Making use of the professional audience on LinkedIn is not just for business owners or C-level executives anymore. A lot of real estate agents and realtors are taking advantage of it and are seeing results using it. If you are a little rusty on LinkedIn marketing, it’s time to advance your real estate lead generation skills. Because of its trusted site status with Google, your LinkedIn profile will help boost your Google ranking and will often appear within the top results when people look for you online.
Currently, there are more than 7 million real estate professionals on LinkedIn so it does mean business—you need to have an active presence! Achieving success using LinkedIn is much more than just putting your profile out there. Take a look at the stats:
Image source: linkedin.com
When used consistently and properly, LinkedIn can help you spring top of mind and get the referral or sale. So let’s get on with it, shall we?
11 LinkedIn Real Estate Marketing Tricks
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1. Reputation and Credibility
As one of the biggest decisions people make in their lives, buying a house will involve a great deal of trust and confidence between two parties.
As a real estate agent, you want to reassure them you know what you’re talking about and have the experience to handle this important deal in their lives. Potential buyers will likely look you up online.
Mark Hawkins of Residential Leasing Group Inc says prospects use social media to research his company, as they do for potential tenants. In this step, your goal is to become one of the best realtor LinkedIn profiles out there.
Your profile page must have all the details of your experience and your specialties to help establish trust with a homebuyer and strengthen the relationship.
Bonus Tip: Make sure your profile data is 100% Complete. Fill out all of the sections and reorder them from the most important information. The more you provide, the easier it will be to find you via LinkedIn search.
2. Powerful and Attractive Profile
First, pay attention to the most popular keywords related to real estate. For example, the fact that “real estate” is the most searched for is a hint that it needs to be somewhere in your headline.
Sure, you may do “home sales” but generally if you are a “realtor” or “real estate agent”, it’s best to put those terms first. Optimize your profile well and make it useful to a viewer so you could appear in more searches and get more visits to your website.
Bonus Tip: To help you in getting real estate leads, treat your LinkedIn profile URL as an online business card. So, if you are a realtor, broker, or agent, customize it to align with your business.
Example: Adding “realtor” to your name improves your profile’s ranking, i.e. http://www.linkedin.com/in/billsmithrealtor
Related Reading: The Ultimate Cheat Sheet in Optimizing Your LinkedIn Profile in 2017
3. Make Your LinkedIn Company Page Stand Out
One reason why real estate agents use LinkedIn marketing is to let people know right off the bat that they are legit and accredited.
Here’s how to make your company page stand out among other competitors:
- Add in every detail about your business
- Outline your experience in real estate
- Website URL
- Links to other social accounts
- Areas you specialize in (like selling certain types of homes or working within criteria)
- Realtor certifications
Once you are done with the critical company info, create a professional-looking banner image for your Company Page header. If you don’t have or don’t know how to create one, you can select from virtual assistant services to develop one for you.
Regardless of how you get it, the important thing is it is high quality and showcases your business accolades. Here’s an example from Realty ONE Group:
Image source: placester.com
A great header image should include:
- Unique info about your business – Perhaps you…
- Had the highest sales volume at your agency last year
- Helped close the largest deal in your company
- or have some top listings you have helped sell
- Anything that makes your business look like the cream of the crop
- An award or recognition in your marketplace or brokerage firm
Informative visual content that you can add to your LinkedIn page:
- Site/home photos
- Video documentary/recording
- Illustrations
- Infographics
- Slideshare presentations
Bonus Tip: Build your image showing that you are a tuned-in, experienced, hard-working real estate professional.
4. Create a Separate Showcase Page
You can create one or more Showcase Pages for posting real estate listings on LinkedIn; or to promote your offers, blog posts, referral programs, and other business information you want your audience to know.
Bonus Tip: The Company Page serves as your other real estate website while the Showcase Page is your dedicated landing page, like your personal blog or “about me” page.
Here’s an example of one of Google’s Showcase Pages, Think with Google, which includes numerous posts linking back to its website:
Image source: Think with Google LinkedIn showcase page
5. Find and Connect with Real Estate Leads
How to get real estate leads on LinkedIn:
- Start by connecting with your old contacts, a network of realtors and brokers, alumni, clients, organization members, and friends.
- Once connected, you can then connect with their connections, and so on.
- Use the search feature to find people that will fit your criteria.
Agent at Re/Max, Phil Lepage, says he found new clients and reconnected with colleagues using LinkedIn.
“These Individuals have been a great source of referrals as well as becoming my own clients when the time came for their real estate needs,” he said.
Bonus tip: Add connections from your existing email contact list or by importing a .csv file. Once you’ve imported these contacts, you can start connecting with them!
If you have multiple contact lists, a real estate virtual assistant can upload them all to your LinkedIn database and connect with them afterward.
6. Stay Top of Mind by Posting Updates
Publish a significant amount of interesting content. Realtors are on LinkedIn often to get valuable information and see the latest market trends.
Picture LinkedIn as some kind of a black tie social media gathering—it’s more on the formal side—as most of your connections are from business relationships. So make your postings appeal to their professional interests.
What To Post/Share on LinkedIn
- Housing market trends and updates
- Financial or investment news and tips
- Construction projects in the community
- Local employment opportunities
- Helpful information on the neighborhood
- Marketing ideas in the real estate industry
- Update to celebrating a finished project (if you are working with one) or closing a deal
Post a variety of content:
- links to blogs
- curated pieces
- video/podcast interviews
- opinion pieces
- related articles
Once you get this posting routine going, publish each piece on your Company Page. People love great content and it’s an effective way to keep you top of mind with them.
Bonus Tip: Post frequently (3-4 per week) so you get more chances of profile views as well. View the status updates of other real estate members, liking and commenting on the ones you find interesting.
7. Join or Create LinkedIn Real Estate Groups
Another effective real estate LinkedIn marketing approach is to reach out to the local community members and promote your business by joining real estate-oriented groups. LinkedIn Groups is one of the best sources for social selling.
Be part of those that are full of potential customers rather than competitors. Once you become a member of these LinkedIn communities, check out the members to see if they fit the criteria you typically look for in clients.
Most of the time their profiles will give you insights into their personal lives, including if they’re in the market for a new home or ready to sell. Speak directly with these leads, answer their questions, and demonstrate your real estate expertise.
Attracting Leads through Asking and Answering Questions
- Ask questions – You never know when you might need a person’s help with a deal, or vice-versa.
- Express your personal and company brand – It is important to answer a question from your own perspective.
- Be helpful – Provide sincere and valuable information.
Bonus Tip: Give a unique voice on things that can help people remember you, making you a resource person for future questions they may have.
8. Private Messaging and Email Campaigns
Always send a personalized message when you find people of interest. The key to earning their trust is being genuine and honest. You can say something like…
- You are always looking to connect with locals
- You are intrigued about their own business or background
- You have known or have heard of them from a conference or event
- Ask who their ideal referrals are and you would be happy to send them their way
- Ask them to keep you in mind if they or people they know need your help
Bonus Tip: LinkedIn is a relationship platform so take at least three interactions before asking for something, like a referral. It shows a lack of relationship and research when you make offers to people who clearly don’t need them.
9. Ask for Appropriate Recommendations
LinkedIn offers a built-in referral machine with its Recommendations feature.
Make sure to be specific about what you want to be included in your recommendations section.
It helps if you provide an outline or Q&A so that it would be easier for the author. This also increases your chances of receiving more recommendations.
10. Be an Authority on Real Estate
As discussed in #3, LinkedIn provides rich media options and the Pulse platform for you to share content and become a published authority on real estate in your network.
Increase your exposure to the new and existing audience by posting images of exciting projects, PDF or Slideshare reports and whitepapers, link to downloadable files and other resources, as well as popular articles that could reach thousands of people.
11. Maintain a Professional Image
Many real estate agents and realtors use social media sites like Facebook and Pinterest to market their businesses and engage with customers.
There should be a strict line between professional and personal when it comes to controlling your brand reputation.
Personal issues and discussions should remain in social and casual sites like Facebook.
LinkedIn is a professional network, not a chat room for your friends.
One real estate agent reported he had little success with Facebook advertising as most people on there are not ready to buy a house. LinkedIn users on the other hand have an average household income of around $100,000, making it a more lucrative network for such purchases.
Limit Your Time on LinkedIn
Don’t spend all of your hours doing these strategies on your LinkedIn account and other social networks. The ultimate goal is to be getting leads, and appointments, and get face-to-face interaction with your prospects.
Looking forward to implementing these LinkedIn Real Estate marketing tips? Hire your team of virtual assistants! Turn to Virtual Assistant Talent, one of the most trusted companies in California that many businesses rely on. Call 1-866-596-9041 to book a FREE, no-obligation consultation today!
Remember, social networks are used to open doors but your focus should be on talking to leads and closing deals!
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References:
www.davebyrnes.com
blog.resaas.com
www.linkedin.com
www.360agentblog.com
