Part of marketing real estate, whether buying or selling, residential or commercial, should be being in control of your efforts. These days, there are still many elements to marketing properties and opportunities, especially for large brokerages and investor groups. The size (or lack thereof) of your marketing budget is not the only challenge. Too many moving parts can do more harm than good with your marketing dollars.
When you have multiple sources or people involved in your marketing, you risk having people do “their” part and leaving important elements to others, only to have them not get done. I see so many of the same mistakes over and over again, and those often make everyone on the team look bad.
Quite often, real estate marketing mistakes are fundamental more so than factual. You can have your SEO, PPC, and IDX in place. However, if no one updates photos of a property, and you still show snow covering the lawn in late May, your overall credibility suffers. Another common mistake I find is not taking two minutes to update a property description upon the sale.
I continue to see some agents promote a “just sold” property, which can be a great strategy. However, when their property description still contains address and price info, an open house date, and fluff copy like “Must See!”, it shows anyone considering that agent that they did not bother to update following the sale and cashing his or her commission check. You only get one chance to make a first impression.
As it stands, many real estate professionals do not spend the time or money needed to have solid research to help them be “first in” on more deals. However, success stories must be “clean” in helping the agent attract more potential buyers and sellers. Telling them you don’t even bother to update your information takes away more than it adds.
What you really can’t afford is to lose someone despite the quality of the time and money you spent to get their attention. Your CRM doesn’t account for that. A helpful research and strategy person or team can fix those problems. You can be “first in” on more opportunities!
