Fortunately or unfortunately – depending on the real estate professional – everyone has a brand, even those who haven’t articulated it. 

 

 

Without the work of articulating, building and promoting the kind of service that defines you as an agent, a broker or a team, you leave yourself at the mercy of either general public opinion or anonymity. 

 

Here are some basic approaches to branding that can help get you on your way, without breaking the budget on coaching fees.

 

 

1.    Use your voice

 

Authenticity rules. Your name, your way of speaking, your personal image and your reputation all contribute to your brand.

 

An easy way to build trust with new clients or with the buyers who might purchase your new listing is to have them feel like they already know you on your first meeting, that your branding told the truth.

 

 

Express your personality in your images, your listing advertisements, your social media verbiage, your blogs and your emails. In all of these, speak to the kind of client you’re trying to reach through your targeting options. 

 

A quick authenticity test: When people read your words, they should hear your voice. To test this technique, read your own writing before hitting send, publish or post. If you stumble over any words or things that just don’t come naturally to you, dictate a new version and use that instead.

 

2.    Do you need a tagline?

 

Give this one some thought. If you can attach a snappy and true tagline to your name that tells a story in a few words and promotes the value that you offer, then go for it. 

 

Remember the difference between taglines and hashtags.

 

Your tagline might already be a hashtag. And that’s just fine, so long as it’s true to you. In fact, if your tagline populates when you enter it in Instagram after a #, go ahead and use it in every post. 

 

 

If it’s catchy and clever, use your tagline as a hashtag every time. But don’t rely on the hashtag version of your tagline to draw people to your posts; be sure to include other relevant, searchable hashtags in every post.

 

Also, be sure to constantly evaluate the effectiveness of a tagline and be prepared to let it go when it gets stale. 

 

3.    Leverage your clients’ reviews

 

Stories sell. And the best success stories are told by the people you helped achieve success.

 

 

If you don’t already have a digital review site established online, create your profiles on reviews sites. Keep the primary image on each review page up-to-date; change it every few months and be sure that the image itself includes your name and other identifying branding, such as colors or logos.

 

Next, share those pages with your clients and referral partners.

 

Spend time with your reviews and reply to anyone who takes the time to write one. Next, extrapolate verbiage that you find repeated in clients’ own words; incorporate those words into your digital marketing, your listings presentations and your conversations with new clients. 

 

4.    Be open to (some) change

 

Brokerages change. Markets change. Even people’s reasons for buying and selling homes change. 

 

Perspectives also change over time, as do the levels of service you offer each time you expand your learning to offer new skills.

 

 

To ensure that your personal growth and change can always be reflected in your branding, don’t get too comfortable with one approach. 

 

Your audiences are unlimited. Let your personality and your distinct levels of energy, knowledge, passion, caring and service shine in everything you publish. 

 

Don’t change your branding too often or you’ll confuse your audiences. But choose messaging, with flexibility, that leaves room for change when you have a new office, a new team or a new market situation.

 

5.    Share your brand in digital layers

 

Speaking of publishing, it would be a shame to spend time refining your brand if you don’t get it out there for the world to discover and for your clients to see how you’re performing on their behalf.

 

At least 90% of home-buyers use the internet as their primary research method, and 52% use it before any other resource.

 

 

An online presence through various channels and targeted to each audience you need to reach is more important now than ever. 

 

A comprehensive digital marketing plan ensures that you target and touch greater numbers of buyers and sellers. 

 

LeadHax and LeadHax Pro include built-in metrics and data management so you can track the success of your listings marketing and clients can see the effectiveness of your efforts.