The information age has changed the buyers buy homes and sellers have to keep up with the innovations. Online listings are so much more comprehensive than the monochromatic newspaper listings of the past and the availability of more information benefits both buyer and seller.
Maintaining a strong online presence is easier than ever, and this guide will help you take the first few steps to online promotion
success.
Virtual Home Tours
Investing in professional photography is a necessity in the age of online real estate marketing, but real estate video-walkthroughs are becoming more important by the day. Of course, you don’t need a high tech interactive walkthrough like those you see on the luxury home listings – a virtual home tour can be as simple as a collection of high quality photographs.
Many online listing sites allow a virtually unlimited number of photos. Use the best photos as your usual eye-catchers but include thumbnails to a full gallery for those who are interested. For photo and video walkthroughs, do a tour of your home just as your real estate agent would do during a showing. Start at the front door and highlight special spaces like stealthy storage and beautiful window views.
Networking and SEO
Include “sharing” buttons on each page to make it easy for friends and interested onlookers to share your real estate listing on their social networks. Most listing sites offer these sharing features automatically, but you’ll have to add them yourself if you plan to promote on classified ad websites or blogs.
If your home is something very special, take advantage of text. You can hire a search engine optimization (SEO) consultant for a few hours and learn everything you need to know about getting your listing to show up in the search results when people are looking for houses. Showing up on the front page of a search engine for “west coast beach house” or “four-bedroom equestrian ranch house” can garner valuable exposure.
Getting Started
Do you want to see these three techniques in action? We recommend contacting Go2Wendy for more net-based home marketing ideas – it pays to work with a real estate firm that understands the necessity of a strong and easily searchable online presence. An experienced but up-to-date full service agent should be able to coordinate the professional photographers, graphic designers, and SEO resources you need to succeed.
Creating a strong online presence is a great way to capture the attention of online house hunters (and nearly every buyer looks at Internet listings), but exposure is not the only benefit. Providing all of your property information easily available online helps answer the questions that potential buyers may have anyways.
Your agent will not have to waste time on the phone answering the same questions repeatedly. Potential buyers will be more likely to pick up the phone if they’re sure that the house is exactly what they’re looking for. Leave a little room for intrigue but take advantage of the Internet’s ability to share huge quantities of information at a glance.
Increase the chances of a fast and satisfactory sale by increasing exposure and marketing efficiency. Look for a full-service agent with experience in online promotion or contact a few online marketing consultants to guide you through the creation of your own online listing. Spread the word and enjoy the returns.
About Author
Noah Z. is an Internet Writer that has authored several e-books and published hundreds of articles on various websites and information hubs. With more than 5 years of content writing experience, he specializes in real estate, insurance and technology topics.