7 Real Estate Marketing Ideas You Should Be Using

When it comes to real estate marketing, you're challenged to make some smart moves. After all, your marketing budget and your time are both limited. You need to have a strategy to determine where you'll focus your marketing and how wide a net you'll cast as you're looking for new tenants. These real estate marketing ideas will help you bring your property marketing to the next level.

1. A Focused Niche

Who are you as a property management organization? If you're just starting out or you've experienced significant growth or staffing changes, you may need to begin by looking at your brand. Having a niche and promoting it allows your prospective tenants to know who you are. You might specialize in upscale properties or in rentals for college students. You could focus on specific neighborhoods where you understand the locale and the clientele. No matter what your focus is, it's important to know who you are before you begin to market yourself so that you can communicate this message clearly to your tenants.

2. An Engaging Website

Is your website looking a little bland? If so, it's time to reinvigorate your content. Your audience uses the Internet as a prime resource to find a place to live, as well as to find everything from contact information to thorough property listings. Make your website sell your properties by adding detailed listings and compelling photos. Make sure that your site has easy contact forms as well, so that prospective tenants can contact you easily.

3. Effectively Targeted SEO

As you redevelop your website, you also need to target your SEO. While your SEO doesn't need to be the focus of your real estate marketing, you do need to understand what tenants are looking for and weave these keywords into your website. Instead of choosing broad keywords that have a lot of competition, look for the phrases that your current tenants would use to find your website. Remember to choose location-specific wording as well, since many tenants will be looking for a rental in a specific area of town.

Move beyond SEO-based pages and use content marketing to draw in readers to your site. Develop quality content that provides current and future tenants with valuable information while incorporating the keywords that will draw leads to your site. Kissmetrics shares advice for brands, cautioning "Don't forget the 'marketing' in content marketing." You need to make sure that you share what you create through the appropriate social media channels.

4. Connection Through Social Media

In this connected age, social media can be an asset or a liability. Make sure that you have a strong social media presence, and a strategy in place to support its success. In addition to property listings, ask questions and look for articles and topics of discussion. Be human, and show that you're connected to your tenants by answering their questions. If you encounter a problem or concern, address it right away so that you can not only deal with the problem but show others how responsive you are as a business.

You can also use social media to promote programs such as a customer referral program. According to Hootsuite, "A referral program is an overarching concept that includes affiliate programs, customer referral programs, and partner programs." Leverage the social networks of your existing tenants to draw in new tenants.

Use online and offline techniques to promote your properties.

5. Listing Your Properties

Where do tenants go when they're looking for a property? While many will come to your website through a search or learn about your business online, others will visit property listing websites. Free listing websites such as Hotpads, Vast, Trulia, and Craigslist and paid listings such as Rental.com will help bring your property to a much wider audience. Look for internet listing services that allow you to post the information that you feel is essential for your pool of tenants and make sure that you add an inviting photo as well.

6. Find Property Marketing Networking Opportunities

Take advantage of opportunities to network within the community. From sponsoring neighborhood events to ads on community message boards, if you're focusing on a particular area of town you want to get your message out in a number of different venues. Join real estate related groups and local business groups as well, so that others in the community know about your business and can send you prospective tenants.

7. Cultivating and Tracking Leads

Your new tenants may be as close as your database. Make sure that you have a system to track and collect basic information about your leads. You may find that you need to improve on your current tracking system in order to effectively target leads who have expressed interest in a particular part of town or type of building.

When you're working on your real estate marketing, look to Propertyware. Our software will help you create the website you need and manage information about your leads and tenants. View a free online demo of Propertyware today.