5 Reasons Smart Agents ALWAYS Send Just Listed/Just Sold Postcards

Apr 3, 2023

Real estate agents are always looking for ways to increase their exposure and generate leads. One effective marketing strategy that has stood the test of time is sending Just Listed and Just Sold postcards.

If you’re wondering why even the highest-producing agents still spend time on this marketing tactic, read on.

Five Reasons Why Smart Real Estate Agents Continually Send Just Listed/Just Sold Postcards:

Builds brand awareness

Just Listed and Just Sold postcards are an excellent way to build brand awareness. By sending regular updates on your recent listings and sales, you remind potential clients of your expertise in the field. This can help you stand out in a crowded market and increase the likelihood that clients will choose you over competitors.

Even if you don’t have any current listings or solds of your own, you can still send a postcard announcing to your farm or targeted neighborhood what property was just sold or just listed in the area.

Or highlight a property listed or sold by someone in your office. This can still trigger inbound leads for you.

Targets potential clients

Sending postcards to a targeted audience can help you reach potential clients looking to buy or sell a property. You can purchase mailing lists segmented by location, income, and occupation, making it easy to target your ideal demographic.

Creates a personal touch

In today’s digital age, getting lost in the noise of email and social media is easy. By sending a physical postcard, you can create a personal touch that sets you apart from competitors. A postcard is tangible, and people are more likely to remember it than an email or a social media post.

And I often hear of agents who show up to a listing appointment and are shown the collection of their postcard mailings that have been kept by the homeowner.

It’s cost-effective marketing

Compared to other forms of marketing, sending postcards is a relatively inexpensive and fast way to get in front of prospects in your market. This makes it an affordable way to reach potential clients and generate leads.

Generates referrals

Just Listed and Just Sold postcards can generate referrals from your existing clients. When people receive your postcard, they may share it with friends or family members who are interested in buying or selling a property. This can help you generate leads without having to do any additional marketing.

Bottom line

Just Listed and Just Sold postcards are a highly effective marketing strategy that has been proven effective time and time again.

By sending regular real estate activity updates to potential clients, you can build brand awareness, target your ideal demographic, create a personal, tangible touch, and generate referrals.

If you’re a real estate agent looking to increase your exposure and generate leads, consider adding Just Listed and Just Sold postcards to your marketing strategy.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks these boxes but is also a business-building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. – Click Here

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Become-A-Listing-Legend-3D-Book-White-274x300.jpg

Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here

Make an Unforgettable Impression with your Real Estate Website

Mar 29, 2023

According to a study by Nielsen Norman Group, your website visitors will leave your homepage within 10 to 20 seconds unless you give them a reason to stay.

“To gain several minutes of user attention, you must clearly communicate your value proposition within 10 seconds.”

Lose visitors here, where they land, and you’ve lost them forever. This page is your curb appeal – your first chance to make such an unforgettable impression that they will register and return.

Who is landing on your site’s homepage?

Knowing your audience is marketing 101, and figuring out who comprises your site’s audience is a no-brainer: a real estate consumer, either a buyer or a seller.

Naturally, a homebuyer wants to see listings, but that’s not all your visitors are searching for. A NAR study found that these visitors also crave information on the purchase process, from getting a loan to closing on the purchase.

Homeowners thinking of selling want information about that process, and many visitors will want to learn more about you, your services, and what you’re like to work with.

To keep these people on your site long enough to convert them to a lead requires making your home page the best it can be. Let’s look at one of the most important fixes you can perform on your real estate website.

Customize your homepage

The area that shows up before you begin scrolling down the page is known as “above the fold.” It’s your homepage’s most valuable real estate, so not one inch of space should be disregarded.

The most common mistake agents make on this part of the page is not mentioning their location. Most of the sites we viewed before writing this included the name of the brokerage, the agent’s name, and his or her phone number and email address.

Aside from a handful of agents, all sites lacked any mention (above the fold) of where the agent works. None of them mention a city, a community, or even the state that the agent serves.

Let visitors know, above the fold, that they’ve landed in the right place. The best way to do this is to localize the text that came with your site.

Something as simple as changing “YOUR DREAM HOME AWAITS” to “YOUR DREAM HOME IN ANYWHEREVILLE AWAITS” will let visitors know they’ve found a local real estate site, and it will help search engines get that too.

Scroll down your homepage, and you’ll find plenty of other localizing opportunities on the homepage. For instance, “SEARCH FOR HOMES” can be “SEARCH FOR HOMES IN ANYWHEREVILLE” and transform “Selling your Home” to “Selling your Anywhereville Home.”

Aside from posting your best and most flattering review above the fold, customizing and localizing the first page a potential client might see will help visitors and SEO.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

How to Market your Real Estate Team, so they STAND OUT!

Mar 22, 2023

Although there is no “typical” home sale, the process shares many similarities. As you know, most for-sale homes are advertised in the MLS and have a sign out front and a lockbox on the door.

How many agents do you know who either hesitate to spend the money required to robustly market their listings or lack the know-how? These agents consider the three previously-mentioned tasks a good marketing program and leave it at that.

Team Homes & Life Magazine, See more, **HERE**

However, we know you beg to differ when it comes to the significant investment that is your clients’ home.

Since you aren’t like those other agents, you need to get the word out. Not all real estate teams are alike; you’ll want to point this out in your real estate team’s marketing.

“No, it doesn’t “take a village” to sell a home in [“Our Town], but to sell it for the most money the market will provide requires a team.”

Comparisons you might want to consider include:

Services you offer that other area agents don’t, such as various programs popular with real estate consumers.

These include the “Worry-Free Listing,” wherein the client can cancel your listing anytime, no questions asked. A free pre-market home inspection, free move-out house cleaning, free anything really, and a discounted commission (sorry, but it is wildly popular).

Brag about team members and their role in your real estate business and community. For instance, if you have an on-staff transaction coordinator, write about his/her duties and how this person will be their point person during the transaction. “Someone to call with any questions or concerns.”

Your marketing plan. Explain how it’s proven to work and why.

The Photo Introduction Postcard is shown above. See more **HERE.**

The proof of that is in your sales statistics:

If you have a decent sales record, tout it. For instance, compare the number of homes your team sold last year to those of the “average real estate” agent or team.
Do your team’s listings sell faster, on average, than homes listed by solo agents or other teams? Shout it out from your marketing materials and website.
Do your listings sell for more than yours of other teams? We recently spoke with an agent in Spokane, Washington, who said he checked his stats for this, and his listings only sell for 1.6% more. Although that doesn’t sound like much, break it down to a figure.

“At the [Name of Market], the average home-sale price works out to nearly $6,500 more for the seller than another team will bring in.”

These are just random considerations when you first think about forming a team. You’ll find tons of good information online, including Linsell’s article at theclose.com and Matt McGee’s piece at homelight.com.

Finally, look at Ben Kinney’s “LEVERAGE – Team UP! How to Build a Team” YouTube video.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Starting a Real Estate Team? Here are a Few Things to Consider

Mar 20, 2023

Imagine a trip to a doctor’s office. You approach the front counter, and there she is, ready to check you in for your appointment. Then, she is, again, prepared to accompany you from the waiting room to the exam room. She performs your exam and is at the desk out front to take your check for your insurance co-pay and schedule your next appointment.

Aside from seeing patients at various times during the day, this doctor will clean exam rooms after each patient leaves, call-in prescriptions to pharmacies, order and interpret diagnostic tests, work on bookkeeping, schedule appointments for other patients, follow up on telephone messages, meet with pharmaceutical company representatives and clean the office.

If this were your doctor, we’d bet you would think she’s either crazy or arrogant. After all, she’s most likely not a trained bookkeeper, administrative assistant, or skilled in sanitation practices in physicians’ offices.

The Market Update Postcard is shown above. See more **HERE**

When any professional works in a practice with many moving parts, it’s simply foolish to presume to wear all the hats.

Many agents across the country figured this out long ago. “We aren’t professional photographers or stagers. Nor are we phone specialists or transaction coordinators. And, we don’t want to be any of those,” says a friend and agent in Los Angeles, California.

This is why this agent built a team, offering professional specialists to each client. In her estimation, this team’s approach to real estate has made her so successful.

When you reach a specific volume, taking your business to the next level requires assistance. Most agents start with admin help.

However, the next level is to build a real estate team.

Structuring your team

Before you jump into the hiring process, consider how you’ll structure your team. This helps you learn who you need to hire and which skills to be on the lookout for. Check out Chris Linsell’s brilliant but simple Real Estate Organizational Chart at theclose.com.

To give you an idea of how to staff your team, take a look at our California friends:

3 listing coordinators
3 staging strategists
An architectural photographer
Marketing Coordinator
6 phone specialists to attract and reach out to potential buyers
17 buyers’ agents

Photo Introduction postcard. See more, **HERE.**

Naturally, you won’t need this many team members when you start but consider adding as your business increases.

Each cog in the aforementioned well-oiled wheel works in tandem with the others. For instance, the phone team recently received a call from a homebuyer interested in one of the team’s listings.

“The call came in at 10:30 on a Saturday morning,” according to our friend. “Our phone specialist returned the call two minutes later, at 10:32, and alerted one of the showing agents on the team. This agent met with the buyers to show them the home at 1 p.m. An hour later, they wrote an offer. This team approach had our listing sold in four hours.”

Impressive, right?

Check back soon for more ideas on forming a real estate team.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Do Your Sellers Understand How Vital Curb Appeal is in the Current Market?

Mar 15, 2023

Although the return on investment for home improvements isn’t as significant as it once was, some home renovations are still wise investments and increase value, especially in a changing or down market.

The latest research finds that curb appeal can add “… up to 7% of a home’s value when sold,” according to associate professor Sriram Villupuram who led a study from the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA).

“The curb appeal premium is more pronounced during housing market weakness …” the study concluded.

Let’s look at some of the study’s findings that you can pass on to your listing clients to help them get more money at the closing table.

The Curb Appeal postcard from the Content Card Series is shown above. To see this card or more options, Click HERE.

New siding/paint

When considering ways to increase curb appeal, you can’t go wrong by recommending your clients get new siding.

This will increase the homeowner’s “… home value by about $12,500, claims CreditKarma.com’s Andrew Dunn, citing a recent real estate Cost vs. Value report. “This also assumes that about 1,250 square feet of new siding were installed and represents a 67% return on investment,” he concludes.

If your listing lacks siding, urge your clients to paint the home’s exterior. While estimates of the ROI for fresh paint are varied, “…it’s the least expensive investment for the biggest return,” according to Jennie Norris with the International Association of Home Staging Professionals.

Be the agent-in-the-know by offering suggestions on current trends. These include “… colors in the ‘greige’ family,” suggests Mekaila Oaks at Redfin.com. She claims that Kelly Moore’s ‘Gallery Gray,’ with ‘Desert Shadow’ as an accent color, will have buyers getting out of their cars and in the front door.

Add new windows

Not only will the addition of new, energy-efficient windows offer an 85% return on your client’s investment, but they may just be able to get a nice tax credit to boot.

Suggest to your clients a visit to energy.gov to learn how to shop for energy-efficient windows.

Spiff up the landscaping

Landscaping renewal’s ROI has been the subject of many studies over the past decade. “Numerous studies have shown that trees increase the value of a property from 3.5 to 27 percent,” according to the experts at the Arbor Day Foundation.

They go on to say that “An analysis of 844 single-family homes that sold in Athens, Georgia, revealed that houses with an average of five trees (regardless of species) in the front yard sold for 3.5 to 4.5 percent more than comparable houses without trees.”

Recommend that your sellers visit ArborDay.org’s tree database to find trees growing well in your area.

Then, suggest they remove weeds, green up the lawn, plant some color and apply fresh mulch to the beds.

There are workarounds to the uncertainty of the current market. Ensure your clients understand that curb appeal can either compel buyers to get out of the car to view the rest of the house or drive to their next showing.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

A Fun Way to Generate Real Estate Leads!

Mar 10, 2023

“A recent poll revealed 66% of Americans aren’t friends with their neighbors,” according to Susan Meyer at thezebra.com. More than one-fourth of those surveyed, however, took part in neighborhood groups online.

While the internet has whittled away many Americans ‘real-life relationships, all it takes is one person to rally neighbors into turning a neighborhood into a community.

Your position in the community as a facilitator in home purchases and sales makes you the perfect person to get the ball rolling.

Did we also mention that it’s an amazing lead-generation strategy as well?

Getting to know the neighbors

There are plenty of ways to get to know your neighbors. If you like to walk, make it a point when folks are out and about, working in the yard or the garage. Stop and say hi, introduce yourself, and ensure that you remember their names.

If this tactic doesn’t expose you to enough neighbors, try door knocking, leaving postcards, or door hangers introducing yourself on the doors unanswered.

The Photo Introduction Series is shown above. To learn more, Click HERE.

Become a one-person welcome wagon

Visiting new neighbors with a housewarming gift in hand not only makes them feel a sense of community but it’s something they won’t forget. You’ll be forever memorable.

The gift can be as simple as a list including contact information for:

Utility companies they’ll need to call
Pool service providers
Handyman/woman
Highly rated doctors, dentists, and veterinarians
Child care options
Any other mentions you think someone new to the neighborhood may appreciate

Create an event to bring everyone together

This idea can be used later in your relationship with neighbors or as a first step instead of visiting each one individually.

The type of event you create depends on how many neighbors you expect to show up and your budget.

It could be as simple as a barbecue at your home, a neighborhood cleanup event, or the ever-popular movie-in-the-park.

Whatever you choose to do, ensure you take lots of photos and then follow up with each attendee.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

The Studied Impact of Sending Real Estate Marketing Over and Over Again

Mar 6, 2023

Marketing is a crucial part of any business, specifically a real estate business because it helps in the following ways,

It promotes your services to target audiences,
Builds brand recognition,
And generate leads and sales.

However, for marketing to be effective, it must be seen by consumers repeatedly.

There is a term for this: “Brand Conditioning.” Over time, this type of marketing of a product or service results in a higher conversion rate due to increased consumer confidence.

Repeat exposure to a brand or message is necessary for the brand to psychologically impact consumer behavior – it’s the true science of marketing.

Here are Five Ways Repeat Exposure to Real Estate Marketing Works:

Reason # 1 – Repeat exposure helps to build brand recognition.

Consumers must be familiar with your brand to trust it enough to consider using your services. The term for this is “Brand awareness.”

Brand awareness measures how memorable and recognizable your brand is to a target audience.

With repeat exposure, consumers become more familiar and more likely to remember your brand, thus increasing brand confidence and awareness.

Once they understand your brand, they can differentiate it from other competing brands as well.

The Looking For Listings Scheduled Campaign is shown above. To learn more, Click HERE.

Reason #2 – Repeat exposure helps to reinforce the message you are delivering.

When consumers are exposed to your message multiple times, they are more likely to remember what’s special about you and your business; your value proposition.

A value proposition is a service or feature about your real estate business that makes you attractive to customers. Hopefully, it is unique as well.

An example might be, “my years of experience allow me to sell homes faster”.

Understanding your message has a stronger impact on their long-term behavior toward your business.

Reason #3 – Repeat exposure to your message is important for the lead generation cycle.

When a consumer is exposed to your brand multiple times, they’re more likely to take action and reach out to you for your services.

This is because your brand message is reinforced with each mailing that you send and the consumer is more likely to remember it when making a decision on a realtor.

In fact, scientific studies have proven a consumer needs to be exposed to the marketing of a business on average 20 times to be sold on using that service or buying that product.

It takes seeing the marketing 5 times before a consumer will stop and read it.

Reason # 4 – Repeat exposure to your brand illustrates your professionalism and ups your credibility.

It demonstrates that you are committed to marketing, including delivering a consistent and strong message over time.

This is perceived by the consumer as a form of marketing or a level of professionalism that you will likely carry through to your real estate clients and the marketing of their homes.

As they say, “the proof is in the putting.” You can tell a potential client how much you will market for them, but showing them through your marketing is a much more powerful demonstration.

Reason #5 – Repeat exposure to your branding is essential for developing relationships.

By delivering a consistent brand message, you can build relationships with your target audience as they slowly get to know you better and rely on your content.

They begin to see you as the local area expert based on the “Just Sold” and Just Listed” success stories you send them, the educational content they receive from you, and the local area market stats you share.

Now that you understand the importance of marketing repetition

Launching a scheduled postcard campaign is an easy way to get in front of your market and stay there long enough to develop the brand recognition we’ve discussed above.

ProspectsPLUS! offers over 40 scheduled postcard campaigns in various niches, and it takes only seconds to set one up.

Once your campaign is launched, your postcards are automatically delivered month after month to your market while you attend to other high-level tasks.

To learn more about scheduled campaigns, Click HERE.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Right Now, Your Real Estate CRM is Worth its Weight in Gold. Here’s Why!

Feb 28, 2023

Back in the dinosaur days of real estate, a simple Rolodex, populated with the contact information of people in an agent’s sphere, ruled the day in most real estate businesses.

As technology advanced from those tiny 2.25-inch x 4-inch Rolodex cards, agents demanded more bells and whistles, which resulted in today’s sophisticated Customer Relationship Management platforms.

With the market in flux, it’s a good time for the less-than-busy agent to get to know their CRM and reacquaint themselves with the gold mine it is.

How about starting a drip campaign to drum up some business?

One of the best ways to grow your business and stay top of mind with your network is by reaching out to each person consistently over time.

Many agents swear by their drip campaigns, sending either automated emails or direct mail out to selected contacts in their CRM. However, how frequently you contact these people sits on a fine line between reaching out and spamming.

Some experts claim that dripping on these folks once a week is going to eventually get your marketing materials tossed in the trash or blocked from delivery to your contacts entirely – especially if they don’t plan on moving for a year or so.

A monthly email is more appropriate – even longer is fine. Just making consistent contact without annoying people is what’s most important.

You have one chance to lure these recipients into reading your drip campaign, which occurs with your first attempt.

The Content Card Series is shown above. To see more designs, Click HERE.

Depending on your database’s size, you may have to create several focused campaigns. Some of the categories to think about include quick (the operative word here) information for:

Homebuyers
Sellers
Condo buyers
FHA or VA buyers

To stay top-of-mind with past clients, think about sending information on their interests:

Gardening
Interior decorating and design trends
Green living
Food
Birthday, anniversary, new baby, and other greetings

The Content Card Series offers many of the topics listed above. Whatever you choose to send, make it count. Wow, them – make the recipients look forward to the next one.

Face-to-Face

Sometimes a face-to-face encounter is called for. Many successful agents plan client-appreciation events periodically throughout the year or one splashy annual event.

One California agent uses her CRM to classify her clients according to how big their sphere of influence is. Those with a huge network of contacts she calls her “A” group and those are the ones she tends to go a bit above and beyond to maintain the relationships.

Her preferred method is to never miss their birthday by issuing a lunch invitation for birthday week. Pricey? Perhaps, but memorable and tax-deductible as well.

Follow up with industry colleagues

Stick all those people you do business with on a regular basis into your CRM too. Begin building relationships with them by attending networking events or even holding your own for title company representatives, escrow people, lenders, contractors, plumbers, home inspectors, and electricians.

Client retention is business promotion at its subtlest, and your CRM is the most valuable tool you have right now.

While letting people know you value them, you plant a seed that will hopefully blossom into a big, fat pipeline full of referrals.

Be sure to check out the CRM that we offer to our customers FOR FREE. It allows you to grab contacts from various customer lists, target them with specific marketing meant just for them, and keep historical notes and personal data (i.e., birthdays, family members, home anniversary dates, etc.).

To check out our FREE Contact Manager, Click HERE.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

The International Real Estate Client Niche, Part Two – a Deeper Dive

Feb 22, 2023

Recently, we discussed how working with international real estate clients can be a lucrative niche. We also took a look at how to break into the niche. Here in Part II, we take a deeper dive into that topic.

Build a Team

International real estate clients count on you, as a native, to help them navigate the foreign waters of the American real estate process. To provide the best service possible, take the time to build an advisory team that includes key players in international real estate transactions, such as lenders, attorneys, and accountants. Ask other agents who specialize in the global real estate market for referrals to the people they use.

Then build your service team. The most important member of this team may be your assistant. If you don’t speak your potential client’s language, hire an assistant who does. Add a handyman, contractors, inspector, and any other service providers your buyer client may need to make the transaction as smooth as possible.

The Neighborhood Update Series is shown above. To see more options, Click HERE.

Language and Culture

“When compared to other investment vehicles, there is a general preference for real estate investment amongst Chinese clients,” Jonathan Cooper tells Inman News. Cooper calls this a “cultural predisposition” and goes on to explain some of the reasons behind it.

Are you aware of the cultural predispositions of your international client? The geopolitical drivers behind his or her desire to purchase properties in the United States and those behind his or her decision-making processes are important for you to understand.

To help you, Waldenmayer recommends reading “Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands (The Bestselling Guide to Doing Business in More than 60 Countries)” by Terri Morrison and Wayne A. Conaway.

She also suggests keeping abreast of issues affecting your clients in their home country by reading one or two magazines and newspapers covering global affairs and the global economy weekly.

Take a crack at local networking

Consider joining an ethnic organization, such as the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce or the National Association of Asian American Professionals, provided there is a chapter in your area.

Canadian broker Tina Mak, who works with clients from Taiwan and mainland China, tells Inman News’ Bernice Ross that she got her start by becoming active in Asian organizations.

Boca Raton’s Senada Adzem, with Douglas Elliman, keeps an eye on who is buying what in her city. She tells the story of taking a listing in a building that was popular with Brazilian nationals. To sell it, she reached out to the top agents in Brazil and found an international buyer.

Working with buyers from across the globe is a lucrative real estate niche. It’s not easy to break into if you lack the appropriate language and cultural similarities, but building a strong, diverse team can be the key to your success.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Plentiful, High-Quality Photos are a Listing MUST-DO: So Find a Good Photographer

Feb 20, 2023

It’s safe to say that most real estate agents aren’t professional photographers. Most do, however, carry smartphones with them – phones with cameras.

It’s all too tempting to skip the expense of a professional photographer and snap photos of a listing with that handy dandy iPhone.

So, while your clients work their fingers to the bone to get the home ready for the market, in walks their real estate agent, breezing through the house snapping phone photos, then slaps them on the MLS and calls it a day.

Listing Photos DO Matter

Let’s get into the statistics. The National Association of Realtors has found that 92 percent of homebuyers start their search for a home online. Of those people, 98 percent say that the listing photos are the most important information they find.

Nearly all of them!

Then there is the study from Old Dominion University in Norfolk, VA’s Institute for Behavioral and Experimental Real Estate. This study finds that the typical homebuyer won’t even look at a listing that doesn’t include photos, and when he or she does look at a listing, the first thing viewed is the photos.

Finally, another study finds that listings that include professional photography get 61 percent more views than those with agent-generated photos.

So, ok, we know that listing photos are an important aspect of generating interest in a home that’s on the market. But there’s more.

The Photo Introduction Series is shown above. To see more, Click HERE.

Pro vs. Amateur

Now, here’s the study that should make you pay attention. A while back, the Wall Street Journal reported that “At the closing table, listings with nicer photos gain anywhere between $934 and $116,076 . . . over listings using photos from point-and-click cameras.”

Your listing clients are paying you to market their homes so that they make the most money possible in the shortest amount of time. The value of hiring a professional photographer is obvious.

How to choose a real estate photographer

As you gain experience as an agent, you will hope that home sellers will ask you about your past marketing efforts. So, ask the photographers you interview the same question. Ask for recent listing photos. Then, request the following:

Names and phone numbers of agents they’ve worked for.
An itemized list of what his or her fee includes. Pay close attention to how much of the post-production work is included in the price.
If a licensing fee isn’t on that list, ask if the photographer charges one and how much it is.
Ask if he or she will retain the copyrights to the photos.

Don’t neglect your due diligence; call those agents that each photographer has worked for.

Choosing the least expensive photographer is easy, especially as a new agent with limited funds. Keep that temptation at bay by understanding that listing agents who use professional photographers earn more money at closing than those whose listing includes bad photos. (Redfin)

Welcome to the world of real estate!

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

A Lucrative Niche You May Want to Consider -International Real Estate Clients

Feb 15, 2023

Real estate is local – how many times have we heard that one? Real estate buyers, however – especially in certain parts of the country – are increasingly global, and many real estate agents are turning the international real estate client niche into a lucrative living.

Consider this: foreign buyers spent $59 billion dollars on U.S. residential real estate in the last two years, according to the National Association of REALTORS®.

The association also claims that the average sale price ($598,200) and the median of $366,100 were the highest on NAR’s record.

Where is all this money coming from? It depends on, again, local markets. NAR claims that most of it are coming from China, Canada, India, Mexico, and Brazil.

Despite the fact that South Americans are flocking to Miami’s luxury condo market, NAR says that most international purchases are for single-family residences. The study also says that the most preferred cities for foreign buyers are Florida, California, Texas, Arizona, New York, and North Carolina.

So, how does an agent get her fingers in the international real estate pie? Like most niches, it takes time, and it requires a system.

The Shifting Market Series is shown above. To see more designs, Click HERE.

How to break into the niche

Choose an area of specialization. “Because of the wide variation in customs, language, geopolitical and procedural considerations involved in serving international customers and clients, international specialists usually specialize in one or two countries, either related by language or belonging to the same global region,” says Coco Waldenmayer, former managing broker of Engel & Völkers in Naples, Florida.

To select a region in the world that you are best suited to serve, Waldenmayer suggests asking yourself the following questions:

Are you attracted to one continent over others?

What is your familiarity with one or more other cultures?

Does your sphere of influence already include individuals from a certain country?

Have you traveled to the region?

Do you speak the language?

Remember that many international clients come from English-speaking countries even if you don’t speak a foreign language. Aside from the United States, the countries with the highest percentage (not number) of English-speaking residents are:

Australia

United Kingdom

Ireland

Philippines

Canada

Germany

Once you’ve decided on an international farm area, consider obtaining the Certified International Property Specialist designation, which offers exceptional networking opportunities.

There is much more to know about successfully working with international buyers; we’ll be unpacking that in an upcoming article.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

Generate More Listings Through Community Involvement

Feb 15, 2023

Some real estate agents enter the business with a huge sphere of influence to tap for their first deals. A lot of these agents are members of civic organizations, churches, or philanthropic groups. Even parents active in the local PTA come to the business with a list of potential clients.

Sound a bit mercenary?

On the contrary, using your community, social and familial contacts to help you cultivate potential clients makes sense.

“Involvement” is the operative word

One would assume that the busier the real estate agent – the more successful his practice – the less likely he is to volunteer within the community. That assumption is wrong.

Successful agents that understand the power of delegation and hire a staff, even if it’s one assistant, typically have a little time to devote to a community cause or to a personal passion.

When asked how they give back, those who claim they don’t have time to get into the community say they donate money.

While giving to non-profits, charities, churches, and other organizations is commendable, it is not really “community involvement.”

So, don’t let us stop you from writing those checks. We just hope you’ll consider giving some of your time as well.

The Comfort Food Series is shown above. To see more designs, Click HERE.

Mingling online doesn’t count either

The internet has changed many things about the way agents run their businesses, including how they stay in touch with past clients and their spheres. Much of it revolves around the use of social media.

But is social networking comparable to meeting face-to-face within the community?

Don’t get me wrong, being social via tech is valuable to your business. So, mingle online all you want, but it should be in addition to in-person involvement.

Meet and greet

This is where the meat of your community involvement campaign is – those organizations where you can contribute your time and talent and meet lots of folks from the community you serve.

Activities are more relaxed than the typical real estate transaction, so people get to know you as a person, not as a real estate agent.

Let’s face it – there isn’t much that distinguishes one agent from another, but on a personal level, it’s easy to set yourself apart.

Network with a passion

It’s important to pick a cause for which you feel some affinity – preferably a passion. This way, you can focus your efforts on the cause, not the leads. The leads will come – just give it some time.

Of course, if you have a passion – say for helping veterans or tutoring children – half the battle is won right there. If you have lots of interests, do some online research to help pare down the choices. Here are several places to start:

VolunteerMatch

AmericaCorps (ideal for Baby Boomers or those specializing in that niche)

Engage

There are numerous civic clubs to consider as well, such as

Finally, ask your local church or school what kind of help they may need, and if you’re athletic, become a volunteer soccer, baseball, football, or tennis coach.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine