Real Estate Sales & Marketing

Marketing For Real Estate Agents: Learn My Simple Philosophy

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There’s way too much complexity when it comes down to marketing for real estate agents and I like to keep things simple, honest and straightforward, so I will give you my ideas right here, in this article.

Now, let me set the scene for you — I’m not going to give you a step-by-step process that reveals all of the “secrets” that will propel you to real estate stardom because there aren’t any.

I will leave those articles, videos, and the like to the gurus and experts…but if you want to take a look at a good article, read this one from WordStream, which covers the basics in a straightforward manner, just how I like it!

I am more concerned with the philosophy of marketing when it comes down to real estate or any industry for that matter.

All realtors do the same thing and it’s not so much “what we do,” when it comes down to marketing, but “how we do it.”

Since the birth of the Internet, we’ve been bombarded by experts, and gurus…lured by the promise of learning the “secrets” and other techniques that really only serve to part you from your hard-earned money.

But I must be fair to the real people out there, who put in hours of work developing real content and with the goal of helping people before they look to earn a single dime…because that is exactly what I try to do in my brokerage and in life.

And in my opinion, this is the attitude you must adopt if you want to market yourself successfully in the real estate world and really nail the art of real estate marketing.

So let’s begin.

Marketing For Real Estate Agents 101: Who Are You?

Marketing-For-Real-Estate-Agents-Who-Am-IThe real estate industry is one that still needs a great deal of human involvement — even though some people will tell you otherwise.

For the moment, forget about “tech disruption” and all of the other fancy terminology that is trying to convince you that agents are not needed and technology will replace them, with the resulting loss of commissions, etc.

This has been threatened in many industries, but we humans are a funny bunch that despite all of the human flaws, still love to deal and interact with other humans.

It’s called “human nature,” as if you didn’t already know…and it’s time to give yourself a dose of it and make sure the human elements are covered when you look at how you market yourself as a real estate agent.

Define Who You Are And What You Stand For

Take some time and give this heading some deep thought — people love to deal with people and this is especially true in real estate.

Clients are interested in you…whether you believe it or not — they love to know what makes you tick, and what you stand for because it provides an element of trust, which is one of the most essential components of successful sales and marketing.

And most importantly, they want to feel your passion and enthusiasm for the industry, which if you don’t have, by the way, then get out of it, because you will never reach your true potential without it.

Get out a copy of your resume and better still, edit and re-write it — would you by from “you.”

Have you listed all of your lifetime achievements, have you documented your failures, and more importantly, what you have learned from them?

Your resume is key and today, it should be on your website and written in a manner that creates a “value proposition.”

What I mean by this is that you are not just writing it for a potential employer and wheeling it out for interviews, you are showcasing yourself to the world…and describing what you have to offer the world.

If you want help with this then please contact me.

You must focus on being YOU, and not try to emulate anyone else…because at the end of the day, you cannot be anyone else!

It’s a great exercise to do by the way and you will also force yourself to confront your failures, which are extremely important.

When I meet people, and I have met many, from all walks of life, I am far more concerned with their failures and how they overcame them than their successes — it motivates me to see how others have bounced back from them.

Never be afraid to do this.

The real estate world is full of fake people, and fake personas — it needs a dose of reality and you can help to provide it.

You are asking people to sell their homes, buy a new one, rent an apartment, or new office premises, so make sure that your clients at the very least, know exactly who and what they are dealing with.

Have A Vision And An Opinion

Marketing-For-Real-Estate-Agents-Vision-Opinion

You must remember that most customers have no idea as to what they want or need — they think they do, but if they did, they would not need you.

One of the worst saying in sales is to give the customer exactly what they want…but what is the point given the above statement?

The key is to ask them exactly what they want and then guide them to refining their answer in line with your knowledge and expertise — there will be occasions when you really do meet people who understand exactly what they want, but don’t bank on it.

To accomplish this you need to have a strong vision for the industry and that means working in anticipation…getting ahead of the curve.

I always look to the future housing market when I am showing a client a home — what will the area and this house look like in the next ten years, for example.

In this manner, I can see the true value of the home and I will give my opinion to the client even if that rules out the deal.

But in reality, I will have done this before the tour, and I will have explained this to the client.

I also keep an eye on all things financial and look at the publicly traded real estate companies to see how they view the market and the future — you cannot ignore this valuable information.

Lastly, you need to form opinions that will be unique to you — don’t be frightened by this and it will form a valuable part of your marketing strategy.

Remember you will be talking and interacting with people — so make sure you have plenty to talk about!

Your vision and opinions will be the key to designing your processes, which are part of your value proposition.

Now Tell The World

Marketing-For-Real-Estate-Agents-Tell-The-World

Once you have defined who you are and what you stand for, it’s time to tell everyone else.

The beauty of being in the real estate industry is that almost anyone can be a client — you also have so many opportunities to connect with people thanks to the Internet and you need to take advantage of all of them.

Create an article about yourself and of course, a bio — this will be a starting point for you and you can see mine here.

Don’t be shy when it comes down to telling the world who you are and forget about any negative comments you receive.

I work on the philosophy that if you have taken the time to write or make a negative comment about someone else, you are probably jealous that you haven’t had the courage to do the same.

Think about it — if you take the time and trouble to trash someone else, then you have too much time on your hands and that should be put to better use.

Also, you care too much about others.

There are enough people in the world to give you business and it’s just a matter of finding them, resonating with them (and them with you, of course), and then allowing the right ones to become clients!

Notice the word “allowing.”

You want to make sure you work with the right clients and remember that being a real estate agent is a two-way situation!

Have the confidence to target and work with the right people.

Now, as I said earlier, this article is about my philosophy and I am not going to go through the process of setting up social media accounts, etc.

You probably know how to do that…but I will talk in the future about my method of social media marketing, so stay tuned.

Marketing For Real Estate Agents: Be Consistent

Marketing-For-Real-Estate-Agents-Be-Consistent

If there are any secrets to success, then being consistent in pretty much everything that you do is one of them.

If you set up your social media accounts and decide to start the process of marketing, then you must create a plan and stick to it.

Too many realtors are inconsistent with their marketing and that means they will more than likely be inconsistent with their clients.

To give you an example, each of our agents receives daily training so that we can stay on top of what is going on with each deal, plus refine the process of delivering the absolute best customer experience in relation to our customer services charter.

The training has been going on daily since I started the brokerage almost two years ago…and I shudder to think about what could have gone wrong if we hadn’t done it.

Be consistent in everything you do, because it is a quality that you can easily demonstrate to all prospective clients and due to the nature of keeping it relevant to you personally, it will be impossible to compete with, because there is only one of YOU.

So What Is The Best Way To Market Your Services?

Marketing-For-Real-Estate-Agents-Yhe-Best-Way-To-Market

The $64m dollar question!

I will explain my thinking here and hopefully give you something to think about and work on.

Firstly, you have to get the “YOU” part down and make sure you consistently tell the world who you are, so you need to come up with a simple bio, that will clearly communicate the value you offer your clients.

This step is not easy and you will agonize over the copy, or the video message, whatever you choose for sure…but it is an essential step to take because the key here is that this is where you can showcase your unique sales proposition (USP).

Remember, nobody else can be you!

Stop The Sleazy Posts

Be careful how you present yourself to the world — people are tired of seeing “lifestyle” posts of the rich and famous, and it is easy to antagonize your clients before you have even met them.

There is a lot to be said by being “understated.”

Money talks…but wealth whispers!

The next stage is to explain to your clients how you work and the precise outcome for them (benefit) in a clear, straightforward manner.

Let me give you an example:

When we work with new commercial clients who are looking for premises, we take a great deal of time to understand the commercial value proposition of the underlying business, before we even consider looking for options.

We also charge a retainer for our services which must be paid upfront and is refunded on success…we don’t work without a retainer unless we have an established (known) client and this is because, through experience, we have wasted a great deal of time before we took this step.

We take the time to understand the business, to be able to better present the business to potential landlords, and we have found that it works extremely well, because not only can we better represent their business, but we are also able to spot potential flaws in the business because as a brokerage, we are founded by entrepreneurs and experienced businessmen.

Your Process Is Key

When you demonstrate your process with a clear articulation of exactly how you help your clients, you can walk each client through it, by demonstrating what to expect at each stage.

In our apartment locating services division, we clearly explain to each client exactly how they will move from the initial inquiry to the moving in date, and as obvious as the process seems, the look of reassurance from our clients tells us consistently that we are doing the right thing!

Demonstrate Your Knowledge & Expertise

This is where you have to make a commitment and that is to invest your time into learning about the real estate industry in its entirety.

Get to know the history, understand where we are today, and more importantly where we are heading in the future.

The more knowledge you have, the more confidence it will give you and the more trust you will be able to build with your clients.

It’s that simple.

Now, it’s time to demonstrate your expertise.

This comes back to your own business and personal value proposition that you will have constructed through the finding out “who” you are and how you operate your real estate business, clearly articulating the benefits to your clients.

Your expertise lies in your processes, which are a reflection of your vision and opinions.

Remember…the customer is not always right and very rarely do they actually understand what they want or need.

That’s why they are working with you.

Conclusion

Don’t fall for the marketing hype out there trying to make a simple process complicated.

This article is all about my philosophy and you can obviously develop your own — the point being that there are so many guides and “how to’s” out there, but very little as to the philosophy behind the process.

I came from an entrepreneurial and business background, which I put to everyday use in my real estate brokerage and you can do the same no matter what your background.

Let’s say you are an engineer, who has decided to make real estate your career — you can talk about real estate from an engineering background, and trust me, you will certainly find some excellent analogies and also, you can target fellow engineers as your clients.

That’s the beauty of the industry.

Finally, please get in touch with me if you have any thoughts or questions and I am also looking to work with like-minded agents, so get in touch with me if you have any interest in working with me, or just to explore ideas and other opportunities.

Danny Kelman | 469-847-3753 | danny@amazingbrokerage.com

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