Real Estate Marketing Guide
Content Marketing
What is Multi-Channel Content Marketing?
The multi-channel approach to content marketing for real estate professionals takes the view that the best way to brand and promote yourself is to reach your target audience everywhere they are - from local events, social media, web, and print.
You’ll need to create original content that addresses the needs, wants, and desires of prospective home buyers and brands you as the expert on the subject matter. Content marketing answers the questions your customers are searching for. By answering questions, you help to solve the problems your customers are asking – providing them value and helping you build trust with your niche community.
Content marketing can be a very useful tool in your marketing toolbox as a real estate agent because content allows you to tell your story and connect with your audience. Through creating content for buyers and sellers, you increase your industry authority, branding yourself as the expert.
In addition to creating brand awareness through your advertising, content marketing is a key component to adding value to your personal brand and builds a deeper connection with your prospects.
Goals of Content Marketing
The goal with all of your content should be to connect with your audience and share more about yourself as a professional expert in the eld. Showcase your knowledge, your personality, and your expertise by creating content that is both relatable, informative, and of value to your target market.
In sharing authentic personal content and content that relates to your niche and target market, you will create top of mind connection and a reputation as someone who is knowledgeable but is also sincere about understanding the needs of the people they serve.
Website Content
Your agent website will be the headquarters of all your content, so it means you need to make it easily accessible and make sure your website looks good and is set up for content! A blog is a great centralized place to start storing and sharing all of the content you create. Read more about real estate agent website tips in our digital marketing section.
Blog Content
Content marketing, with the help of SEO will help you to rank higher in the search engine results. Publishing new content on a regular schedule is important to help your search rankings.
Having a blog is a critical component of your website. Here you can communicate about your personal experiences as a real estate agent, you can tell the story about the people you help on a daily basis, you can communicate what your personal brand means and your “why” for being an agent.
You can give tips to home buyers and sellers, and you can share all of your valuable local market knowledge with the world. Blog content proves you are relatable, gives people a reason for wanting to work with you.
Blogging of course takes time to build a following, just like any other branding strategy. Stick with it! Make it a goal to create a new blog at least once per week. The more content you create, the more your website will show up on Google, and then more leads you will receive local traffic and leads. Some of the best types of blog content is content that addresses and answers buyer and seller questions.
As they ask their questions to Google, the idea is your blog post will answer it, giving you the visibility as the expert. Home buying and selling can be a complicated process for many, especially first-time homebuyers or relocating buyers. Creating content that can ease their minds and make them feel more comfortable about the complicated process is a win for you in acquiring new leads and the trust of those who needed your help.
With most blogging platforms, if not all, you have the option of allowing comments. Comments will give you a chance to interact and engage with your audience. Also, by posting your blog posts to social media, this gives you another way to get people talking about your content.
You can also include calls to action in your blogs to lead people to sign up for your newsletter or to request more information or a call back from you. Knowing a prospect has just read your content before becoming a lead means they’re already warmed up to who you are and were interested in what you had to say. Make sure you know which blog posts your leads come from so you can reference the content they viewed when reaching out.
As mentioned above, Search Engine Optimization of your site is huge to assure that your website isn’t a billboard in the middle of nowhere; you want it to be seen and want it to be relevant to the people wanting your services!
Another tip for your website and blog is to track the activity, using a tool like Google Analytics to see what pages are generating the most traffic. You may want to also see how long people are staying on a page. This proves that people are either actually reading your content or they are clicking on your page and bouncing quickly.
Knowing what content works the best is the best way to keep your strategy on point and to create more content similar to the content that is most appreciated by your audience. You will also want to evaluate that you are getting leads and that your forms work.
Another key tenant of strong SEO is to build links to your site. The more credible websites link to you, the higher your search rankings will be because Google uses backlinks to your site as one factor in how trustworthy you are. If credible sources are citing you as a credible site, Google takes note and rewards you in the search rankings. Links from local associations is a good way to start. Ask for links from your neighborhood association or any local business site that links to local vendors.
All of your email marketing and social media marketing can link back to your blog, which lives on your website, which also serves as the main portal for which to get connected with you and reach out. You can also share valuable testimonials, information about new listings, updates about your upcoming happenings. As well as local content. Good content proves you’re the expert. Make sure to include a lead form on all your content for getting back in touch with you.
Evergreen Content
For some of your content, it will be nice to create some that stands the test of time, for information that is relevant from year to year and doesn’t go outdate quickly. Some things may change, but certain aspects of the home buying process don’t change much. This type of content is perfect for creating evergreen content. Creating a piece of evergreen content means you can create it once and share it on a regular basis.
Storytelling
The most compelling and engaging content is content that tells a story. For you as a real estate agent, you can share your personal story about working as a realtor. You can also include the stories of your buyers and sellers as they transport from one home to the next, as they close one chapter of their lives and open another.
For blogs, think about what the homeowners’ purchase process is like. Think back to when you got your training in real estate. What were some of the things you learned when you first started out as an agent that could help homeowners? Capture these ideas and you can share your personal experiences to help them navigate “what to do and what not to do” as a first-time homebuyer.
Home buying is an emotional decision and journey. Your content can show that emotion as can share the emotional benefits of home ownership, and the process of moving, owning for the first time, maybe a first home with kids, or stories of couples downsizing when the kids leave home.
Capture video of your homeowners moving in their new home, how easy the process was with you as their agent. You can also follow up with previous clients to see how they are liking their new home years later. Show how they are enjoying their home, their neighborhood and their community. In effect you’re showing that your job contributes to the joy of families building their own space and their own roots.
Another example of storytelling would be to tell your “day in the life” story of being an agent and document your life to create content that shows more of your personality and how you work with clients.
Content Marketing Examples
Types of content to create:
Blogs
eBooks
infographics
Geo-specific neighborhood articles
Guides for buying, selling and moving
New listing write ups
Infographics, listing photos, other photography related to your target market
Content can be anything from blogs, articles, videos, photos, infographics and social media content. The trick is finding the type of content you enjoy creating. Ask yourself, are you better with the written word or in front of a camera?
Over time, as you stay consistent and get better, your content marketing will help build you an audience, connect with new buyers and sellers, and boost your brand.
When you’re creating your content and speaking directly to your target audience consider these things:
What problem do homebuyers and sellers in your niche have?
What form of content can help solve this problem?
Share this content with your audience.
Some topics you can create content for:
Why are you in real estate?
Customer stories
Talk about your town – from the schools, restaurants
Local business reviews
School reviews
Neighborhood reviews
Transit content
Infographics
In addition, infographics can pop and get a lot of engagement due to the combination of graphics and information to consume that will help your customers. They serve a double purpose of engagement and education by using graphics to answer your customers’ common questions about homes. 2 column comparison infographics are effective and easy to make.
Pros and Cons lists like Condos vs. House or renting or owning are good examples. Showcasing information about the home in an infographic can be useful to a potential homebuyer. Other infographics that could be made include property tax information, recommended home maintenance, or homeowners tips.
Local business reviews
Write about your favorite local businesses, from restaurants, coffee shops, scoop shops, hardware stores, other local businesses in your key target neighborhoods
School reviews
Write about the schools in your area. You can write about the private schools in the area, the public, the colleges, depending on your target demographic. Talk about if any schools are a charter school or focus on honor students or a science specialty.
Neighborhood reviews
Write your reviews about the neighborhoods you will specialize in. You can talk about what makes a neighborhood unique, what attractions are in the area, nearby landmarks, potential pros and cons. Keep in mind fair housing guidelines when putting out any content.
Transit content
Act as a tour guide for your prospective clients. Show them the most popular streets in the area. Let them know about any hike or bike trails residents can get around on. What’s also important is how close neighborhoods are to the nearest highway, as an example.
Fact sheets and glossaries
Sometimes in real estate, your job is to educate your customers as much as excite them. Creating and curating educational content for your customers fills in the gap of lack of knowledge about the home buying process, and hopefully answers many homebuyers and sellers questions before they ask them.
FAQ resource pages, key terms to know, fact sheets, and guides include helpful information. You can format these materials with your brand colors, custom layouts, and your own design to build your brand.
You can also break up this information into smaller social media posts like tip of the day or fact of the day. All of these materials can be offered on your website and can appear in search engines, helping guide customers to more of your content on your website and social media channels. You can use them as a lead magnet to connect with any would-be or future customers.
Educating customers into all the more boring, factual, and legal facts and figures of homeownership shows that you’re an expert of knowledge and also helps your customers become more pleasant to work with because they are better educated and understand the process much better.
Many of your buyer’s and seller’s pain points will live in the unknown; not feeling confident they understand the process. Your guidance and knowledge in your factual content is content that builds the depth of your expertise.
Social Media Content
For social media content, you can publicize your blogs, infographics, videos, photos, open houses, community events, and virtual events. You’ll also incorporate your personal, professional, and listings posts on a regular social media schedule.
Podcasting
Should you start your own podcast as a real estate agent? First of all, do you enjoy talking? If you have the gift of gab, it might be the medium for you. You’ll want to make sure to take care of all the technical requirements – you’ll need a computer, and maybe some mics and audio editing software.
The same goes for all your content. You’ll want to plan your podcast topics, guests, schedule and more. Once edited, you’ll need to publish your podcast. There’s many free services, like Simplecast, that will automatically publish your podcast to all the major podcast services.