Social Media Marketing for Real Estate Agents – The Ultimate Guide for REALTORS®

How REALTORS® Can Effectively Use Social Media Marketing to Convert Leads

Academy Content Team

June 6, 2024

Social media is now an indispensable part of successful marketing. Worldwide, four billion people use the internet with three billion using social media each month. Of course, it isn’t enough to just be on social media. What you want is a well-crafted social media strategy for your Real Estate business as part of your overall marketing goals. And we have your back with our ultimate guide to social media use for REALTORS®.

This post is a comprehensive breakdown of social media and how to use it to get qualified leads. Whether it’s the first time you’re using social media to promote your Real Estate or you’re brushing up on your social media management skills, this post is everything you need to boost your presence.

We’ll start with some interesting stats about social media and Real Estate. We will then go over how to identify your objective, create customer personas, and tailor your social media strategies to them. We’ll look at four main platforms Real Estate agents must consider. We will also bring you examples of the right things to do on each platform: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube.

More than anything else, this guide is created to get you up and on your way with the essential types of Real Estate content, you need for your social media posts. This will be done with samples, ideas, and tools to help you stand out, grab attention and capture leads. We’ll show you how to grow your Real Estate business using social media, provide you with Pro tips and finally make you aware of the common mistakes in social media marketing. Are you ready? Let’s dive in.

The statistics for Real Estate reveal that agents should definitely be investing time online. The NAR Home Buyer and Seller Generational Trends Report indicate:

When searching for a home 99% of Millennials search online websites. Such a high percentage of potential young buyers really cannot be ignored
89% of Older Boomers search online. This should do away with any assumption that older users seeking to move to smaller properties would not be heavy internet searchers.
For nearly all generations the first step taken was to look online for properties (the exception being buyers 71 and older who did contact an agent first). Your first impressions are overwhelmingly being made online. And first impressions still carry the most weight.
58% of Millennials found their home on a mobile device. This generation was raised in the internet era and has high expectations of mobile content.
The number of Generation X finding their home on a mobile device is 46%. Further proof that reaching out to younger buyers requires mobile-friendly content.

We are currently facing the unprecedented global challenges of COVID-19. What has been made clear during the pandemic is that businesses, in general, must be able to transition fully online during times of crisis. Total time spent online has increased by 8%, For both 18-24s and over 55s this time has gone up by 12%.

What is the best social media channel for REALTORS®?

There will be variations in answers based on who messaging is aimed at, but there are a few platforms REALTORS® should focus their attention on.

And it is important that attention is focused. We have stressed before that consistency is essential. With only 13% of agents in a 2018 NAR technology survey stating that they use social media management software, it is unlikely that the remaining agents are consistently active across multiple channels. As such, selecting a channel to update consistently is paramount.

Facebook

Facebook is one of the most effective marketing tools for REALTORS®. You can use location, demographics, and interests to target potential buyers who are the best fit for your property.

It is also still very popular with active users across age groups. This could change, as younger users more heavily represent newer platforms. Given the rapid growth and change in social media keeping up to date with new developments in social media is necessary.

Setting Up a Facebook Business Page

You need to have a business profile on Facebook. Besides being a must in order to appear professional this allows you to take advantage of great features like insights. You will be prompted to set up a business-specific URL for your page. Your URL is of great SEO value. If you have a website with the name XYZ Realty then opt for facebook.com/XYZRealty as a URL name for your Facebook business profile. See how Courtney Knopf has used her website, www.knopfproperties.com, to build her Facebook URL: www.facebook.com/KnopfProperties

Enter Business Information

Your NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) is entered in the “About” section.

Upload Profile Image & Cover Image / Video

The profile image should be 180 x 180 pixels. Your logo as a profile image is recommended for brand recall. Cover video dimensions for Facebook need to be at least 820 x 312 pixels, the recommended size is 820 x 462 pixels, and it can be anywhere from 20-90 seconds playing in a loop. If the video doesn’t fit, you will receive an error message.

Add Call to Action (CTA)

The button should be right below the cover photo. This button helps your Facebook page appear when people search.

Post Content

Post one to two times a day. As mentioned, posting between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. is ideal for Facebook. While of course, you will want to post your listings do not saturate the page with them. This is a great place to share local events, helpful articles, and general market information.

You will also want to share ratings and reviews here.

Instagram

As a visual medium, Instagram is perfect for highlighting a house’s best features.

But there is more to this platform than pretty pictures, and to use it effectively you need an understanding of its possibilities and how best to capitalize on its potential.

Instagram is great for reaching younger markets

This is most clearly illustrated in the following graph by Our World in Data. While there is a dropoff in use for the 30-49 year age range, at 47% it is not as steep of a drop as a platform like Snapchat where users in this age bracket plummet to 25%.

Instagram accounts also have relatively high interaction levels. The average Facebook or Twitter user has an engagement rate of only 0.5-1.0%. The average Instagram account has an engagement rate of 3%.

The Instagram crowd has more money than Facebook and Twitter followers. According to a study by data cruncher Statista, its users’ salaries are higher than those on Facebook and Twitter. Also, more online purchases are channeled via Instagram than Facebook or Twitter.

As a visual medium, Instagram can actually spur market interest. For this to work, you must “create stylized and beautiful curated content that delivers aspirational messages and invites engagement”.

Fortunately, Instagram’s user-friendly features can make even a novice photographer look professional.

Post original photos and content

Don’t use stock photos or videos. Instagram offers a place to display your best listings and highlight your brand. Using stock photos reduces credibility.

Use relevant hashtags

Putting hashtags on your brand or business name is one way of generating attention to your IG posts. For example #[Real Estate Team Name] #[Brokerage Name] #[Your Brand Tagline ]. To target, local markets make sure to use city neighborhood, or area hashtags as Eva does here with #bayarea. So for example; #[Target Neighbourhood] #[Target City]homes #[Target City]. You can also use hashtags based on general Real Estate terms, such as #realty, #realtors, #luxuryliving, etc.

or see how Lucy Enriquez uses hashtags to increase her reach on Instagram

Use Instagram as your Real Estate portfolio to showcase your Real Estate brand

Instagram allows up to 10 pictures per post. This multi-photo feature offers you the opportunity for a full showcase of your sales listings. In one post, you can present the home’s interiors and exteriors, as well as amenities in the neighborhood.

Don’t forget to include Real Estate videos: Plan videos well though as Instagram limits you to just up to 60 seconds of exposure (unless you upload your videos to IGTV).

Use Instagram Stories

Stories are different from regular Instagram posts. You can highlight your story in 15 seconds or less. Most of the features are very useful in building community conversations.

Use Emojis for Branding on Instagram

Research shows that posts with emojis have higher audience recall.

Respond to Comments

Go beyond basic responses; answer any inquiry or volunteer other vital information about your business.

Have an Updated Photo and Bio

Periodically update your photo and bio. This captures attention ensuring that your page is up-to-date.

Follow Popular Accounts

Be inspired, see the tips and tricks, and learn from top agents. Find what the industry leaders do and how they do it to get exposure.

Upload Multiple Instagram Posts a Week

Use Repost or Regram App and post three Instagram stories daily ideally between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. and at 2 a.m. You can share posts easily using the Regram app.

Create Live Stream Videos

This feature will enable you to connect with your followers in real time. You can answer questions as you are recording, so it’s a great feature to build strong relationships with your followers and stand out as an up-to-date REALTOR®.

Increase Your Followers by Following Your Competition’s Followers

Select active followers and initiate a connection. Building up your network will lead to receiving potential leads when you don’t expect them.

LinkedIn is ideally used for networking and job searching but it is also a great space for posting content related to your business. According to a study by Hubspot, traffic from LinkedIn generates almost three times a higher visitor-to-lead conversion rate than Facebook and Twitter. This study of 5000 businesses, shows that LinkedIn’s conversion rate also ranks above the other two platforms.

It’s also best to invest in LinkedIn to stand out from the crowd, especially if you are new to Real Estate. There’s far less competition and you can get attention more effectively.

So where do you start? Yes, creating a professional profile:

Set Up a Real Estate Profile

When completing your profile, remember that this won’t be just an online resume. To be searchable, you have to differentiate yourself. Think about your expertise, and how you can help sellers with your service and assist homebuyers to find their dream homes. Always put yourself in their shoes. For instance, what are the first-time homebuyers’ concerns? What do they search for to find the answer?

Use your Real Estate specialties to answer the most important questions and take the following steps to set up your LinkedIn profile.

An eye-catching Cover Photo

Note the photo below. It is very professional and thought was clearly given to a background that works with the photo. While you may want to present something less general, do still keep in mind matters like the color scheme.

A Clear About (bio) Section

A bio that clearly lets prospects know who you are and what you’re about. The bio below clearly and succinctly outlines relevant experience, the ultimate goal, and how this person helps clients achieve that goal. Check out Denise Mai’s About section (bio) on LinkedIn:

Past Experience and Accomplishments

Your experience, accolades, and accomplishments. Denise Mai, a top 1% REALTOR® in Greater Vancouver, included her extensive experience and impressive list of accomplishments:

All accomplishments are relevant to her field of Real Estate. This is important as you want the majority of accomplishments listed to be related to your chosen field of Real Estate.

Posting on LinkedIn

It is best to post on LinkedIn, once a day between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m.

Your posts can be your listings, market news, home buyer/seller tips, etc.

YouTube

YouTube is a powerful video marketing medium. YouTube is a great place to host your video content online because it’s the #2 search engine in the world and is extremely reliable for video streaming. Google also weighs video differently when computing its web page rankings. You can use YouTube as a very important hosting platform after making your Real Estate videos.

In order to post or upload videos to YouTube, you need to create a channel.

Setting up a YouTube Channel

In order to post or upload videos to YouTube, you need to create a channel. Have these tips in mind when creating your channel:

Make your channel page look as good as your website. You want your brand to be reinforced visually in all aspects of your online presence, and YouTube should not be an exception to this
Include all your agency information in the About section. Provide links, your email, and relevant phone numbers

Check out how Ryan Serhant is using the description to include his information.

Devise a Real Estate video marketing plan for the long term. It is important to ensure that your video marketing folds into your larger marketing plan. Will your focus be How-to Videos? Market Update videos? Listing videos? Interviews? Or Neighborhood Overviews?

Add Video Details

While YouTube is processing your video, you can update the video details. Such as title, description, and video thumbnail.

YouTube title limit is 100 characters but it’s best to keep it under 70 characters or locate the main keywords within the 70-character section.

YouTube’s description limit is 1000 characters but the first few sentences are the most important section. The first sentence is always the same as your title followed by a link to your website or listing page. Add more information in the second paragraph.

YouTube thumbnail should be an engaging photo related to the video. This is a picture that shows what your video is about. Either use YouTube’s suggested thumbnails or get creative and use tools like Canva or Photoshop to make your thumbnail and upload it to YouTube.

Video Elements and Visibility

Adding an end screen, cards are under the video element section. Visibility allows you to publish or schedule the post and make sure you follow YouTube’s guidance in protecting kids.

Tag Your Content

Once you have set up your channel you can use tags (hashtags) to help viewers when they search them out. You just enter the hashtag in the title or the description. Hashtags in the title are hyperlinked. If there are none in the title the first three in the description will show above the video’s title.

Use hashtags for Real Estate and include city or neighborhood information such as #realty, #realtors,#[Target Neighbourhood] #[Target City]

Engage With Audience

You will also want to prepare how to engage with your audience. Ask questions and respond to viewer comments. This builds a relationship between your brand and viewers

Ask viewers to subscribe to your channel. They will receive regular notifications about your channel once subscribed.

Grow Your YouTube Channel

With regards to the videos themselves, look into what other agents are doing on YouTube. Decide what works (and what doesn’t) with your business model.

There are some key features you will want to keep in mind when posting videos to YouTube:

Titles. These should be captivating, SEO-friendly, and enticing
Cards. Cards present links and CTAs, important for keeping viewers on your content
Thumbnails. These should convey exactly what each video is about.
Descriptions. Make sure your descriptions consist of search-optimized copy summarizing your video
Captions. These are important for reaching a wider and more diverse audience

If you’re new to using video and don’t feel confident taking advantage of YouTube, collaborate with third-party companies or agencies to make your Real Estate video and/or post it to YouTube.

Content marketing is focused on creating, publishing, and distributing content for a targeted audience. In contrast to marketing that “creates a need,” this method of marketing is aimed at someone in need of and possibly actively looking for a particular product or service (a qualified lead).

The digital age has brought about the “democratization of the content. Now anyone with an internet connection can create and promote content, reaching and holding the attention of many people for a nominal cost.

We have investigated how to set up and best use key social media platforms in Real Estate but what content?

There is a mutual understanding of Real Estate. Potential buyers know agents are there to sell the property, but agents should make buyers feel secure in thinking of this as a mutually beneficial relationship.

Quality content marketing on social media can help achieve this goal. What follows is a summary of marketing in Real Estate and how to use the various platforms best:

Listings and Open Houses

In a market so dependent on visuals Real Estate agents need to prioritize visual content. The first thing buyers look at are the photographs. Ideally, you want to impress them with professionally shot images. Facebook and Instagram are both excellent ways to show off your listings.

Instagram is a natural fit. It’s highly visual and easy to use.

With Facebook, you can add more listing information. It presents a bit better on the platform Note the “see more” to extend the information in the example below. And that the main points (address/hosting agent) appear before the need to click “See More”.

As they excel at visuals and engagement along with being able to share location and content Facebook and Instagram are both good platforms for promoting an open house. Note how this agent uses hashtags to promote the open house on Instagram.

As does Gina Swanson in the Facebook post below.

Using video marketing is an excellent way to get more inquiries. It is also an important tool for building trust, showcasing your listed properties and expertise, and gaining more name recognition.

For a listing video, it is best to have a trained and vetted videographer. These are the videos aimed at getting potential clients excited. The videos that motivate qualified leads to call and become clients:

Roomvu offers a high-quality listing video service. Cinematic Real Estate videos are professionally shot and ready to be shared across various social media platforms. Learn more or book now

Virtual Open house

A virtual open house is a great option for expanding the reach of your open house. Here Facebook and Instagram also excel with the benefit of live-stream. Instagram Live expanded in popularity during the Covid-19 pandemic and people now appreciate this previously somewhat neglected feature.

Benefits:

It is free
You can add your Instagram Live video to your saved Stories, so people can continue to view the tour of rooms after you’re done going Live
You can reach a wide audience
People can ask questions in real-time, but only in written form, so you can pick and choose which to respond to

Real Estate Market Update

Market Updates can be presented in any format but the most convenient and effective for social sharing is video. Market update videos are professionally made videos where REALTORS® are coached to talk about the facts and figures to the market which could be city or neighborhood-specific. Such videos build trust in agents’ knowledge and expertise.

Effective video in general increases understanding of a product or service by 74% as well as increasing purchasing likelihood.

It is convenient because video can be shared across platforms including YouTube (an immensely powerful platform with 1.90 billion users). Check Denise Mai’s market update:

Branded Real Estate Videos

Every month, based on the MLS board’s report, roomvu creates a video branded with your profile picture, brokerage, and contact information. This helps agents streamline their brands and work more efficiently. You can see a sample here:

In addition to YouTube, these videos are shareable on Facebook and Instagram. For more information on branded Real Estate

Testimonials

Contact previous customers and see if they are willing to give any customer testimonials. With testimonials, you can turn quotes into social media graphics.

With more visual mediums you may use graphics (with quotes):

Or includes happy customers with pictures:

Home Buying/Selling Tips

While you are there to guide people through the process, the more clients know about the home-buying process, the smoother it will be. Sharing content about home buying/selling has multiple benefits. Clients will be grateful for content that seems to take into account some of the more stressful aspects of home buying.

Having an audience familiar with a Firm versus a Conditional Offer and what is needed in terms of paperwork will make your job easier.

Renovation and Improvement ideas

Some renovations or improvements before a sale are a good idea. Others not so much. Twitter is a good platform for sharing (or resharing) articles and information.

Like this one from REALTOR® Lorre Burden sharing a Better Homes and Gardens article.

You can also, with minimal research, follow writers such as Amanda Lauren (who writes about Real Estate, décor, and design for Forbes) and retweet their work. Providing useful information without a great deal of effort and time expended.

Ideally, you can write your own blog article on these topics and share it on Twitter and Facebook to increase direct engagement with your site. Also, collaboration with a third party can make it easier to make Real Estate videos.

Home Maintenance Tips

The educational content on home maintenance serves multiple audiences and highlights your know-how. YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook would be useful and engaging platforms on which to post such content.

Market News

You can also post videos when events in the market change drastically. For example the lack of in-person showings during COVID-19 or during the market fall of 2008. It is important that people view you as aware, in control, and knowledgeable. In the best-case scenario you can offer alternatives (such as the increase in virtual showings during COVID-19).

Virtual Tours (iGuide and Matterport)

A virtual tour is the simulation of an existing location with the help of sequential videos or still images. These extend reach, providing the next best thing to being there. You can upload virtual tours on any social media platform and engage with more quality leads online.

Matterport gives you an immersive tour experience that’s compatible with desktops, tablets, and smartphones. See a demo here:

iGuide is an all-inclusive service. iGuide bundles contain a 3D walkthrough tour, photos, and floor plan, all in one place. See iGuide:

Infographics

Infographics are collections of imagery, charts, and minimal text giving easy-to-understand overviews of a topic.

These have huge potential. By adding color visuals to their text researchers were able to increase their audience’s willingness to read it by 80%.

Here’s a three-step process for creating your Real Estate agent infographics: Choose an idea. Find your formatting. Use these tools.

Choose an idea: This involves brainstorming. If you are new to this process it’s probably best to research what other agents are doing. This will give you an idea of what styles you favor and what appears most effective.
Choose a Format: The simpler your infographic, the easier it is to understand.
Use these Tools:
- Venngage: Venngage was created specifically for infographic design.
- Canva: Is a more holistic platform integrating many elements of graphic design (and including infographics)

To help you with the brainstorming process check out the infographic list in the following link from the National Association of REALTORS®.

In order to know what works best for Real Estate on Social Media, it’s wise to check out agents who are doing it really well along with those who are experts in social media content.

Fit Small Business checked in with several such agents back in 2019. Many confirmed previously outlined points.

Of particular note was advice from Gavin Graham, and Maggie Aland, Editors of Fit Small Business. Gavin advised outsourcing social media management and Maggie recommended Hootsuite for posting across platforms. This was notable in that if you recall only 13% of agents in 2018 stated they used social media management software in a NAR technology survey. If we return to Maggie’s recommendation specifically Hootsuite allows you to post to up to three social media accounts using Hootsuite absolutely free. If you’ve selected three primary platforms this might give you a bit of an edge in terms of freeing up time.

Ines Hegedus-Garcia a Real Estate agent at RelatedISG International Realty had excellent advice about working across platforms and remembering that each platform has a unique “voice”.

Keeping it light, keeping in touch with past clients, and sharing videos were all mentioned as crucial to growing your Real Estate business with social media.

We will explore the social media channels in more detail further below but with regards to the time of day you’re scheduling your posts, it makes a difference depending on the channel. Best practices are as follows:

Facebook, once a day between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.
Twitter, 15 tweets per day between 2 a.m. and 10 p.m
Pinterest, 11 pins per day between 2 a.m. and 11 p.m
LinkedIn, once a day between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m
Instagram, once or twice per day between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. and at 2 a.m

Knowing the best time of day to post on your chosen platform (or platforms) helps create a detailed plan for engagement.

Any good plan needs direction.

Where do you want to go? You need to identify your social media objectives at the outset of forming a plan. What are your goals, your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)?

Platforms can be used to:

Increase website traffic
Raise your follower count
Improve engagement (to increase brand loyalty)
Generate more contact form submissions
Produce more property inquiries or sales (converting social followers to qualified leads and new business)

If you start with a social media goal, one aligning with company-wide goals, and work back from this you’ll have a better chance of creating a successful social media plan.

What is Your Customer Persona?

Exceptional marketing should make the customer feel as though they are being spoken to and their needs directly addressed. This has always been the case. Good marketing requires an understanding of customer needs in order to provide the products to solve them. This is why creating a customer persona is so important.

A customer persona (also known as a buyer persona) is a semi-fictional archetype representing key traits of a large segment of your audience. This is primarily based on data you’ve collected from user research and web analytics.

The persona allows you to group your customers into buckets (sometimes called “segments”). For example; if you’re finding a growing number of your customers are college-educated, recently married women in their thirties you may create a customer named “Melanie” (Melanie Married).

Essentially personas are just groups of past, current, and potential customers. So why create a customer persona?

The technical answers to this question include:

Creating Focus and Targeting. Personas help you identify and focus on the people likely to buy.
Crafting your Pitch: Personas help you identify potential buyers’ goals and problems. You can then craft your pitch to emphasize meeting their needs.
Lead Nurturing: Using the persona you can strategically devote effort, time, and money to leads based on where they are in the sales cycle.

The creative answer to this question is more intuitive.

Good marketing requires creative thinking and imagination. It is easier to speak to an individual representing a group than to a group.

The persona allows the marketer to imagine speaking to a person, this creates the response for the customer of being seen and spoken to.

Simple steps to start creating a customer persona include:

Source information: Generate background information as specific as possible, using your roster of previous customers whom you’ve successfully engaged before. Pick five to ten individuals with whom you’ve established good relationships and interview them. Dig into these customers’ occupations, home locations, purchasing power, recreational habits, and other personal traits. Importantly, you should likewise weigh the demographics of the customers including their age, sex, and marital status.
Understand customer problems and challenges: Draw from prior customers the hurdles they faced in the process. Try to determine the potential deal-breakers that they encountered or other negative aspects that bothered them. Seek the alternatives they would have preferred. Information from the experience of these customers is valuable in avoiding similar situations in the future.
Know customer needs and goals: Using the initial inputs from five-to-ten customer samplings, establish the needs and goals that dictate the life directions of these subjects. Learn what their long-term aspirations are regarding their careers, income or investment opportunities, as well as domicile and lifestyle preferences. This insight into their life objectives is a start to developing marketing roadmaps suited to personalities.
Analyze and adopt appropriate web content: Determine the online messaging best suited to identified Real Estate customer customers. Take into account the communication channels that particular customers prefer to access or use for their own messaging.
Create the customer personas: Name the customer persona, highlighting the customer’s dominant characteristic based not only on their demographics but also on their demeanor or idiosyncrasies and even physical features. For easier recall, the names typically adopted for Real Estate customer personas are alliterations that best describe specific customers like Starter Stan, Techie Tony, or Caring Carl. Try to limit the Real Estate customer personas that you create from three to five of your core clientele. This way, you can really focus on the segments that deliver positive results in Real Estate marketing.

Once you have identified your objectives and created your customer personas, there are social media strategies to tailor to them. And personalization is important to any agent’s strategy.

In Real Estate, you are the brand. This is true of other industries, but it is especially so when operating in your local community. You want to engage in ways that establish that you are someone who is vested in your community. You also want to post content that allows people to benefit from your knowledge. In posting quality personalized content on social media, always remember to:

Promote the town/neighborhood, not just the house
Post helpful articles regarding home buying and personal finance. Educate buyers
Post pictures and videos promoting community events
Talk about the market
Engage followers (respond to good and bad comments and provide interactive content)
Share endorsements from existing clients
Use video and photography to promote properties or highlight past sales
Be consistent
Utilize analytics
Avoid “shouting about your home listings” (let people know about the homes you’re marketing, but don’t make the house the primary topic)
Be consistent with the themes each week. The message “be consistent” tends to focus on frequency, but it is also important that you post only social media content that is in line with the themes you’ve chosen for your marketing strategy.
Intentionally Re-post or Engage Other Local Business Owners Weekly. This is in line with the promotion of community events and it encourages others to re-post your content.
Recognize Clients, Your Team, or Other Agents. Examples of this would include posting photos or videos of a recent sale and tagging your clients.
Search Local Hashtags to Like and Follow New Connections
Change an Instagram Link to a Twitter Picture. Direct picture posting on Twitter is possible through IFTTT.com

Read more details: Advanced Social Media Strategies

We have established why social media is important. And focused on individual platforms and their benefits. Here we present some general tips to help you form your social media strategy.

The bio is the potential client’s first introduction to you. Depending on the platform you may have a long or short bio, either way, social media users should feel like they know you.

Ideally, you want to include information on your qualifications, personal background, knowledge, and involvement in the local community. Statistics, certifications, and client testimonials should also be added to establish credibility.

Importantly you should try to tell a story. You may be limited by character limits at times in providing anecdotes about why and how you came to be in Real Estate, but wherever possible try to inject a sense of levity and who you are.

Tips for customizing your bio for the various platforms are largely focused on character limits. Here Unbounce provides some help with the following reference tool providing the limits for several major platforms (noticeably absent is Instagram which has a 150-character limit for their bio):

We are going to briefly touch on recommendations for a few of the main platforms, Placester is an excellent source for examples of some of these platforms.

Facebook: There are a few elements to Facebook. There is the tagline bio which will show on the main page and then there is the “about” page which will include the tagline bio, mission, and details. Carefully craft the “about” page as people will be going here if you’ve piqued their interest and they want to investigate further. For the bio use strong aspirational words; “smart”, “loyal”, and “empathetic”.

Twitter: For this bio provide deliberate information; title, goals, accomplishments, and interests. It’s a casual platform so try to add some humor and personality.

LinkedIn: In contrast to Twitter LinkedIn is the most professional networking social site. Your summary should be more formal and showcase your accomplishments and experience.

Instagram: Your bio should be similar to Twitter through more goal or mission-focused. This is where you provide the link to your website, so what’s said in the bio should make the user want to click.

*Use a clear professional photo across all platforms. On some platforms, the bio photo is very small. But this emphasizes the importance of a professional-looking photo.

Using hashtags

While hashtags do bring more engagement to your content, they also facilitate discovery on social media. They are an avenue for potential customers to find your Real Estate brand.

Hashtags increase engagement. They are a path for qualified leads to become clients.

There are generic hashtags for Real Estate such as #realestate and more customized hashtags #[Target Neighbourhood]

Engagement is vital to nurturing and a key aspect of social media content. The specifics of this are varied. It really depends on the platform. For platforms such as LinkedIn and Facebook, it can mean you post blog content to assert your expertise and engage your audience. For Instagram, it can be as simple as encouraging engagement with a question like REALTOR® Chad Carroll does in this share. Asking his followers;

“What are your thoughts on the Kitchen?”

Whatever the platform, and resulting engagement method, you will want to adopt a personal tone that sounds true. Show your offices, and employees at work, publish a report of a site visit, and involve your pet in your posts. You can promote yourself while showing some lightness and humor.

Social media groups are a powerful way to boost your name recognition, increase engagement, and form professional contacts.

Facebook groups are better for a more local perspective – it is easy to reach homeowners in local neighborhoods here.

For finding property investors LinkedIn groups are perfect.

On LinkedIn, joining groups generally isn’t more complicated than pressing the “Ask to join” button.

On Facebook, however, it can be a bit more complicated There are three different types of groups: Public, Closed, and Secret.

Helpful Facebook Groups:

Buy, sell, and swap groups indicate people downsizing or moving.
Class of/ Grew up around/ Remember when/ Then and now/ Memories or histories: Many of the members of these groups will have long affiliations with the area. It’s an excellent way to meet Baby Boomers who will likely downsize.
Mothers and fathers groups: Members of these groups have children and might be thinking of upgrading for more space
Humans of/ Living in broader groups of people who live in and around the area
Property to buy, rent or sell: These may have been set up by other agents, but they can be great places to find FSBO (For Sale By Owner) properties.

Helpful LinkedIn Groups: LinkedIn is a career site and both the content you post and the groups you search out should reflect that.

Chamber of Commerce/ business networks: These can be a good place to build a referral network.
Property developer or asset manager groups: If your focus is commercial projects this is where you want to be.
Property investor/ Self Managed Super Fund (SMSF) groups: If you want to meet those with the intention and means to invest in property.

When you join a group be sure to follow the rules of the group (especially when posting content). Share useful and interesting information. Be courteous and respectful (as you would hopefully be face-to-face. Be an active participant, liking, commenting on, and sharing the posts of others. And remember the purpose of joining groups is to form connections and be engaged online. Do not “sell” in groups set up for community and networking.

Landing pages

Your landing page, or lead capture page, refers to the web page that appears in response to clicking on a search engine-optimized search result, marketing promotion, marketing email, or an online advertisement. This is different from a website homepage in that it is designed specifically to draw contact details from its visitors.

Given its purpose, your landing page needs to have compelling headlines and make use of powerful words, visuals, and videos, and require minimal form fields to fill in. You will also want to make sure that your page is mobile-friendly. One study shows 76% of home buyers use their phones in their property searches.

One popular lead-capturing landing page is the Home Evaluation form. Agents can use this form to capture qualified home sellers. Once a home seller enters their home address, the Real Estate agent will be getting a notification email with the client’s entered info.

Real estate agents can share this landing page on their social media platforms and get qualified leads.

You are likely somewhat familiar with analytics. Essentially you use analytics to apply data patterns toward effective decision-making.

Many brands and most marketing firms rely on digital analytics for their digital marketing assignments, Marketing Return on Investment is an important key performance indicator.

You should be somewhat familiar with Google Analytics if you have a website.

Google Analytics allows you to track and measure your business’ traffic goals and prove the ROI of your web and social media presence.

Within social media platforms, Facebook provides analytics.

With Facebook’s analytics you can analyze:

Impressions
Click through rates
Engagement
Demographics
Location
Reach
Relevancy

You can sort through your content to see what is resonating and with who.

While much of what’s been covered here falls under content marketing (specifically brand awareness) social platforms have made it affordable and easy for smaller businesses with less staff to create and post advertising.

Facebook/Instagram

As stated earlier Facebook is ideal for Real Estate due to its targeted nature.

Once you have gone to Facebook’s Ad Manager (found when you click on the drop-down arrow in the upper-right corner of a Facebook page and choose “Manage Ads”) you can customize your audience by such important considerations as location, age, and interests. From here you set your budget and create your ad.

When creating your ad for Facebook (or Instagram) you’ll want to include strong visuals and, even better, video. By 2021 online videos would account for more than 82% of all consumer internet traffic.

Roomvu’s market update video offers professional branded content which can easily be included in your Facebook ad.

Step-by-step guide: How to set up advertising on Facebook

Instagram offers a potential audience of more than 928 million people with the added bonus of access to parent company Facebook’s targeting options.

Step-by-step guide: How to set up advertising on Instagram

YouTube (Google)

The best way to advertise video is through, of course, YouTube. And currently, this platform is the best and most popular one for streaming videos both in live and recorded forms.

Advertising on this platform is done through Google Ads and maximizes user reach in search results.

If you avoid these errors you are on your way to running a successful social media campaign:

The first mistake would be not taking social media seriously. Social media is not just an add-on to your “main” marketing tools. It should be given the weight and importance of ads in newspapers and magazines.
Inappropriate Comments: While levity is fine, and even encouraged on some platforms, you still need to be a professional. You want to treat viewers with courtesy and civility.
Outsourcing Everything: It absolutely makes sense to use freelancers and social media software. Especially if you find you do not have the time to post consistently. But under no circumstances should you abandon your role as director and integrator of the marketing process.
Not creating Original Content: Some reposts are fine. But you want to build a reputation as an expert and that is much better displayed with original content.
Automating Everything: Like mistake three this is about being in charge of the marketing process and providing personalized attention when needed.

A lot has been covered in this guide. But it should be kept in mind that these are quickly evolving mediums. You will want to be up-to-date on the latest platforms, what they are and if they can be folded into your marketing campaign.

There should be no doubt in your mind now that a well-planned social media strategy can make or break a brand. The Internet allows millions of people around the world to connect with each other and gives unparalleled opportunities to promote your brand using social media.

In today’s world, traditional advertising strategies are not enough. Social media allows for vast and inexpensive outreach and networking. It simultaneously allows for personal engagement that, if properly utilized, can be very beneficial.

With social media, you have direct access to qualified leads and can communicate with them in real time. You have a platform where you can showcase your listings as well as your technological savvy and creativity.

If properly managed you will see a noticeable uptick in both website traffic and sales. We are looking forward to your next post.

*Featured Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Social media is hard to run at its best. It takes time, commitment, consistency, accuracy, skills, and lots of data to deliver a coherent and valuable message for your business. We get it. You REALTORS® barely have time to get around to your ordinary chores let alone time for extra activities like social media. We heard your voice and we created a solution.

roomvu social media calendar is an all-in-one solution that aims at automating social media for Real Estate agents. it not only automates it and keeps your social accounts running regularly, but it also takes care of the content. After all, creating the content is the hard part and then there comes sharing them.

Our content factory uses in-depth market data to create different Real Estate videos that fit your needs. All you need to do is just connect your social media accounts and pick the videos you like and add them to your calendar.

Join now and start your social media presence today. Wait no longer as every day passes you miss your chances of getting leads on social media! Real estate social media marketing services can help agents achieve success on social media.

How social media promotes Real Estate?

The statistics for Real Estate reveal that agents should definitely be investing time online. The NAR Home Buyer and Seller Generational Trends Report indicate:
When searching for a home 99% of Millennials search online websites. Such a high percentage of potential young buyers really cannot be ignored
89% of Older Boomers search online. This should do away with any assumption that older users seeking to move to smaller properties would not be heavy internet searchers.
For nearly all generations the first step taken was to look online for properties (the exception being buyers 71 and older who did contact an agent first). Your first impressions are overwhelmingly being made online. And first impressions still carry the most weight.

Is Social Media Marketing Good for the Real Estate?

How to Run Social Media Marketing for Real Estate