Digital marketing is essential for real estate agents.
I know you get it – how important it is for personal branding, lead generation and staying in touch.
So you know, the what and the why; but what about the ‘how’. At Elite Agent, we’ve road tested many theories and tools (“everything is a test until it’s not”) to build our digital presence from scratch.
Here are 10 principals that as a real estate agent will make you a better marketer.
1 Build your own home
Your own home on the web – your website – is your most important digital platform to invest in; because just like renting vs owning a home, nobody can change the rules or sell it out from under you. You can make all the changes, renovations and tweaks you like without needing a landlord’s permission. You cannot say the same for your Facebook presence, Instagram following or even your LinkedIn profile. The landlord could change the terms of the lease on you at any moment, and in the case of Facebook they do all the time (and remember Facebook own Instagram!)
2 Renting is still OK
If you can’t afford to have someone build a website for you, creating your own is not that expensive and also not that difficult with tools like WordPress. But if you can’t do any of this make sure that your outside profiles – eg realestate.com.au, LinkedIn, Google Business and so on – are all as complete as possible. That will help you rise to the top of the ranks, because more complete profiles get naturally boosted in search results.
If you like Instagram, check out a tool called Linktr.ee – it allows you to put one link in your bio and then link off to a whole bunch of other stuff. See how we use it here.
3 Use ‘rented’ platforms to drive traffic to your website
Yes, you should use things like Facebook and Instagram to drive traffic to your website. But you want to be able to retarget that traffic if your visitor fails to, say take action or sign up to your email list. To make effective use of your Facebook ads, you need to install a Facebook pixel. The easiest way to do that is with a plugin called Pixel Your Site (pixelyoursite.com – we use the Pro version).
If you’re looking to create beautiful images and ads, the tool we are loving right now is called Stencil. It is ridiculously easy to use and has a bunch of those motivational quotes built in that everyone loves.
4 Use your advertising dollars wisely
Don’t boost posts from your mobile phone; use Facebook Business Manager. It’s not the friendliest thing ever, but it does give you more control over types of ads and audiences, which is a whole topic all on its own.
5 Stay in touch
On public platforms like Facebook and Instagram you are fighting for attention amongst all the other things going on in that your future customer’s social life. Build your own email list keep in touch by sending good content regularly. We use ActiveCampaign for this as it allows us to create different interest buckets and nurture paths for people who subscribe to #TheBrief (such as a welcome) – and if you’re starting out it’s free.
6 When you’re thinking SEO, think local
Speaking of search results, Google is favouring local businesses right now over the ‘Trip Advisors’ of real estate – you know who they are. So, if nothing else, make sure you have a Google Business Page set up and yes you can do this on Google Ads. You only have to be the best in your local area, not Australia or the whole world. Also, once you’ve got your WordPress website up and running, make sure you install a plugin called Yoast SEO which also has a Local SEO plugin add-on – it goes a long way to sorting your SEO for you automatically.
You only have to win the digital game in your local area, not the whole country.
7 Measure with Google Marketing Centre
If you are going to build any type of website you need to measure how it’s going so that you can make tweaks. My favourite WordPress plugin for that is Google Analytics Dashboard for WP by ExactMetrics – it makes it really easy to install once you have set up an account in Google for Analytics.
8 Stalk your competition
Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all? Tools like Buzzsumo and Likealyzer will give you some answers as to how well you stack up vs your competitors on content marketing and social media. Work out what is working for others in your space, put your spin on it and do it better (or, as Gary Vee says, build a bigger building!).
9 Don’t make it an Easter egg hunt
Planes land on purpose-built runways and so should your prospects, and funnily enough they are called landing pages. If it’s a download or an offer of an appraisal you are promoting in return for an email address, build a landing page (or several of them) to keep the focus on what you want your web visitors to do. Landing pages are really easy to create with a WordPress tool we use called Elementor. In fact, with Elementor you can quickly build just about any type of page you like – no web developer needed.
10 Don’t take a christening gift to a graduation
When you buy someone a gift, do you think about what they would like, or are you thinking more about what you would like to give them? No matter how much you’ve heard it’s all about content marketing, broadcasting, reaching a large number of people, there is just no point if you are providing the content that you want to deliver, rather than what your audience wants (or needs). It’s the same with digital marketing.
Smaller, more quality conversations are what’s working now. Find what your target customer wants and give it to them in the way they want it, whether it’s digital or in-person.
If you’ve ever wished that someone would sit alongside you and help you step by step with your marketing, our next round of Transform is for you. Starting on 15 November our final 30-day challenge for 2018 will focus specifically on digital marketing for both sales agents and property managers. We will demo all of this stuff (and more) so you can implement it one step at a time over 30 days to make sure you get well on your way to nailing your digital brand. Together (if you’re game) we’re going to build some WordPress landing pages, get some ad campaigns running, pimp some profiles, start building your email list, plus much more. To find out more and to register, visit eliteagenttransform.com.
