As a real estate photography and visual marketing company, we are always interested in understanding which marketing strategies work for our clients. We also like to know which strategies are complete fluff.

We compiled a list of strategies we believe realtors should invest more energy into and which hyped strategies need to be scaled back.

Bring these back…

Referral Marketing with Direct Mail

Direct mail marketing is an affordable marketing strategy for real estate agents. This style of marketing was around since the beginning for realtors and it’s still considered an effective way to advertise your business.

From the Real Estate Marketing Dude: “Essentially referral marketing your database is much like farming a neighborhood. We are not farming a strange community, but we are farming your relationships. The relationship you have intact with your direct mail list is very important because it’s all about the quality of your relationship. It’s not about buying a list of names and numbers to market to.”

Why we love direct mail marketing:

It’s targeted
It’s affordable
It’s trackable
It’s fast

Another reason we are advocates of direct mail – you can highlight your professionalism. When sending direct mail, create postcards that show you use professional real estate photography. Likewise, stay professional with an updated headshot and your brand colors/logo.

Statistics about direct mail:

70 percent of Americans say mail is more personal than the internet
70 percent higher brand recall than digital ads
62 percent of people who responded to direct mail made a purchase
80-90 percent of direct mail gets opened vs 20 percent of emails

Warm Calling / Door Knocking

It may feel nerve-wracking to call prospects you’ve never met before, or go door knocking as a new agent. Warm calling (like cold calling but the prospect has had contact with your company) and door knocking are both important marketing strategies for real estate agents looking to establish themselves.

The key to both of these techniques is preparation. And good old fashioned confidence. The confidence can come later, though.

There are plenty of resources that can help you prepare for both warm calling and door knocking. Here are a few of our favorites:

Fitsmallbusiness: Top 10 Real Estate Scripts for Cold Calling
Hubspot: 9 Ways to Generate Real Estate Leads With a Door-Knocking Strategy
BoomTown!: 97% of Cold Calling is a Waste of Time

Statistics about warm calling:

Wednesdays have a 46% higher answer rate than Mondays
450% better response time from leads if followed-up within 1 hour
Contact rates improve by 110% with six calls scheduled over a 15-day period saw

Cut back on these…

Chatbots

Chatbots are great for scaling your business and can help your clients/prospects get answers they need quickly. However, if you’re using them as your main form of communication to prospects and clients, you aren’t going to get the value you’re hoping for. We never recommend complete automation in place of personal communication.

Your contacts will find automated responses cumbersome and frustrating over time, especially when they aren’t getting the response they are looking for.

A complex, over the top website

You don’t need a website with a hundred click-throughs or lead capture pop-ups. Consumers, as well as Google, enjoy simple user-friendly web pages. Focus on the important things – who you are, how you sell/buy homes, and your listings.

Sometimes complex websites can have slower page load speeds, which causes friction for your prospects. Remember to test your site’s page speed often.

While we believe in innovation and welcome new marketing strategies, we also feel that you should never have to reinvent the wheel. Stick to marketing strategies that offer value and let them evolve into what truly works for you.