Your ‘selling’ is getting very boring…
Having set up, failed at, sold on, succeeded and much more with the businesses I have created over the last few years I can fully understand and support any marketing drive to secure more customers.
One of the biggest things for me when creating my businesses was the branding and how I communicated my message out to my target audience. I went from the carrying a cheap Vista Print card with my mobile number and hotmail email address on along with branding led by cheap images I grabbed for free from stock photo websites to seeing out all these mistakes to instead create myself professional looking brands.
We all need to go through the learning process and depending on what level you want to see yourself at, you will always improve and recognise your failings and replace them with successful business methods.
As technology advances we too have to run with new features that we should adopt, sometimes those which have no history to learn from and again we find ourselves trying to find the best solution for success. Who as of yet as mastered Tik Tok for instance! Though we surely should have no excuses for communication channels that have long been with us such as emails and websites…
I have found myself going from the provider, having set up many businesses previously that serviced other businesses, to having platforms that others can market themselves on. Estate Agent Networking is one such platform with beneath it many avenues of communication in order to reach it’s audience.
Estate Agent Networking, as I always explain to people, is a concept driven by social media, you get the right message out and you will engage the audience. For sure headlines and recent industry topics will attract interest and conversation, from Rightmove to DSS in rentals, if we are in the business of property then certainly key words will always attract our eyes and attention.
What about marketing to these audiences?
Social media is here in the property industry, long gone are the days when I needed to speak to large audiences at industry property awards pleading for them to see the light behind Facebook and LinkedIn. I would say that all estate agents realise the power and importance of social media and in one way or another it is used in their business model.
One part of my job at Estate Agent Networking is to admin the large groups across social media that we have, mostly this will be accepting new members to groups and allowing or deleting posts. Here is where I am seeing a rather poor show in the style of marketing nearly all businesses (and their chosen PR / marketing agency) are making.
As an example, todays bucket load of marketing posts I have deleted include the following examples as their first message:
- Visit our website today….
- I offer the best virtual tours….
- Do you need handy man services in Bradford…
- Can I ask you to visit my Facebook page and like us…
A minor percentage of posts I have kept and these led with:
- Your free weekly update on mortgage rates…
- 5 amazing photography tips you can action today that are free…
- Do you think virtual tours enhance property listings and would you invest in this service…
I am finding more and more, especially PR agencies, doing such lazy marketing. It has not been thought out and it is simply chuck out as much garbage as you can in hope in style.
If you see a large Facebook group full of your potential target audience, such as Facebook Estate Agency, then think first and then devise a post / message that will engage the members to you. Just marketing yourself will not get you sales unless the group is specific to your service, ie Facebook Group for Virtual Tour Companies: Then you can market yourself by posting ‘I offer virtual tours in London and here is my website‘.
I get many messages from disgruntled new members to my groups saying ‘Why don’t you allow me to post on your group, who the hell do you think you are?‘ whereas I always reply, ‘I’m the person who set up this group and maintained it’s growth over the years and we do not want to be directly sold to thanks‘. I never close the door, yet I hope this gets the said person thinking and turning things round in their head to offer the group something first before thinking of getting something back.
Some people make it easy, they submit a post and say ‘Please delete this post if inappropriate admin‘ which of course means they are either selling or not abiding by the rules.
There are positive stories though. Sometimes I will get a DM and someone says ‘I see you have deleted my post to said group, what do I need to do in order to appear on the timeline?‘ and this always ends up with that person getting themselves a great post out and interaction.
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