What does a Locksmith know about Marketing for Realtors?
That’s a great question actually. Although Mr. Rekey is a locksmithing company, we know a thing or two about marketing. We’ve been in business for nearly 20 years and like to think of ourselves as a marketing company that just so happens to be a locksmith. We also know the challenges Realtors face in today’s market and feel like we can offer some great advice on how to effectively market your real estate business.
Establish an Online Presence
Having an established online presence is not only important for Realtors, it’s important for just about any business. Without a website or any web presence, you are effectively ensuring potential buyers won’t be able to find you and your listings. One of the most important steps to take in this process, besides creating a website or having someone create one for you, is your search engine optimization (SEO).
One of the first steps to ensure great SEO is to get your real estate business listed on Google Places. When you set up your business on Google Places, you’re making sure that when someone searches for “Realtor” or “Real Estate” in a given area, your business will appear as a verified business in that particular area and your search ranking (where you show up on a search engine’s listing) will be positively effected by being a verified business on Google Places. Having a presence on other local business listings such as Yelp, Yahoo Local, or Foursquare also helps your search ranking. Having a blog with unique content that people will actually want to read is another great way to improve your SEO.
Paid search ads and effective keywords are also a great way to drive more eyes to your real estate business. Paid search does require you to bid for placement, but new business from potential buyers can greatly outweigh the costs associated with running the ad. Having effective keywords for that ad can also increase the chances that someone searching for a Realtor in their local area will find your business. There is no exact science to search marketing and it requires constant attention, but in this day and age it’s an absolute necessity.
Utilize Social Media to Get Your Listings Seen
Social media is a great tool for any business, but it’s an especially valuable tool for Realtors. Realtors can establish relationships and conversations with potential buyers that they never would have been able to do with the old park bench ads of old. Not only can Realtors post their listings to Facebook and Twitter, but they can create a conversation within those posted listings, establishing a relationship with potential buyers without ever having met them.
A great way to get potential client’s attention is to post listings with media such as video tours or high resolution pictures of a property. Video is especially a very effective means of drawing attention to your posts. In fact, the National Association of Realtors, recommends using video tours as a means of attracting potential buyers. Staged photographs taken by a professional photography of your properties are also an effective means of promoting properties on social media.
Establishing and maintaining your presence on social media and online reviews sites can be a great way to showcase your brand. Utilizing Facebook pages as a means of garnering reviews helps to establish credibility for yourself as a Realtor. Responding to reviews of your real estate business on other reviews sites like Yelp or Google Places provides potential buyers with information on how you might serve them, and is a great way to maintain relationships with your clients.
How Do You Make Yourself Memorable After a Closing?
Paying attention to your ratings on reviews sites and your relationships with your clients on social media are great ways to cultivate your brand and make yourself memorable as a Realtor, but you really want to create a life time value for that client. The best way to do this is provide them with something they can really use after a closing. In the past Realtors gave homebuyers fruit baskets or a bottle of wine or champagne. Those are all great things, but why not give them something they could really use for their new home. Something that might make them consider your business relationship in the future and might make them recommend you to friends and family. That’s where Mr. Rekey comes in.
We think we have the perfect closing gift for Realtors, the Rekey Special! For a standard, low price your homebuyer will get a service call to their property, we’ll rekey 6 keyholes, and provide your homebuyer with 4 new keys. We provide gift certificates for Realtors to give to their new homebuyers. All you have to do is call us at 1-888-MrRekey (677-3539) and set up an account to start giving gift certificates for the perfect closing gift today!
You can’t be in business for 20 years and not know a thing or two about marketing, as well as locksmithing! And you certainly know a few things about the importance safety plays in both commercial and residential real estate. Thanks for sharing this information with us here!