. Around the online real estate world, a small debate was going on about the different schools of thought on real estate marketing methods such as social media and online marketing, and the more traditional routes such as cold calling, door knocking, and direct mail.
Some have quickly taken one side over the other, dismissing the validity of the other point. The “old school” folks cheer on the statement that social media is a total waste of time. The “new school” people think the ones who deny the potential of social media are dinosaurs of the industry that should step aside. I think the the bigger picture here in this debate is that a balanced approach using both old and new methods is necessary to succeed in this market.
Is social media a complete waste of time? I don’t certainly think so. If you know me, you know that I am a big social media fan, and use things like Facebook and Twitter quite often personally and for my business. I have even signed new clients that I’ve met via social media.
Social networking can certainly have potential to be a time waster, with the virtual farms, virtual mafia, and the penchant to announce what one had for breakfast. Certainly if you spend too much of your time living on Facebook and Twitter, you are not going to get much done in general, or be able to effectively work with your clients. But if you handle your social networking activities correctly (strategically), you can get potentially attract new business through your social media engagement.
It is also necessary to have the right mindset and expectation about the potential business social media marketing can bring you. Connections that you attract through social media can take a long time for them to convert to actual business, much like other internet leads. But if you look at the bigger picture, social networks are a great tool to foster new relationships with prospects by engaging with them and repeatedly be out in front of them.
Through some of the more traditional methods of cold calling, and door knocking, most of the “old school” gurus direct agents to go through their database, sphere or lists looking for buyers and sellers that are ready to make their move RIGHT NOW. And then they’ll instruct them to cross the prospect off the list and move on the the next if the are not ready to do business in the immediate. Where this differs from social media marketing is that you are spending little time incubating those warm or cold leads, and going directly for the hot ones. While this approach may be successful for some, it is not for everyone, and even some prospects find this type of communication a total turn off (Hello Gen Y?).
Both social media marketing and more traditional prospecting methods both have their place in today’s marketing plans. Cold calling for hot leads can help you generate business that is ready to move right now, while social media marketing can help fill that pipeline of incoming leads that can eventually warm up to actual business too. I believe a balanced approach in your marketing plan is best.
There is no one marketing method that is the magic bullet. But use any combination of them with the right approach and mindset, and they will bring you new business.
What side of the debate do you stand on? Or what marketing methods have yielded the best results for you? I want to hear from you, so please comment below!
RISMedia just released this fantastic new video today about the impact of social media and mobile internet on the future of real estate. It is evident that they worked hard on this. This video has some good stuff to get you thinking in case you are on the fence.
This is a great video that illustrates what is coming in the future. But I don’t think social media is THE magic bullet. I have a post upcoming that talks about this more, so stay tuned!
Let me know your thoughts on the video. Leave me a comment below!
Take a look at the “About Me” page on your website. Have you not updated your bio within the last several years on there? Or worse, do you have canned content from your template website provider? Or worse yet, you have the phrase “This is where you put in information about yourself” in that spot?
The About page on any given website is about the first or second place a visitor clicks on when visiting a new site (on a real estate site, it’s probably 2nd to property searches). People want to know the person or people that are behind the business and what that business is really about. It is important to show who you are and still give people a reason to stay on your site and want more from you.
I recently decided to take a new approach to my own About page on my website. Before, my page was just like any professional profile or resume, stating my certifications, my past work experience and so on. It was a snooze fest. And I really didn’t think it conveyed who I was or represented me authentically. So I changed it up, re-wrote it in my own voice and added some more personal information about me outside of my business. I still kept at the end bullet points with my professional certifications and such, but now I gave a little more insight to the REAL me.
Now, I’m not saying that my new about page is the most compelling thing ever written on the planet. But I feel it is more authentic. I wrote it in my own voice, telling more of the story on how I got to be in the business I’m in, and showing the REAL person behind the business (who is a busy mommy as well as a wine lover).
Now I have mentioned before, that real estate consumers don’t really care about the agent at first, and that mostly is true. They mostly want property info and market conditions. But once they ARE ready to care about the agent they want to use, you’re about page can help to convince them that YOU are the one they can be comfortable working with.
About pages don’t have to be boring and resume like. Check out this blog with 12 of the best about pages from around the web. You can also check out this site About.me and create your own profile on there as well as get your creative wheels turning. You can check out my own About.me page here with a slightly shortened version of my bio.
I recommend you examine your own About page right now. Does it authentically represent you? Does it say who you are and give people a reason to stay and find out more. Does it tell of all of your professional experience and most updated certifications? Does it have an updated photo of you, or glamor shot of you from 25 years ago? Go look at it, re-work it and make sure it makes a great first impression.
Have a great About.me page or an about page on your site to be proud of? Leave me a comment and share it below!
This year I am on a mission to help REALTORS use video, and use it effectively to build their business. By now, you’ve seen many agents all over the web taking matters into their own hands and creating videos for their real estate marketing. Though some will say that it should be left to the video pros to use video successfully, agents are fully able to do it themselves with the right tools and tricks in place.
Here are some tips and best practices for video success.
If you haven’t started with video for your business yet, hopefully the above tips will get you going. And as always, you can make use of a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, to help with editing your videos and broadcasting across the web.
Are you frustrated with not getting a steady stream of quality prospects from your real estate website? Suffering from too many visitors leaving your website and never coming back? If you are having a tough time getting new leads and visitors to sign up for your list and contact you, take a long hard look at your site. Chances are, you are probably doing it wrong.
1. Your site is a stale static site that does not have regularly updated content like a blog.
2. You have pictures of palm trees and beaches all over your header and pages, but your local market is in Denver Colorado.
3. You have a forced sign-up immediately just to be able to start a property search or to view IDX listings.
4. It is too hard to find the top THREE things visitors to your site want most: Home Search, “What is my home worth”, “How is the Market”
5. Your website is all about you and nothing much about your local market and what your visitors want (see the top 3 items above).
6. You’re not offering buyers and sellers something of actual value to them for signing up for your list or updates.
7. Your site has no links or way to connect with you on social media.
8. There’s no clear call to action on your site.
9. You have no contact forms on your site for visitors to actually contact you when they are ready.
10. You say you are different from the rest, yet you are using a templated website that looks identical to 50,000 other agents’ sites.
If you took a good look at your site and saw that your are doing one, all or any combination of the above, it is probably time for a new approach. Your website should be your hub, your engine for delivering exactly what consumers want when they search for real estate info. If you are not making it easy, not making it all about them, you are losing them. Stop doing it wrong.
Consider utilizing a Real Estate Virtual Assistant to help you do it right.
Seen other ways people are doing it wrong? Have any questions on how to do it right? We want to hear from you! Leave us a comment below and let us know.
A new web comedy series titled “The Agent”, is coming to a computer near you. Created by David Winans, and his marketing team at Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, David Winans & Associates, “The Agent”, showcases a young man who stumbles into the world of becoming a REALTOR, and hilarity ensues.
The series pokes fun a the industry featuring some of the trials and tribulations of an agent’s daily life in the field, which at times can be quite funny. Like David Winans says in the above article, a little self-depreciating humor is always healthy.
You can check out The Agent at http://theagent.tv and be sure to watch the rap song and video used to kick off the series “Makin’ Money”. Funny stuff! And a fun use of video.
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