Marketing Techniques to Market Your Listings Online
When it comes to marketing your listings online, 2020 changed everything. Suddenly, sellers were much more aware of the way listings can be marketed, and they were much more demanding about what you did to promote their properties online.
Now more than ever, your ability to market a listing successfully online can directly contribute to you actually getting the listing or not.
This year, having a plan for marketing your listings online is more important than ever:
Go Beyond Video, Way Beyond
After 2020, more and more people are now fully-comfortable with searching for properties from their own home, and to be successful, you need to do everything you can to make it feel like they’re actually there in person, when in fact, they could be anywhere.
Having a video for your listing is standard; you’re not going above and beyond in your listing marketing strategy by just having a video tour of your property. Why not have multiple videos? I’ve seen agents do plain old video tours, but what about evening video tours or neighbourhood video tours?
While 3D walkthrough usage surged last year, and in most cases, has become a standard now, how people interact with them has also changed. Right now, most people will probably just click their way around a 3D walkthrough tour on a flat screen, but with advancements in Augmented Reality and VR, it won’t be long before there are a lot of other ways to experience what actually ‘being there’ is like.
Always Use Your Own Website
A lot of agents use single-property websites to market their listings online, which is usually a free solution provided by a photographer. Sure, it’s convenient, but it’s definitely not an effective part of a modern listing marketing strategy.
As part of your strategy, you should always be pushing people to your website for 2 main reasons:
1. You have a lot more control over what they’re see and how they’ll experience your listing.
Your local MLS board probably doesn’t showcase your property in best light. Remember, listing marketing is all about making someone feel like they’re actually there, and purely from a visual standpoint, Realtor.com, Zillow, etc, all fail at that. A gallery with tiny images, Google map, and a description written by the agent just isn’t enough.
You need embedded 3D walkthrough tours, downloadable feature sheets, multiple videos, neighbourhood highlights, and lot more. On your own website, you can include all of that, in the way and order that allows it to show it’s best to potential buyers and your sellers alike.
2. Getting them to your website is a bigger part of your overall digital strategy.
Most agents know the chances of someone finding your listing on your website and then actually buying it is slim. It does happen, but not often.
Getting someone from within your target audience that’s interested in the types of properties you sell to your website should be part of your overall marketing strategy. Whether it’s to learn more about you or because you want to install a tracking cookie in their browser for advertising purposes, you’re going to want them to visit your website.
One of the best ways to do that is through advertising your listings; and if your listing is on a secondary website and not your own, you’ll be missing out on a big piece of your strategy.
โ If you’re interesting in learning more, we have a more detailed break-down right here on why you should stop using single property websites.
Out Rank Your Competition
In 2021, digital strategy is more important than ever, and a key part of that strategy is going to be getting your listings to show up in search results.
But a lot of agents ask: if I have my own listing online on my website, why isn’t it on the first page of search results? The easy answer is: you have way too much competition, but there are still a number of things you can do to improve your chances of your listings displaying higher in search results.
The key is to be different. Remember, all of those websites that are beating you in search are getting their listing information from the same place: the local MLS board, so by being different you’ll be giving yourself a better chance of beating them. Consider doing the following:
- Have a different, more detailed listing description than what you put on MLS.
- Publish your listings earlier than you would submit them to MLS.
- Build a link strategy to your published listing.
- Define meta-descriptions and other SEO elements.
โ If you’re interesting in learning more, we have a more detailed break-down right here that outlines how to get your listings to display higher in search results and ahead of your competition.
Think Ahead
Real estate is already a competitive business, but in 2021, by confidently being able to tell your potential clients that you understand digital strategy and listing marketing, the better you’ll be able to position yourself differently than the ones that don’t.
Remember, in 2021 (and way beyond) the more you can market your listings so that someone really feels like they’re there, the more success you’ll see in earning new business.
With up to date marketing trends relevant to today’s market, our report is a selection of curated content, information, and data that will give you an outline of what’s working right now in real estate marketing.
