While real estate agents are still key in the home buying process, buyers are increasingly looking to do more leg work online before involving the experts. A study from the National Association of Realtors showed that 92% of buyers use the internet to begin their house hunting quest, driving home the vital need for real estate agents to have an active online presence. If you’re not active, engaging, and networking online, then you’re missing out.
Here are over 40 of our best real estate marketing ideas for those looking to win the real estate marketing game.
Table of contents
Real estate marketing ideas for your website
A website is not a real estate marketing idea, but a must. Consumers expect businesses to have websites today, and a bad website can be worse than no website at all. Here are some ideas to get your website marketing your real estate business around the clock.
1. Have an impressive homepage
Did you know that 75% of people admit to judging the credibility of a business based on its website design? First impressions matter, which is why your homepage should be in top shape. This means vibrant images, a prominent call to action, and an intuitive menu.
2. Create awesome listings
Today’s consumers like to do a lot of legwork themselves online when making major purchases, and that includes home buying as well. I myself have only rented, but even then, when scouting around, I’ll Google Map the address, use Street View to get a feel for the area, see which businesses are within walking distance, look at home photos, and, ideally take a virtual tour of the property.
Your property pages and listings should make it easy for users to access all this information—with detailed descriptions, great photos, virtual tours, and easy access to Google Maps and Google Earth. List the hot spots nearby and their respective walking distances (mention the bus stop that’s just a five minute walk, or the Starbucks at the end of the block).
3. Hire a photographer
It’s absolutely vital that you have gorgeous photos of your properties. The right time of day or angle can make all the difference. Hire a professional photographer (preferably with experience photographing homes and architecture), or, if you have sophisticated equipment and are confident in your abilities, have your own hand at it. Just remember this is one of those scenarios when it pays to bring in the professionals.
4. Create lead magnets
The key to generating leads is to offer something to your audience that is worth giving up their contact information for. Consider producing a lead magnet guide like “X Common Mistakes New Homeowners Make” or “X Features to Look For In a New Home.” things new homeowners should consider before buying” or “X most valuable features of a new home.” Offering free ebooks in exchange for an email address (and zip code, in the case of real estate) is a great way to capture high-quality leads.
Real estate marketing ideas for social media
Social media marketing for your real estate business . Here are some ideas on using these channels to market your real estate business.
7. Set yourself up for social
The most popular social media platforms for real estate marketing are Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram. When creating your accounts, make sure you fill out every field available so you can get found by relevant users.
8. Use the right hashtags
Use our guide to hashtags to come up with the right mix of local, topical, and popular hashtags that are relevant to your audience in your Instagram and Twitter posts. These will help you to get found by the right people
- Local hashtags: #[city]realestate #[city]realtor #[city]realestatebroker #[city]living #[city]homes #thingstodoin[city]
- Topical hashtags: #realestatetips #homebuyertips
- Broad hashtags: #realtorsofinstagram #luxuryhomes #newhomes #
9. Be useful
Social media affords real estate businesses many opportunities to build an audience, engage with followers, and strengthen relationships. Here are just a few real estate social media marketing ideas:
- Use YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram live to do home tours and Q&A sessions.
- Provide bite-sized real estate tips
- Share news relevant to your community and niche.
- Post your new listings, of course.
- Join relevant Facebook and LinkedIn groups
10. Add social share buttons to property pages
Home shoppers are eager to share their top housing pics with friends and family, so make it easy for them to email and share various properties online by adding social sharing buttons.
11. Run social ads
Regular Facebook marketing is great for building client relationships, but if you’re looking to land new clients, you won’t get far. But while it has the weakest organic reach of all platforms, its targeting capabilities for paid ads is unmatched. If you want to target single thirty-somethings who work from home and own a pet, you can do that. If you want to target LGBTQ couples looking to buy a condo, you can do that too. Useour real estate Instagram ad examples and real estate Facebook ad examples like the one below to inspire you.
Already running Facebook ads? Use our Free Facebook Ads Performance Grader to make sure you’re not wasting any budget.
12. Pinterest boards
Pinterest advertising and marketing still have their place for some industries—real estate being one of them. Boards are a great way to provide images and information for specific listings. You can create a Pinterest board for a single property that, in addition, to property photos, highlights features and benefits of the area.
Local real estate marketing ideas
Your website and social media profiles are two of the three basic pillars of your real estate marketing strategy. The third one is with listings and local marketing. Now if you really want to go deep on local marketing, your best bet is to head to this free Local Marketing 101 course by LOCALiQ’s Marketing Lab. But for some quick ideas, keep reading.
13. Local sponsorships
Consider helping sponsor local festivals, sports teams, or school events. Signing up as a local sponsor often means getting your business name a spot on t-shirts, program pamphlets, or flyers.
14. Local content on your website
In many ways, you’re not just selling a house, you’re selling a whole town or area. Showcase the best that your area has to offer, with high-quality, beautiful photos of local town landmarks and familiar sites.
Also, make sure you are including some local-oriented keywords in your copy to ensure that your content is found by buyers Googling online for homes in your area.
15. Build your Google Business Profile
One of the most important aspects of local SEO is listings, and one of the most important listings? Your Google Business Profile. This free listing makes it easy for users to find you in Google Search, Google Maps, and the Knowledge Panel…not to mention the fact that it’s basically a second homepage for your business. With it a person can:
- Call or book an appointment
- Read and leave reviews
- Read, ask, and answer FAQs
- View listings and prices
- Get a feel for your brand and expertise
…all without even going to your website.
Needless to say a complete, optimized Google Business Profile is a very. good idea. for your real estate business.
16. Become a columnist in local magazines
See if you can write a column or feature for local publications. You don’t want to be blatantly salesy. Today’s consumers don’t like to be pitched to. Instead, share advice and perspectives that add value. Write about how rising prices of houses on the market show that the town is doing well, or list the reasons why your regional area is becoming more popular (maybe it’s the revitalized downtown area or improved school system).
17. Host free seminars for home buyers
Make yourself and your knowledge available to the community by hosting mini-seminars. Consider providing a basic 101 seminar about the basics of home buying and mortgages.
Remember, marketing today is all about inbound, and that doesn’t just apply online. Users want you to share some of your knowledge for free before investing time and money in you. A home buying seminar is the local equivalent of a webinar. Yes, it will take time and energy, but attendees will walk away impressed and will have established a relationship with you. That relationship will be worth its weight in gold when they’re ready to shop for a home.
18. Partner with local businesses
Developing relationships with other local businesses will be key for your real estate marketing efforts. See if you can get local breakfast joints to let you buy them a set of new coffee mugs with your logo on them, or buy a place on their paper placemat setting. Or partner up with local moving companies to swap referrals.
Real estate email marketing ideas
Email marketing has long been one of the best marketing strategies for any industry and for any stage of the funnel. Here are some real estate marketing ideas using email.
19. Create a newsletter
Collect email signups via your website and events and send out a helpful newsletter with new listings, upcoming seminars you’re offering, local events, tips, and more. Be sure to segment your lists out by different communities so you can provide super-relevant content.
It also helps to have a creative newsletter signup CTA.
20. Start an email nurture campaign
Nurture campaigns are like the breadcrumb paths of Hansel and Gretel, except instead of a gingerbread house at the end, clients find their dream home (hopefully without a resident evil witch).
Leave your clients a trail of high-end panko breadcrumbs by tailoring your interactions with them based on previous actions they’ve taken. If they first attended an open house with you, send them an email detailing other nearby houses on the market. If they attended your first-time homebuyer’s seminar, send them your “10 Things Every New Homebuyer Should Know “ ebook. Deliver content that will help your clients take the appropriate next step, depending on where they are in their journey.
21. Send out greeting emails
Here’s a simple but smart email marketing tip: send out personalized emails during the holidays or even on your clients’ birthdays or anniversaries. A simple gesture can go a long way, and happy clients will be eager to refer you to others in need of your services. Just don’t go with a generic email! Use these posts for inspiration:
Offline real estate marketing ideas
With all this digital marketing talk, let’s not forget about the physical world! Here are some good ol’ offline real estate marketing ideas that are as effective as ever.
22. Branded swag
Business branding is your buddy – that means pens, drink koozies, and all those other freebies people love. Give out some branded goodies at local festivals and events to spread your brand.
23. Use call tracking
Real estate is one of those industries that absolutely must use call tracking in their paid search campaigns. Most people use the phone when trying to find a realtor or make an appointment to view an apartment, condo,or house. If those calls come about because someone saw your PPC ad, you want to be able to track which ads and keywords are driving calls.
24. Create a killer business card
Get an awesome-looking business card and hand them out like pizza flyers on a Friday night. And don’t forget your email signature!
Canva has tons of free real estate business card templates to choose from.
25. Old-school mailers
The web is where it’s at, but that’s not to say traditional advertising doesn’t have its place, especially when you have targeted audiences. Consider sending out postcards to qualified leads or potential buyers in the specific zip codes you are active in.
26. Give a local care package after closing
Your relationship with a client doesn’t end right after they close. You want them to remember your name so that hopefully they’ll share your info with friends, family, and acquaintances who might consider moving in the future. Send a local care package to clients after they close, with local movie or theater tickets, restaurant gift cards, etc.
Unique real estate marketing ideas
Last but not least, some ideas that will get you thinking outside the box.
27. Be playful
Some industries (like pets and babies) get to have all the fun, right? Not necessarily! In fact, being playful with your Facebook ad copy and other materials can help you to stand out.
28. Animated video
Consider outsourcing a quality animated video for your real estate businesses. Short, cute, high-quality cartoon videos can help establish your brand as well as give a touch of personality. You may even want to consider featuring local landmarks or sites in your animated video to make it ultra-unique and targeted.
29. Market with emotion
Emotions drive behaviors. And no, you don’t need to create a tear-jerker video (Subaru? MSPCA + Arms of the Angels?) to elicit them in marketing. Something simple like “Imagine living your dream every day” can do the trick.
Use these words and phrases to market with emotion, and when you’re done there, head to our library of over 273 emotional trigger words to get your copy to connect with our audience and create customers out of them!
30. Get seasonal
Aside from federal and religious holidays, every month of the year has its own set of social awareness themes and national days that inspire tons of creative marketing ideas.
Or you can just adjust your strategy for the seasons to stay relevant. For example, take a look at these spring real estate marketing ideas.
31. Get on Zillow
Zillow is basically the Yelp of real estate marketing, and you really need to be on there if you want any chance of being discovered – you can ignore the sun, but it will still burn you! Zillow offers the ability to advertise as an agent on their website. This can get a bit pricey, but considering the huge role Zillow plays in home buying, it’s probably your best bet. After all, sites like Zillow account for 48% of all site traffic for real estate searches on the web.
Zillow also allows users to review real estate agents, so put on a smile and rack up that rating, as a solid star rating will greatly increase your leads.
32. Ask for testimonials from former clients
Testimonials are tremendous trust signals. Showing that real, live people endorse your services means the world to potential clients. When a homebuyer has had a great experience with you, reach out to them and ask for a testimonial. If possible, try to get a photo of them as well. Make the most of these testimonials by placing them strategically on your website and sharing them now and then on social networks.
33. Host a webinar
If you feel comfortable enough, hosting a webinar can be a great way to garner attention for your business. Host a “12 Little-Known Things to Look For In A New Home” webinar, providing a Q&A at the end for questions. Webinars can also be repurposed as YouTube videos (more real estate video marketing ideas here), with can serve as valuable video content that can live permanently on your website! Here are some more tips on putting together a great webinar.
34. Keep an eye out on the competition
What are other realtors in your area doing? What do their websites look like? How active are they on social media? Take note of what competitors are doing – then avoid their mistakes and replicate their success!
Here are some tips to help with that:
35. Offer virtual tours
Your client’s time is precious, and they want to understand as much as possible about a property prior to visiting in person. Virtual tours are a great way to give a comprehensive, accurate preview of the property for potential buyers.
Most platforms, like Zillow, offer easy ways to create virtual tours.
36. Shared scheduling apps
Use a scheduling sharing app to coordinate times to show a house to buyers. Scheduling apps like Doodle can cut down on the endless back and forth timeslot swapping.
37. Look at benchmarks
Let’s say you’re advertising on search or social and your conversion rates are better than last week. That’s great, but is it a good conversion rate overall? Or let’s say that you want to start advertising on search but aren’t sure how much Google Ads will cost. The best way to make sure you’re not over or underperforming with your ads is to look at benchmarks.
Head on over to LOCALiQ’s real estate advertising benchmarks to stay informed.
38. Keep in touch
Stay in touch (even months and years later) with past buyers in order to build in that good relationship. Send anniversary cards, holiday cards, etc to stay fresh in their minds. When they have a friend who is ready to buy, they’ll pass along your info.
39. Create a referral system
Provide incentives for past clients to refer you to future homebuyers.
40. Consider going niche
If you’ve got some real estate marketing competition in your area, you may want to consider making yourself stand out with niche marketing. Become the go-to real estate agent for dog owners, families with kids, divorced individuals, whatever. Making a name for yourself in regards to a specific niche need can make you memorable, especially in saturated zip codes.
The competition is fierce, and these days you’ll need expert online and offline marketing skills to set yourself apart from the pack. Use these practical, tactical, and unique real estate marketing ideas to make your mark.
More Stories
Product Vs Project Management
Handyman Services: Find a Professional Handyman That’s Right for Your Needs
All You Need to Know When Moving Offices