Instagram boasts 1 billion monthly active users with more than 500 million using the platform every day. Being one of the most used platforms in the world, Instagram has completely changed the way businesses work. If you haven’t started marketing your real estate business on Instagram, now is the time. Let’s take a look at how Instagram can help your real estate business take off!
- Show off your listings: Instagram provides just the right tools to showcase your properties through virtual tools and eye-grabbing images.
- Build long-term relationships: Word-of-mouth will always be the best marketing strategy. By connecting and engaging with your past, current and potential buyers you are building relationships that can set off your business. And what’s a better way to engage with your target audience?
- Improve your business reputation: It’s no secret that social media is perfect for boosting the credibility and authenticity of your brand. It allows for a better connection with your target audience, an enhanced sense of engagement and better establishment of your company’s vision and culture.
- Reach the millennials: Without a doubt, you are going to have a difficult time if you are trying to reach millennials through traditional advertising methods like TV, Radio, and Print. So unless you are active on digital, you are losing a significant target group that is just starting their life (and probably looking for their first home too!).
What you need to know before developing your Content Strategy
The first step to expanding your real estate business into the digital world is to develop a kick-ass content strategy that serves your goals and objectives. If you want to find out how… keep reading:
What is your USP?
First off, you will need to identify the solution that your business provides to the customers. Ask yourself what are you trying to sell to your customers? The answer is more than just a property. Dive into your mission and vision and focus on the key areas you are focusing on. Is it quality, is it price, or is it customer service? Identify your Unique Selling Proposition and craft your content strategy accordingly.
What is your target audience?
The next question that needs to be answered is ‘Who are you targeting?’ Knowing your target audience is much more important than it sounds. Make sure to identify your segmentation variables first and segment your audience accordingly. This might be done based on demographic, geographic, psychographic or other segmentation variables. Keep in mind that if you are targeting several segments at once you will probably need to mix up your strategy a little bit. Why? You are probably more likely to sell that beautiful apartment in a crowded city to the career-oriented couple rather than to the elderly married couple.
What are your goals and objectives?
So if you have this all set up you can then proceed on to set your objectives. What are you trying to achieve? Are you trying to raise brand awareness? Are you wishing to increase your sales? Having in mind what you want to achieve will help you build an appropriate content strategy that meets your business goals while keeping your customers interested and engaged
If you have all three questions answered, then you are all ready to start crafting your kick-ass content strategy!
The features that you need to be using
Hashtags are your go-to tool for reaching the people that are likely to be interested in your business. We have done a little search for you and found out the top 20 hashtags for your real estate business. Make sure you use them wisely.
#Realestate
#Realtor
#Newhome
#Househunting
#Homeforsale
#Property
#Listing
#Dreamhome
#Realty
#Housegoals
#Makememove
#Luxuryliving
#Realestateagent
#Homegoals
#Newlisting
#Justsold
#Starterhome
#Realestateexperts
#HUDhome
#Mansion
Stories are another vital feature you should never forget. Make good use of stories and don’t forget to include some GIFs to grab attention. Remember to highlight the stories that you do not want to be forgotten and categorize them according to their purpose. #Listings #Sold #ForRent #ForSale
Expand your reach with Location. Although this feature might sound too simplistic, tagging your location can really help you target people close to the city of your listing. Users that search for that location will be seeing your posts as well.
The Swipe up feature is something that you definitely need to use if you are trying to drive traffic to your blog or business website. In case you have not heard about this again, the swipe up features directs your users to another link by swiping up on your story. This way you can drive users just where you want them to be, to a property, a testimonial or even to your contact information. In order to get access to this tool, you will need to be verified, or have at least 10.000 Instagram followers.
What about content?
Create visually appealing material
This should be on the very first rows of your checklist. Every single communication material you create should be visually pleasing and eye-grabbing. Remember that you will need to stand out from a highly crowded platform within the very few seconds of human’s attention span which has only been decreasing over the last years.
Add variety
Do not stick to the plain, old-school static posts. Instagram is built for much more than that. Add a touch of creativity to your posts and play up with the different formats like videos, carousels, stop-motion, and gifs. Use them creatively to tell a story that your following wants to her. If you want some inspiration go straight to National Geographic’s Instagram account to see some amazing storytelling.
Make it engaging
Even though your job is to sell properties, not every single thing you post should be sales-oriented. Make sure to spice up your content with something that is away from the ordinary and will grab the reader’s attention. Maybe it’s a weekly décor inspiration tip, or maybe it’s a monthly giveaway. This is totally up to you. The important thing to remember is that you will need to use indirect methods to drive engagement to your Instagram account.
But never lose your personality…
Yet as a realtor, you should never lose your business persona, attitude, and personality. This is why your customers have chosen you in the first place and this is why they will keep choosing you over competitors. Make sure that you remain authentic, genuine and honest with your audience.
The 3 Instagram KPIs you should be tracking and monitoring
Reach
The first metric you will need to track is the number of people you reached with your ads. This can help you understand how your content has been disseminating. Make sure to check the audience you have been reaching in order to ensure that you are targeting the audience you are intending.
Engagement
Simply put, engagement records all the likes, comments and social updates your Instagram account receives. This is a very important metric to see how your brand is doing in terms of actively involved with your business.
ROI
Although you are off a good start if you have satisfactory reach and engagement metrics, it is also important to look into the number of people actually interested in making a purchase. In other words, ROI measures how your Instagram investment translates into sales. Are you winning new clients? Are you bringing up past clients? These are all questions that need to be answered.
Aftermath: Get your buyers talking with Instagram!
By the time you have read this article, the number of businesses on Instagram will have definitely increased. This tells us something. Instagram is one of the hottest platforms around the whole world and still has a long way to go.
So you haven’t yet encapsulated Instagram within your marketing strategy, then it’s a high time you do. Instagram is capable of adding significant value to your brand and it can boost your real estate business before you even realize.
