Long gone are the days when there wasn’t an inordinately large number of real estate agents for the amount of available business in any region of Canada. While that’s pretty much always been the case for major metro regions like Greater Vancouver and Greater Toronto, it is also increasingly true for smaller cities and towns. It’s unlikely we’re ever going back to a time when realtors find it easy to drum up new clientele, and so for this reason every agent is going to have to put a lot more effort into new client generation.
We’ve been insistent for years that a realtor should never overlook the traditional means of doing that, and you can and will get new clients if you’re persistent with efforts to meet clients in person, whether that’s by door knocking or volunteering at community events etc. But we are definitely living in the information age, and digital technologies are being embraced in every industry and profession. That is the case for real estate too, and look no further than the fact that most realtors and their clients view MLS listings in Canada online.
Being provided with leads has also long been a way that realtors find new clients, but up until the advent of the Internet those leads were acquired by word of mouth. That’s no longer the case, and you won’t find anyone who doesn’t think that is a darn good thing. Our online real estate lead generation system here at Real Estate Leads is as good an example as any, but what we’re going to do with this entry is lay out an advanced real estate lead generation guide so that you can create a more effective plan for yourself if you’re a real estate agent.
Optimized Campaign
Effective lead generation is the process of stimulating interest in a product or service for the purpose of developing a sales pipeline. Keep in mind that it’s uncommon for a person who buys or sells a home to have that be the only real estate transaction they’re going to make. If you can create them as repeat clientele that’s always going to be best.
Lead generation is also essential to preparing a business for long-term success. Effective real estate lead generation has the potential to take a business to the next level, and especially if the realtor’s excellence in serving those clients means they will happily use the realtor’s services the next time they’re making a move in the real estate market. Your aim should be flourishing with a continual stream of new potential clients.
These leads will usually come from a combination of referrals, advertising, trade shows, direct mailings and additional marketing efforts, but in truth they can come from anywhere. In the simplest form it could involve a potential client providing their contact information to you, or something equally simple like commenting on your social media post. Any successful real estate lead generation campaign will have a clear goal of turning a lead into a prospect and then a client, and that will be true no matter how ‘hot’ the lead is or not or how it was obtained.
Viable Opportunities / Vital for Success
The first thing a realtor should understand here is that you should never be placing less value or importance on a lead compared to others. You will learn that the most promising leads can go nowhere just as easily as a lead that looked to be nothing materializes into a client down the road. Some have the mindset that if the person isn’t ready to do business right then and there, it’s a dead-end lead. There’s absolutely no truth or logic to that, and it’s important that you realize this.
A primary truth for generating real estate leads is the importance of taking every lead seriously. And even if you believe it’s not likely that it materializes into anything in the nearer future. You never know which lead may turn out favorably down the road. Realtors should leave no stone unturned in order to capitalize on a prospective deal. Your real estate lead generation efforts are only as strong as you make them, so you need to be collecting leads and pursuing ALL of them to the best of your abilities at all times.
Let’s consider some numbers that have been verified by industry research; estimates are that 50% of online leads fail to convert into customers for a year or two at least. And that’s even ones that look especially promising when they’re first obtained. This reinforces the fact that leads take time to cultivate, and it’s important to stay persistent and continue to carry out marketing efforts.
Another very relevant statistic here – 90% of homebuyers in today’s market do their own research when looking for homes, and that’s another reflection of what online connectivity is doing for the world and business these days. These people are choosing to do the initial research rather than have an agent do it for them. This definitely changes the dynamic of the realtor-client relationship, and you need to be receptive to that if you’re going to be turning leads into clients and then clients converted into homes bought or sold.
Lead Generation in Real Estate
The next step in real estate lead generation will be to cultivate those leads into clients. This will be an on-going process that should be systemized and improved upon as you learn more about what is the best way to convince sellers to list with you, or vice versa if they are homebuyer clients. The most essential part of all of that is keeping lines of communication open with the prospects, but also incorporating a call to action in all communications you have with them after the initial 2 or 3 communications that you have with them.
This could range from open house invitations to real estate pamphlets on what they need to know to buy or sell a house. Then once you have successfully assisted many people accomplish their home ownership goals with your expertise, other prospective clients will start approaching you. This has to be the larger, overarching goal for any realtor who wants to build a successful business from their leads and do it as quickly and efficiently as possible.
A good rule of thumb is to spend 20% of your time generating leads, and 80% of your time converting them. Smart networking can be a big part of this, and you should be aiming to meet like-minded people in an effort to exchange referrals, advice, experience, contacts and even knowledge. Regular attendance at industry events and workshops is a good place to start, and if you apply yourself and really makes yourself visible as a reputable realtors then it will ultimately help you reach a wider audience.
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Sign up for Real Estate Leads here and receive a monthly quota of qualified, online-generated buyer and / or seller leads that will only be delivered to you and that applies to every batch of them you receive each month. They are yours exclusively, and with them you have an exclusive opportunity to bring them in as your clients before any other realtor becomes aware of the same possibility. There’s everything to like about that as realtor given how competitive the business is, so sign up now and claim the advantage for yourself.
