19 June 2022

10 ESSENTIAL LEAD GENERATION TIPS FOR REAL ESTATE AGENTS

Introduction:

The process of generating new leads is a necessary fixture of the real estate business. It's also many agents' least favorite part of their job. It doesn't have to be. There are many ways to attract new leads in real estate and you don't necessarily have to start cold-calling every name in the phonebook. 

These 10 tips on lead generation in real estate offer a wide variety of ways to go about this business. They are different, yet complementary to one another and so easy to carry out that it would be easy to incorporate ALL of them into your day-to-day routine as an agent. If you do, you are bound to generate and sustain a wonderful buzz in your business life. 

1) Go Beyond A CMA: Tell Them How You Will Market Their Home

One of the most common prospecting techniques among real estate agents is to offer a homeowner a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA), which gives a person an indication of what they should ask for their home. 

This method of prospecting has been proven to net results. However, according to National Association of Realtors' 2022 Home Buyers and Sellers Generational Trends Report, sellers are just as interested in how an agent will market their home, as what an agent thinks their property might fetch.

One way to attract the attention of a potential client is to explain to them HOW you would market their property. When you include a marketing plan with your CMA, your approach will have more traction than that of the agent who simply tells someone what their home might be worth. The more detailed the better. For example, did you know that Floor Plans are the most under-used and under-rated marketing tool in real estate? Buyers love them, most listings don’t include them.

With the abundance of MLS information and an increase in the overall tech-savviness of the population, it is becoming easier and easier for non-real estate professionals to arrive at a ballpark notion of what their home might be worth. In other words, CMAs are less likely to catch the attention of a prospective client than a CMA attached to a top-of-the-line marketing plan. 

What constitutes a top-of-the-line marketing plan? Well, to put it simply, it's whatever the buyers want to see. And no one tracks buyer preferences more meticulously than NAR. In the same survey mentioned above, NAR reports that professional images, informative copy, a Floor Plan, and a 360° Virtual Tour are the marketing features that buyers find most useful in their search for a home. 

Every CMA you present to a potential client should be accompanied by a marketing plan that incorporates these features and cites the NAR research explaining why they should be used when listing their home for sale. That is the sort of detail that will encourage someone to list their home with you. 

2) 360° Virtual Tours Offer Much More Than A 360° Virtual Tour

Yes, as Forbes has reported, the 360° Virtual Tour has surpassed the in-person inspection as property buyers’ preferred way to first view a home. But this is only one benefit to this marketing equivalent of the knockout punch. 

Another huge reason to include a Virtual Tour with every listing is that these detailed, interactive, user-guided experiences will save you tremendous amounts of time because they work as valuable screening devices that separate the serious buyers from the tire-kickers. 

When someone contacts you to see a property AFTER taking a Virtual Tour online, you know that they are at least a few degrees more serious than those curious neighbors who merely want to check out the inside of a nearby property. 

This little gizmo (360° camera) is something you might want to ad to your hardware arsenal. Even the most basic model can be used to easily create a Virtual Tour, which buyers now expect to see among the marketing materials for a listing. Remember, potential clients are assessing you based on the quality of your marketing!

As a real estate agent, when you include a Virtual Tour in your listing's marketing, you are not only giving your client the best chance of hooking up with the most possible buyers, but you are making a statement about yourself and your brand as a real estate agent: List with me and I will give your property the attention it deserves. 

This is one of the most important stepping stones to attracting and converting fresh leads. When someone is considering listing their property with you they are 100% going to check out the way you are marketing your current listings. The Virtual Tour is the jewel in the real estate marketing crown, and they are easy and inexpensive to put together. Don't sell yourself or your clients short. 

3) QR Codes Are Catching On In Real Estate Marketing

Once a kind of an outlier in the realm of real estate marketing, the QR code is increasingly a fixture of the mainstream. This might have to do with the fact that millennials are comfortable using them, and millennials are now the demographic who buys the most property in the USA every year.

Speaking of Virtual Tours, a great way to deliver them is via QR codes - but this is just one of the many increasing reasons to give QR codes a role in your lead generation approach.

QR codes are over a decade old, but only recently have they started to show some real traction in the real estate industry. Most of the major real estate organizations now prioritize them as elements of their marketing outreach: RE/MAX, Sotheby's, Corcoran Group, and Century 21 - to name just a few. Even we at BoxBrownie.com have climbed aboard the QR train and have no intention of disembarking.

There are at least four solid reasons for this:

1. The population has become accustomed to using them.
2. Millennials - the segment of the population that first accepted the QR code - are now buying more houses than any other demographic.
3. They are a great way to collect data on your incoming inquiries. QR codes provide information on the lead's exact location, date, and time of the scan. 
4. They are remarkably flexible. You can place QR codes on real estate signs, flyers, business cards, social media pages, bar coasters, and newspaper ads and they can be used for any number of purposes from driving app downloads, to retargeting potential leads to social media platforms, or directly marketing listings. 

4) Share What You Know

Take it from us, one of the best ways to meet new people who are interested in the services you offer is to share what you know. 

Being generous with your time and expertise is one of the most rewarding ways to attract new clientele - primarily because you are giving somebody something of value.

Our automated products and services like Virtual Staging, Image Enhancement, and CGI Renders (to name but a few!) might be how we make our money, but as our co-founder, Brad Filliponi will tell you, we get just as much fulfillment in sharing what we know.

Anyone who knows Brad or has seen him in one of his many online tutorials is aware of his zest for sharing his expertise. And as we've discovered at BoxBrownie.com this willingness to teach and help others through their technological gray areas has indirectly brought many new clients to our doorstep.

Jesse Peters of Canada and Michael Bryden of Australia's Gold Coast are two of our great mates and steady clients who first reached out to us after stumbling upon one of Brad's tutorials.

Our co-founder Brad Filliponi loves sharing what he knows. Here he is in one of his numerous video tutorials explaining how to shoot real estate with a smartphone. When you share what you know, you do others a service, boost your exposure, expand your network of connections and even attract new clients.

5) Divorce Leads Will Appreciate Your TLC

It might be a sad commentary on the times we live in, but almost half of all marriages now end in divorce.  More often than not, these situations will require at least one - sometimes even two or three - real estate transactions. 

Situations involving divorce require the highest level of sensitivity from the agent who approaches either party - the agents who are adept at navigating the divorce market often find a way to represent both parties fairly.  The most important thing to keep in mind is that couples undergoing divorce genuinely can use the help of a real estate agent. 

If you want to place yourself in a position to pick up divorce leads regularly, it is well worth your time to put some extra time and focus into this realm. There are several certification courses available that specialize in sales due to divorce - take one. 

Another essential step toward attracting divorce leads is to network with lawyers or law firms that deal with such matters.  

Finally, if you can demonstrate compassion and neutrality to the individuals involved in these stressful and unfortunate situations, they are bound to appreciate it. They are also likely to recommend you to those they know whose marriages also are unable to stand the test of time. And when such matters are handled well you are bound to pick up at least one lifetime client. 

6) Join Your Chamber Of Commerce

If you’re an agent who has not yet joined your local chamber of commerce, take some advice from Nike and ‘Just Do It’. 

There are bucketloads of testimonials from real estate agents who credit involvement with their chamber of commerce as one of their most important sources of generating leads. One reason for this is that chamber members all understand that networking is perhaps the major benefit to their membership so that when you attend one of their events you are rubbing elbows with people who already understand that they are there for a common purpose. 

The more involved you become with your chamber of commerce the more real estate leads are likely to come your way: From direct listings, to quid pro quo referral arrangements to contact details for people who need an agent - you never know what goodness arrive from involvement with your local chamber. 

But as the saying goes: ‘You gotta be in it to win it!’

7) Put Your Heart And Soul Into Your Landing Page

So much attention goes to getting people to click on something you are offering that it can be tempting to neglect the landing page they go to once they do. Poor landing pages are probably the primary area where potential leads are lost.

Have you ever clicked “Learn More” on a Facebook Ad that caught your attention, then become so frustrated with the hoops you're made to jump through that you've just moved on?

One of the great things about most social media advertising is that it allows you to collect information on those who complete your click-through process. But don’t view this as your opportunity to interrogate whoever happens to click on your ad. 

Yes, it’s important to collect information, but not at the expense of losing clients. 

Landing pages are not just the places you send people when they click on one of your ads. You probably have many landing pages active online right now, whether you have any paid ads online or not. 

Any link you post for someone to find you is a landing page. Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, Snap - each one is a separate landing page. Pay careful attention to what a first-time visitor might see when they visit one of your landing pages. 

Make their experience as effortless and as pleasant as possible. Don't make anyone feel like they have to work to become your client!

8) Start A Blog Covering Real Estate Developments At Council Meetings

If you want insider information on the future of real estate in your farm area, attend council meetings.

If you want to meet the movers and shakers in the real estate industry in your farm area, attend council meetings.

If you want to meet the lawyers, architects, community stakeholders, special interest groups, and elected officials that have the most influence on real estate in your farm area, attend council meetings.

If you want to leverage the enormous sphere of influence that you accumulate from attending council meetings, turn your regular presence there into a blog.

Not only will you be privy to the latest breaking news impacting your farm area, but you will be raising your profile among some of the most influential people in your community while becoming a valued source for relevant local information. 

When it comes to generating leads, this is the ideal position for any real estate agent to be in.

Make sure you come equipped with a business card (maybe even one with a QR code printed on it) inviting all you meet to check out your blog for the latest council news.

9) Join (Or Start) A Local Real Estate Investment Group

This is just one of the hundreds of real estate investors groups available on Facebook. Joining and monitoring such groups can be a great way to spot new and relevant leads.

This could also be known as the shooting fish in a barrel approach to lead generation. Understandably, there is perhaps no more appealing environment for a real estate agent to be in than a room full of people who are interested in becoming property investors. 

It no longer even has to be a real room. Social media is probably the best place to start (or find) a local real estate investment group - at least for now. The way things are moving you'd be well-advised to get yourself an avatar and head out into the metaverse because this is where a lot of the real estate action is happening these days.

Though Facebook groups probably are the best place to find active local groups that are made up of members of your community (not just real estate professionals) this might not be the case in ten years.

Whether your group is based in the real world, on social media, or in the metaverse, if you stay active and alert to what's being posted these environments can be a great way to make meaningful connections - from off-market listings to people seeking investors to people seeking advice, you just never know what sort of opportunities will turn up in these groups. Your level of responsiveness and outreach will determine the extent of the benefits you reap. 

10) Flee The Real Estate Scene: The Organic Approach To Lead Generation

Oddly Enough, maybe the best way to generate authentic leads in real estate is to stop trying to generate leads completely. This doesn’t mean you’re not thinking of it, this doesn’t mean you’re not ready to turn anyone you meet into a lead at the drop of a  hat … such readiness is always necessary for the real estate business. 

This approach is founded on the practice of being active in ways and places that know you will meet people with common interests. 

• A barstool at a place where everyone is cheering for your sports team
• A plot of land in a community garden
• A weekend cyclist’s club
• An astronomy club that meets regularly to gaze at the stars
• A local heritage group that documents the history of local properties

Go wherever your passion takes you. When you forge relationships based on common interests, you are much more likely to meet people who want to work with you. The path from stranger to acquaintance, to client, is always a lot more effortless this way. And it's certainly much more enjoyable, too!

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