A Marketing Strategy that Works
A Quality Real Estate Strategy begins and ends with custom photography. The internet has allowed buyers to browse the real estate market from the comfort of their computers while sorting through location, price, size and specific items such as pools, great rooms, kitchens, construction style and other amenities. Selling real estate is all about exposure and bringing potential buyers together with sellers. Realtors do this in many ways, but great realtors do this by maximizing ad impressions and getting their client’s homes noticed by the buyer community. The money spent on professional photography is well worth every penny.
Here’s the process I use to market and sell homes. We’ll start with the 3 P’s of real estate marketing:
Custom Photography that attracts Buyers: Give Buyers what they are looking for and illuminate the best features of the property. Whether it’s Million Dollar views, or a dream kitchen, each and every home has features to sell. It’s up to the professional realtor to find and determine which features stand out and do a good job or marketing those qualities.
Properly Pricing the Property: Of course all sellers want to get as much as they can for selling their property. Nobody wants to leave money on the table by setting the listing price too low and accepting less money than they could have received if they remained patient. Therefore, pricing is important and getting as many ad impressions as possible so more people can see the property and make a move if they want. The more impressions a property receives, the greater chance for a higher purchase price for that property.
Promoting the Property: This comes down spending marketing dollars in areas that allow qualified buyers to shop for the home. There is no reason to market the home to a group of people who can’t afford the home or to people who have no reason to live in the area. The key is exposure and spending money where it does the most good. Internet ads directed to a select group of people is probably better than ads that fall into the hands of people who are not even interested. So, knowing the market and pitching the home to the correct group is very important. Using syndicate websites like Zillow, Trulia, RealEstate.com, REMAX.net and Redfin get the best results.
Staging Homes: Remember. Clean sells and Dirty doesn’t. The more sellers work to organize and remove the clutter from their home, the more $’s the sellers will realize through the sales of their property. Focus on the details from the moment people walk in the door to the moment they leave. The details and the way the buyers feel about the home is a big motivator if they want to buy the property. Buyers tend to adjust prices lower in their heads when they see property blemishes, and they tend to increase prices in their heads when they see homes that check all the boxes.
Signage is Important: Getting the neighbors talking and the Drive By’s to notice the location of the property. Also, creating professional marketing flyers that describe the property and give the potential buyer a glimpse of the home attributes. There are many buyers who drive the neighborhoods of the places that they want to live. A real estate sign with custom marketing material can grab the potential buyers attention and let them know that the home is available.
Adwerx Campaign: This internet site strategically puts your property on the computer of potential buyers. Social media networks like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram use algorithms to identify and direct ads to potential buyers in demographics that have expressed interest in real estate and specifically, real estate in certain geographic area. This is where smart ad money directed at the proper people really allows a property to stand out from the crowd.
Open Houses: Whether inviting the Broker Tour or having Open Houses for the neighbors and for people travelling to the area is a really good way of exposing the property to potential buyers. Its amazing on how many friends, family members or friends of friends get introduced to a home through unconventional means. A friend stopping by an Open House and calling a friend or family member to introduce a potential home buying opportunity, happens all the time. So, you just never know where the buyer is going to come from.
Negotiations and Experience is why it all Matters: So many inexperienced realtors aren’t there to help their clients determine the right offer and the right time. There is no substitute for experience and knowing the market and reading between the lines of when an offer comes in. Not all offers are the same, and you need a Realtor with experience to sift through the crumbs to find the jewels. Hire a Realtor who has your best interest at heart and can navigate the complexities of every transaction. Experience Matters.