Real estate marketing is a varied and diverse challenge (just like ALL aspects of real estate sales!) Here are some real estate marketing ideas for prospecting buyers and sellers.
Real Estate Marketing Overview
One of the hardest things about marketing for Realtors is that there are two distinct types of clients you are prospecting for, buyers and sellers. I have to say that the old adage really holds true, Buyers buy houses and sellers buy marketing. With this in mind, prospecting for sellers involves a totally different skill set than prospecting for buyers, let’s look at some different marketing ideas.
Marketing For Buyers
These guys are SUPER easy to market for! They are floating around looking for houses to buy and as long as you have some inventory (yours or borrowed from another agent) you can get them. Here are some great types of marketing for buyers:
- Open houses – I KNOW, you think that open houses are stupid. You have done a couple and no one came. What I recommend is to do two a week for a year and then check back and see how many opportunities came from them! Buyers are VERY likely to go to open houses and they are great because you generally get uninterrupted time to talk with them. PLUS you can use a signup sheet to get them to give you their contact info!
- Your MLS listing – Huh? How can this be a marketing tactic? The MLS, Zillow and Realtor.com are just databases and so having great distinctive text that buyers are interested in when they do searches is a powerful tool! If you like working with Short Sale buyers or investors, make sure you are using words like short sale and foreclosure in your property description. Want luxury buyers, make sure to use terms that they search for (not just checking the box that says waterfront or in ground pool).
- Craiglist – This site is great for finding buyers. Have a great picture and an AMAZING (keyworded) description and buyers will be willing to give you a call or pop on over to your website!
Marketing for Sellers
I think you are going to be surprised by a couple of these, but the old days are gone and you need to embrace both technology and in-person networking.
- Open Houses – I KNOW, I just said this for buyers, how can they be good for sellers too? Well, most agents are at an open house are buyer agents. They are sad when the “nosy neighbors” show up and just kind of ignore them. Well, I am here to tell you, they are not nosy neighbors, they are potential SELLERS! Most people are too busy to just pop into all the open houses in their neighborhood, so they have at least a possibility of being there to “interview” potential agents.
- In Person Networking – This is the Chamber of Commerce, Meetups and mixers approach. Getting out there with people and letting them know that you are in the real estate business can lead to LOTS of listings. Make sure you are networking where you want to list and in the price range you are targeting (don’t go to the free networking events if you are a luxury agent and skip the fundraising dinners if you are in the first time homeowner range).
- Social Media – I have talked to more than one agent who gets MOST of their business from Facebook. They spend time like and listening to their friends, noting when someone talks about new baby or job transfer. These are all people who will be looking to move up, down or somewhere and are great listing prospects.
OF COURSE there are a million different things you can do to make your real estate marketing efforts successful BUT to make things SUPER easy for you. Pick SOMETHING that you are going to do and commit to it whole heartedly for a good amount of time (a year, 6 months).
If you are going to do open houses, do two a week for a year. Going to networking, two a week for a year. Social media, plan on at least an hour or so a day. Honestly, anything that you like to do and do consistently will help you meet your real estate marketing goals!
Incoming search terms:
- real estate advertising for both buyer and sellers