Real Estate Prospecting Tips - The Unprospecting Method
I have to goals for this blog post. The first is to create a disturbing image of an "old school" prospector panning for people. Mission accomplished! My second goal is to offer some real estate prospecting tips that will help you save time and energy down the road. Specifically, I want to explain how you can use the Internet to make your prospecting efforts much easier.
For those of you who are new to this jargon, real estate prospecting is the process of generating leads and inquiries from potential clients in your geographical area. For example, if you send letters or postcards to certain neighborhoods in your area, then you are prospecting for clients in that area. It's also commonly referred to as real estate farming.
Like the old-timer shown above, you are dipping your metaphorical pan into the "waters" and hoping to come up with something of value -- new clients.
I've already mentioned one of the most common prospecting tools used by real estate agents, and that's direct mail. Many agents send letters and postcards to residents in a certain area as a way of generating leads. The concept behind these prospecting letters is simple. That logic is that, if you send out enough direct mail pieces, you're bound to get some phone calls eventually.
Easy enough. But if you go about this the wrong way, you can end up wasting a lot of time and energy. That's why I'm offering you these tips for a smarter real estate prospecting system. There's a better way to go about it!
Before we get into this any further, let me admit that it's a long-term strategy. I would plan on getting real results from this prospecting system about a year out. So you might have to stick with your current methods while developing the one I'm proposing.
When you get down to it, real estate prospecting is an in-your-face approach to marketing. You are thrusting yourself in front of strangers in the hope that they contact you. But what if you had a steady stream of emails and phone calls from people who found you personally? That would be worth the effort, wouldn't it?
There's really no secret to all of this. What I'm talking about here is Internet visibility. Or more specifically, search engine visibility. I will say this from experience -- if you can earn maximum visibility for your real estate website, you'll never have to use traditional prospecting methods again.
I have former clients who operate under this kind of business model. Through my SEO consultation services, I've helped them achieve top search engine rankings within their respective cities. And now they focus most of their effort on sustaining (and even improving) what I helped them build.
In the past, they had to exhaust themselves with the usual real estate prospecting methods. But now the process works in reverse. Instead of thrusting themselves in front of potential clients, they let the prospects come to them. When people visit Google or Yahoo and type city-specific "homes" and "real estate" phrases, they often find my clients' websites right up top. One of my clients here in the Austin area gets 85% of his new leads in this way.
This is why I refer to this as "unprospecting" -- it reverses the dynamic. And it saves you a lot of time and energy in the process. You are still real estate prospecting in the sense that you are dipping your pan into the stream. But in this case, the pan is your website and the stream is the Internet. Big difference.
Yes, it takes a lot of work to reach this point. Boosting a website's rankings in the major search engines takes a lot of work, especially in a big city with a lot of real estate competition. I know, because I do it for a living. It's not rocket science ... it just takes a lot of time and persistence.
Here's a checklist of what you'll need to achieve real estate prospecting success via the Internet:
There you have them ... the four primary components of your new-and-improved prospecting system. Build a great website and fill it with keyword-specific content. Add some useful tools while you're at it, such as property listings, local market news, etc. Improve your search engine rankings by adding new content often, and by conducting a link-building campaign. And set up some lead generation channels to convert your visitors into leads.
I began this article with two goals -- to create a funny image and to offer some solid advice. Hopefully, at this point, I've got a check in both boxes. If you have questions about this article, or about real estate prospecting in general, type it into the Q&A box at the top of the blog.
For those of you who are new to this jargon, real estate prospecting is the process of generating leads and inquiries from potential clients in your geographical area. For example, if you send letters or postcards to certain neighborhoods in your area, then you are prospecting for clients in that area. It's also commonly referred to as real estate farming.
Like the old-timer shown above, you are dipping your metaphorical pan into the "waters" and hoping to come up with something of value -- new clients.
Common Prospecting Techniques
I've already mentioned one of the most common prospecting tools used by real estate agents, and that's direct mail. Many agents send letters and postcards to residents in a certain area as a way of generating leads. The concept behind these prospecting letters is simple. That logic is that, if you send out enough direct mail pieces, you're bound to get some phone calls eventually.
Easy enough. But if you go about this the wrong way, you can end up wasting a lot of time and energy. That's why I'm offering you these tips for a smarter real estate prospecting system. There's a better way to go about it!
Before we get into this any further, let me admit that it's a long-term strategy. I would plan on getting real results from this prospecting system about a year out. So you might have to stick with your current methods while developing the one I'm proposing.
Real Estate "Unprospecting"
When you get down to it, real estate prospecting is an in-your-face approach to marketing. You are thrusting yourself in front of strangers in the hope that they contact you. But what if you had a steady stream of emails and phone calls from people who found you personally? That would be worth the effort, wouldn't it?
There's really no secret to all of this. What I'm talking about here is Internet visibility. Or more specifically, search engine visibility. I will say this from experience -- if you can earn maximum visibility for your real estate website, you'll never have to use traditional prospecting methods again.
I have former clients who operate under this kind of business model. Through my SEO consultation services, I've helped them achieve top search engine rankings within their respective cities. And now they focus most of their effort on sustaining (and even improving) what I helped them build.
In the past, they had to exhaust themselves with the usual real estate prospecting methods. But now the process works in reverse. Instead of thrusting themselves in front of potential clients, they let the prospects come to them. When people visit Google or Yahoo and type city-specific "homes" and "real estate" phrases, they often find my clients' websites right up top. One of my clients here in the Austin area gets 85% of his new leads in this way.
This is why I refer to this as "unprospecting" -- it reverses the dynamic. And it saves you a lot of time and energy in the process. You are still real estate prospecting in the sense that you are dipping your pan into the stream. But in this case, the pan is your website and the stream is the Internet. Big difference.
Yes, it takes a lot of work to reach this point. Boosting a website's rankings in the major search engines takes a lot of work, especially in a big city with a lot of real estate competition. I know, because I do it for a living. It's not rocket science ... it just takes a lot of time and persistence.
Here's a checklist of what you'll need to achieve real estate prospecting success via the Internet:
- A website, obviously. It helps to have a professional, nice-looking website as well. In other words, spend the money to do it right. Don't have your neighbor's sister's niece design it to save money. This is the centerpiece of your online prospecting system.
- Plenty of great content. This is the building block for your future search engine visibility. The more keyword-rich content you have on your website, the better!
- A link-building program. By this, I mean you should consistently seek new links to your website (from other websites). This will help to increase your website's ranking in search engines, especially in Google. Publish articles online. Submit your website to real estate directories. Do whatever it takes to gain links from relevant, quality websites. Just avoid reciprocal linking schemes.
- Lead generation tools. The goal of this web-based approach to real estate prospecting is to generate inquires through your website. Traffic alone is not enough. You have to convert those visitors into leads you can follow up with. Here's some help with this one.
There you have them ... the four primary components of your new-and-improved prospecting system. Build a great website and fill it with keyword-specific content. Add some useful tools while you're at it, such as property listings, local market news, etc. Improve your search engine rankings by adding new content often, and by conducting a link-building campaign. And set up some lead generation channels to convert your visitors into leads.
I began this article with two goals -- to create a funny image and to offer some solid advice. Hopefully, at this point, I've got a check in both boxes. If you have questions about this article, or about real estate prospecting in general, type it into the Q&A box at the top of the blog.
Labels: Real Estate SEO
posted by Brandon at
2:05 PM
