It's an ongoing effort to improve the perception of our profession. We accomplish this by adhering to and performing according to the highest ethical standards and to Truth in Advertising.
MAXIMIZE BENEFITS OF FREE ADVERTISING
Most of us, however, have limited budgets and may not be able to do a lot of print, billboard, internet sponsored ads, etc. And if are confined to FREE advertising, then we should take advantage of them, using
- Postlets
- Vflyer
- Trulia
- Zillow
- Craigslist
- Facebook which has advertising options
- Twitter (and Active Rain gives your the option to have your blogs automatically appear on Twitter, too)
MULTI-MEDIA ADVERTISING
Good and bad ads: In case you haven't seen this site before, it's worth visiting: The official Real "Ad" for Awards. The site promotes itself as:
The Real"ad"tor Awards is a showcase of the most superb talent from the men and women in the Real Estate advertising world.
Video: find out ways to make, or convert them.
- For example, VisualTour (which stitches still photos to create tours) can convert the tour to video for posting on youtube.
- Or get a FlipVideo. Brad Andersohn provides great info about this.
Lots of good ideas --- and lots of caution as to what to avoid
MLS ADVERTISING
Remember THE most important advertising: the MLS listing
Because of RSS feeds etc., our MLS listings are immediately picked up by multiple realty sites especially by REALTOR.com where prospective buyers (and sellers) sign up to get information about active listings. So your MLS info should be the best that it can be.
Before we finalize that MLS listing, make sure you have it right the first time around:
- Post your best photo(s). If the property is presentable, post the maximum number of photos allowed. If it doesn't look great, but the neighborhood does, post a photo of some neighborhood amenities, like a neighborhood park or playground, for example.
- Be informative and factual. If you don't know for sure, don't say it.
- Don't make promises. In short sale scenarios, we can never be too sure of anything.
- Don't be overly flowery
- Don't exaggerate --- words like "ideal" or "perfect". It's all relative.
- Avoid cliches. If you do a search for advertising cliches, there are so many ActiveRain blogs on the subject.
- Here's one by Jim Crawford from Atlanta.
- And on Trulia, here's what Patrick Mahoney from Phoenix calls his "Top 11 Realtor Remarks of 2009"
- Think of keywords --- what do people often look for? If they want hardwood floors, but your listing has engineered wood floors, say it's engineered WOOD floors. "Wood floors" are keywords.
Don't forget: ActiveRain, offers advertising specials.
Wishing everyone a happy and prosperous new year and beyond!
Comments(4)