In a slow market, agents will need to maximize sales lead generation through their real estate portals.
Facebook ads for real estate Having worked in Online Real Estate Marketing for nearly 2 years I would like to share some points which I consider are vital for improving sales lead generation.
Attrition
At every stage of a persons search for property your listing will experience attrition or in other words a point where the searcher does will not proceed to view details or make an enquiry about the property you are selling. Consider the following:
Your property can not be found – Agents looking for maximum results should be utilizing all major portals to minimize attrition. Business2 has a great list of portals available in Australia. Each have their own unique audience engaged in buying or selling real estate.
No attention grabbers – Poorly optimized and presented Images, Titles and Text increase your rate of attrition significantly, all listings presented on portals should use professional real estate photography as well as optimized titles and text.
Loss of interest – People online get bored quickly, if you lose a persons interest while they are reviewing your property you have lost your chance at a potential sale.
How Can I Minimize Attrition?
As well as getting bored quickly, people using the internet react impulsively. They are quick to judge and if their perception is negative of what they are reading or seeing they will leave and move on, potentially never to look at your listing again.
In sales, whether it be a holiday, a car or a house it’s important to establish trust. Within your real estate listing you could establish trust by setting the scene for your listing. Describing the location and surrounds instead of going straight into a property description. If your vendors have a close relationship with their neighbours, then why not try and get a quote from them what it is like to live in the neighbourhood. This will set a level of trust and people may feel more comfortable in reading more detail.
Seth Godin, a well respected marketer and author quoted “Every day, consumers come face to face with a lot of boring stuff — a lot of brown cows — but you can bet they won’t forget a Purple Cow.” With so much property on the market, what makes your property the “Purple Cow”? Research is essential and spending time looking at similar properties for sale in the area and finding a point of difference about your property is essential.
Generating the lead
It is never a given that the property searcher will send an enquiry, maybe they were not completely convinced that your property was their dream home. You can increase your enquiry rate by simply offering something in return for sending you their details. You may consider producing a suburb profile document including images, quotes from locals, services, shops in the neighbourhood etc. You could then include some text in your description which prompts the visitor to contact you via the enquiry form for an in depth suburb analysis.
3 basic steps to maximizing real estate sales lead generation
In summary there are 3 points to remember when you publish listings to a real estate portal:
Minimize attrition
Present the “Purple Cow”
Offer something for nothing
Happy selling in 2011.
