4 minute read
Find Clients with a Marketing Budget of $0.00
from Insight | May 2012
by NC REALTORS®
TODAY’S REALTORS® FACE A CHALLENGING MARKET AS THE VOLUME OF REAL ESTATE TRANSACTIONS IN MARKETS ALL OVER THE COUNTRY ARE DOWN SIGNIFICANTLY FROM THE MARKET HEYDAY IN 2003-05. FURTHER, THE VALUE OF EACH TRANSACTION IS DOWN 30 TO 50 PERCENT IN MOST MARKETS, AND COMMISSIONS HAVE NOT INCREASED FROM THE TYPICAL 6 TO 7 PERCENT THAT IS COMMON IN MOST MARKETS, EVEN THOUGH AGENTS ARE WORKING HARDER TO SELL EACH PROPERTY.
In short, if today’s REALTOR® does not increase the number of clients he or she has, it will be difficult to meet their income goals. So where are these new clients going to come from? With fewer transactions and less market activity, even superstar agents who fed the pipeline almost exclusively with referrals will find this does not work as well these days. Compounding the problem is that traditional marketing channels, such as newspaper ads and billboards, are out of the reach of all but a handful of agents.
If we assume a marketing budget of close to zero, how can a resourceful agent find new clients within his/her community? The only answer is through social media. Social media includes both known and up and coming sites where prospective clients are spending time and are ripe for the picking. When it comes to social media, most REALTORS® fall into one of three categories: w Agents who are not typically on social media sites. w Agents who are on some social media sites, but are not getting business from these sites (yet); and w Agents who are on social media sites, and have started to get some clients via social media.
Let’s first discuss agents who are not typically on social media sites. Why aren’t they there? The most common explanation is “I do not have time or I do not understand social media.” Certainly, there are generational factors impacting an agent’s use of social media. However, social media has now reached a point where, particularly in the real estate industry, it cannot be ignored as a vehicle to find new clients.
For the agents who are not Internetsavvy, or lack the time or desire to learn, you’ll need to find some help. The ideal candidate is a computersavvy teenager or college student who is already familiar with basic social networking sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and who is looking for some corporate social media experience or who will do this for a small amount of money.
Give the student some sample profiles of other successful agents, some background on your successes, and your professional photo, and have the student set up profiles for you on a wide variety of social media sites, both big (like Twitter and Facebook) and niche.
An example of a niche site where agents can find new clients is RealtyJoin. I am a cofounder. This site (www.realtyjoin.com) is intended to be an online marketplace connecting real estate investors with the vendors investors need to be successful, such as real estate agents.
While not as voluminous as Facebook or LinkedIn, RealtyJoin is a great place for agents to find clients, as most members of RealtyJoin are potential clients. They’re investors looking to add to their properties in what is likely the best foreclosure buying market in history. Tapping into investors who have the cash and expertise to take advantage of the local marketplace is a great example of how a targetrich niche site like RealtyJoin can be used by agents to grow their business.
Many REALTORS® are on a variety of social media sites, and yet this has not yet translated to new business. Why is that? A successful social media strategy hinges on the details. If you don’t connect the dots for your prospective clients, they won’t find you. Here are three simple and easy tips to help you generate more business from your social media efforts:
Create a Social Media Activity Strategy
What you do with social media has to be more than just showing up on a page. In other words, you have to be active and you have to know what you’re doing.
Respected author, blogger, and social media consultant Ilyce Glink discusses strategy for how REALTORS® can easily get business from social media. At our website, you can click on a link and listen to a short teleseminar where Ilyce lays out effective strategy tips for real estate professionals to use on social media.
Make Sure Your Profile Says to a Reader, “I Should Be Doing Business With This REALTOR®.”
So many profiles of REALTORS® provide repetitive information, but they don’t tell readers why they need you to be successful.
The most effective tool you can use is a testimonial. Having other people sing your praises is extremely powerful. Then kick that up a notch by making sure the provider of the testimonial has a profile within the same social media community.
This makes it easy for the reader of your profile to reach out to your customer and ask a question or two. The reader may not take the time to do that, but just being able to locate the satisfied customer within the same community will enhance the effectiveness of the recommendation.
On our website, take a careful look at real estate agent and RealtyJoin member Mitch Levinson’s profile. Mitch makes great use of testimonials, and his satisfied customers are in turn reachable and available for contact within the same community.
Be a Resource Online, As Well As a Resource in Person
Offering valuable information through your social media communities will help you attract the type of clients you are seeking. The strategy behind this is discussed in Ilyce’s teleseminar.
Further, as an example, agent Chris Bradley is seeking to attract investors in the Atlanta area, and she is using her RealtyJoin blog to position herself as a resource for investors in the Atlanta area. If you are seeking homebuyers rather than investors, be a homebuyer resource on sites frequented by prospective homeowners.
The world as we know it is changing. In the past few years, social media has had a hand in overthrowing governments overseas, ending political careers, and launching upstart companies. Like it or not, social media is here to stay and will only increase in importance to today’s real estate professional. Oh, and by the way, did we happen to mention social media is also free? v
Andy Heller is a real estate investor, author, and educator. He is cofounder of www.realtyjoin.com, the social media site dedicated to the real estate industry.
BY JULIE WOODSON DIRECTOR OF POLITICAL COMMUNICATIONS
