This is What Every Agent Should Be Doing Right Now

The last couple of months have been a rollercoaster ride of emotions.

As we cope with the next phase of this pandemic, many cities and states around the country are slowly reopening. While we haven’t quite reached the normal we had before everything happened, we do see progress in one area: the real estate market.

High buyer demand coupled with low inventory is driving an even more competitive market than what we saw before. Which means this is the time to give yourself every advantage you can to win listings, convert clients, and keep your business going.

The market is in your hands.

Here’s how to make it happen.

The Real Estate Customer Journey

There are three basic phases to every customer’s journey: gathering leads, nurturing them and converting them into clients.

Here’s the breakdown:

Prospecting Leads: online advertising, cold calls, landing pages, website, social media
Nurturing Leads: emails, texts, phone calls, social media
Converting Leads: Seller signs contract, buyer purchases home

For many of you, converting leads is more difficult due to general apprehension about our economy’s future. But there are two very important steps in this process you can still be focusing on: prospecting and nurturing.

And when this passes, the agents who have done that will be ready to start back up where they left off.

Analyze and Revise Your Lead Generation

As the trusted advisor, your sphere of influence is looking to you to answer some tough questions, even if they aren’t openly asking them.

A picture says a thousand words, and visuals are the single best way to communicate data and hard facts.

Instead of trying to explain why the housing market won’t collapse, show them.

Here’s how to do it:

  1. Sign up for a free trial of KCM Pro
  2. Download the social graphics to your phone
  3. Copy the captions & hashtags
  4. Create a new Instagram or Facebook post.
  5. Upload the graphic, and insert the caption and hashtags.
  6. Publish and repeat.

Not only are you boosting your social media marketing and growing your following, you’re providing relevant market data that educates. It’s a win win.

CRM and Database

There won’t be a better time to organize your database. Don’t have one? Create one. Make sure all your leads are labeled appropriately. That way you have a solid list of promising prospects that you can hit hard and don’t waste time.

Email

The same goes for your email campaigns. If you use an email marketing platform, now is a great time to do a deep dive and see who opens your emails. If they’re interacting, that means there’s potential. If they aren’t, you can probably write them off as a cold lead.

On that note, a tone-deaf email could make or break your brand right now. Make sure you go through all of your campaigns and pause any that may send the wrong message.

Website

You should also be taking this time to update your website with the latest information. Create a new landing page addressing the needs of buyers and sellers in the market right now. Update images, include SEO-charged language. Comb through every piece of your site to make sure it reflects your brand and is easily navigable by prospects.

Social Media

This is especially true for social media. If your strategy usually consisted of sharing your listings, this is a good time to pivot. Fill your feed with graphs, charts and quotes that keep your followers informed and promote engagement.

In a recent Qualtrics survey of home sellers, 87% of respondents said they were concerned their home won’t sell because of the pandemic and resulting economic recession.

However, buyers haven’t skipped a beat. A recent report from ShowingTime reported that appointments to see homes (both virtually and in-person) have increased in every region of the country and are up 21.4% nationwide over the same time last year.

The key to creating balance in the market and helping inventory catch up with demand is building seller confidence. Sharing the right information will do that.

Amp Up Your Lead Nurture

Now more than ever, your leads, clients and sphere need to hear from you. They need a trusted advisor. It’s your job, and frankly your moral obligation, to educate them on the market and what it means for their real estate decisions.

There have been a lot of frightening headlines and many people expect the worst, but recent data shows that buyers are still looking for homes at nearly the same rate that they were before.

By keeping your contacts informed with facts and insights about what’s really happening in the market, you’re helping to calm fear while building trust and credibility with your clients.

You can do this by:

  • Creating market update videos
  • Sharing on social media
  • Sending emails
  • Sending texts
  • Making phone calls

Consumers are out there. The digital space is booming. The agents that are able to adapt and create new business in this environment will not only survive, they’ll thrive as the market continues to pick up.

See How Agents Are Doing This

By taking real estate insights, KCM content and local statistics, you can create materials that help calm fear and educate your community. Whether you’re throwing together a video, sending an email or being more vocal on social media, there are many ways that you can step up as a trusted advisor.

Here are a couple ways agents like you are doing it (and seeing success).

Share Market Insights on Social Media

If you’re wanting to get the right information out on the right platform fast, social media is a great place to start. By sharing data, statistics and insights, you’re not only filling your feed with useful and educational real estate information, you’re showing clients and prospective clients that you’re an industry expert.

In the examples below, you can see how KCM members put their Social Graphics in action on their feeds. Professionally designed and ready-to-post, all you have to do is download, copy and paste. They not only help create a consistent social media presence, they’re packed with important industry insights and include ready-to-go captions and hashtags.

Sign up for a 14-day free trial and start using KCM Social Graphics today.

Post a Market Update Video to Youtube

Tamara Inzunza, an agent in the D.C. area, had always wanted to get into making videos but, like most agents, was intimidated by the process. However, when COVID-19 hit and her clients were looking for answers, she realized video was the best way to keep them up to date on what was happening in the market.

One of the main fears surrounding real estate right now is that mass unemployment is going to lead to a massive amount of foreclosures. So, Tamara teamed up with loan officer and financial planner, Eric Wigren, to offer a special client webinar going through forbearances FAQs. Using KCM Monthly Market Report slides to detail special data points, she was able to create a video that helped discuss a hard topic easily and educated her clients through the process.

Bottom Line

With all the uncertainty surrounding today’s economy, people are searching for answers about where the housing market is headed.

Anxiety sparked from memories of the Great Recession is in full swing, and your clients are looking to you to calm their fears.

This is an important time to connect and correct any misinformation with research-backed facts so when everything is said and done, you stand out as a real estate expert that can be trusted.

Create videos, share real estate insights, and stay up-to-date with what’s happening in the market by visiting our Resource Page often.