Do you feel like you’re missing out on listing leads because you’re spending all your time with buyers?
Since listings take less time than working with buyers, they present an opportunity for real estate businesses to promote their services and bring in new clients.
Hence, we shall shift our attention away from buyers and instead focus on new listing leads.
1. 90-Day CMA-a-thon Using Google Earth
One strategy that has been successful for some people is to send unsolicited CMAs to property owners that they have built relationships with in the past, and who have mentioned wanting to sell their home in the future. We recommend sending out two to three comparative market analyses per day. This strategy can easily be accomplished by using the video tool BombBomb. BombBomb’s analytics let you see how many people watched your video, so you can follow up with them.
You can use data from your video’s analytics to find out who watched it and how they interacted with it. Based on this information, you can reach out to your viewers with a personalized letter, call, or visit. You can use these analytics to get a better understanding of the people who are most engaged.
The Harvard Business Review Analytic Services research shows that only 13% of business leaders say they are very effective in providing personalized customer experiences. To win more listings, you need to take a unique approach to CMAs.
2. “What’s Your Plan?”
Every consumer knows more than one agent.
An agent who is the last to interact with a homeowner who is ready to sell has a significantly higher chance of winning that business. The “right message at the right time” strategy is easy to implement.
How many of the leads and clients in your database are planning to sell within the next three months? 6 months? 12 months? After you have collected the necessary data, you can start to develop a targeted follow-up plan for each of your sellers based on their individual timelines.
At the beginning of the year, it’s a good idea to send an email asking your friends or coworkers about their plans for the year. This can help start a conversation and get to know each other better. After a few months, you could message them again with a slight change, asking if their plans have changed.
By staying in touch with past clients and seller leads, you can build long-term relationships with them.
3. Branded YouTube Pre-Roll Ads
In just four years, the majority of internet traffic will be video. YouTube has been shown to be an effective way to discover new products and brands for 90% of consumers.
The YouTube pre-roll ad is a video ad that plays before a video. Ads like these are extremely useful in helping to increase brand awareness, build your influence, and generate sales.
If you are looking to promote your YouTube channel to a specific audience, you can create an ad set that is specifically tailored to reach people in the area you want to target. These ads typically last 15-30 seconds, but can be up to 2 minutes long. This strategy is very effective in making your brand known as a local authority, so that when someone needing to buy or sell a house thinks of an agent, you’re the first that comes to mind.
4. Blog
Only 11% of Realtors have a blog. However, most of them are not worth reading, and very few real estate agents have a blog with new content that is published on a regular basis. This means that by publishing one custom blog post per week, you can be better than 98% of other agents. If your content was well-written and useful, it would be easier to imagine. You’d be in the Top 1%!
The main issue is that many agents are unaware of how a blog can produce leads.
When you blog on your website, you give search engines content to index. This helps your site rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs). This indexing allows Google to send traffic to your website.
If someone searches for “home values in Denver,” Google will present results from websites that cover this topic. A Denver-based real estate agent should have a blog post about this topic so that Google can index it and recommend it to searchers.
There is always a strategy for what you should blog about. If you are not a writer, you can still create a high-quality real estate blog that attracts new listing leads. If you’re bad at writing but want to start a blog, this is the article for you.
5. Create a Killer Offer
An offer that is significantly better than what other agents in your market are offering. An incentive is typically an offer to pay for a service that other agents don’t offer, or to pay for an expense that sellers usually have to pay for themselves.
For example, if agents in your market don’t usually pay for professional listing photos, you can promote the fact that you include professional listing photos for every one of your listings. If you follow these steps, not only will your listings sell more quickly and for more money, but you’ll also have a significant competitive advantage when presenting your listings.
If professional photos are already standard in your market, try covering the cost of:
- Drone photos
- Virtual tours
- Staging
- Moving
If you have a great offer, you could use it as a limited-time offer, or make it a permanent part of your marketing plan to make your business stand out.
How to Market Your Killer Offer
As soon as you decide on your killer offer, promote it like crazy through:
- Social media posts (free!)
- Social media ads (affordable)
- Add an eye-catching banner to your website (free!)
- Door hangers or fliers on parked cars (affordable)
- Direct mailer postcards (affordable)
- TV or radio ad slots (pricey)
- An email or text campaign to the homeowners in your sphere (free!)
Make sure your promotions include a referral reminder. Something like,
“Not ready to sell? No problem! If you know anyone who is interested in selling, please let me know so I can get in touch with them. I will give them this special offer, and I will give you the same offer as a gift for referring them to me.”
5. Use Zillow (But Don’t Pay to Play)
You can find people who are interested in selling their homes on Zillow without having to pay for leads. Then you can contact those owners directly. There are two types of homeowners that are perfect for this: FSBOs and “Make Me Move” homeowners.
FSBOs
You might already have a script for selling your home without a real estate agent, and/or a marketing plan to go along with it. Reach out to each of these owners and see if you can work something out.
If you don’t have a FSBO marketing plan, you can invite your FSBO contacts to a free guide or workshop (which we will discuss later on in this list)!
Make-Me-Movers
Here’s a simple plan for working with Make-Me-Movers:
- Contact the homeowner and let them know you’re working with buyers looking for an x-bed/x-bath home in their neighborhood. (If you don’t have a buyer in the pipeline looking for those basic specs, what are you even doing?)
- Ask if you can preview the house to see if it’s a good fit for any of your buyers.
- Ask questions to learn more about these homeowners and gauge their level of interest in selling.
- If they seem open to listing, start pitching your services. If they’re simply looking to make a certain amount on the sale, and the market supports that sales price, you may have an easy listing!
- Now, if they’re not interested, don’t push. But before you leave, say, “I know you’re not looking to list with a real estate agent right now, and I respect that. But if you ever need assistance or direction, I’m always happy to help where I can.” Then hand them your card or brochure and leave.
If you do a good job with the house hunt, you may end up getting a commission quickly. If the homeowner isn’t interested, add them to your CRM and give them regular market updates.
6. Redfin Research Tools
The main point is to use data to make better content for your customers.
Redfin’s research is very helpful in allowing customers to make better decisions. The most important thing is to take the data you find, examine it, and make it useful for the customer.
The reality is that consumers have more access to information than ever before, but they are also more frustrated, confused, and overwhelmed than they’ve ever been.
7. Home Value Ads 2.0
Average home value ads aren’t cutting it anymore.
In order to generate quality seller leads, you will need to improve these ads. To engage your audience through hyperlocal photography, copy that qualifies leads, and making sure you are in the ad. You can do this by using market data that is relevant to them.
If you pursue this strategy more assertively than you have in the past, you will receive more inbound leads who are eager to work with you.
8. Use Your Open House to Land More Sellers
An open house is a chance for you to meet your potential new neighbors and see the area you may be moving into. And these neighbors could be your next seller clients!
Open houses are a good opportunity to use this old-school prospecting method. Go to your neighbors’ houses and knock on their doors to invite them to the open house in person.
Walk or drive around the neighborhood and talk to as many people as possible. Here’s a simple script:
Knock, knock, knock
Hi, I’m Michelle with Key Real Estate. I came by to invite you to an open house at the Sanders’ house on 145 Maple Dr. We’ll be there from 3 to 6 this Sunday with some homemade cookie bars. Here’s a flyer with more details.
I’m wondering if you know anyone who might want to live in this neighborhood.
And how about you? What is your timeframe for finding a new place to live?
It’s been a pleasure chatting with you! We would appreciate it if you could come to our open house.
Be sure to include information about your listing services on your flyer. Also on your flyer, you’ll notice the median home value for the neighborhood. Keep in mind that Zillow’s Zestimates are often inaccurate. Then offer a custom CMA free of charge.
9. Teach a Real Estate Investing Seminar
Plenty of agents offer first-time homebuyer seminars. But how many offer real estate investing seminars?
If you attend investing seminars, you can meet people who are interested in buying or selling investments. You will likely have many first-time investors in your group who will need your assistance buying their first income property that they plan to hold onto for a long time. Which is great! But make sure you also discuss the fix-and-flip strategy. You can refer your students to local contractors not only when they are buying their first property, but also to show goodwill in the local business community. You earn the listing when the rehab is complete and when they’re ready to sell.
So much upside!
10. Ask Your Buyers the Magic Question
Even though we said we would ignore buyer leads for today, the first way to get new listing leads actually comes from those buyer leads.
Contact all your buyer leads (even if they said they won’t be looking for several months), and enquire:
If you’re planning on buying a new home, you may need to sell your current one first.
Most buyers will need to sell their current homes before buying a new one. It’s your responsibility to ensure that they understand the timing. Your buyers may need to list their current home sooner than they anticipated if they want to stay on schedule.
If you have clients who will need to sell their property in order to purchase another, it’s important to offer them information about the selling process, even if they aren’t ready to list yet. By doing so, you can help them be as prepared as possible when the time comes. Then continue sending friendly follow-ups and market updates. You want to be the first person they think of when they are ready to list their property.
If you’re wondering how this could be done, this idea won’t seem clever to you. But most agents don’t know about the magic enquiry. And it’s costing them listing leads!
