In your day to day list of tasks it's easy to overlook taking the time to learn new tools that will help with your marketing. It's also very easy to get overwhelmed once you do sit down and try to learn. It seems like there are a thousand different tools to help with your social media posts, blogs, and email marketing. How do you know which ones to use? I get it! Your time is valuable and you don't want to waste it clicking around blindly.
In this blog post I will focus on five tools to will help you become a master of blogging, social media, email marketing, PPC, along with Google Analytics to help you measure your website's traffic. There are multiple networks and tools out there, both paid and free, that will provide similar benefits to these but hopefully you can take something away from each tool that I will focus on.
HubSpot's Blog Topic Generator
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understand it can be difficult to keep up on a blog. It is a time commitment, not only the writing but the planning as well. To have a good blog you need to have a good content strategy. One tool that can help you come up with good blog topics is HubSpot's Blog Topic Generator. This tool works off the premise of providing some general terms about your industry and then creating blog titles using those terms. It's not perfect by any means but it will help point you in the right direction.
Facebook is by far the most widely used social media platform. It currently has 1.49 billion active monthly users. That is a lot of people. So, since there is a lot of people on Facebook it is a great place to share information and reach new potential clients. Coming up with posts can be challenging. Here are some post ideas that may help you appeal to prospective clients. :
- Remodel Ideas
- Neighborhood Comparisons
- Share Helpful Blogs
- Recreational Opportunities In Your City
- Moving/Relocating Tips
- Top 10 Lists
- Positive Local News
- Mortgage News
- FAQs
- Share Your Passions
When people are looking for an agent they want someone who is knowledgeable, easy to communicate with, and someone who has their best interest at heart. So demonstrate these qualities within your posts and be yourself.
Email Marketing With Mail Chimp
Mail Chimp is one of many email marketing platforms but it is the one that we prefer within our office. It can be an effective tool to managing email lists, creating attractive HTML based emails, and analyzing reports about which emails are being opened and who is clicking through to your website. Keep in mind your personal habits when reading emails. Don't always make your emails about selling. Provide helpful information that readers will appreciate. Also spend some time creating interesting subjects that will entice readers to open your emails.
Driving Traffic With Google Adwords
If you are having trouble getting traffic to your site it might be worth exploring some Pay Per Click (PPC) options like Google Adwords. Google Adwords provides paid search results based on searches within Google. By selecting keywords to target you can get your site on the first page of Google by bidding on your target keywords. You only pay when someone clicks on your link and visits your site. Use Google Adwords in conjunction with some other digital marketing strategies but don't become reliant on PPC. The more free traffic you can drive through your blog, social media, and email marketing the better, but PPC can help you supplement your traffic.
Measuring Results with Google Analytics
Now that you have some traffic flowing to your website you want to make sure you have a general understanding of your traffic sources, what content people are engaging with, and where you are losing visitors. Google Analytics is a very powerful tool that can help you track conversions, understand your user demographics, and analyze your traffic patterns. There is a wealth of information for you to review, you just need to figure out what to do with that information to make your website more successful and capturing leads.
The great thing about digital marketing is that it's all measurable. So don't be intimidated and do nothing. Create a real estate marketing plan that works for you and your real estate office. Start somewhere with one of these tools and measure your results with Google Analytics. The more you do the more comfortable you will get and you will see improvement. To help you lay out your marketing plan check out our Real Estate Marketing Checklist and follow us on Twitter for more helpful tips.
