Ready. Aim. Fire! Strategic Planning for Your Land Real Estate Business

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This article was originally featured in the 2018 Winter Terra Firma Magazine, the official publication of the REALTORS® Land Institute.

Last January, I hosted a group of clients for a duck hunt on the Texas coast. Huge groups of redheads flock together during the late season, and when they commit to the decoys, the hunter who takes careful aim can fill his bag with drakes in a hurry! One of my companions, however, was not having a productive hunt. Opportunities were abundant, and he was shooting aggressively, but his shots rarely connected. When he did hit a duck, he was just as surprised as we were! But, more often we heard the words, “%$#@, I should have aimed better!” He failed to follow the proven “ready, aim, fire” model.

Unfortunately, this sounds too much like how many real estate agents approach the land business. Abundant opportunities, lucrative commissions, and time spent outdoors tend to attract these folks to the land business. But many operate their businesses in a reactive fashion, simply taking what the market gives them. While they may feel busy, their business is unpredictable and it leads to the high percentage of agents who fail to make it past five years in this business. Strategic planning for your land sales business boils down to a few simple steps: set clear, written goals (ready), identify the specific activities to get you there (aim), then execute the plan (fire). Top agents who do take time to strategically plan have a more predictable business and, consequently, they operate with more clarity. Core business and operational decisions become much easier with a predictable business. Hiring, debt, expansion, marketing, and scheduling are much easier if you can confidently predict the results you will likely achieve.

As you plan your business empire, you should start by considering where your leads will come from. Use a simple spreadsheet or one of the many software programs available online to track your lead sources by percentage and volume. By identifying your core sources of business, you can confidently plan your activities, make better marketing decisions and bring in the proper leverage to maximize the potential of these lead sources. Additionally, this will force you to calculate the cost of these leads, which will come in handy when doing your pro forma. Knowing the sources of your business is the first step to clear planning.

Now, let’s look at three basic components of a productive and clear business plan. Remember, this is a plan for you to follow, not a 50-page textbook that requires a Ph.D. to interpret! The idea of a business plan is to clearly lay out the specific steps and activities required to reach your goals, and to project profitability once you reach them. The three basic components we will look at are: the Financial Model, or pro forma, the Organizational Model (who does what), and a one-page plan with written goals and the clear steps to accomplish them.

Top business people know their numbers and track them closely. The Financial Model or pro forma is where you write down how much income you would like to net, and calculate all the costs associated with getting to that number. According to the Millionaire Real Estate Agent model, start with your desired net income, then back into the total sales required to support this goal.

For example, if I want to net $300,000 in annual income (before taxes), I would write down $300,000 + $87,600 (29.2% cost of sales) + $87,600 (29.2% operating expenses) to get my total required gross commission income (GCI) = $475,200. Now I know how much revenue I will need to bring in to support my income goal and I can calculate how I will get there. To do this, divide $475,200 (GCI) by your average commission rate to get the necessary total sales volume. In this example, I would need to close $15,840,000 in sales volume to reach my goal. Next, I will need to know my average sales price to calculate the number of transactions needed to reach my goal. My average sale has been tracking around $2,000,000. $15,840,000 divided by $2,000,000 tells me I need to close 7.9, or 8 transactions at my average commission rate to reach my goal. Now, I simply plug in the percentage of listings I expect to close (65%) from the appointments I expect to win (70%) to get the number of listing appointments I will need to set. In this example, I would need to go on 18 listing appointments in order to predictably win 12 so that I could expect to close 8 property transactions. If they average $2,000,000 and I earn my average commission rate that will determine my GCI. After expenses and cost of sales, I will reach my income goal of $300,000. *see chart on page 4 of the Millionaire Real Estate Agent Business Plan

The success of any sales business boils down to the right amount of quality leads. The Financial Model showed me how many leads I need to generate to reach my financial goal; now I can build a plan to get there. We have found a simple, single-page business plan to be the most effective way to do this. The COB and CEO of the largest real estate company in the world can fit theirs on a single page, so we can too! The single-page business plan requires extreme clarity on the goal and the specific things that must happen in order to accomplish the goal. In his book The ONE Thing, Gary Keller asks the question, “What’s the ONE thing I can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?” This clarity allows you to line up your dominoes and start with the most important task first. Focus on the big rocks, the things that only you can do, and break them down into action items.

We start with a written five-year goal, a written one-year goal, three top priorities that absolutely must happen to ensure the one-year goal is met, and five strategies to accomplish each priority. We creatively refer to this exercise as the 1-3-5 goals sheet. Going back to my example from the Financial Model, I would write my one year goal of $300,000 net income and roughly $16,000,000 in sales volume. My five-year goal is a stretch goal, but for the purposes of this exercise it won’t matter unless I hit my one-year goal. Next, I need clarity on what the three things are that must happen to support my goal. These are my top three priorities, and I write them down as well. First, I know I will need $24,600,000 in listing inventory (12 listing agreements at a $2,000,000 average) to predictably close $16,000,000 (65%). Then I break down my five strategies to get there. Secondly, I know I will have to nail lead generation, and third, I will need a solid marketing plan. Each of these gets the same five detailed strategies. If I have clarity on these big rocks, I can dig into each of them and hold the activity (and the person attached to it) accountable for producing the results.

Now that I have completed my Financial Model and I have clarity on the core things that must happen to support it, my final step is the Organizational Model. This is where I bring in leverage and assign who does what in the business. I cannot do everything, and in fact I shouldn’t. There are things I do poorly, like administrative work and bookkeeping. There are others who do those very well, and by delegating to them, I am released to do the things I do well – like lead generation and interacting with clients. Leverage is freedom for business owners. It allows you to scale by staying in your strength zone and working on the business, rather than in the business. Leverage could be defined as strategically removing yourself from every aspect of your business based on your skill set and the value of your time. For most real estate agents and business owners, the logical first hire is an executive assistant, followed by a buyer agent and maybe a second assistant. Draw a simple org chart with clarity on who does what and who they report to. As your business grows, you add future hires under them and build a job description or “missing person’s report” for these future hires. Hiring for the future with a big goal in mind changes the way you hire and lead people. Success through people is one of the hardest things for most entrepreneurs to master, but for most, it is the single largest factor in their ceiling of achievement.

If you own or operate multiple businesses like I do, then simply do these steps for each business and combine the results. With multiple businesses, you would also consider shared resources, shared employees, and weigh any direct ancillary benefits of one business to another. For example, a farm management company and a land sales company might complement each other quite well by maximizing the client opportunity and sharing administrative expenses.

Lastly, you will likely not nail this on the first or even the hundredth try! So inspect what you expect, monitor your progress regularly with good accountability, and make adjustments as you go. What you focus on expands. Have a predictable written plan and focus on the detailed activities that will produce the results you desire.

Go get ‘em!

 About the Author: Kasey Mock is the Director of KW LAND division at Keller Williams Realty International. Mock is a member of the REALTORS® Land Institute now serving his second year on their Future Leaders Committee. Make sure to check out his break out session diving further into this topic at the 2018 National Land Conference in Nashville, TN, in March.

Teaming Up To Transform Your Real Estate Business

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“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” – unkown

What is the best way to achieve the highest level of success in your land brokerage career? The answer to that question varies greatly depending on your definition of success. Many brokers would like to see an increase in income earned, number of transactions closed, quality agents hired or retained, or any combination of other metrics used to define success. There are many definitions of success that do not have their own column in your firm’s P&L sheet, such as: spending more time with family, creating a steady stream of income, or dominating your local market. Figuring out the best way to achieve those goals is a real challenge for real estate salespeople.

“If you want to succeed, buckle down and work harder. You need to make more calls, set more appointments, and spend more time in front of decision makers.” This is good advice, but at a certain point in your career it becomes unproductive to pour yourself into more of the same. You can reach a plateau where spending more hours at work does not yield the desired results. In economic terms, this concept is called “The Law of Diminishing Returns.”

In 2013, my co-worker, Robert King, ALC, and I candidly discussed our goals for the year and how our numbers were tracking to date. Robert shared how his goal for the coming year was to increase the size of his average transaction to raise his total commissions earned. At the time, Robert was closing forty land transactions per year and was one of the top producers for Southeastern Land Group. The next year, he and Randall Upchurch teamed up and formulated a plan to increase their business and target a market segment that was largely under-served in Alabama. They focused on marketing and selling poultry farms across the state.

Poultry is the leading agricultural product in our state, and both Robert and Randall had previous experience with poultry operations and real estate brokerage. In 2014, they formed PoultrySouth to focus on marketing poultry farms. It took only two years for Robert to not only increase his commissions, but he was also able to more than double them as a result of teaming up with Randall. This is a perfect example of how two REALTORS® Land Institute members can partner to totally transform their business.

Randall is grateful the partnership has worked so well and, as he recounts their success, he does not take it for granted. “By working together the past three years, Robert and I have helped our clients close twenty-five poultry farms for a total of about fifty-five million dollars in sales. We currently have six pending farm deals, and are working on others.” Robert explains the upside of their partnership this way, “The benefit of two minds working through the issues of real estate transactions is a multiplying effect, not merely additive.” King continues, “Having slightly different perspectives focused on the same goal is a win-win for agents and clients. Additionally, we have seen the unexpected benefit of being able to multiply our effective handling of listings. Randall and I could probably only manage twenty-five or thirty listings apiece. Together we are able to handle one-hundred or more listings, while providing good service to our clients.”

The financial success of the partnership at PoultrySouth has opened doors for Robert and Randall to add cattle to their personal herds and each have purchased additional acreage for their family farms. The benefits from their business have overflowed into achieving goals for their families and farms. They are the perfect example of how real estate teams are supposed to function.

How do we achieve the positive outcomes we desire in our careers? One way is to align yourself with like-minded people. The power that comes from working together to achieve a common goal cannot be overstated. Fletcher Majors, an ALC from Alabama, has done a great job fostering an atmosphere of cooperation at Great Southern Land, both internally and with outside agents. In early 2015, Fletcher and three of his agents worked tirelessly to help one of their clients sell 6,477 acres in forty-five different tracts to thirteen different buyers in a single bid sale. Calvin Perryman, an ALC who works with Fletcher, explains why they believe in the team approach, saying “We often use a teamwork approach on special projects as well as everyday listings and appraisals. We believe having multiple opinions and ideas along with additional boots on the ground helps us better serve our clients.”

Each winter, nature demonstrates the power of teamwork when we see the V-shaped formations of geese as they fly south from Canada to warmer climates. The flock is able to survive by travelling great distances with maximum efficiency because of the cooperation of all the individuals. Each member of the flock benefits from the cooperative efforts of the group. This collaborative effort only works because each individual is clear on the objective, their responsibility, and they expend the effort to achieve the desired result.

There are many ingredients to creating a great team, but there are three essential elements that this article seeks to address. In order to form a great partnership, you must ACT like a team.

Agreement- “Can two walk together unless they are in agreement?” This question was posed by Amos, a shepherd turned prophet, that lived about 750 B.C. This question is still relevant millennia later. For a partnership to be effective, the partners must hold a common vision and agree on implementation of their strategy. The objectives must be clear so that everyone knows what they are working toward and how they will achieve the desired result.

Communication- Operation without communication leads to frustration. Sharing frequent updates, addressing problems jointly, and asking accountability questions helps ensure that the partnership stays on track. No member of the team should blindly assume that everyone has the most recent information or is acting on it. There will be hiccups in every partnership, but as a mentor often told me, “Communication covers a multitude of sins.” Receiving information makes people feel important and in the loop, so, be sure to share all that is appropriate with your teammate to increase the chances of mutual success.

Trust- The single most important ingredient to a well-functioning team is trust. Working with people that you know unquestionably have your best interest at heart frees you to focus on the challenge before you, and not on defending yourself from the people around you. Trust is very difficult to manufacture or bestow, and is generally built gradually and methodically through shared experiences. Trust breeds loyalty. Loyalty begets a willingness to work hard and take risks together. Working hard and taking calculated risks together is the formula most successful entrepreneurs use to achieve their goals.

RLI’s 2016 ALC-to-ALC Networking Award was recently presented to three ALCs from Hertz Real Estate Services in Iowa. ALCs Kirk Weih, Troy Louwagle, and Kyle Hansen teamed up to close a $12,263,100 transaction on 998 acres. This size and type of transaction requires that teammates have a lot of trust. Kyle’s advice for creating this type of success is, “Remember why you are working with another broker. It isn’t because they provide the highest referral or pay the best commission; it is because they can provide the best service to you and your client. We are in business to provide the best product and experience possible. To do that, you need to work with the best brokers possible. That’s why I like to work with Accredited Land Consultants and agents that I trust. That is what our clients deserve.”

A quick search in the “Book” category on Amazon.com for “Team” returns about 310,000 entries. With that much written on the topic, the best this article can hope to do is highlight a few essentials to creating positive teamwork for land brokers. There are dozens of free resources on teamwork available at the National Association of REALTORS® website. We face a challenge when we take a competitive vocation and ask individual agents to work together; however, good brokers know this is the formula for long term success.

“Our industry is unique in that it helps to have salespeople that are fiercely competitive, and yet be able to work well as a team. In many land brokerage companies, the agents are independent contractors and not traditional employees. In that type of relationship, you mandate only what is necessary and encourage your group as much as you can,” says Dave Milton, ALC and President of Southeastern Land Group. Dave adds, “For agents to succeed in this business, brokers have to do all you can to create an atmosphere of trust that leads to a strong team. The best way to help new agents launch their career is for them to team up with someone more experienced. Hiring the right kind of people is the best way to ensure buy-in from existing employees and protect the continuity of your team.”

A wise writer of antiquity once observed, “Two are better than one for they get a good return for their labor.” My hope is that by hearing other brokers involved with RLI share stories about the success they have had by teaming up, that you will find new ways to foster teamwork in your land brokerage business. “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” Here’s wishing you all the best as you “Go together!”

This article originally appeared in the 2017 Summer Terra Firma Magazine, the official publication of the REALTORS® Land Institute.

Jonathan Goode, ALCAbout the author: Jonathan Goode, ALC, is an active member of the REALTORS® Land Institute. He is a Co-owner of Southeastern Land Group, LLC (SELG) and is the Responsible Broker for the company in Mississippi. He is passionate about helping people buy and sell land.

Public Relations: The Land Real Estate Professional’s Ultimate Weapon

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Public Relations has become the most fundamental tool for shaping public opinion, investment markets, company reputations and business outcomes. As a land professional, your career is tied to a commodity with many stakeholders and many opinions on how land is to be managed and regulated. Far from being a “nice to have,” PR defines success—and failure—in today’s world.

Land professionals and Accredited Land Consultants (ALCs) have a right-down-to-the-soil impact on the physical and economic well-being of America. In a high-risk world, land—particularly commodity-producing acreage—offers roots of stability and a solid base for expansion. Land professionals, including brokers, agents, appraisers and auctioneers, together comprise the infrastructure upon which land is profitably conserved, exchanged and utilized.

Public Relations Gets You Known

But who really knows these things about land professionals?

By survey, one of the biggest hurdles a land professional faces is trying to explain what they do, what their knowledge and skills are, and how to care for the land and livestock on that land—free range, antibiotics vs. organic, and so forth. Ninety-eight percent of the general public has no knowledge of agriculture. This is a strong indication that effective public relations is not in play. The objective of PR is to make your business well-known and highly regarded so that you don’t have to repeatedly explain yourself.

If what you do, your purpose and the benefits you provide as a land professional are not clear to your public, some other perception will take its place—one that usually favors a competing interest.

Public Relations is About Reaching Minds: It Manages Emotions and Directs Attention

Public opinion regarding land management, its resources and the concept of stakeholder (the general public) over shareholder (the owners) is being shaped today by social media. And that social media, uncontrolled, has the liability of amplifying emotions over logic, presenting inaccurate data as fact, and omitting balanced points of view. It is a runaway horse, and only the art and science of public relations can manage.

Strong new community realities, such as sustainability; natural resources stake holding; environmental impact management; the control of interrelated natural systems such as navigable waters (Waters of the U.S. or WOTUS) and wildlife habitats—along with many other concerns—have created tension with private ownership. All of these factors influence legislation and can negatively affect land prices. Look carefully at any new legislation that affects land profits or limits sales—or any successful repeal of legislation—and you will usually find a publicity campaign that preceded it.

PR is often confused with activities that are more properly parts of branding, promotion and marketing, or it is thought to be only a plan to put out press releases now and then. While it has high synergy with these activities—even making them more effective—PR has its own precise scope.

It takes only a quick look at the news today to see that we live in highly opinionated times. People with strongly held beliefs and agendas often seek out only the news and information that support their viewpoints, and will disregard conflicting reports. Imagine, for example, trying to sell a fervent Republican on a Democratic candidate—the facts would be flying back and forth, but neither side would be listening to the other. Impasse! PR would need to step in, find the real issues people care about, and either makes a bipartisan solution well known, push a workable compromise, or show one side (or the other) to be the best solution.

PR—not money—is how the world turns today. It’s PR first that determines how the money will be spent.

As simple as it should be, the buying and selling of land will face increasingly complex challenges in the immediate future as more organized groups and government agencies seek to exert influence on how land is managed, transferred and used. Each will be passionate about their position.

Public Relations Creates Agreement

PR is the art and science of creating agreement and cooperation. It achieves this by framing the real issues involved in such a way that both sides might better work together.

Take, for example, the Clean Water Rule. Its stated purpose is to ensure that waters protected under the Clean Water Act are more precisely defined, more predictably determined, and easier for businesses and industry to understand. A visit to the EPA website shows the scope of the rule. But the comments on the regulations.gov website range from fear that individual farms will be decimated to fears that a government conspiracy aims to take over control of farming.

PR exposes the real issues in a strategic fashion in order to gain agreement, and in so doing, a solution often appears that everyone can get behind. Sometimes it’s simply a matter of reframing an issue to eliminate unproductive bias or false data. We want a clean flow of water. We also want viable farms and sustainable lands. Workable resolutions bring about mutual understanding and progress.

Public Relations is Proactive

A recent seminar by Hertz Farm Management, Inc., revealed that most farmers are over sixty-five years of age, and that forty-two percent of them plan to retire within the next five years. Many of them have yet to identify a successor. The number of farmers under the age of thirty-five is dwindling. These factors could change the characteristic of the farm market within this decade—more farms for sale by auction. A land professional who proactively prepares to take on a leadership position will be able to take advantage of shifts in the marketplace—but to do so, requires a PR strategy. Many prospective buyers are investors. They may run their own numbers and valuations, but they look for brokers with strong local savvy—someone who can connect the dots for them and has easily referenced credibility. Keeping yourself in the news, leading thought with insightful articles, and making public your good works are invaluable.

PR releases are written specifically to change perceptions, create strong affinities, forward strategies and form profitable perceptions. They are not fluff pieces full of bragging. Some common errors that show up too often, wasting valuable time and money, include:

  • Written by a committee. You’ve heard that a camel is actually a horse designed by a committee. Don’t let anything you publish sound like it came from a group. No one will read it, and no media will pick it up. Writing has to connect on a one-to-one basis. PR releases with strong points of view and a persuasive story/argument directed at the right public are pure gold.
  • Deliver a relevant message. It is the whole point, really. However, incredibly, it is often missing or overshadowed by less important details. Every PR campaign has, as its purpose, to deliver a specific message and make it stick in the minds of the public. A message is really what the reader comes away thinking, once he or she has read the release.
  • Keep it lean. Factually, you have about 1/125th of a second to grab attention, and from there, every word has to count. Short and sweet communications get read. They stand out from the ocean of verbosity online.
  • It’s not about you. Bad releases often come off as too self-serving and are rarely newsworthy. How great you are is not news, how you can serve your public is.
  • Not written for humans. Releases and web content cranked out to attract the eyes of keyword searchers with sentences built for search engine optimization don’t engage anyone, and make the reader think the writer doesn’t know what he or she is talking about.

Public Relations is Causative—It Gets Results

As a land professional, public relations technology really is your ultimate weapon. You are dealing with the most basic commodity on earth—Earth—and you are living in a time of unprecedented attention on how we manage our natural resources. Your efficient use of PR can help you get out ahead of non-optimum legislation before it happens; influence those who might otherwise oppose you; secure your business leadership; and create a stable future. These benefit everyone.

This article originally appeared in the 2016 Winter Terra Firma Magazine, the official publication of the REALTORS® Land Institute.

Karla Jo Helms, Public RelationsAbout the author: Karla Jo Helms, is the CEO and visionary behind JoTo PR. She has patterned her agency on a combination of her hard-won Public Relations experience, uncompromising high standards and exacting nationwide market research. Karla hosted two breakout sessions and a round table discussion at the 2016 National Land Conference.

Be An Intentional Real Estate Networker

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It happens to all of us!  We attend a conference and we are pumped to network — fully armed with a new box of business cards, excited about the all the like-minded business leaders we are about to meet.  We meet energetic people who are passionate about land transactions, and start to collect brilliant ideas – and business cards – to bring home like souvenirs.  Let’s be real, we are so blown away by the talented associates we meet along the way, we think that there is no way that we will forget that face and the incredible value they provided during the brief interactions.  When we get home, the face, value and promised follow-up morphs into a big stack of ambiguity.

land real estate professionals networking at the 2015 national land conferenceWe know that our biggest strengths are often our biggest weaknesses and too many outstanding connections is a problem I am happy to tackle!  I am taking steps to be more intentional about my networking and more importantly, my follow-up. Join me in my quest to be an intentional networker!

Have a Networking Mission and Goal
Is your mission to build your referral business or to attract talent? Be focused about this mission and then set a goal to achieve this mission. Networking is lead generation and you are already a pro. Determine how many people you want to meet and track this number each day. What we focus on expands!

Identify and Leverage a System
Before heading to any networking event, create your system for follow-up. If a connection is a brief encounter that involves a business card, write a quick note on the back of the card so that you have context for any follow-up or notes that should be added to your database. Leverage an assistant or technology to track your follow-up. Using Evernote or assigning yourself Outlook Tasks are great ways to ensure you do what you say you will do when you return home.

Digitize Your Business Card Collection
The dreaded stack of business cards does not have to be a dread.  Technology is your leverage! Check out these tips from PC World on how to digitize business cards. Transfer these contacts to your phone AND your database.

Use Your Database
Your database is not just for clients, it’s for your network too. Add a tag or bucket for RLI Referrals for all of your new connections. Create a monthly touch campaign for your fellow RLI members from afar that includes fun tips about your city, a recap of key takeaways from your last RLI Chapter training or updates about your business. You will be front of mind when one of your contacts has a client interested in your area.

land real estate professionals networking at the 2016 national land conferenceWork Your Calendar
If it’s not on our calendar, it doesn’t exist. This goes for networking too! Before attending any networking event, make a list of the people you want to meet. This could be an actual name or it could be that you wish to connect with someone from a certain state. Leverage the RLI Membership Portal to collect contact information. Then, reach out to these associates ahead of time to schedule a coffee break to connect one on one. Don’t forget, conference events are perfect for meeting new people.

Be Social
Keep in touch and stay front of mind by connecting with your new contacts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and other social channels. A “like,” retweet or comment will keep you in the networking game — even from afar. More importantly, engage with your connections through all the benefits being a member of RLI offers you.

There will always be a new opportunity to implement these best practices to help with more intentional networking.  Stay connected!

About the author: Holly Priestner, Director of Talent Acquisition at Keller Williams, has never met a stranger, literally. Her enthusiasm for people and their stories enables her to connect people to resources that can make both their professional and personal dreams come true. This is advantageous when recruiting top talent to KWRI, with recruits quickly recognizing that their goals matter to Holly and that she cares about their happiness and success. Attend Holly’s webinar Elevate Your Elevator Pitch hosted by the REALTORS® Land Institute on March 8.

Recruiting and Developing Our Most Valuable Asset

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This piece originally appeared in the REALTORS® Land Institute’s Summer 2016 Terra Firma magazine.

You know it isn’t very difficult for an agent to shine in the real estate profession.  In some cases all they have to do is return a phone call or follow through on something they promised.  I think it is pretty sad that the bar is set that low….

whitetail2You can have a beautiful building and offices, state of the art website and office equipment and you can spend a fortune on PR, social media and marketing.  However, at the end of the day, if your company is not represented by professional real estate agents you are hurting your business, your brand and the real estate profession as a whole.

Make no mistake, when a real estate agent, regardless of who he or she is licensed with, represents himself in less than a professional manner due to his or her poor work ethic, lack of skill or dishonesty, every single one of us in the real estate profession pays the price.

One very common real estate business model is to hire as many agents as possible, offer them a large split and let them beat it out.  Meanwhile, whether those agents know what they are doing or not, they may acquire a listing or two simply because a friend or family member feels obligated to list with them.  This approach is strongly why over seventy percent of the real estate agents will quit this profession within two years.  I feel this business model is extremely unfair to the agents; unfair to the public; and catastrophically harmful to the image of our industry.

Forget the representation of your company for the moment and consider the amount of money that exchanges hands along with legalities, complexities and the consequences associated with the sale and purchase of land.  I believe our objective as brokers and leaders should be to hire the best people and support them through training, marketing and structure.  In essence, we pour everything we can into them to ensure they are successful and in turn we will be successful because our relationship will be bilaterally equitable.

Recruiting

Our primary recruiting resources are online companies like, Monster, Indeed and Zip Recruiter to name a few. We target the nearest major metropolitans to the areas we wish to populate. These companies cast pretty large nets in that they often have sub-chapters/boards and communities that extend their radius. Our collateral resources include: our own career page on our website; social media; LinkedIn careers; The Outdoorwire; outdoorindustryjobs.com; AGcareers.com and AgHires.com to name a few.

What we do not do at Whitetail Properties is try to recruit/steal-away other broker’s agents. When you consider that we work in an industry where we work together through co-brokers and referrals, trying to recruit agents away from other brokers does not feel anymore ethical to me than calling another broker’s client. If agents from other companies call us, we are more than happy to talk to them; however, we will never call them first.

The prospective agent’s initial phone interview is with our HR executive (we provide her with the qualifying criteria).  If the prospective agent makes the cut, HR then sets up a second phone interview with our three-person interview panel. We then rate the candidate on a scale of one through ten on a ten-line score sheet.  If the candidate makes the second cut, we then setup an in person interview.  If the candidate gives a good personal interview we sign them up for the next orientation after they’ve obtained their real estate license.  It’s important that they attend orientation before we allow them to represent our company and our brand.

Basic Foundation

There are a lot of real estate companies that will hire anyone who has a pulse and the ability to acquire a real estate license.  I believe that this, along with a lack of training, is why many people stereotype real estate agents as a bunch of incompetent crooks.

We have four basic cornerstones when considering a new agent:  First and foremost, the prospective agent has to be an honorable person; the prospective agent has to be passionate about land and every aspect of land; the prospective agent has to have a strong work ethic; and the prospective agent has to be professional.

We can teach real estate, but in my opinion by the time human beings reach adulthood we can’t make them love land or teach them to be honorable!

Additional Prerequisites:

  • Financially Stable
  • Ability to work full time
  • Self-motivated
  • Accountable
  • Trainable

Developing Superstars

whitetailOrientation

We are accountable for and to our agents.  For this reason, we do not allow our agents to represent our company until they have attended orientation.  At Whitetail Properties’ three-day orientation, our goal is to give our agents everything they need to start their career on a successful path.

Weekly Webinars

Our weekly webinars provide our agents with solid career building knowledge. The topics cover everything from utilizing your sphere of influence to recognizing a property’s highest and best use.  Training is not something that you do once in a while.  Training has to be scheduled and repeated on a regular basis.  The key is to keep it fresh, informative, relative, productive and entertaining.

Maintaining Pro-active Contact

It’s important to maintain regularly scheduled calls with agents in order to review, mentor and coach them.  You see, the agents who contact their brokers for assistance are generally the ones working deals.  However, the agents who typically need help the most are the ones we don’t hear from because they are not working anything so it’s very important that we reach out to them and explore what they are doing and how we can help them

Support

Every member of our staff is employed for the sole purpose of helping our agents become successful and continue to grow their businesses.  In addition to the office and administrative staff, the following employees are at our agents disposal: we employ our own graphic designer, marketing director, advertising team, creative director, production department, IT department, compliance officer, accounting department, Chief Financial Officer, Chief Operating Officer, Chief Executive Officer as well as team leaders and brokers.  Of course we did not start off with such an extensive staff.  We realized early on that in order to grow our business and our agents’ businesses, we had to develop a formula where we employed key staff members for every X number of agents.

Experience

The most important thing we teach our agents is that our client’s experience is the single most important part of their jobs. None of us will sell every tract of land we list, but when our ultimate goal is not necessarily to sell the listing but rather to provide our clients with the ultimate land buying or selling experience, we will sell more land.  In addition, we will receive more referrals and elevate the image of our company and of the industry.

There are too many real estate companies who feel making the sale is more important than working in their client’s best interest; more important than building a relationship; more important than being a professional and even more important than being honest.  This has to change.

Our Most Valuable Asset

Our agents are unquestionably our most valuable assets.  However, we can’t just wind them up and turn them loose. Through explanation and repetition we have to instill our company’s core values in our agents.  Our company’s ideology is the foundation from which we’ve grown our business.  Without a solid foundation based on integrity you are not developing or nourishing your most valuable assets.

As I mentioned before, we have to provide a consistent training program.  We have to take every opportunity to mentor and guide our agents and we have to teach our staff how to best assist our agents to ensure their success.  Along with this, we don’t allow agents to simply “hang their licenses” with us.  If we teach, train and mentor our licensees they become our most valuable assets.  However, if we do not teach, train and mentor an agent, that agent becomes our biggest liability!

We take our obligation to our agents; to our clients; to the public; to the States where we are licensed; and to all of our fellow brokers and agents in the industry very seriously.   Although as brokers we are held responsible and accountable for every one of our agents, there is no possible way that we can be present every single time our agents interact with buyers, sellers, customers or clients.  However, we can pour into our agents on a regular basis to ensure they conduct themselves, knowledgably, honestly, professionally and responsibly.  After all, they are our most valuable assets.

perez-danAbout the author: Dan Perez, RLI Member, is the CEO, Chief Broker, and one of the Founding Owners of Whitetail Properties Real Estate as well as the host of the ever-popular Whitetail Properties television show. Dan is passionate about the land business and driven by hiring and developing real estate agents to become multi-million-dollar land specialists.

Accredited Land Consultant Pin

Promoting Your ALC Real Estate Designation

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No matter the industry, separating yourself from the competition is a critical component that can’t be overlooked. We RLI members know what an Accredited Land Consultant (ALC) is, but does the public? I don’t believe they do. Isn’t our duty to educate the public? We are the elite members of the REALTORS® Land Institute (RLI) and we need to inform the public about WHO we are, not just WHAT we do.

I would like to share some ideas/thoughts that fellow ALCs have shared with us which are working well for them.

Don’t just market specific properties, market yourself! Tell the public who you are, how you got to be an ALC. Let them know about the rigorous requirements you had to meet to obtain the designation and how you can use your expertise to assist a client with their current real estate needs.

Educate everyone around you. Let your colleagues, clients, friends and family know what RLI is and how this amazing group of land professionals have helped you in your career. Let clients know that you have a huge network of experts to assist you in meeting their needs. Let them know having your ALC Designation, sets you apart from the other millions of real estate agents. Get them to ask themselves, why use anyone else?

Establish connections. Develop a sold group of bankers, accountants, attorneys and financial advisors that you trust. Help the client with full process of their land sale or purchase. It’s more than just buying and/or selling; it’s helping them understand each step and how it will affect them financially.

Write land articles, blogs, post videos etc. These are great ways to position yourself in the industry as the expert you are and share your knowledge and expertise. It helps build a brand with the public that you are the go to person for all their real estate needs. Be the star you are!

These are just a few things that you can do to promote your ALC designation and set yourself apart as being the one they will come to when they think about selling or buying real estate.

I will leave you with this thought. Another MN ALC gathered some data and found out these staggering facts. There are 23,565 licensed real estate agents in the state of Minnesota and of those agents, there are only 13 are ALCs–in the whole state of Minnesota! I am proud to say that I am 1 of those 13 ALCs and I need to educate the public to again get them to ask the question… WHY USE ANYONE ELSE?

Quick fact: According to a recent Nielsen study, only 33% of buyers trust what a brand says about itself; however, 92% believe what their peers say about a brand! What does that mean to you? If you are an ALC you are the best recruiting tool to motivate and promote your peers to grow and join RLI. As the old saying goes, there is strength in numbers. The more RLI members, the more networking, awareness about the ALC, and organizational growth there will be–which benefits all ALCs!

wendy forthun, ALCWendy Forthun, ALC, is an experienced broker and 1 Stop Realty’s Vice President. Wendy joined RLI in 2006 and earned her Accredited Land Consultant designation from RLI in 2013. She has successfully marketed her esteemed designation to help grow her business.

Working with Efficiency on the Road

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How much time do you spend in your vehicle during the work week? What about the average amount of time you spend in your vehicle during a growing season? Don’t forget the commute to and from work. If you tally it up, you might be shocked or perhaps a little horrified at the answer. Then comes the next level of questioning: What do you do with yourself during that time? Are you prepared for what might be waiting for you on a dusty dirt road?

These latter questions were posed during a recent ALC-to-ALC teleconference that I co-hosted with Jeramy Stephens, ALC, from National Land Reality out of Stuttgart, Arkansas. These questions lead us many different places but for me personally, it comes down to efficiency. I have a thirty-five minute drive to and from work on top of wherever my job takes me during the business day. I have been intentional about developing habits that allow me to be productive during this time. This seventy minute minimum of car time has become a valuable part of my work day. Here are some tips that might help you achieve greater efficiency:

  1. Get started on the go. If you have support staff, then I recommend a Dictaphone or other recording technology. I try to dictate at least 2-3 emails/letters every morning on my way to work. These communications can range from crop reports to land inquiries – you name it. Just this very morning I dictated a letter highlighting crop inputs that need reimbursed at an upcoming closing, contacted a neighbor about a property for sale and sent a “feeler” to an owner in Missouri who has underutilized land near a management account of ours in Greene County, Illinois. Each of these things needed to be done. Why not do them while I am sitting in the car?
  2. Plan calls accordingly. We all obviously spend a lot of time on the phone in order to do our jobs well. Some calls need to be made while sitting at the desk so we can access folders, spreadsheets and computers, but there are also calls that can be made anytime, anywhere. I categorize my calls. If I don’t need to reference something at my desk, I save it for when I am in transit going home, to a closing or checking on crops across West Central Illinois.
  3. Be prepared and communicate with your co-workers. If I am going to be scouting farms in Morgan, Scott and Greene counties, then I make sure I have all three of those plat books with me, either in paper or electronically. You never know when you might get a call to check something out while already on the road. If I am going to a county seat, I always ask my co-workers if they need anything while I am there. If I spent all morning near Carlinville, Illinois (1 hour away) it would be discouraging to get back to the office and hear Dad say, “Not sure when you’re going to Carlinville, but the next time you’re there I need something from the courthouse.” Kill multiple birds with one stone and help each other limit needless travel.
  4. De-Compress. This might sound contradictory to previous points, but we all reach a point on certain days where we are fried. We are tired and desperate to chill out a bit. I use the “Pocket Cast” app to download my preferred podcasts. It allows me to quickly filter and download podcasts that interest me. I can go from economics to sports to my own personal nerdy interests with the click of a button (nerdy interests shall go unnamed). As much as I love podcasts and music, I also find it reinvigorating from time to time to simply turn everything off and sit in the silence. Silence is hard to come by at work and I certainly don’t get it at home with sons ages one and six!

Jeramy did a great job on the ALC teleconference call highlighting certain technology he uses to stay plugged in and there is a wealth of articles out there on smartphone apps that help in all sorts of ways. He also mentioned his truck being a traveling convenience store full of emergency and convenient items. He spoke on it better than I can write so I highly recommend you take some time and listen to the recording which can be heard here.

The long story short is that we as professionals in the land industry are on the road a lot. We can’t afford to mindlessly hit seek on the radio over and over. Tweak your tasks that need done to fit your travel schedule. You can get more done and become more efficient in the process. Be prepared. Take the time to think through your day before jumping in the car or truck. Do the preparation that has you ready to tackle the day and adapt on the fly. Do it safely and do it efficiently.

Luke Worrell, ALCContributor Luke Worrell, ALC, Worrell Land Services
Luke Worrell, ALC, is a Broker and Accredited Farm Manager in Jacksonville, IL.  He specializes in agricultural real estate and land management in west central Illinois.  Luke enjoys all things sports and traveling.  He resides in Springfield, IL with his wife Allison and two sons Kale and Benson.
Optimizing Your Website As A Land Real Estate Broker

Optimizing Your Website As A Land Real Estate Broker

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This piece was originally featured in the 2016 Winter Terra Firma Magazine

When people hear the term “optimization” they often think of search engine optimization (SEO), but it is so much more than that. Optimizing your website is all about making your website as effective as possible to help reach your business objectives.

When land and ranch brokers ask me to help them optimize their website, there are two fundamentals I hit hard before even talking about search engine strategies. First, ensure you build value into the experience your audience has while they are browsing your site. Second, ensure you build value into the properties your audience is coming to your site to explore. Brokers work very hard to build value into their business through the expertise they deliver, the trustworthy relationships they build, and the solutions they provide, but they don’t always understand how to extend that value through their website. Your website is the single most important tool to represent you online. Ensuring you have the basics in place will go a long way towards extending the same value online as you do, so naturally, in person. So, to build value into the actual audience experience, start by asking yourself these key questions.

  1. When you click on your home page, does it look like you? Your website should be consistent with all of your branding. Your logo, your color scheme and your content should all represent your company. You want people to recognize your name, your signs, your email signature, and your business card. It doesn’t cost any more to make them all match, and it helps people get to know and trust your brand.
  2. Is all of your property information up to date? There is nothing worse than having a potential client request information and having to tell them the website details are outdated. Your website technology and approaches should make the update process quick and easy so you never have a problem in this area. You can even eliminate the need to update your land and ranch properties on your own site by choosing a website provider like us who partners with Lands of America to completely automate that process. The key here is that providing consistent and accurate information builds trust with your prospects and clients, while providing outdated information breaks trust.
  3. Is your website easy to use? You want your audience to find what they are looking for quickly and easily. They do not want to be forced to view advertisements, fill out a form, click through multiple pages, or create complicated searches to find what they need. Take them where they want to go immediately, and ensure your phone number is visible from every single page of your website. You want to make it easy for them to call you when they are ready.
  4. Is your website mobile-friendly? As of 2014, there are more mobile users than desktop users, but many companies still have not updated their technology to make the experience a good one for smart phone users. The “pinch and zoom” method results in text that is too small to read, links that are too close together, and pictures that don’t fit the screen. This frustrates prospects and clients coming to your website to view property details and request information. Make sure your site is truly mobile-friendly.

Once you’ve built value into the audience’s website experience, the next fundamental area of focus should be building value into the properties your audience is coming to your site to explore.  There are a number of things you can do to set yourself apart from the competition and draw more clients, especially sellers.

  1. Use only high quality photography. Do not settle for small, grainy, or even blurry photography on your website. It is a disservice to your company, your clients and often detracts from the property value. If you choose not to hire a professional photographer (which is preferred), at the very least make sure you use the highest possible quality setting on your camera. Many people take short cuts with high quality photography because it costs more and many website providers can’t accommodate it. Choose a website provider who can.
  2. Create property and agency profile films. When I say film, I don’t mean just posting a virtual tour or raw aerial footage taken from your new drone. I mean using video to tell an engaging story about your agency and properties that capture and maintains your audience’s attention.
  3. Use a high quality mapping service. I recommend moving beyond Google mapping of pins and boundary markers to a monthly service. One that drives value into your properties by letting you mark and label property assets such as wells, structures, roads, and other unique features that set your property apart. One that has no limits to the number of boundary markers you can map and, then, easily share all of the mapping details via email. Some even have apps you can use while standing on the property, whether to create the asset details or show a prospect through a mobile device on the spot.

Once you have invested in the online fundamentals above, it is appropriate to start investing in driving more people to your website. You are well positioned to convert those leads to sales, positioning for a better return on your investment.

  1. Include your website address on all advertising and social media. You may chuckle at this one, but you’d be surprised how many people over look this critical opportunity. Whether it’s on your listings, in a trade journal, on social media, or in the home town paper, prominently (and proudly!) display your website address. One caution, if you do not intend to manage and maintain your social media sites, do not create them. Neglecting updates to your social media can create negative results. Social media sites are an extension of your business and you must have someone manning the desk to build trust.
  2. Provide regular email communication with your clients. Everyone knows the best leads come from client referrals. Staying in front of your clients with valuable information is very important. Ensure you have a database of clients willing to receive emails from you and reach out to them regularly with new properties, updated property information, highlights of sold properties, or something engaging, like a link to your agency profile film on your website. (Use your website as a convenient place to opt in or out of such mailings.) Ask for referrals and always include your website address in your email signature.
  3. Invest appropriately in SEO and internet marketing. I say “appropriately” because it can cost quite a bit to get your company to rank within the top three spots of an internet search page. Your company, broker, and agent names should be built into your website pages to generate free, top search engine placement, but beyond that, you should anticipate spending a minimum of $3,000 – $6,000 per year for a good internet marketing campaign. When choosing an internet marketing company, avoid those who guarantees success without demonstrating a significant plan involving trial, error, adjustment, and continued investment to see what works. Ask for research that demonstrates the best key words for high ranking in your business and in your region, and analyzes how your competition is placing. Choose a provider who commits to regular traffic reports to analyze what is and is not working and understand that success is based on many factors out of your control, which change all the time. For instance, if you spend $500 in a month to ensure a key word important to your region places you on the top three results of a search page, but your competitor spends $1,000 in a month for the same word, your competitor will out rank you. This is how it works, so you need to approach internet marketing as an evolving strategy requiring long term investment, both in time and money. Your goal is to build a foundation that tells the search engines you are a reputable player so they send the traffic your way. You are competing with others trying to do the same.           

As you can see, optimizing your website is all about making it as effective as possible to help reach your business objectives. I always remind people there is a lot you can do to reach your business objectives before investing in search engines, and even social media, despite the current hype.

Ciesiensky, MikeMike Ciesiensky is the President & Founder of LandBrokerWebsites.com, a Crystalcore.net division. Ciesiensky is experienced in helping land and ranch brokers create websites to meet their business objectives. Ciesiensky presented at the 2016 National Land Conference in Dallas and is a partner of the Institute.

 

Is New Technology Replacing Land Brokers?

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Are real estate land brokerages going the way of the dinosaur?

With the advent of drone videos, Google Earth, digitized County GIS records, and property advertising websites, are the traditional services of rural land brokers still needed? This article is my attempt to address that question.

If you are a part-time or mediocre land agent who only does an occasional land deal, you should be worried about how necessary you are going to be to consumers going forward. Your services will probably not continue to be as relevant in the near future. Brokers that continue to get better at their jobs and excel in professionalism have a bright future ahead.

My conclusion comes from observing craftsmen in their trades. A mediocre cabinet maker with access to fine tools, will continue to make substandard cabinets. A master with ordinary tools can accomplish surpassing quality because they pour their heart and mind into their work. It isn’t the tools that do the work, it is the expertise and discipline of the craftsman.

Websites, videos, mapping systems, UTV’s, and internet access to information are all tools of the land brokerage trade. There have been immense advancements in technology in my short 8 years in this business. Mapping technology is infinitely easier to use than when I entered the field. Now every buyer has access to Google tools that allow them to zoom in and out, draw boundaries, measure distances and area, and determine distances to their home. This is no longer proprietary information that consumers rely on brokers to obtain. There have been similar developments in finding property listings and also about obtaining county tax assessor information on parcels.

A conversation like this begs the question,  “What do land brokers really do?” If you are a broker and your answer to that is that you put properties online and in the newspaper, then your days in this business are likely numbered. I answer it this way, “I help people buy and sell land.” The emphasis in that sentence is on, “I help people.”

Consumers like to work with people they trust.

Our job as brokers is to give people all the information they need to make the best decision possible. For our clients, we also provide advice as to the proper course of action for their situation. In order for a broker to be able to provide expert advice, one must continue to learn and develop professionally. It takes a deep level of commitment to follow current trends, join professional organizations, network with others in the business, and constantly reflect on issues and trends that affect our industry.

My feeling is that brokers that are in this career for the long haul should join an organization like the REALTORS® Land Institute (RLI), and work toward earning their Accredited Land Consultant (ALC) designation. The Institute was founded by and for land brokers to promote the level of professionalism and increase the level of service to our customers and clients. Our members take an oath to conduct business in the most ethical manner, and agree to be held to a higher standard in their daily practices. The ALC designation is earned by those who demonstrate a commitment to obtaining the education and exercising proficiency in serving people who buy or sell land.

A consumer may be thinking, “But brokers are not necessary because I can use the internet to do what you do.” A portion of that statement is true, the internet is helping to educate consumers. There is an ample amount of good information from Toyota on how to change the timing belt on my truck. Is that something that I would personally try? Probably not. My feeling is to leave that to the experts, because messing up such an important task could cost me more than it would save me. WebMD is filled with information on diagnosing many important health conditions. Is it a good idea to diagnose and treat yourself based merely on the range of symptoms contained in the two paragraphs you read?  No. You should seek out the person with the training and knowledge to help you diagnose and treat the actual condition.

We should work hard to offer our clients the best possible service that leads to the best possible outcomes for them. Those brokers who take the time to get the proper instruction, master the tools of the trade, and do their work with expert skill will have a successful career. There will be changes in our industry, and some among our ranks will be weeded out. Make a commitment to do the things necessary to help you excel in our profession and elevate the reputation of our industry. There will never be a replacement for a passionate person, driven to excellence who excels in serving people. Those are the brokers consumers will line up to work with.

Goode, JonathanAbout the Author: Jonathan Goode, ALC, is an active member of the REALTORS® Land Institute. He is a Co-owner of Southeastern Land Group, LLC (SELG) and is the Responsible Broker for the company in Mississippi. He is passionate about helping people buy and sell land.

Integrated Content Marketing (Made Easy) for Real Estate Professionals

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Today, email remains the most effective way of digitally marketing your services. It still beats social media and direct mail by a longshot. In this article you’ll learn why email marketing is important as well as get an overview of the different types of content you should be using in your email marketing.

Why It’s Important?

Reduces Costs

Email marketing greatly reduces marketing costs. The cost to reach a potential customer is very low compared to direct mail, which requires materials, production and postage. Email marketing does require the use of an email service provider. There are many such providers including Constant Contact, MailChimp, Aweber, and many others. These service providers help you manage your list of email addresses, sending emails in bulk, provide templates that you can use, and most include other options as well including social media integration.

Ease of Use

What other method of marketing allows you to reach your entire customer base with the click of an email? Through the user of an email marketing provider like MailChimp or Constant Contact you can write your email once, schedule it, and have the service provider sent out the email to all your subscribers at once.

Email service providers make the job of email marketing easier by providing functionality such as a database for storing your contacts, web and mobile HTML templates for your email communications, sending of email to your entire list or a segment of your list, automated unsubscribe, and the ability to group or segment your list.

Customer Communication

Email allows you to quickly and easily communicate with your audience, drive traffic to your website, develop loyalty, increase brand awareness, and gain referrals.

 

6 Types of Email Content

 

Real estate professionals should constantly strive to add fresh, new content to email marketing campaigns. Many of us fall into a rut of sending out the same old boring content over and over. Not that there is anything wrong with letting your email subscribers know all about your current listings.

That certainly has a place in any email campaign, but your readers want and expect more from you. And I’m not talking about providing buyer and seller checklists, tips for selling your home, and other articles that we’ve all seen a million times. Guess who reads those? That’s right — no one. Don’t waste your time writing these, because no one is going to waste time reading them.

There are many different types of content that can be integrated into your overall email marketing strategy. You should not think of these content types in isolation but rather as individual components that are combined into an overall strategy. In this article we’ll give you a high level overview of the basic content types that can be used in real estate email marketing.

It’s really difficult to separate email marketing from your overall content marketing strategy including the obvious need for a website. And you shouldn’t separate them. You want to create an integrated content marketing strategy with email marketing playing a central role. Your email should be directing readers to your website so they can consume your great content, and in turn the great content on your website should attract many new readers (and potential clients). Ultimately you want the great content on your website to trigger a desire on the part of the reader to register for your email newsletter.

Here, then, are six basic content types that every real estate professional should be using in email marketing efforts. There are many email marketing providers but they should all be able to support all of these content types.

Blog Posts

Your blog posts will be the primary way that you generate content. Blog posts can contain many different types of content including articles about local events, restaurants, shopping, schools, and other local information. And yes, your property listings will play a big role as well. You should also include market reports and neighborhood tours as well as property tours. Tours are a great way to introduce video to your site. Other blog posts include curated content and graphic visualizations. Portions of these blog posts can be placed into your email newsletter along with links to the full article on your website. Again, you want to use the email to funnel readers to your website. The Your Berkeley site provides a great example of how to provide fresh content that can also be integrated into an email newsletter.

Video

Video is becoming more and more widespread and important. In real estate visualization is extremely important and video is the best way to visualize a property without actually being at the physical location. Video allows potential buyers to sort through potential properties without physically visiting each location. It is a more efficient way of searching for properties from a buyers point of view and saves you time as well. You should plan on using a video sharing site like YouTube or Vimeo to host your videos. Using a video sharing site increases the potential viewership of your videos so that search engines can organically display your videos in search results.

Also keep an eye on the drone (UAV) video space. As of the writing of this article we are still awaiting FAA guidelines on how drones can be used for real estate marketing. However, drones have the potential to revolutionize how video is used for marketing various properties. It has particular significance for high properties and large acreage properties.

There are also many apps that you can use to record high quality video. I recently wrote about the Hyperlapse application and its potential to add unique video capabilities for marketing properties.

Audio

Audio is sometimes neglected in content marketing efforts but don’t overlook this opportunity to provide great content. However, audio is not for everyone. Some people are not comfortable with this medium, don’t like to hear their own voice, or simply don’t know what to talk about. With a little practice though most people can become reasonably comfortable and effective with this content medium. Podcasting has become extremely popular and is a great way to attract attention to your website and social media channels. You could interview local or industry experts, talk about important topics or simply record question/answer sessions.

Graphic Visualization

Graphic visualization is a diverse and exploding content type. This can include many types of visualization including maps, infographics, charts and graphs, and photos. These provide unique, highly visual content that people really enjoy. These content types require specific software and expertise to create but are highly effective in generating traffic.

Reports

Buyers and sellers want information about their homes and the areas where they live. In particular, sellers want to know how much their house is worth and buyers want to the general trends in an area. Your reports should ideally be generated and shared on a monthly basis and should contain information such as active listings, recently sold properties as well as market trends.

Social Media

You shouldn’t consider email and social media to be isolated activities, but rather different channels that should be integrated into an overall plan. Today, email remains the most effective way to digitally market to your customers. While social media gets all the attention, it is not as effective as email. That doesn’t mean it isn’t useful, but you really need to combine the channels to take full advantage of everything they provide. The question is how? Most email marketing providers are fast becoming integrated solutions providing functionality that allows you to embed social media follow and share buttons into your emails as well as automatically send notifications to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and other channels. The integration capabilities of providers will vary widely so you’ll need to do your research in this area.

 

In Conclusion

 

Today there is no excuse for not providing your email subscribers with fresh, compelling content. A wide variety of content types supported by easy to use technologies make it easy to attract and keep readers.

 

About the Author

 

Eric is an approved LANDU Instructor for RLI. He is the founder and owner of the GeoSpatial Training Services and has over 20 years experience teaching GIS solutions and other technology. You can learn more about this topic in his company’s upcoming Getting Started with Email Marketing for Real Estate Professionals Course offered by Location3x.