Realtor advertising is nothing new. While you know that you can make clients’ home-buying or selling dreams come true, advertising spreads the message to every homeowner in your community. According to the National Association of Realtors, only 35% of a realtor’s business comes from existing customers and referrals. This means spreading your message far and wide to generate new clients is crucial to a profitable career.
To spark some inspiration, here are the top 5 realtor advertising strategies from our real estate agency marketing experts that attract customers and expand your client base.
What Are Real Estate Ads and How Do You Use Them?
Real estate advertisements are promotional content that is used by real estate enterprises, agencies, or agents to market their services or properties to potential clients. These ads are created to generate curiosity among individuals looking for real estate services or properties, using text, visuals, and videos. If you are a real estate agent, investing in realtor advertising will help you generate more leads and help your business grow its client base in this competitive industry.
If you haven’t used real estate agent advertisements before, here are several ways you can use them to your advantage
Build a Brand Presence
When the ads for real estate agents are done right, they help create a lasting brand presence on the prospects. Consistent advertising efforts across multiple channels help create a cohesive and memorable image of your real estate business or practice, building trust and credibility among all potential clients. Apart from boosting your brand’s visibility, the right kind of advertising for real estate agents can foster a sense of reliability and familiarity.
Highlight the Focus of Your Services
As you may realize, the market is filled with realtors. With well-written ads, you can highlight your niche in the real estate business and project yourself as a specialist in the area. For example, if your listings are based around a particular location in the city or the properties are mostly commercial – the ads should put emphasis on these areas. This will help you stand out more to the customers and lower your chances of becoming just another realtor in the city.
Effectively Showcase Properties
Realtor advertising can help you present a property to your potential clients in the most appealing way possible. From virtual tours to engaging ad copies – skilfully crafted real estate marketing ads can transform a listing into a visual experience that captures the imagination of a potential buyer. A well-advertised property can attract attention and also elevate its perceived value.
Stay Competitive
The real estate market is extremely competitive. You can use realtor ads to showcase what separates you from the rest. You may have several unique services, such as virtual tours or home staging, specialized expertise in a niche market, or a different approach to client support – effective advertising for real estate agents can put you way ahead of the competition.
Real Estate Advertisements via Platform
With the growing number of networking websites and internet users, it has become easier for real estate agents and other professionals to target demographics online than through conventional ad campaigns. While you are trying to promote your services and properties through real estate agent advertisements, it is important to find the right platform and use its full potential instead of juggling multiple platforms.
PPC Platforms
Since most people use Google to look for new property listings in their area, you should consider running PPC advertising campaigns through Google Ads. The Google Local Services Ads lets your advertisement appear at the top of search results when a user performs a local search for the services you offer. Take advantage of Google Ads tools and Google Analytics to track the performance of your ads and generate more leads. Apart from Google, social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and others offer great PPC options. You can even run PPC campaigns on specialized real estate websites such as Zillow and Realtor.com. Using different advertising platforms helps you diversify your marketing efforts. However, you need to focus on the techniques that work best for each ad campaign.
Due to its large number of users, Facebook is one of the best platforms for real estate agents to promote their practices and property listings. The in-built marketing tools provided by the platform allow realtors to target specific audiences. Moreover, Facebook realtor ads are highly targeted and locally focused. Other features, such as Facebook Live, Facebook events, and Facebook Marketplace, enable realtors to do a lot more for their ad campaigns. You can also find community-centric groups on this platform and use it to reach thousands of individuals from the same local area.
Instagram is significantly popular among millennials, who encompass a major portion of modern-age customers. It is the best platform to post high-quality property photos, as well as 3D-rendered property visuals. You can further use the reels and videos to advertise walkthrough animations of the properties. The “Story” feature can highlight the listings, key features, and time-lapse videos to entice and attract leads. The Instagram ads feature also serves your realtor’s advertising efforts. Take advantage of short teaser videos to poke the interests of potential home buyers. Similar to Facebook Live, the Instagram Live feature can also help you engage with a niche audience.
While this social media platform may seem a bit underrated compared to the first two, a majority of new-age customers use Pinterest for online searches. With more than 460 million monthly active users, it is a great place to find qualified leads. This platform supports high-quality property images, which you can use for your realtor advertisement. You can also use backlinks from the images as excellent lead-generation tools. You can also cross-post on other channels like Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
YouTube
If you are planning to add video content to your real estate ad campaign, YouTube should be the go-to platform for you. You can promote fascinating 3D walkthrough videos, different types of panoramas, virtually staged rooms, aerial and 360° shots, time-lapse videos, personal branding videos, and more. You can also use the YouTube Live feature to conduct live Q&A sessions. The Shorts feature is also great for creating engaging ads. Moreover, you can optimize these videos and their descriptions and meta tags to appear at the top of relevant Google search results.
TikTok
You must have noticed that a huge section of the population is hooked to micro-content at present. Even though TikTok may seem like a platform only for fun and entertainment videos, it can drive more traction than you realize. TikTok’s strong niche can be used to target a particular demographic and put up listings. Also, TikTok trends can be used to create buzz and get better engagement. You can even use the most popular TikTok hashtags and audio that can enhance audience engagement for your realtor ads.
LinkedIn is a great platform for networking and building connections with fellow realtors. Also, running real estate agent advertisement campaigns on this platform helps you create a digital resume for other professionals, including brokers, lenders, home movers, business owners, relocators, etc. Create a professional company profile with an optimized bio, banner, location, and contact information. Reach out to professionals in your niche. Share your achievements with the audience. You can showcase the events in video format to create higher engagement. You should also upload concise case studies with a backlink to your website. Additionally, engage in interaction in relevant LinkedIn groups for visibility.
X (Twitter)
X, formerly known as Twitter, can help you engage with potential buyers and promote your brand. This platform is saturated with professionals, celebrities, and influencers. Look for relevant tweets and reply to them. You should add high-quality images of the property along with enticing videos in advertising for realtors made for your target audience. You can use GIFs and informative infographics for engagement. Make sure your profile is optimized so that it can appear in the location-based search results. Most X users are 30-49 years of age and ideal home buyers, making this a great place to promote your services and properties.
How can I create Real Estate Ads for Agents that Convert?
If you are planning to develop a real estate agent advertisement for the very first time, you can take inspiration from a few successful campaigns for real estate marketing ads from the past. However, if you want to build trust among your prospects and generate qualified leads, you need to perform the following measures while preparing the real estate ads for agents.
Get Crystal Clear on Your Audience
As a real estate agent, you should start narrowing down your audience by location. Once you have done that, you need to narrow it down further to pinpoint the target audience. Whether you are targeting first-time homebuyers or people who want to sell luxury properties – knowing your audience will help you create a more effective message for your real estate marketing ads.
Set the Right Ad Goals
Next, you need to determine the goal of your realtor advertisement. Your ad strategies and the ad content will change based on your goal. Some of the most common goals for such real estate agent advertisements are:
- Listing promotion
- Brand awareness
- Lead generation
While there can be some other objectives for your ad campaigns, a majority of realtors consider these to be their goals. When you have clarity about your goal, it will be easier for you to measure and improve your advertising efforts accurately over time.
Know Your Ad Budget
To run an ad campaign, you need to spend a significant amount of capital. In fact, the success of your real estate ad campaign depends a lot on your ad budget. If your goal is to promote your business to the entire state of California, but you have a nominal budget, a lot of your campaign objectives will remain unfulfilled. You need to set your ad budget as per your goals.
When you have clarity of how much you are going to spend on the realtor advertisement campaign, it becomes easier for you to select the necessary resources to create effective ads that can convert. Ideally, you should aim to spend about 10% of your income from real estate commissions on ads and marketing. However, some agents spend even more.
Be Ready to Grab (and Keep) Your Audience’s Attention
Lastly, you need to create ad copies that trigger the pain points of your target audience, compelling them to read further and take further action. Focus on every aspect of your ad copy – text, visuals, placement, and more. You may need to hire professional copywriters, photographers, graphic designers, videographers, video editors, etc., to develop ads that will help you fulfill the campaign goals.
While ads in text format can be quite powerful when done correctly, you may make it more engaging by adding a few visual elements to it. Professionally captured photos or real estate properties can create interest among potential clients. You may also create video ads for your real estate business or practice. You will need a script, a team of videographers, and a video editor to create a masterpiece that will set the tone for your ad campaign.
5 Best Realtor Advertising Strategies To Boost Your Business
To spark some inspiration, here are the top 5 realtor advertising strategies from our real estate agency marketing experts that attract customers and expand your client base.
Social Media
Although most realtors use social media to some extent, many are greatly underutilizing these vital channels. Establishing a Facebook page is a good start. The next step is to keep it regularly updated and relevant to your audience.
Of course, you should post photos or videos of your newest listings to keep potential clients informed. Additionally, you can post reviews from existing clients to really show off your great customer service.
An active social media strategy requires a lot of time and a little hard work. But, the brand recognition you can generate with the help of our real estate agency marketing experts is a terrific complement to your other advertising tactics.
Paid Online Advertising
The internet forever changed how realtors advertise. Perhaps nowhere has that been more evident than with targeted pay-per-click and paid search advertising. Basically, you pay Google, Facebook, or other services to promote your business to web users – especially web users searching for real estate agents in your area. Paid online advertising can deliver leads and even clients, but beware – it can get costly in a hurry.
An Updated Website
A realtor’s website can be much like his or her social media presence – it’s only as good as the work put into it. On one side of the spectrum, agents who constantly update their websites with new listings, market trends, and other things that appeal to visitors tend to draw more clients. On the other hand, a boring, static website won’t impress anyone and could lose potential clients to the competition. If you are spending money to build and maintain a website for your business, take the time to maximize its potential. Our real estate agency marketing team can help you create and maintain a modern, attractive website that drives business to you.
Beautiful Business Cards
One realtor advertising strategy that hasn’t changed over the years is an impressive business card. This traditional tactic is still crucial to promoting yourself to potential clients. With modern digital printing options, you can create a beautiful, eye-catching business card—complete with your picture, phone number, email address, website, and social media handles—and have it printed for a relatively low cost. You need people to remember you, and a high-quality business card further boosts your other advertising strategies, so that can more likely happen.
Shopping Cart Advertising
Shopping cart advertising – full-color ads placed on the baby seats of shopping carts – has emerged as a powerful option for realtors to market themselves in their communities. You’ve probably even seen them at your local grocery store. These ads are simple yet crazy effective for realtor and real estate agent marketing campaigns.
Everyone needs groceries, and when they shop for those groceries, they are most likely to do so within a few miles of their home. Each trip to the store equals an opportunity to see your face on a grocery cart.
Although it may seem strange at first, this type of constant exposure is essential to building your local brand. When buying or selling property, homeowners look for a trusted adviser. Your business needs to be the literal face of trust in order to secure new clients, and shopping cart advertising is the expert in building local brand recognition.