Each newsletter includes a link or resource to share on social media to help with your real estate marketing. This is a compiled list of all of the links from previous issues.

1. It is summer vacation season so 5 tips to Safely Book a Vacation Rental might be a good resource to share with your clients.
2. This is an article entitled 4 Thing Homeowners Must Stop Doing which are all very down to earth and probably good for your clients to hear without it being you saying it!
3. Water features are a great landscaping feature but the ponds can be a risk to children and increase insurance rates. This article on how to create Pondless Water Features might give your clients some neat inspiration.
4. CNN Money just ran an article pointing out that Housing Affordability is Way Up which could be a good conversation starter with potential buyers.
5. Zillow published an article called: Off-Beat Homes Perfect for the Off-Beat Personality and the homes featured are pretty entertaining! Fun for your clients to check out.
6. This is a short article from InMan for your buyer prospects. 6 Signs a Home Will Hold Its Resale Value A bit of food for thought for them and perhaps a conversation starter for you!
7. It’s always fun to see amazing houses, condos, and townhouses. Well Joan Rivers Manhattan Penthouse is for sale and it’s pretty fun to check out all the pictures of it!
8. Spring has official sprung and in some areas it feels like summer. Here are 10 Home Maintenance Tips for Spring from Inman.
9. The national association of home builders released a list of 8 design trends for this year. It makes for an interesting but quick read and has some good eye-candy in the pictures.
10. Lots of people are wondering if we have reached the bottom of the housing crisis. This Housing Affordability Infographic doesn’t answer the question but is good eye candy for anyone curious about the market situation!
11. Martha Stewart has a Spring Cleaning Checklist that your clients can download, printout, and use this spring!
12. The US government has an internet resource for homeowners to get information and learn. Maybe your clients and prospects would like to check it out! USA.gov Homeowners Resources

Each newsletter includes a quick tip for real estate marketing. This is a compiled list of all of the tips from previous issues.

1. There is a free online tool at cooltext.com that you can use to create quick stylized text graphics for use in your marketing. It isn’t the most polished of options for super classy stuff but works great for a quick option! In fact, I used it to create the vs. part of the graphic for this article.
2. It’s a grim reality that right now there are a fair amount of homeowners holding garage sales to earn some cash to pay the bills or even because they anticipate foreclosure and are clearing out things they don’t need before a move. They may not know how a short-sale could buy them time AND help protect their credit. Do them a favor and let them know!
3. When writing anything targeting consumers go through it and change any real estate jargon to words that clients use. For example normal people don’t list houses. The put houses up for sale. They don’t say a house has curb appeal. They say it looks great. Write for the audience as much as you can.
4. The pictures taken by your cameras and even phones are almost always a higher resolution than you want online. Even after you resize pictures they almost certainly are full of unused information. I use a site called Smush It to solve this problem. Small picture files load faster so your clients and prospects are more likely to see the photos. Also, site speed is a factor in SEO. The faster your listing pages load the better. Speed them up!
5. For the last year or so I’ve been using an online tool called Trello for organizing my to-do lists. This is different than tracking calls and follow-ups which should be done in your CRM. It lets me slide thoughts around, organize them in different ways and share them with team members. Check it out!
6. It sounds obvious but a quick check of MLS pictures makes it clear that many agents don’t think of this. When taking listing pictures of kitchens take down all of the refrigerator magnets and clutter. In person it can be easy to overlook but in a picture it makes the kitchen seem cluttered and the refrigerator look smaller.
7. A big challenge I have is getting distracted by emails, interesting links, news, etc. when I sit down to get to work. I found a little mental trick that really helps. Any time I have break in my work flow for some reason, I stop before I sit back down at my computer and decide what I’m going to do next. I know that sounds insignificant but already having my next action in mind keeps me from getting sidetracked. Maybe it will work for you too!
8. Add a bright neon flag to each of your open house signs. The extra height will make them easier for drivers to see and by being different your signs will stand out and stick in the mind of prospects more easily. Most open house signs look pretty much the same so this is a way to stand out at a glance!
9. If you find a marketing tool or channel that works profitably in your market push it until it breaks before exploring new options. How much can you scale it up? Do it. Once scaled up can you improve it to convert better? Do so. The truth is most marketing doesn’t work out. It sounds like it will but then it doesn’t. No one can tell you why. You were sure it would be awesome! So, if you find something that works, don’t distract yourself looking for the next thing to do too. Just focus like a laser on that golden goose until there isn’t anything more you can do with it. Don’t be afraid to do what works for you!
10. Make laminated copies of both sides of your property fliers that go in your flyer boxes. Then, staple them directly to the post of the yard sign. If you run out of flyers the information is still available and the folks who just want to know the price for curiousity but have no real interest don’t have to throw away your flyer at the next trash can they see!
11. Are you using Google Reader to keep up with the news in your market? If not, you should really check it out! Most blogs and news resources have an RSS feed option you can use to read all of their new posts without having to go the site. It’s a huge time saver for me!
12. When you get a new signup for your drip campaign, in addition to the automatic response send a personal one. Do not cut and paste something generic but write with a reference to something current like the weather or local news. Even a short message shows that you are “real” and paying attention will help you stand out!

There are two main types of real estate agents who become highly successful. Know which type you are and take advantage of your strengths. You will make more money, avoid frustration and could even lead your marketplace.

The two types of agents are:

• Marketers – This type of agent is primarily oriented toward systems and processes. Their primary source of clients and business is driven through things like print ads, PPC, search engines, and perfecting their ability to take a relatively cold lead and turn it into a client. The big money for marketers is usually created through a high volume of transactions.
• Connectors – These are people who are naturally social and capable networkers. Their primary source of clients and business is through their social farm driven by live networking, social media, and referrals. The big money for this type of agent is made by climbing the listing value ladder from intro homes and condos to luxury homes and penthouses.

All agents embody both types to some degree but most lean one way or the other. Some people lean almost completely to one side.

What Type Are You?

Figuring out what type you are will help you plan your career and business growth. The skillsets marketers should focus on are different than connectors and vice-versa. A marketer attempting to work like a connector isn’t going to get results nor is a connector likely to succeed trying to be a marketer. It IS NOT a good strategy to try and be both equally. You may survive as an agent but you will NEVER be dominant. The reason is that you aren’t going to be good enough to beat out agents of either type. You’ll scrounge in the mediocre middle. So be honest with yourself about which way you lean.

Here are some questions to help you figure it out.

You May Be a Connector If:

• You love going out socially and do a lot of it.
• Facebook is fun. You like seeing what everyone is up to and sharing your life with everyone you know.
• It’s easy to remember names and faces.
• When a friend needs a plumber, chiropractor, mechanic, whatever you always seem to know a good person.

You May Be a Marketer If:

• You look at your contact manager and can immediately imagine how having a bunch of names in there with addresses, categories, follow up plans, etc. would be awesome and powerful.
• You drive past billboards and bench ads and wonder how much they cost and whether the person on them is actually making money off of them or not.
• You like to know the facts of a situation and get a little irritated by all the “fluff” in advertising. You just want the information so you can make your own decision and move on.
• You probably didn’t fail math in school.

Got Your Type Figured Out? Now What?

Connectors:

If you are a connector, you will be more successful if you further strengthen your people skills. Read books like Never Eat Alone that give practical advice on strategic networking. Learn about body language, positioning in social settings, etc. These things come naturally to you but with study can get even better.

You are lucky as a connector because many of the skills you need you’ve probably been working on since you were in kindergarten. Now it’s time to apply them with a bit more planning. Your future career and income growth is going to be in selling increasingly more expensive properties.

Therefore, the challenge is putting yourself into environments where your natural networking skills can work on higher-net worth individuals or people who will be. It is important to keep in mind that it will be difficult to displace connectors who have long relationships with your prospective clients. Client loyalty is an advantage of being a connector. Some of your growth is going to come not from landing wealthy clients but from having your network grow in their own income and wealth over time. They will continue to use you as their agent when they move up or buy investment property.

One of the biggest challenges you may have as a connector is getting over the feeling that being strategic in your networking is manipulative or dishonest. Remember, this is your JOB. It doesn’t have to be 24 hours a day how you live. Know when you are networking strategically but give yourself room to “just be you” too. Network strategically at the polo club and still network naturally and happily while you volunteer at the homeless shelter and enjoy it on a personal level.

Marketers:

If you are a marketer, the key skillset for you is going to be built on understanding marketing copywriting, measuring results, and sales funnels. It’s a difficult learning curve compared to that of connectors since much of it is going to be relatively new. Hopefully you have some natural talent but the learning process is going to cost you money.

The fastest arena to learn and practice in is online. It also provides the lowest cost point to hone your skills. A book like Always Be Testing is a good starting point on the mindset and some tools to use. (Though Google Website Optimizer is about to fold into Google Analytics it will still be similar.) For copywriting skills you can learn a ton at site like CopyBlogger.

There is no way to learn this stuff without just jumping in and trying to do it. You’ll want to start by working on your own website and with PPC ads. You can also play with Craigslist ads or a local equivalent if you have an online player in your market that matters. Social media is a probably less likely to be productive early on other than buying advertising. The interaction style just isn’t going to mesh for you.

Be honest, how many posts do you want to see in Facebook from your dentist about teeth? None. And you see your dentist probably twice a year. How many times do you think your clients or prospects want to see anything from an agent they will use once in five years? Never. Connectors pull it off because they are so likeable and engaging. You’re a marketer. You’ll do something crazy like try and get them to take action, they will hide your posts, and then you never get on their wall again wasting everyone’s time. Don’t bother.

Your path to huge success lies in building a marketing machine that is profitable and then growing, adjusting and maintaining it going forward. Your biggest challenge is going to be breaking plateaus. There will be marketing media that you will get working but they ALL max out at some spending point. After that point you just can’t throw more money at it to get more leads. There are only so many searches for long-tail keywords in Google that actually are profitable in any given market. Once you have a good ad position and optimized ad for them all, you’re done. You’ve maxed it out. Time to find another channel to add to your mix.

That is your pattern. When you find something that works, dig into and max it out. Shotgun to find what has potential and then focus on just one until you’ve nailed it. Repeat.

 WARNING FOR NEW AGENTS

Most new agents are trained as though they are connectors because it is seen as the easiest and cheapest way to get going. To a degree that is true. Everyone has a network of friends and family. Looking there for clients makes sense. However, if you are a marketer, that is where your career will likely end because you aren’t going to make enough money to stay in the game trying to work like a connector. I think most career agents are connectors not because it is superior but because the marketers usually don’t survive long enough to really figure things out.

If you already know that you are a marketer, here is my recommendation. Take a side job or even volunteer as an intern for a more established agent to manage their online marketing for them. Or create it from scratch if they don’t have any. Learn by actually doing it BEFORE your car payment depends on it. In fact, you can start as a marketing assistant even before you have your license. It might not be the greatest role for your ego but will be the greatest role in the long run for your success.

Stephen Garner, who writes for and runs MyTitleGuy, had a great post on updating the tried-and-true real estate flyer. He was kind enough to allow me to republish it here for your benefit. Stephen brings his usual directness and experience to the article and doesn’t hesitate to point out why the old designs just are not working in today’s real estate environment. If you are an agent in the Phoenx, AZ area I strongly recommend getting in on Stephen’s classes. If not, well, at least he shares his insights online!

So, without further ado, here is Stephen:

How To Use Real Estate Flyers To Get More Leads

How would you like to design a real estate flyer, print it, distribute it and have it work? When I say “work” I mean, get a lead?

It would be Awesome!

But why don’t real estate flyers work the way they “used” to? Could it be that it’s not the flyer’s fault but instead the problem lies with the user?

I call it user error.

In many cases it is not the marketing vehicle that is to blame but the real estate agent that created and distributed it.

So first let me TELL you how 99% of real estate agents use real estate flyers and then, SHOW YOU HOW you can use real estate flyers to improve traffic to your real estate website and therefore – leads.

CONTENT

Most failure with real estate flyers lies in the content. In 2005 and 2006 “Just Listed!” or “Just SOLD!” was great content. Why? Because consumers cared more than ever what their homes were worth. I like to say “even a blind poodle could sell real estate back then”, It didn’t take much to get a seller off the fence when they realized their properties went up 47%, nor did it take much to get a buyer to commit at the prospect of being “Priced Out Of The Market”.

But today? Uh, not so much.

Creating Awesome Real Estate Content

Today you need content just as good, just as compelling as the “Just Listed!” or the “Just SOLD!”. But what kind of content is that? In 2005 and 2006 this type of messaging worked because home values were on the minds of everyone. Everywhere you went: the grocery store, kids soccer games, PTA meetings, Church, EVERYONE was talking about their home values.

What is on the minds of homeowners today? Short Sale. Foreclosure. Avoiding Foreclosure. Short Sale Deficiency. Tax Liability. Home Values. HAFA, HAMO, TARP. These are just some of the things consumers care about.

So, should you just piece together a flyer with information about short sale or foreclosure, deficiency or home values and send it out?

NO.

In addition to rockstar real estate content, another way to get leads from a real estate flyer is by creating a compelling call to action. A call to action is something that encourages consumers to DO SOMETHING!

Call me! Click Here! Email Me! Subscribe! Watch The Video! Text. Tweet This. Share This. Connect With Me On Facebook. Fill Out The Form Below!

Whatever you do, Go BIG or Go HOME. Make it BIG and IMPOSSIBLE to not notice. Make it a different color or font size and even different shapes.

It’s not good enough to send out that same boring real estate flyer and expect consumers to TAKE ACTION. They have to be told WHAT to do, HOW to do it and the VALUE they will receive for doing it.

Where should that call to action go?

To your real estate website of course!

Create a page on your real estate website that is full of THE EXACT INFORMATION you promised the consumer in your real estate flyer. Nothing More, Nothing Less. Use a Gravity Form or other form of lead capture that consumers can fill out for more information. Use a Video! Video says more than text or a picture ever could.

If you have promised a way to avoid foreclosure have a video on that subject. Be empathetic. Identify with your audience. Tell a story.

“Ya know, In all my years of selling real estate, I have NEVER seen a market like this one. I am seeing good, hard working people lose their homes to foreclosure, good people that could have avoided the “F” word if they had only known. . . ., just last week I met with John & Lisa Smith. . . .” story continues.

Then use a URL shortener like Bit.ly or Goo.gl or Tr.im or Cli.gs one of the others that offers the ability to TRACK THE NUMBER OF CLICKS your link gets. I like Bit.ly because you can customize the link. Instead of Bit.ly/56gy36$ it could be Bit.ly/AvoidForeclosure.

A customizable URL shortener will make your links easier to type into a browser and trackable links will tell you IF your real estate flyer is having its desired effect. If you are getting clicks and no leads, it could be a problem with your value statement or USP. After all, who has the time to type a URL into a web browser unless they are interested in learning more? Every visit usually indicates INTENT.

BTW: When the consumer is on your real estate website it is not JUST the article or VIDEO that they will be reading/watching, they can also [ready for this?] SEARCH FOR HOMES, DISCOVER MORE ABOUT YOU, YOUR EXPERIENCE, KNOWLEDGE and VALUE to name a few. Now they are on your HUB – right where you want them. Did you notice where you are right now? uh yeah!

If you are going to spend your hard earned TIME and MONEY on a real estate flyer you can improve your success rate by focusing your real estate content on something your ideal client actually cares about. You can track the effect your real estate marketing is having with a URL shortener as well.

What are some other ways that you use real estate flyers to get leads? How do you use real estate flyers in your real estate business?

Real Estate Is A Strange Business

The human side of the business requires compassion, openness, and a lot of emotional intelligence. In fact, most of your time is spent in those “soft” zones of human psychology and (if in escrow) perhaps human neurosis. Then you get a new listing or open an escrow and BAM! you are expected to function like a right-brained CPA and be organized, analytical, and on top of deadlines, complex processes, and strict formal timelines.

Keeping track of the many detailed processes in real estate can be deceptively difficult. Panicked buyers and needy sellers calling can break even the most focused person’s concentration and allow the occasional to-do item to slip through the cracks. We’ve all been there at one time or another trying to remember if something actually got done or not. Or worse, trying to remember something we were sure we need to remember and didn’t want to forget. Now what the heck was it?

The root of the problem is just how many individual steps and processes are involved in a single real estate transaction, listing, or office management. Unless you are one of those people who can remember PI to 50 digits or something, keeping it straight in your head is nearly impossible! Most of us use checklists of some sort to try and help. Not all checklists are created equally though.

My Checklist on Steroids Approach

I’m going to lay out a checklist approach that I used for managing our listing marketing. This approach works great for managing and conveying a lot of information at a glance. It also creates a foundation from which to work with and manage assistants when you are ready. To get started, here’s a sample of a spreadsheet. It is a little ugly perhaps but there is a lot of information in there. Now let’s talk about what this thing is showing and why:

• First of all, this is a spreadsheet. This isn’t a word doc, or a pdf you print out and check off with a pen. You need to be able to see all of your listings in one place at one time. A spreadsheet allows you to scroll back and forth so you aren’t limited in the number of tasks or houses you can track. Closed or expired listings can be hidden easily when they are finished so you can stay focused on your live listings without losing your old information.
• It doesn’t really matter which spreadsheet program you use but if you have (or will have) an assistant you need to be able to share the document through a file-server, Gdrive, SkyDrive from Microsoft, etc. (If you don’t know what this means, just send me a note and I can help you out.)
• The list of properties goes down the left side while a list of tasks goes across the top. Your task names would be descriptive like “order flyers” or “post on facebook”.
• Some of the tasks are grouped by color which helps to break up the information a little and also to correspond to some form of logic depending on what suits you. For example you could group social media tasks, tasks handled by your assistant, or tasks that should be done at the same time.
• The cells in the sheet have the date when a task is started. Blank means it hasn’t been started yet while an X means it isn’t going to happen. (For example ordering a yard sign is a common task but for a condo it may not be possible.)
• You might have noticed that the last two listings have a couple other things going on. First, there are some dates with a # sign in front of them. This means that the task is started but not done yet. A work in progress. An example would be designing a property flyer or setting up a property website.
• There are also some dates that have an * in front of them. This symbol represents tasks that are done but not verified yet. Was the placement of the yard sign checked? What about looking at the craigslist ad once it was posted to check for errors? Most tasks will have a verification step that can (and ought to) be performed.

At first this kind of spreadsheet can look messy and confusing but once you get used to it, it conveys a tremendous amount of information very quickly about:

• What is done
• What is a work in progress
• What is waiting for confirmation that it was done right
• What is still waiting to get started.

As your business grows, tracking tools like this allow you to scale up without finding out the embarrassing way that communication isn’t as simple as it used to be! A similar approach can be used for tracking employee training, new buyer relationship building, etc. Any process that lends itself to a list and will be happening repetitively in your business can benefit from a visually based system.

Do you have an awesome system for running your office? I’d really appreciate hearing about it!

Stephen Garner, who writes for and runs MyTitleGuy, wrote an article regarding conveying your value to prospects in real estate video marketing that I liked a lot. He was kind enough to allow me to republish it here for your benefit. In the article Stephen makes his point with some good examples and in his unique style which is one of the reasons he is on my list of favorite real estate marketing resources! If you are in the Phoenix area Stephen teaches regular classes on how to create these kinds of videos for your clients. It’s definitely worth checking out!

So, without further ado, here is Stephen:

Conveying Value In Real Estate Marketing With Video

You have seen it before, a postcard, flyer, print real estate magazine, grocery cart, bus stop, billboard ad or newsletter from a real estate agent that SAYS they are all about the consumer when it is OBVIOUSLY all about them. You know, the photo shopped picture of the agent, from 5 years ago, OR MORE, in front of a multi million dollar home or leaning on a luxury car or SOLD sign, arms folded, teeth – white with some cheesy caption like “RESULTS FOR YOU”. Sound familiar?

Real Estate Vanity Marketing

If there is one thing about real estate marketing that makes me cringe, it’s this kind of VANITY marketing, the ME, ME, ME, ME and I’m THIS and I’m THAT, and I sell more houses than anyone else, and I’m #1 in my office and EVERYONE loves me and yada, yada, yada. It makes me cringe because I know it is not about YOU, it is about ME, the consumer and HOW you can help me buy or sell my next home.

Why should I choose you

Take a look around folks, here in Arizona there are over 20,000 licensed real estate agents, what separates YOU from your competition? Why should a consumer choose you? What VALUE do you provide? Do you have access to information other real estate agents do not? Do you have more knowledge than other real estate agents? What is SOOO special about you? This may come as a shock to you but the general public, does not necessarily see a difference between real estate agent A and real estate agent B. How else can you explain a brand new agent sitting a multi million dollar open house – and selling it? It’s all about VALUE to the consumer and sometimes that VALUE is WHO is THERE when they finally need you.

Using Video To Convey Value

In a field of Gray, of Vanilla real estate marketing, there is a way to stand out from your competitors, a way to convey your value without having to resort to that ME, ME, ME real estate marketing. HOW? Video. Last month, Jay Thompson, Scott Cook and I were recognized by Techsmith, the makers of Camtasia, Jing and Snagit for the way we use their screen capture products to convey value. You don’t have to talk about how AWESOME you are, you can let the consumer realize it in how you use tools like VIDEO to convey value, educate and inform, to make their lives easier.

Here are some awesome examples of video, used not to talk about how AMAZING the real estate agent is but to help, educate and inform the consumer. When you watch these, take your REALTOR® hat off and watch them as a consumer, would you want to work with these agents? My answer – ABSOLUTELY.

Jay Thompson, PhoenixRealEstateGuy.com

Scott Cook, MyShortSaleGuy.com

I could tell you how “awesome” I am or that I am the best at this and that but what YOU want is help growing your real estate business – with Video, WordPress, SEO and more. I think this video says more that I could say myself, and THAT my friends, is the power of using VIDEO in your real estate marketing.

Stephen Garner, MyTitleGuy.com

Video is the future of real estate marketing, it is not only visual, its also emotional. YouTube has come out on record saying 90% of all web traffic will be VIDEO.

Rise Above Fighting Fires and Boost Your Creativity By Doing These Three Tasks

I’m giving you a little homework today. Try to get it done by the end of the weekend. Approach this assignment with an open mind and a blank sheet of paper. The three tasks are each very different and focus on different business areas of being an agent. As you do them, various random and related thoughts will cross your mind about your business. Your job is to briefly write down all the business ideas, to-do’s, and inspirations that cross your mind. Don’t worry about being picky. You can sort it all out afterward.

Task #1: Call a client from a deal that closed at least 6 months ago to ask for referrals.

It’s likely your client won’t have anyone off the top of their head for you to contact. That is OK. The main thing is to chat them up, hear how things are going, and offer them advice on any questions they have. You’re planting the seed. Hopefully in the days that follow they will think of possible connections for you. Toward the end of the call ask them if it would be all right if you mailed them a few business cards. (This gives you a second touch with the client when the cards arrive and business cards tend to lurk in purses and wallets to give away.)

Three questions to answer after the call:

• How did that go?
• What could you have said or worded in a better way during the conversation?
• Was the call worth your time?

In addition to your examination of the call itself, what thoughts came to mind? Did you think of other clients you should contact in some way? Follow-up process improvements? Do you need to redesign your cards or get new real estate headshots?

Task #2: A Quick Analysis of Your Closed Transactions Over the Past 12 Months

Three points to consider as you look over your list are:

• What lead source did the most closed deals come from?
• What lead source did the best closed deals come from?
• What is the simplest thing I can do to increase the leads from one of those sources?

Hopefully, seeing the names and addresses from the past year triggered some interesting thoughts. Remember any ideas you had at the time that were lost in the shuffle of daily tasks? Or are you spending money and energy on a lead source that is producing leads but not sales?

Task #3: Create a Plan of Action for the Most Important Thing you are Currently Procrastinating

Your plan of action will consist of two parts:

• A complete list of small steps to complete the task
• A method for completing the steps

Maybe commit to do doing one small step between each phone call. Or one step each day before you can eat lunch. Maybe you are procrastinating an uncomfortable phone call and you just have to pick up the phone and dial. Whatever it is, the task is to plan it.

I hope you remembered some other to-do’s that you’ve been burying lately. For me, procrastination drains energy in the background of my mind. Biting the bullet and getting them done would be ideal but in the absence of that kind of motivation, giving myself small, almost trivial steps can often help me get the ball rolling. Do you work the same way? Did your mind come up with any interesting objections to try to get you to avoid the task?

Now Wrap it Up

I hope that these three tasks directly produced some value for you. That stated, I’m most interested in the thoughts you collected during the process. By hitting totally different parts of your business like this the goal was to spark your mind across your business from a higher level. I hope that you came up with quite a few thoughts, inspirations, and forgotten but valuable to-do’s.

How did it go? I’d love to hear how it went for you so if you have a moment let me know!

How is the return on investment from your office rent?

Make it great! It was one of the best dollar-for-dollar marketing spends I made! Having an accessible and visible physical office location was one of my best methods of getting completely new customers. I see so many real estate offices that don’t take full advantage of the opportunity they have to attract new business… it kills me!

Your physical location is typically a long-term commitment so as I write this I acknowledge some of the recommendations I make won’t be possible for everyone to follow. Take a look at what you CAN do and consider your options going forward. If you are starting up your own brokerage or renting some space for your real estate team pay close attention!

The biggest mistake I see in real estate office creation is that so many are designed with two priorities:

1. Minimize cost.
2. Appeal to the ego of agents.

HUGE mistake. The number 1 priority OUGHT to be:

1) Maximize the Return on Investment of Office Fixed Costs

Get where the clients are!

For an industry that likes to trump “Location, Location, Location!” to clients it is shocking how many realtors completely ignore location when setting up shop. Get close to your clients. Be where they already are and you are automatically a step ahead of your competitors. Think how often you see a dominant team with crazy market share in a particular section of a city. They almost always have a highly visible and accessible office in a busy walking/shopping zone in that community. Lots of agents think “If I had as much business here as they do I would open an office too!” They are missing the point. The office HELPS them get that market share and keep it. It’s like planting a flag in the ground.

Make Your Office Welcoming!

Make the office easy to approach. For the general public real estate is intimidating and real estate agents are sleazy sales people they would really rather not have to talk to. (Sorry but it is true. Real estate agents and car salesman are similar in the minds of many.) When you see large brokerages with tinted windows and a stodgy brand sign on the building it just looks like “stay away” to a consumer. It is far better to look welcoming and maybe even a little dorky. Be approachable! Make it clear that walking in doesn’t have to be a commitment.

Depending on your climate, consider propping the doors open when you possible. Throw some bright colors on your exterior if you can within the bounds of property management rules. If nothing else, putting an a-frame outside with some balloons on it can go a long way to looking friendly, welcoming and open.

Take Advantage of Temporary Sign Locations for Your Office

Real estate agents are masters of putting out open house signs and famously determined to get yard signs in front of their listings. Be just as determined for your office. There are opportunities nearby your office for temporary signage. One of my offices was inside of  a shopping center. We used to put an a-frame sign with our logo next to the main road with flags on it just to make sure anyone driving by knew we were there. We also had a rolling yard sign we affectionately referred to as “Big Bertha”. We would roll it out on the sidewalk going past our office to give us an eye-level bit of signage for cars going by. Permanent structure signs were not allowed but temporary unattached signs were good to go! Free exposure like that in a high traffic area is worth a lot and we took full advantage of it. You should too!

The Big Advantages of an Office Walk-In Prospect

• You get a chance to make a personal connection and impression. HUGE.
• Far more information is shared face-to-face that over the phone or initial email.
• Better than an open-house walk-in where buyers have seen lots of agents all day.
• Good chance of sellers walking in to gauge the market value of their home and the current sales climate.
• You catch these sellers at the perfect time. They probably started researching online but now want quality information in person. They aren’t quite ready to have hopeful agents showing up at their house for dreaded “listing presentations”. This is your window to save them the trouble!

Take the time to do what you can to optimize your office expense. You are already spending the money every month. Make the most of it! The only downside to how powerful my physical office was as a marketing tool was that I couldn’t ramp up the spend on it. Unlike other marketing channels you can’t really buy more location quickly and easily each month. Wishing you could invest more in a marketing channel is a good sign!

By the Way:

Do you do some pretty cool stuff with your office advertising? I’d love to see it! Send in some pictures! Want to know whose office is in the picture?

Feedburner is an awesome free tool from Google to manage the RSS feed on your website.

An RSS feed is created automatically by WordPress websites and many other website frameworks. What an RSS feed does is distribute your newest posts and articles to subscribers automatically without them having to visit your site.

In a way, it is a bit like friending someone on Facebook or following them on Twitter. When a prospect adds your RSS feed to their reader, every time you post something new they will automatically get it in their RSS reader. Feedburner gives you lots of options to help market your posts as well as manage your feed itself.

Reasons why you should setup Feedburner for your site or blog:

• It is a “fire and forget” task. Once you set it up it works for you from then on without requiring more attention
• It automatically adds social sharing options into your feed (Your default system probably doesn’t)
• Once someone signs up for your feed they tend to stay signed up for a long time
• It can get your posts right into iGoogle desktops and other places online
• Professionals who share a lot of online information with their own client base tend to use RSS to collect articles and posts to reshare. (Content curators in your local market.)
• It’s easy to setup, get going, and it is free so why not?

So here’s what you need to do:

1. Find out what your current feed address is. You’ll need to put it into Feedburner in the next step. In my case it is http://www.realestatemarketinghq.com/feed/ which is typical for most WordPress sites. You might have to contact tech support to ask if you are using a site produced by your franchisor or crm vendor.
2. Go to the Feedburner Site and sign in using your google account.
3. Put your feed address in the box and click on Next. (Don’t worry about checking the podcaster box.)
4. Make sure you like the title for your feed. I would recommend using Your Site: Town Real Estate. (For example: Rocking Brokerage: Salt Lake City Real Estate)
5. Copy the Feed Address so that you can update any feed links on your website.
6. Your feed is created! The next page typically tells you it is too soon for stats yet. That’s OK. Just click on the Optimize tab.
7. There is a long list of available services. You click once on the service to choose it and then click in the message that appears to activate it. I recommend activating:
1. - SmartFeed – Makes your feed fit a wider range of RSS readers
2. - FeedFlare – Adds links under each post in your feed for your prospects to share your articles and posts. Check the boxes for any you want. (The checkboxes under site are for if you choose to add a widget to your site showing your feed posts. I don’t bother since it seems redundant to me.) When you’ve checked the options you want remember to click activate at the bottom of the screen.
3. - Feed Image Burner – Some RSS readers will show your logo. You can add it here. You can’t upload the logo to feedburner as a file so you have to paste in the url to it on your website.
   

   I highlighted the recommended services in red.

8. Under “Publicize” activate PingShot. It just helps get your updates out everywhere as fast as possible.
   

   Recommended service highlighted in red

You’re Done! Feedburner has now made your feed way more awesome than it was. Now just let it roll!

Want to see what it does when you are all done? Check out the RSS Feed for Real Estate Marketing HQ. Pretty cool eh? If you run into any trouble just let me know!

Real estate has flexible and unpredictable time demands. As a result, successful time management is a major secret to success. Making the most of your time is critical whether you are a solo agent just starting out, managing your own team, or running your own brokerage with all those responsibilities added on.

There are the same number of hours in a day for everyone. So why do some agents get so much more done than others? There are really only two reasons:

• They Prioritize Very Well
• They Focus Clearly When Working

Those two skills are the keys to success. The truth is most of us will NEVER get everything done that we think we ought to. Think about it. How many areas of your business could you work on right now? A typical list of work beyond current escrows could include:

• Improve your website design
• Test sign up forms for better conversions
• Review and improve email follow-up campaigns
• Get more organized so taxes next year are easier than they were this year
• Contact past clients personally for referalls
• Really figure out how to take advantage of your phone/ipad
• Order replacement signs and flyer boxes
• … on and on and on

So let’s start with prioritization. You probably already know the most important item on your list of to-do’s. Or at least which to-do’s are in the running (which is close enough). The best method I know of for organizing, planning, and prioritizing your tasks is “GTD”. This is a reference to David Allen’s book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity which is a national best-seller and whose principles have been featured by Fast Company, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, and many more. So what’s so great about it?

Here’s the core concept: Get all of the things you need to do out of your head and into a system you trust so you don’t waste any energy and time re-remembering your to-do’s and trying to make sure you don’t forget anything. The book lays out an entire plan and system to manage everything. It sounds simple and I suppose the most effective methods usually are. Actually getting used to it and making it a habit takes some time but will be well worth it. It’s kind of like compound time instead of compound interest on your initial investment.

I wish that I could tell you what specific tasks you should prioritize but I can’t. No one besides you or a mentor who has an intimate understanding of your business can. However I can offer you some general guidelines of the general order I would go:

1. Start with things that directly make you money
2. Next are opportunities to save cash
3. Next are time savers
4. Finally legal and accounting tightening

The next topic to focus on is focus! This is an area that working from a home office or coffee shop can make very difficult. A simple and useful method I’ve found that works great for me is called the Pomodoro technique. Especially great is that all the information for it is totally free!

It boils down to spending a set, focused amount of time working on a particular task. When the time is up you take a mandatory break before continuing. Knowing that you have a limited amount of time to work focuses the mind while knowing that there is a break coming allows you to not feel too much stress about trying to focus.

I’m still adapting the technique for my own tasks and lifestyle but it seems to work well. To download a free copy of the technique just go to the Pomodoro Technique site and scroll down to the bottom of the page. You can download the book (it’s short… 38 pages with lots of graphics) as well as resource sheets to help you out.

Focus Booster is an onscreen timer for the technique that is simple, effective, and free. It’s hard to argue with that!

I hope that these time management techniques can help you get more out of each day. I’d also like to learn the tips and tricks you’ve found that help you get things done in a work environment that is really flexible! Please send them my way!