A real estate agent is more than a salesman, and a house is more than the sum of its drywall and vanilla accents.
Buying that forever home is an experience like no other. It’s a milestone symbolising one’s entrance into adulthood. It’s a bridge to the classic 2.5 children, dog and backyard barbecue.
Property is also the largest source of wealth the average person will ever hold. These factors, among others, make real estate an eternally experiential and life-affirming transaction.
Professionals working in the real estate sector — agents, mortgage originators, appraisers, loan officers, brokers and other financial services parties — must cater to this sentiment in their marketing. Advertising low-interest rates or diverse inventory may draw attention, but there is so much more real estate marketers can do to heighten curiosity, captivate prospective homebuyers and generate new customers.
This article details 12 content marketing tactics every real estate brand can use to increase its curb appeal.
1. Visuals of Every Kind
It’s no secret that much of the real estate game is won or lost on first impressions. As such, real estate marketers should prioritise visual content formats above anything else.
On a practical level, this means professional hi-res photography for staging, showcasing and open house purposes. These photographs can be reused across every marketing channel, from printed, physical collateral to social media. This is relevant collateral for those who are shopping for homes in the modern marketplace, where virtual tours are king.
In the digital sphere, websites and other online media properties should be populated with interactive carousels of visuals so potential clients can better assess homes on the market. Infographics are also dynamic assets for real estate agents, as they’re perfect for answering commonly asked questions in an illustrative format. Concepts like pros vs. cons, renting vs. owning, fixed-rate vs. adjustable-rate and condo vs. townhouse are easily visualised and shared via infographics.
2. AR/VR for Virtual Tours
Static visuals are one thing; interactive video is another. Services like Google Tango, roOomy and Matterport allow real estate marketers to use augmented and virtual reality video for one-of-a-kind, custom open houses.
This technology isn’t exclusive to luxury real estate. Redfin allows any listing on its site to feature VR tours. Prospective homebuyers can select from more than 100,000 furniture and household items to virtually drag and drop into the homes they’re interested in, giving them a good idea of how the space may look once they’re actually moved in. Customers can decorate, personalise and visualise unbuilt and empty spaces with multidimensional views.
It won’t be long before open houses could become obsolete. Prospects will just use their smartphones or VR headsets to get the full experience without stepping foot in the home.
Though seeming futuristic, this technology is already in action, and real estate agents are missing a big opportunity if their real estate content marketing programs lack dimension. Customers want 360-degree, panoramic visuals they can engage with. This is more important than it was even 2 years ago, with the pandemic skyrocketing virtual reality as a means of connection. The option offers a way for potential buyers to receive an immersive experience, whether or not they are physically present at the home.
3. Newsletter Marketing
Marketers who used segmented campaigns noted as much as a 760% increase in revenue, according to HubSpot. Email marketing delivers the highest ROI of any channel for the average marketer.
Email may seem like an outdated mode of communication in the era of apps, texting and chatbots, but email marketing delivers the highest ROI of any channel for the average marketer.
Real estate newsletters should contain a mix of assets, like:
- Blog posts.
- Infographics.
- Links to social media feeds.
- Short videos.
- Trending data points.
- Geo-specific news.
- New listings.
- Buyers/sellers guides.
- Helpful tangential content.
Email is an easy way to stay in 24/7 touch with prospects and previous customers — you never know when someone could be in the market for another home. And with so many automated email tools like Constant Contact and Mailchimp, personalising a branded newsletter based on a template is incredibly quick and efficient.
4. Success Stories
User-generated content, or user-complemented content, can be an effective way to allow other parties to work for you. It can also serve as a dynamic mid- and bottom-of-the-funnel tactic.
If the goal is to obtain new customers and sell more homes, then customer quotes, video testimonials and success stories confirming a real estate agent’s expertise go a long way toward assuaging any prospect fears. Much of real estate still conforms to a word-of-mouth marketing model, and testimony from friends, followers and clients is a linchpin for prospecting and potential client onboarding.
Data attests to this fact, as social proof — people copying the actions of others — is an unbreakable influence in our everyday lives (and marketing, too). 92% of people trust the recommendations of their peers, and 88% of global respondents trust recommendations from people they know more than any other channel.
By featuring user reviews and satisfied clients on real estate websites and profiles, marketers can convert social proof into tangible ROI.
5. Local SEO
Part of remaining a click away from prospects is being ultimately accessible via local listings. This is where an updated Google My Business profile is key.
GMB info is scraped and populated in Google Maps on iPhones and is featured on the first page of Google SERPs in various formats. Because of the all-encompassing presence and utility of Google — 68% of all trackable web traffic comes from organic search — it’s vital that real estate marketers optimise their GMB.
This means a completely updated profile, accurate contact info across multiple locations, images, high user ratings, testimonials from customers and hours of operation.
Page one of SERPs and Google Maps are often the first touch points with prospects, and for a sector such as real estate that’s keenly tethered to location, Local SEO is a baseline marketing necessity.
6. Fact Sheets and Glossaries
In total, marketing is a tool for resolving customer issues and educating prospects, not all that unlike customer service or tech support. One of the best ways to accomplish this is by having a revolving door of digital and physical collateral online and on hand for events.
FAQ resource pages, glossaries of key terms to know, simple one-page fact sheets and similar guides are packed with helpful information. They can also be professionally formatted with branded features, custom illustrations and other visualised artwork so that the information is consumed through a combination of written word and graphics.
Each data point or factoid can be further broken down into small snippets to share on social media or via email, helping fuel distribution campaigns and stay top of mind. In an industry rife with acronyms, arcane tax law and myriad procedural steps, a simple, comprehensive compilation of advice, guidance and knowledge is a nontrivial piece of content. Social media marketing is a valuable strategy.
7. Evergreen Content
Though there’s plenty of variability and volatility in terms of benchmark interest rates, government-sponsored loan programs, market inventory and pricing trends, much of the core functions of the real estate industry are unchanging year to year, decade to decade.
Consumers take out mortgages from lenders; owners sell their homes. Done.
This means the pain points and questions that exist now are likely to surface in the future, too, which is great for evergreen content marketing ideas. Evergreen blogs, infographics and sales sheets can quickly be re-optimised with minimal effort, rather than having to start from scratch.
When developing a content marketing strategy, real estate agents should focus on articles and other assets that have staying power, since these pieces of content can accrue greater organic authority over time and be repurposed endlessly. As far as investments go, evergreen content is a surefire mechanism for long-term ROI.
8. Real Estate Agent Website and Portal
It may go without saying, but marketing for real estate brands is a digital enterprise. And that means having a digital-first mentality in all facets of the operation, including the real estate website.
As stated before, word of mouth and physical events still play a prominent role in real estate, but today’s home buyer places a much greater emphasis on brands’ accessibility online and frictionless electronic interactions. Millennials now make up 43% of home buyers, and we all know millennials are well-versed in digital communications and purchasing.
Real estate agents need top-of-the-line websites and portals to meet these customer expectations. This translates to:
- Optimal site speed (less than two-second load time).
- Visually stimulating UX.
- Readily available content.
- Convenient appointment-booking features
- Calculators.
- Quizzes.
- Chatbots.
- Social media widgets.
- Payments processing.
- Maps.
- Image/video galleries.
- Resource center.
- Functioning links/CTAs/contact info.
- Social proof quotes.
- Form downloads.
- Logical site layout.
A strong domain lays the foundation for a powerful brand image, one that’s designed to be as customer-centric as possible.
