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Key Things New Real Estate Agents Should Know
Once you’re ready to start your new real estate business, it can be overwhelming. You’re competing with people who have been in the business for a lot longer than you, and you may feel like there’s no way you can possibly stand out.
The good news is that you can, but it takes work and strategic thinking.
The following are things every new real estate agent should know, and specific things to get you started.
Create Your Own Real Estate App
If there’s one tech tool you take advantage of in your new real estate business, it should be a custom app. There are a lot of benefits to a custom real estate app. Some of these benefits include:
- A real estate app offers you the opportunity to custom brand the platform as you build your business.
- You can have the advantage of analytics on the back end to gain a greater understanding of user behavior, which can then help you more effectively convert leads.
- A custom real estate app can link the MLS directly to the platform, and then for all of your listings, you’re the only point of contact.
- Having a convenient, well-designed app can make you appear more professional and modern, both of which are important to launching your real estate business.
Automate Your Marketing
When you’re a new real estate agent, or you’re really at any point in your business, you need to be able to focus on sales. This means that you need to automate as much as you can in other areas of your business.
Automating your marketing is a great place to start.
Invest in an automated lead generation solution that will allow you to create a custom-branded website and add leads to your CRM. You can then set-up automated email campaigns.
Other automation tools that you should consider using when you’re starting out as a real estate agent include:
- Social media automation: Social media is an important component of pretty much every successful real estate business, but it’s also incredibly time-consuming. If you can automate more of that work, you’ll have time to focus on strategy and sales. You can plan your posts and updates ahead of time, and then you can also start to learn more about which types of posts resonate most with your audience and even the time of day it’s best for you to post.
- Create an email template that you can use every time you send out a newsletter or update. This way, it’s easy to just add the new content as you need to.
- Set up a sales funnel so you can automate how you move prospects through the funnel.
- Include a live chat on your website. This will let you provide more in-depth customer service and interaction without having to spend too much time on it.
- Let your prospects schedule showings and other things with you online. You can create an online calendar that will automatically display the times you have available.
You should also develop a marketing plan. Some things to remember when creating a real estate marketing plan include:
- Identify your objective and goals—when doing so, be as specific as possible.
- Create targeted client personas. This is a big one in real estate—think about the people you can ideally imagine yourself working with. What characteristics do they have? What properties and areas are they most likely to be interested in? When you have your personas, you can then target your marketing efforts toward them, and it makes it much easier than broadly trying to market to everyone. Create different personas for buyers and sellers.
- Know your farm area data, and if you haven’t already selected a farm, do so now.
- Analyze your competition as you’re creating your marketing plan. What is your competition doing well, and where are there gaps that you could potentially fill?
- Create a marketing budget and define what you’d like to see in terms of return on your investment.
Build a Brand Based on Your Strengths
No one is good at all things, but you should work on building and cultivating your brand around what your strengths are. Sit down as you’re just starting out and think about what makes you unique and what will make you most appealing to buyers and sellers.
Use this as the foundation for your brand, and then stick with it.
You want to think carefully about how you want the public to perceive you and what you have to offer.
Prepare Yourself to Continue Learning
Once you pass your real estate class and you get your license, you may think you’re done learning. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth.
The best real estate agents are always learning. This could mean learning about specific new things you don’t know much about, like blogging and content marketing or learning more about real estate in general.
You can take online courses, talk to experienced real estate professionals, or attend workshops and professional development events.
One specific area where you can focus on learning are neighborhoods and niche areas in your community. Get out and explore, and think about a neighborhood or two where you can really become an expert.
Get Involved in the Community
Finally, relationships are the foundation of a successful real estate career. You want to build relationships with people in the community, including other real estate agents.
You should participate in local community groups and organizations as much as you can. Get out and about and join the local chapter of the Realtor’s association. Frequent local businesses, perhaps volunteer in your community.
You want to show that you’re interested and engaged in the community, and the more people who know you and also perceive you in a positive way, the more you’re likely to be able to grow your business.
When you’re a real estate professional, you’re selling yourself as much as you’re selling a property.
Meet The Author:
Susan is an avid writer, traveler, and overall enthusiast.
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