Article By Dylan Hasson “We’ve ‘boosted’ a couple of posts for $20, but nothing really came from it..” – I’ve heard this phrase (or along similar lines) more than a few times over the years when talking with business owners and consultants about using social media as a form of marketing. My response: “When you ‘boosted’ those posts, what were you hoping would happen?” is usually answered with something along the lines of: “Well, the post was to offer appraisals to people looking to sell their property, it reached over 3000 people but I didn’t get a single response.” Does this sound familiar?.. During my entrepreneurial career, I’ve used social media to promote a transport company, a concrete manufacturing company, myself as a real estate consultant, a trailer & vehicle hire company, a restaurant, and now real estate again.. Although these were very different industries, using social media as a form of marketing had the same realization, IT WORKS! However, I’ve found there is no “one size fits all” solution. The reality is though, that there is A LOT more to it than simply ‘boosting’ that appraisal post. Who are you promoting your content to? Are you making sure you’re promoting in the correct areas? (It doesn’t help much if you finally get a response to appraise a property, but the vendor lives far away) Are you promoting to the correct age groups? (A very common mistake I see many real estate offices making) Are you narrowing down on your target audience’s interests/ behaviors? (This can be very tricky) And is your content eye-catching enough to prevent your potential client from scrolling by? By getting these right, it can be a lot more effective to reach just 100 people who might be looking for your service than reaching 3000 random people who don’t. Below, I’ll break down a few key elements to making your social media more effective: 1) Know What Your Goal Is. Are you wanting people to call you about an offer? Are you aiming to drive traffic to your personal website? Are you trying to promote a specific property? Or are you aiming to gain as much exposure as possible so that people remember your name? Different posts on your social media channels will likely appeal to different people, ie; investors, people looking for a home appraisal, people looking for a rental property, etc. So before spending any money on that ‘boost’, you need to have an understanding of who that post is likely to appeal to and, if it does appeal to them, what action do you want them to take? Call you? Visit your website? By having a desired outcome in mind, you can design your advert accordingly. Keep in mind that your advert first needs to catch the attention of a potential client/ customer in order for them to stop and actually take the desired action. Once they start the action, are they completing it? I often see real estate agencies doing paid campaigns for potential clients to complete a contact form which then ask for a lot of private information – I’m not saying they don’t work, however, how likely is it that a client would provide (accurate) personal information to a company without first building an element of trust? 2) Understand Who Your Target Audience Is. One differentiating factor of Property365 which I believe really sets us apart is the thought behind who the target audience is for each paid post – A large family home for sale or to rent is likely going to appeal to a family with kids, whereas a city studio for rent is likely to appeal to a single professional or student at a nearby university (or an investor, if it were for sale). By really trying to understand who the target audience is and how to reach them, you’re able to make the most out of any money spent on the advert by ensuring it’s shown to the right people. These are simple examples, yet so many agencies are spending money and not narrowing down their audiences. For fun: Let’s imagine you listed a beachfront section in a small ‘holiday’ town – Who would you promote this listing to and how would you narrow down the audience? 3) Long Term Consistency Is Key! Much like building up a successful business, it’s going to take consistency and it’s not going to happen overnight. I often suggest to people that if they’re not going to actively post content on their business pages, then perhaps consider removing the page and focus on the areas where they are active – if a potential client were to find their social media and see the last post was over a year ago, it may give the wrong impression that they’re not active in real estate. You may also be thinking “I don’t want to post videos of myself talking to the camera, it’s embarrassing.” No worries, you don’t have to, there are many other ways to create engaging and informative content without needing to talk to a camera. However, if you are comfortable creating videos of yourself, then it can be a very effective way of engaging with potential clients who may start feeling like they already know you a bit more personally without actually having met you, besides, embarrassment is often the cost of entry to something new and although I often see people in real estate posting some ’embarrassing’ content, they are also doing more than those who aren’t trying anything. Real estate is an industry where the average person may only have a real estate need a handful of times during their lifetime. So although it may feel demotivating to see your post reached 3000+ people, but you didn’t get a response, it’s important to consider that there’s a very high chance that very few, if any, of those people had a real estate need at that time of seeing your content….
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