Hear from 10 top real estate agents on the secrets to success and learn how to turn those tips into texts your clients will love.
It seems like everyone has their real estate license these days. According to the National Association of Realtors 2018 Member Report, there are 1.3 million Realtors in the United States. That’s a 6% increase from 2017!
Just take a look at the rise of the Google search “how long to get real estate license” over the last 8 years.
In our text marketing guide for real estate, we covered how to use SMS to collect leads and close sales. Still, it helps to listen to advice from top-selling agents across the country.
In this article, we collected words of wisdom from successful realtors. Under each tip, we explain how to put their advice into action through text messages.
10 Text-Enabled Tips From Top Realtors
1. “Have a scalable CRM.”
Gavin Graham, Editor, FitSmallBusiness
It isn’t sustainable to manage all your conversations from your cellphone. On the other hand, text marketing is designed to scale. You can adjust your plan at any time based on how many messages you plan to send. This means you can start small. Why not create a keyword for just one property and see how it goes? (E.g. Text MAINST to 94090 for more info.) Once you fall in love—and see ROI—you can upgrade.
2. “Maintain a budget and embrace the untraditional.”
Jared Barnett, Real Estate Agent, Compass, The Barnett Bittencourt Team
Most people in the real estate industry stick to email and direct mail. To start texting your clients is the definition of embracing the untraditional. This may sound scary, but data shows that home buyers would much rather receive texts!
3. “Communicate quickly and reliably.”
Tommy Mutchler, Real Estate Agent, RE/MAX
95% of texts are read within 3 minutes. If you send your most time-sensitive messages by SMS, you can ensure clients read them right when you need them to. Plus, you can schedule messages to go out at specific dates and times. Send a message directly after inquiry or showing—or weeks later!
4. “Continually prospecting maintains a sales pipeline.”
Michael Kelczewski, Brandywine Fine Properties Sotheby’s International Realty
Stay top-of-mind with your audience with autoresponders. You can set up a series of messages to send to your prospects days, weeks, even months after initial contact.
5. “Get reviews on sites such as Zillow, Trulia, Yelp, and Realtor.com. Profiles with just 5-10 reviews get 50% more traffic than profiles with 0 reviews.”
Chase Michels, Baird & Warner
Did you know that SMS engagement rates are six to eight times higher than email marketing engagement rates? When you need to ask for ratings and reviews, clients are more likely to click on and engage with a request on their cellphone as opposed to email or direct mail. You can even use link-tracking to send automatic nudges to those who didn’t leave a review. Read about our tips on using SMS as a way to ask customers for ratings and reviews!
6. “Never stop working on the NEXT deal.”
Lynn Rapp from Coldwell Bank Kaiser
With texting, you can be in hundreds of places at once. While you may be closing one deal with a client, you could already have your next keyword ready and printed out for another property you’re about to put on the market. By advertising this keyword with a “for more information” CTA, you can get the ball rolling on your next big deal before your current one wraps.
[Read: How a 30-Under-30 Reatlro Uses Keywords to Advertise His Properties]
7. “Keep up with all your clients after the sale…they will stay loyal and will sell and buy from you in the future.”
Shannon Thomas, Avon Indiana Real Estate Broker
By using custom fields and data collection, you can gather personal information about your contacts such as their name, birthday, and current address. You can then use that information to automate fun little texts to send throughout the year such as birthday texts, congrats on purchase anniversaries, and much more! You can learn how to utilize the custom fields and data collection tools with this article, or perhaps get some creative ideas on the texts you may want to send with the information you collect!
8. “Be obsessed with providing them [your clients] with the highest level of service and satisfaction. Be obsessed with solving their problems and growing your business in the process.”
Lucas Pinto, Lucas Pinto Real Estate Group, LLC
Many businesses have turned to SMS for customer service due to the ease of use on the customer’s end, the ability to field, manage, and respond to issues as they come in. Consider dedicating a keyword entirely to customer or client inquiries or advertising your ability to resolve client concerns in real-time.
9. “You have to spend money on advertising to make money. If you keep your name silent, no one will ever know your brand exists or what your company offers. Advertising dollars equal profits.”
Angela Yaun, Day Realty Group
You could use your personal cellphone to communicate with your clients. Not only does that bog down your personal life with businesses, but it has its limits. By shifting some of your marketing dollars over to text marketing you not only have a dedicated professional space for your communications, but you also get access to all of the advanced features, some of which we’ve mentioned throughout this article.
10. “Being a good listener is key to sales success.”
Lisa Fettner, ReferralExchange
One of the best things about texting is that it’s built on two-way communication. Everything about a text message invites reciprocation. When you send a text message to your clients, you’re not only giving them a space to share their thoughts, but you’re giving yourself an organized. You can even add notes to conversations that only you can see to remind yourself of what someone has said, making customers feel especially valued.
Final Thoughts
Well, you heard it here from the best. It seems like the main takeaways for success revolve around quick communication, strong listening skills, and attention to detail! While you take all this into consideration, know that we’re is ready to answer your call—or text—if you have any questions.
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