Real estate agents or brokers play many roles. It can be an educator, a negotiator, a neighborhood guide and a salesman. Their most important job, however, is to be a marketer.
In the real estate industry, every successful transaction begins with the contact of the agent or broker with the prospect. Thus, a quick follow-up of the prospect is crucial. One of the invaluable channels for connecting with your prospects today is SMS marketing. It is a fast and reliable platform to contact your potential buyers.
As a real estate agent or business owner, you need to stay innovative and competitive in the market. You need to make the most of every available marketing channel and use them to your advantage. SMS marketing is a channel that you should definitely incorporate into your sales funnel or process. Integrating it with your CRM goes a long way in delivering consistent leads to your pipeline and increasing your conversion rates.
Potential buyers looking for properties online are now estimated at almost 90%. Meanwhile, 30% of the 90s use their cell phones to do research. This trend should be reason enough for real estate agents to use mass texting software and attract a few more clients each month.
Below is a fuller discussion of the power of text messaging for your real estate business.
What types of campaigns can you run through SMS Marketing?
You have three main choices for the type of SMS marketing campaign to run as part of your overall marketing strategy.
Take a closer look at each of them below.
- Text messaging opt-in campaigns – You can build a list for your text messaging marketing efforts, much like the idea of building a mailing list. The advantage of SMS marketing is that you can start building a list using shortcodes. Short codes are an alternative to the usual 10-digit number you’re used to seeing. Shortcodes consist of only five or six digits, so they are instantly memorable.
Your clients can use the shortcodes to text you and learn more about the properties you offer. Shortcodes, along with keywords, are essential in initial opt-in campaigns and follow-ups where you are trying to collect information from prospects such as their cell phone number, email address, zip code and their name.
- Bulk Text Messaging Campaigns – Another benefit of SMS marketing for real estate business owners is the ability to quickly send bulk messages. Most text messaging software lets you upload a list, write a message, schedule the time messages are sent, and hit the start button to begin your campaign. It’s that simple, and then your promotions, reminders, discounts, and event invites reach your target audience in no time. You’ll also have the option to manually reply to messages or set up automated replies to streamline the process.
- P2P Text Messaging Campaigns – P2P or Peer-To-Peer text messaging allows you to send messages to your prospects with the help of agents. All you have to do is upload your contact list and assign batches of contacts to agents. After receiving the data, agents will contact and try to engage with everyone in the contact list in one-to-one conversations. Surprisingly, each of the agents can send around 1,500 texts in an hour and collect data from the conversation with prospects visiting your CRM. If that doesn’t sound fantastic to you as a real estate business owner, then maybe you don’t want to get it right in the marketing aspect of your business.
What information can you include in your real estate SMS marketing campaigns?
The body of your SMS can contain several crucial pieces of information for the success of your marketing campaign. You can customize it to include a link to your website, a link to Google Maps, your contact details, the price of the property, the size of the property, your profile and the address where the property is located.
How do you maximize the power of real estate text messaging?
There are different ways to use text messaging to your advantage as a real estate business owner. Check them out below.
- Advertise your opt-in campaigns via text endorsements – You can place real estate text endorsements outside the property you are selling. Text endorsements are signs that make it easy for potential buyers to sign up to quickly receive communications from you. Prospective owners use real estate text endorsements to get more information about the property they are considering buying. This is an opportunity you should take advantage of and a testament to how text messaging marketing can effectively unleash your business potential.
You can also notify your prospects of your SMS alerts via email or through your website.
- Track “cold leads” using automated messages
You’ve probably experienced this before: a potential buyer inquired about a property you’re selling, but after the initial connection didn’t ask for more and became “cold”. Are you going to let the prospect slip away or try to bring them back into your sales funnel? If you want to sue a potential customer, an automated message can help.
What you can do is send a message after a week that you’ve made the initial connection with the prospect. Include a link to your website in the text so that potential buyers can get a glimpse of what you’re selling right now. An automated message can help your potential buyers review what you can offer them.
Of course, the last thing you want is to make your prospects feel like spam, so a few well-timed messages reminding them of your services will do the trick. An automated message goes a long way in converting a cold prospect into a customer. An unresponsive contact doesn’t mean a lost lead or customer, so don’t give up and send them an automated real estate message.
- Create a keyword for each property in your listing
Keywords can be a significant help when sending prospects the necessary information, especially if they are inquiring about a specific property they are considering buying. For example, you can use keywords such as “A”, “B”, and “C” for three properties in your ad. If the potential buyer texts “C” to your short code, follow it up with information specific to the property associated with the keyword “C”.
- Send photos of the property you are offering via MMS
Most text messaging platforms won’t limit you to just sending words for your marketing campaigns. One of the things that speeds up a prospect’s decision is a great photo of the property you’re trying to sell. Send photos and video presentations to increase the chances that potential buyers will schedule a property viewing with you.
- Increase attendance at open days
Ninety-eight percent of people open and read the text messages they receive, which means it’s one of the most effective ways to let interested buyers know about your open house events. Using the best text messaging platforms, you can send automated messages that remind prospects the day before your open house schedule. You can also share photos via MMS or links to video tours to increase their excitement and spark their interest. Connect with your leads and encourage them to text your keyword so you can automatically follow them two or three days later. There is no doubt that this is an effective way to easily capture open house attendees.
What are the benefits of using text messaging for real estate marketing?
Now that you already know the different types of campaigns you can run in text messaging marketing and how to maximize its power to your advantage as a real estate business owner, it’s time to understand the benefits of using it. Keep in mind, however, that text messaging is just one of many marketing tools that realtors, brokers, and landlords use along with video and social media marketing strategy. So, without further ado, here are some of the benefits of real estate SMS marketing:
- Allows you to personalize your communication with prospects
– The modern generation is now more likely to rent or buy homes if they receive personalized communication from you, which you can achieve with SMS marketing. Yes, other tools such as email remain essential, but they are often impersonal for your prospects.
- Streamlines the lead generation process – As you already know, the real estate market is getting more and more competitive every year, which makes every lead valuable. That said, you should take advantage of the lead capture system offered by real estate SMS marketing so that you spend less money and time on attracting, nurturing, and converting leads.
- Send reminders and schedule appointments much faster – Appointment booking has become faster and more comfortable than ever thanks to text message technology. This is also true when it comes to reminding customers of scheduled meetings, appointments, and open house events. With real estate SMS marketing, you may have the ability to sync the software with your calendar to receive an alert about upcoming appointments and send automated reminders to prospects regarding the calendar.
- It is affordable compared to other forms of marketing – Admit it, nothing can compare to SMS marketing when it comes to affordability. It’s an inexpensive option for sending bulk messages, delivering critical information, and capturing more leads quickly.
Conclusion
SMS marketing is an affordable tool that offers many benefits to real estate business owners, property managers, brokers and agents. And the discussion above is an insight into the power of this marketing platform if used correctly. All of the things mentioned in this article make text messaging not only useful, but also a necessary tool to incorporate into your marketing strategy.
