Realtor Marketing

Local Business Marketing Plan

When you are marketing a local business online, you may feel like you are a tiny company fighting huge rivals at a disadvantage. It is true, you can not compete with a national company’s budget and resources… so what you need is an online marketing plan that leverages your advantages to put you on top.

You are Local and that Matters.

When you are marketing a local business online you can show off things about your company that the national guys can not offer. Things like the local employees and owners that live in the community and understand it, their passion and personality should be front and center in your marketing plan.

Example: I often talk about Realtor Marketing Online, because one of my clients is a local broker who has set out to dramatically reshape his company’s presence online this year. To do so, the marketing plan we created for him focused on sharing his company’s amazing skill set through online content.

This online content takes the shape of blog posts, data driven market reports, informational videos, and sharing it all through social media. When you are talking to a real estate broker who wants to take his business to the next level, what type of marketing plan would you suggest? Real Estate is a VERY local business… the product never moves, so it is clearly a local marketing plan that leverages the fact that they know the community and the market that is needed.

For this account we demonstrate his employee’s ties to the community and why his brokerage is the number one brokerage in both homes sold and average selling price. We don’t just send out every home he lists and call it a day, we make online content like this video:

And we create compelling online content that brings value to his customers and potential customers, like this:

What this online content does is accomplish a few things that are crucial to the success of marketing a local business online:

Demonstrate your expert status
Let people get to know you and identify with you as a person in their community
Show that your knowledge leads to results
Offer them information for free that helps them understand your business

Your Business Can Compete

The game has changed but you are still positioned to come out on top as a local business, so many industries have been turned upside down by the ease of connecting online. Instead of suffering from this change I encourage you to take the opportunity to share your skills, knowledge, and ability to help people with the business they do in the markets you serve.

Whether you sell Instructional Seminars, Chicken Parmesan, Million Dollar Homes, or Designer Jeans.

Thanks for reading, and be sure to shoot me any questions, comments, or ideas. Plus please subscribe to my updates above in that BIG orange box. You can find me @Spirocks on Twitter.

Realtor Websites Suck, Here is Why

Spiro Pappadopoulos

This is the next in my series of suck posts, because it’s time for a change in how Realtors address the internet.

Why? Because Most Realtor Websites Suck, and I know why:

Technology moves fast and yet many Realtors are still filling out paper ad requests and calling it a day on marketing.
The use of the Internet by real estate consumers took off and crafty companies sold mediocre websites to Realtors who think they are done with their ‘internet presence’.
MLS data conglomerates like Trulia, Zip Realty, Realtor.com, and Homes.com, have the resources to outdo the individual who uses a pre-made MLS regurgitating website, rendering them more like brochures than resources.
Most Realtors don’t have the time, expertise, or desire to build a great web presence so they use a template reseller, and check off the website box in their mind.

Realtors are people, and People are different. Putting your name on a website that hundreds on other realtors use in your region is not good enough. Ask yourself what value does it add, why do I have it, and where am I going with it?

Yes I am talking to you, with your nifty RLS2000 site, it has all the words you need. MLS search, lead generator, a blog. You have your own web address you can send people to, but guess what, they are not using it. Instead they go to trulia or zip realty and they get what they are looking for there.

Why? Because MLS data is a commodity now, and your site offers it in a restrictive way: Sign up to search, check out the little pictures, search for only one MLS# at a time. In short your website sucks. Sorry but you can choose to deal with it, or fork over hundreds of dollars a year to maintain your status as: I Own a sucky website.

What Realtors Should Do with Their Personal/Brokerage Sites

I didn’t come here to just tell you your site sucked, I came here with a solution so put away your knives. If you are ready to make a change, get outside of your comfort zone a little bit, and step out of the pack of people who check off their web to do list by paying for a cookie cutter site that regurgitates MLS data keep reading.

An Online Marketing Argument for Non-Believers

Spiro Pappadopoulos

I am writing today to those of you who don’t think your business would benefit, or those who are not taking part in your companies inevitable involvement in online marketing. So if this is you, take a few moments and read on.

Online Marketing Relies on the Interconnections between People Online

The following explanation has its roots in the study of Stanley Milgram, who was an American social psychologist who was fascinated by all aspects of social order. For more details on his studies you can see this recent article on PSYBLOG.

I intend to focus on his studies of the interconnectedness of human societies.

In 1969 he conducted an experiment which sent letters to random people in Nebraska or Boston and asking them to forward it to someone who might be more likely to know the target person, who lived in Massachusetts (Travers & Milgram, 1969).

He found that on average it would take 5.2 intermediaries for his letter to go from the first person to its destination, via each person’s social network.

This was 1969 and the experiment required the subjects to overcome the relatively high obstacle of physically mailing something, and to rely on their social network which (without the online networking tools of today) was significantly smaller, yet it still only took 5.2 intermediaries to find its mark.

This Number is Surely Lower Today

With the average number of online connections reaching the thousands the ability to sort and direct information today is much higher than when this study was conducted.

Here is a Facebook insight Statistic from a recently launched real estate company Facebook Page:

Notice two stunning statistics here: 87 people have liked the page, and if they all shared the page’s next post, it would reach 24,885 people. Amazing isn’t it? That is 286 friends per person who liked the page, and what this does not tell us is how many connections those friends of fans would bring to the table.

Social Networks (Share on Them) But Host Your Own Website

Spiro Pappadopoulos

Why Host Your Own Website, Social Networks Host a Page for You for Free?

Today Posterous got bought by Twitter, and likely will fade away and be shut down in the not too distant future. It follows a long line of other social networks, some alive but irrelevant like MySpace, and others that have been shut down completely.

The image above is from The Next Web delivering the news today, and those who have built their web presence around a Posterous space are now left to either try and move it or start anew. I am here to explain why you cshould choose a wordpress sefl hosted site over other social networks.

This moving around could all be avoided, and should be avoided at all costs, by any business who wants an online presence. You need to create and host your own content, on your own website, and it is easy and not that much money either.

I host all my sites (15+) on one Bluehost account which runs about $5.95 a month, then I build them on wordpress using the genesis framework of amazing WordPress themes. You can check them out here: StudioPress Themes for WordPress, by using wordpress I can log in from any browser and post/edit/manage my website without needing any software on whichever computer or device I am using. I can also use the wordpress app on any iOS or Android device to make the edits. It truly is as simple as can be imagined for a self hosted website. I am an affiliate of both of these companies and you can see them in action here on spirocks.com, I love using them.

But You Want to Be on these Social Networks

You can be, in fact you will get more out of social networks this way. Here is how the workflow goes:

Create Content for your blog. Video, Text, Photos, etc.
Share the link to that post on your Facebook, Twitter, Posterous, Tumblr, Pinterest, Etc…
When people click on those posts they are led back to your website/blog and you get a chance to show them more.

Now in this scenario if Posterous is gone, all you lose is the links from your blog that you shared there, not the actual content that you spent time, effort, and money creating.

It is clearly the way to go, and sooner or later there is always a new popular site, and a fading older one, so why not be a part of them while they are vibrant and not lose anything when they fade away?

What are your thoughts?

Find me on Twitter and say HI here: @Spirocks and be sure to subscribe to my updates above.

Blog is the Foundation — Your Blog is Your Online Foundation

This is 2012, the Year of Humanizing Video

Spiro Pappadopoulos

Avoiding the onslaught of 2012 posts in the last week of 2011 is almost as impressive as avoiding them in the first week of 2012. Now that I accomplished that, I have started the year of in a way that will define my success and that of my marketing clients.

Video

People have been video blogging for a while, to great effect, so this isn’t some new idea. What sets it apart is the scale, the professionalism, and the focus of the video. I am not going to sit here and give you some bullshit list of the equipment you need, or start sitting in front of my web cam talking to you like a preacher, nor am I going to share 15 second cell phone video clips.

Video has the ability to humanize you, to make people comfortable with you, to bring out your personality, to convey the inflection in your voice, and the smirk on your face. Video can squeeze an hour of reading into minutes, and gives your audience the ability to identify with you like never before.

If you sell homes for a living, you are asking somebody you barely know to entrust you with their most valuable possession. To listen to your advice on how much that possession is worth, and to accept when you suggest they take less than that to make a deal. If you are marketing yourself by mailing out 5×7 cards with your four year old headshot on them, by sending out packets that include fifteen award certificates from your parent realty company to everyone who lists their home for sale by owner, and lastly by taking out an ad in the local paper that gets recycled the same day it is distributed… your chances of excelling in the future gets slimmer by the day.

Truth be told you actually might make more money by stopping all marketing and just living off of walk ins at your office, phone calls to your office, and your network of friends and past customers. That is not what marketing is for, and believe me whatever industry you are in, if you are doing all the same impersonal marketing techniques as everyone else it is not money well spent.

How Does Video Apply?

Well for one, it allows your prospective clients to see you, hear you, and get to know you. You know what the best part is? Getting to know you will sort out the best clients for you, and that means it will turn some in other directions. That is a good thing, believe it or not because those that it doesn’t turn away are more likely to believe in you more than they would if you played it safe by hiding behind certificates and old photos. More likely to believe the real you with your confidence in yourself to go in front of the lens, to pull back the curtain, and to share you with them, is the right person for their need.

Those people call more often, sign up more often, and drive your business to a place it has not been before. Everyone won’t love you, but more people will than did before.

I put my money where my mouth is, and started a video series:

One that chronicles days in my life, it is a broad series without a specific work focus unlike what a client would have. It is daily, and personal, and it has people viewing it I never thought would. Here is one:

Now my video series is a bit wild for most business people, I try my best and fail often to control my language (mostly for my niece) and the editing is done on the fly so it isn’t as polished as what I would do for a client. But one thing is for sure, you see the real me, and you decide if I could be someone you could work with. You get to know my beautiful fiance and my friends, I am me. Like it or not, its true and you would figure it out sooner or later so I shoot for sooner.

2012 Will See Me Roll Out Multiple Creative Video Series for Clients

Clients that either get it, or are willing to do something different with genuine hope and belief that it will be a good idea. I am pitching and working on these campaigns as we speak and I can’t wait to get them live so I can share them, and the norm busting business people who are going for something bigger this year. These videos will help them find their fans, future customers, and their place in the market. A place I intend on making the top.

Are you ready for people to get to know you yet? Well planned video, made with style and originality, and delivered via websites, blogs, and social media, is a choice that few will make. That is why it is powerful.

I am doing it today.

@spirocks on Twitter is where I do my thing, say Hi.

Google Plus Customer Management

Spiro Pappadopoulos

So I am embarking on a new project with my clients, to utilize the tools google has given us in Google plus to organize and market to their customers, prospective customers, and the world in general. First we are using gmail to maintain customer database, and then we are organizing these customers into circles by things they have in common. For instance a realtor is grouping buyers into price range circles, and town circles. In this way she will be able to share only that which is relevant to each group and never be intrusive.

Here is a video explaining a bit more about circles:

Even if the customer is not using Google Plus she will receive an email notifying her of what the realtor is sharing, the versatility of Google Plus will allow my client to share the stunning photos, videos, and written work we do with her in a variety of ways. Gmail will allow her to record all pertinent contact details both at her computer and via her smartphone. Here is the variety of information that Gmail will manage for each customer:

As you can see for a small business or professional the contact data is clearly sufficient with multiple notes sections that can be added for further customization. Couple that with the amazing google plus sharing technology, including video chat, and you have a dynamic FREE CMR and Marketing solution for the mobile entrepreneur and professional.

I will explain further in this video:

Let me know what you think in the comments, or hit me up on twitter: @spirocks

What Do Only You Do?

Spiro Pappadopoulos

Its crazy but business owners often forget WHY customers come to them. Chances are you are one of them, I think about things like this all the time and occasionally I catch myself doing exactly that too. It is weird, and it is costly.

Why do customers choose you?

Is it your location, a skill that only you have, a recipe, a willingness to do things others are too lazy to do? Are you the most dedicated, do you always smile? Is there a single thing that you can point to that brings in customers that none of your competitors can claim?

Chance are there are more than one, but even if it is just one thing, all is not lost. You have that one thing. Ask Google if that worked for them.

Leverage the Hell out of it.

Take that one advantage and figure out a way to make sure as many people as heavenly possible know that about you or your business. If you perform 100 services that mimic other companies, but two that only you do, talk about those two.

If you have a restaurant that grows its own basil to infuse vodka with, and your basil lemon gimlet is amazing, you should talk about that as opposed to the $2 Bud Light Drafts. Sure $2 is a great deal but are you differentiating yourself? Are your marketing pitches interesting or the same as every other going through the motions marketer?

Do me a favor, I know you want to make more money by bringing in more customers. That we agree on, but can we agree on what marketing is and is not?

Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large. – American Marketing Association

That seems about right, the key being that you are communicating offers that have value for your audience. That VALUE is the key, and that is why I am asking you to think about what only you do. The things that only you do are where your intrinsic value lies to the customer you seek.

Find it, Embrace it, Share it, and Build On it.

Thanks for checking this out, if you are marketing yourself or your business, or are doing marketing for others, I would love to help you. With the software tools and experience we have at our disposal at GuestFeed let us know what your challenge is and I will personally offer you a plan of attack.

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Why Realtors Need Professional Social Media Content

Spiro Pappadopoulos

It seems like Real Estate was made to be marketed online, the time, travel, and money it saves to sort through homes first online makes it hard to imagine a time when we would have to drive around to see a bunch of property we had no desire to buy. Social media provides the connections to people that a Realtor needs to show the property they are selling.

Take this quote from Beverly K. Thorne, Senior Vice President, Marketing Century 21 Real Estate LLC

“With approximately 94% of home buyers starting their home search online, we turned our focus to driving these consumers directly to Century 21 brokers and their agents. This decision was not always popular with all of our system brokers; however, the results have proven that it was a sound strategic decision. In the first year of digital strategy, we realized a 65% increase in leads to our franchisees, while decreasing our cost per lead by 50%. Since that time, we have increased our leads by an additional 40% and cut our cost per lead incrementally by 33%.”