Property marketing for estate agents [A guide for 2022]

When it comes to marketing properties, the approach needs to be a little bit different to how you might market any other product. And yes, properties are products.

The only difference between an extremely valuable product like a house and an everyday purchase like a smartphone is the price. They both need the same commitment to marketing in order to make a successful sale. Property marketing has 4 main focus areas, known as the 4 P’s.

What are the 4 P’s of marketing in real estate?

1. Product — This is the house, home or property for sale and its characteristics. The garden, land, garages and driveways are all part and parcel of the product you are selling as the real estate agent.
2. Price — This speaks for itself, but comes with a lot of questions you need to answer to get the bigger picture. Is the property priced correctly? Will it sell at that price? Is it the right time? What’s the property market like?
3. Place — This isn’t just the location (location location) of the property, but the places that you are marketing the product. Who is seeing your marketing and where are you promoting it? Potential buyers are only half of your audience when you think that other estate agents will see your product and potentially instruct you to sell on their behalf if their products match or complement yours.
4. Promotion — To sell the house, home or property, you’ve got to communicate the product through the right channels. And that means a marketing strategy that reaches all the right people, from potential buyers to other real estate agents. More on that later.

What is the best marketing strategy?

If we knew the answer to this, there would be no marketing masterclasses or top secrets. But as it happens, we believe the best marketing strategy for real estate agents is a combination of great communication, helpful content (*cough cough* — like our blogs) and being super visible to your potential buyers.

Also, reviews. Who doesn’t look at reviews of a company before dealing with them in this day and age? Collecting reviews from your delighted customers should be a must and each one is gold for your marketing. Whether on Trustpilot, Feefo, Reviews.io, Facebook, Google – everywhere and anywhere that makes sense for you and is where your customers will see them.

Personally, I would suggest that you could simply say that doing a blinding job selling or letting property for your clients and then getting a review is your marketing strategy. Word of mouth will spread like wildfire!

Just make damn sure that when a new potential vendor or landlord checks you out and peruses your existing listings, they look absolutely on fleek. I’m talking stunning photos, a professional floorplan, a video or video tour, full detailed descriptions – the lot. See Creating the ultimate Rightmove listing for more.

How do you market to sellers?

Why should sellers come to you to list and sell their properties? How do they know you’re a safe pair of hands? Make the time to share your expertise through great content (like this guide), videos, or via interactive Q&A sessions either in person or online – and, AND – those all-important reviews I mentioned above.

Your sellers need to have the same great experience that your buyers have. Sellers should expect friendly, easy service from day one. When you do get the opportunity to pitch to a potential customer, dazzle them with other similar properties you’re selling or have sold recently. Whip out the iPad and let the beautiful photos, floorplans and videos you’ve produced for other properties do the talking.

If the shots you’re taking happen to look a little uninspiring, check out our FREE Ultimate Guide to Property Photography and *shameless plug*, our excellent Image Enhancement service to turn those grey skies blue and to remove pesky cars from driveways as if by magic. Okay, spoiler alert: it’s not magic, but it is Photoshop, which is almost the same thing.

How do I create a real estate marketing plan?

You’ll be pleased to know you’ve already done step #1 — which is establish that you need a real estate marketing plan. The real aim of a real estate marketing plan is to reach your customers where they are. And to do that, you need to get a bit personal. Find out where they hang out — in a purely digital sense, of course — and then target any advertising in those places. So that means getting your name out there and all marketing efforts nice and visible.

Think about Google pay-per-click advertising (aka PPC) on social media, creating landing pages specifically for your most popular properties, and engaging customers with insightful, valuable content, like blogs, explainers, how-tos and videos.

We’ve gathered our top 10 tips and digital marketing ideas below, so check them out for some great ideas.

How do I attract luxury real estate clients?

Luxury clients are looking for a luxurious experience. End of. That means everything you’re offering them needs to be the best of the best.

Beautifully presented properties, stunning property photography to capture their imagination, immaculately dressed and styled homes, and outstanding customer service to boot.

That means building a genuine customer relationship and learning everything about their interests, motivations and reasons to buy a property. Share your expertise on the location and property, and make sure luxury clients receive a 5–star experience with your business, every time they interact with you.

Property lead generation ideas

In this section, we’re looking at all the ways you can generate leads for properties and how to sell them. We’ll keep it snappy.

How do you generate leads for house sales and create more listings?

Our number #1 tip in this area is an online valuation tool. Potential sellers can use these tools to get a valuation on their property, and potential buyers can use them to judge what they can afford. Sure, you’ll get the odd few people playing around with it for fun, but that won’t hurt in the long run if you get some solid leads that create more listings.

We also recommend display advertising — you know once you’ve searched for something on Google and you get followed around with little ads for it afterwards everywhere you go online? You can do that for your potential buyers and stay in the front of their minds. It’s a powerful and small tool with a massive impact.

What is the best real estate marketing tool?

Is there just one? We don’t think so! There are so many great real estate marketing tools out there for you to choose from. Here are a handful:

• Platform — Obviously, you’ll need a platform like Rightmove, Zoopla, Zillow etc
• Email — to drop in once a week with potential customers, think Mailchimp, Send in Blue or Mailerlite
• Social media scheduling — to automate posting across multiple platforms, think MeetEdgar or Hootsuite
• Graphics — check out Canva for easy ways to create marketing graphics
• Stock images — Unsplash (free) or Shutterstock (paid) have you covered
• Photos — use Image Enhancement to boost colours, add blue sky, remove things etc
• Floorplans — look at Floorplan Conversion for converting sketches into professional floorplans
• Video — inject motion into your images and create a cool video from them with Video Slideshow
• Copywriting — look at Jasper for generating text content via AI (if that’s your thing)
• Live chat — a great addition to your website to answer customer questions, think Crisp or Zendesk
• Camera — an entry-level DSLR will be more than enough for most real estate photography
• Lens — a wide-angle lens is one of the most important bits of kit you’ll need

Read on to find out our top 10 digital marketing ideas.

Are direct mail techniques still effective?

You might be surprised by our answer: yes! When it’s used correctly, direct mail techniques can still be a very effective tool to reach your customers. Plus, tucking a stylishly designed leaflet into a free magazine can’t hurt your marketing efforts. Make sure any direct mail goes to the right places in your local area and it can only help with local PR. Find out more about local PR in our top 10 tips below.

Digital marketing ideas for estate agents

Estate agents aren’t short of a clever idea or two but sometimes it can be tricky to figure out what to do first. Digital marketing takes time and effort, and sometimes a fully dedicated team. But with a few smart moves, you can get your digital marketing looking ship-shape in no time.

Why is digital marketing important for your property business?

It’s been said many times before that your website is your shop window, and that’s certainly true for estate agent businesses. After all, you can fit a lot more properties into your online listings than you can in a physical shop window! Digital marketing and creating an online presence is no longer optional: it’s crucial for getting ahead in a crowded marketplace. We’ve collected our top 10 tips and we’re sharing them with you, because we’re nice like that. Stick the kettle on and make notes!

1. How to use Google and leverage digital marketing

Google has an excellent, free-to-use tool called Google My Business. Simply register your business and it creates a mini one-stop-shop for your business when people search for it on Google. Make sure to include your opening hours, business address and any other details customers might need in order to reach you. It’s a handy tool and one that not all businesses make the most of, so make sure you do and stand out from the crowd.

2. A local approach to SEO

As well as your list of handy SEO keywords, another great idea for website optimisation is individual landing pages. Has your estate agent business got several different physical branches? Design and publish a unique landing page for each branch so customers can search for their local business, and for the houses and properties listed in their local area. This will help you rank better on Google, too — so don’t skip out on this step. It could make a huge difference!

3. Website optimisation

Great search engine optimisation (SEO) is the difference between customers and potential property buyers finding you online, and missing you completely. Do some SEO keyword research and find out the words and phrases that people use when they search for properties and estate agents online. Include these keywords in your website in the pages your customers see and in the ‘back end’ as well, that is the behind-the-scenes inner workings of your website.

4. How to create visual content

This one has to be the easiest one on the list. You’ve got great properties just crying out to be photographed and styled to look absolutely stunning. And it doesn’t just stop at photos: you can create stylish Video Slideshows of your property, and interact with potential buyers by filming a guided tour of your hottest properties. You won’t be short of image ideas, but if on the off chance that your photos don’t look amazing, we can help you out. Talk to us today about our Image Enhancement services and we’ll get your property photos looking tip-top in no time.

5. Getting the most from advertising

Google Ads and pay-per click (PPC) ads aren’t going away any time soon, so take advantage of online advertising. These ads help you rank better in Google search results, and are easy to get in front of your customers on social media and other online platforms. Physical print adverts can still be effective, so don’t pass them over just yet. Place ads where your customers will see them, such as in local newspapers, free magazines and more.

6. Are directories worth the effort?

In a word? Yes. Registering your estate agent business in a directory is definitely worth the effort. Some of the big players like Rightmove, Zoopla, Yell.com, 192.com and the UK Property Guide are the best places to look first, but also keep an eye on where your competitors are listed, and make sure you’re registered there too.

7. How important is Local PR?

Local PR can be a really important tool in your advertising kit, and often it can even be free. It’s an exercise in link building, and Google loves a good link to your website because it shows your site — and therefore your business — has authority. In turn that boosts how visible your business is in search results, so it’s a win–win situation. If you’re part of local business associations, or your business sponsors a local sports team or has done fundraising for a local charity, ask them to include a link from their website to yours. Every little link helps.

8. Leveraging customer feedback

Customer feedback is one of the most powerful tools you have. Keep note of all your 5-star reviews, recommendations and glowing reviews and use them to your advantage — think social media posts, email footers and more. Give customers multiple ways to spread positive word of mouth for you, including links to wherever you collect reviews. And if the customer feedback isn’t so good — and it does happen — then there’s an opportunity to learn from it and come back stronger.

9. Using social media to attract interest

Social media is the 21st century shop window. This is where you can pour all your best marketing ideas and efforts into a single point of contact with your customers. Got a stunning property you know will sell in days? Post it on Instagram with details on how to book a viewing. Get creative and think of different ways to interact with your customers, like seasonal promotions around holidays. Digital Easter egg hunt, anyone?

10. How to get personal with email marketing

Personalisation is one trend that isn’t going anywhere. It’s more than putting your customer’s name in the subject line — it’s finding out what makes them tick and promoting the best properties to them, straight to their inbox. Promote the hottest properties to the best potential buyers with smart, personalised email marketing. Don’t forget to send retargeting emails if potential buyers have shown interest before — because you might just win their business.

Agents! Can we help turbocharge your property marketing?

Think beautiful images, professional floorplans and cool videos – all from the files you send us and back with you in as little as 3 hours to help get your listings live the same day. BOOM! Your vendors are gonna love that!

If you’re an agent or property professional, come try us out for free! Simply enter promo code BLOG56 when creating your account.