Real estate marketing is undergoing a major change and 2019 will be a defining year for our industry. Social media, 3D-technology and other emerging trends will play a significant role in determining how effective is your overall real estate marketing strategy. Another emerging trend that will mature fully in 2019 is the death of lead generation as we know it.
In this article, we will focus on 4 key real estate marketing trends in 2019 and what it means for your real estate business.
Let’s get started.
Death of lead generation as we know it
Lead generation has been the pillar on which many rockstar agents built their business in this decade. There are lots of companies that became successful offering you buyer and seller leads for your geographic area.
However, consumer behavior is changing and 2019 will see a significant shift in how homeowners respond to generic lead generation campaigns. As you probably know, homeowners are often bombarded with multiple agents asking for their information in exchange for their home value all across the internet.
They get targeted on Facebook, Google Search, and even YouTube. Most of these adverts are similar and repetitive. This is the primary reason why the close ratio for closing a new deal from your real estate leads in rising sharply.
In 2019, you should focus on giving value to your local homeowners first by implementing a viable inbound marketing strategy.
The key strategy is to give something of value first before asking for anything in return from your target audience.
In 2019, trust will be the new currency of the real estate industry.
If a potential customer trusts you enough they will select you as their agent, regardless of seeing other ads online (all the time).
The only way to build trust in your local farm area is to either help people directly or offer something (like a local website with news, events and deals) that they benefit from.
So, in 2019, when you are re-evaluating your lead generation strategy and allocate a part of your ad-spend into creating content that the local homeowners can benefit from.
Protip: Check out our 2 step Facebook Ads strategy to land buyers and sellers
Mainstream adoption of Instagram marketing by real estate professionals
Real Estate agents will finally realize the true power of Instagram in 2019. Very few real estate agents are actively using Instagram to stay relevant to their community and target audience.
In 2019, more agents will include Instagram stories, Instagram posts and sponsored content as part of their overall marketing strategy to attract millennial home buyers and sellers.
Here are some quick Instagram tips that will help generate new prospects for your business:
- Post consistently on your Instagram profile. Share local neighborhood updates, 60 second home tour videos, images and client testimonials on your instagram profile.
- Change your Instagram account to a business profile. The Instagram business profile allows you to a call button, URL to your website and access to Instagram analytics.
- Do live videos of your open houses on Instagram.
- Use lots of local hashtags in order to make your content discoverable on various local search queries inside Instagram.
Organic Real Estate social media marketing will reach fewer people in 2019
A few years back you could easily get lots of high-quality traffic by posting an open house on your social media and using a bunch of hashtags. However, social media organic reach continues to decline through 2018 and we can expect the same for 2019.
The decline of organic reach makes perfect sense as the social media giants like Facebook & Twitter want you to spend money boosting your content and reaching other people’s newsfeed. This means you need to allocate a separate budget to boost your local content and divert some local homeowners to your website.
One big mistake that many agents make with their overall social media strategy is that they only post content about real estate on their business page or profile. The fact of the matter is, anyone can go to your local IDX website to check out a listing.
You need to shift your focus into content that builds trust with potential homebuyers and sellers.
Check out these social media content strategies that helps separate you from the rest of the competition.
Facebook 3D Photos Will Be How Cool Real Estate Agents Share Photos In 2019
3D photos (for now) is an iPhone X only exclusive feature. Log in to your Facebook app and select “3D photo from new photo video”.
The 3D photos can be viewed on any phone or computer. A practical way to use 3D photos to give your views a sense of space for different rooms in your new listing.
We have a feeling this Facebook feature will be a hit with real estate professionals in 2019 since agents love virtual walkthroughs already. Facebook 3d photos is a welcome addition on top of that.