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 Developing a Property Marketing Plan Listing and Marketing Checklist Marketing Media To Consider Advanced tip Property Advertising Techniques Advanced tip Advanced: Getting the Most from Your Advertising Dollars Online Property Marketing Advanced tip Conducting Open Houses Advanced tip Advanced tip Alternative Selling Options Advanced tip Complying with Fair Housing Broker tip Property Disclosure Broker tip Common Property Hazards Broker tip Advanced tip Property Marketing Quiz Bright Ideas: Property Marketing More Resources: Property Marketing Code of Ethics: Property Marketing |
ONLINE PROPERTY MARKETING The 2003 NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers found that 65 percent of buyers had investigated properties on the Internet in 2002. Online Listing Services Many online listing services pull listings directly from local MLSs. Still, there can be some benefit to spending your own dollars for online marketing. Mr. Internet’s (Michael Russer) Pluses and Minuses of Online Listing Services
TIP: To help prospects feel comfortable using online listing services, provide tips on what to look for in a listing and a brief glossary of real estate terms they may encounter on your site near your listing service links.
TIP: Promote your online listings on your yard signs as a “24-hour open house.” —Valerie Kelly, Century 21 Alamo Realty, Clarksville, Tenn. For the Advanced Salesperson Depending on your MLS’s reciprocity regulations, you may be able to copy all the current listings from your MLS onto your own Web site. This technique gives buyers who come to your site the impression that you control all the listings in your market—unless your competition is using the same strategy. Before you copy files, however, you should also check with your state licensing agency to be sure that this practice is not considered a violation of the state’s real estate license law. —Michael Russer, “Mr. Internet,” Russer Communications, Santa Barbara, Calif. TIP: Placing your current listing on an auction site such as Yahoo! Auctions gives listings extra exposure to buyers, even if the property doesn’t sell online. Don’t forget to make the full list price your reserve price on the site so you won’t have to sell below market. —Michael Russer, “Mr. Internet,” Russer Communications, Santa Barbara, Calif. 4 Questions to Ask Your Online Listing Service Provider 1. How many listings do you currently average a month? 2. Describe the process, step-by-step, that I must follow to send a listing to you? 3. How long does it take for newly submitted listings to post? 4. What percentage of the properties listed on your site sell within 60 days? Posting Listings on Your Site: A Step-by-Step Guide You also can realize some of the benefits of online listing by posting your listing on your own or your company’s Web site. 1. Create, or have your Web designer create, a standard master HTML form for all your listings. Create labeled lines for information you will always include, such as age of the house, square footage, number of bedrooms, and so forth. Use your local MLS listing as a guide for what to include, but don’t forget to leave a space for several promotional lines about the property at the top of each page. 2. Leave designated spaces for one to three photos in the template that can be pasted in later. 3. Take digital photos of the exterior and the one or two best features of the house and then download the photos into a software program that will allow you to manipulate them, such as Adobe Photoshop or Image Ready. 4. Use the program to resize the photos to fit the spaces designated on your template. Compress them so that they will take up less bandwidth and load more quickly. Use low-resolution photos (72 dpi or less) for the Web site and save files as a “jpg” file. 5. Copy the photos into the HTML file of your pre-created listing template, as you would insert copy or a picture into a Word document, using a Web authoring program, such as Dreamweaver, Front Page, or GoLive. 6. Save the template using a unique name (the name of the property is easiest) and the proper extension (.htm or .html). Don’t forget to rename the file, or it will replace your master template. 7. Connect to your Web site and transfer the new listing file using the file transfer protocol feature of the Web authoring software. In GoLive, look under “File:ftp.Browser”; in Dreamweaver, look under “Site:Site Files.” In GoLive, the windows will be divided in half on your screen—the local file (the HTML file on your hard drive) to the remote location (your Web page). Send the local file from your hard disk to the remote Web server by clicking on its name in the list and then clicking the “put” button. A window will pop up asking you if you want to “include independent files.” Say “yes” and you will transfer the photo along with the file. In Dreamweaver, use a drag and drop technique to transfer files to your FTP client directory window. ARELLO Guidelines for Online Marketing The Association of Real Estate License Law Officials has promulgated guidelines for real estate practitioners marketing property online.
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Keep It Ethical Be sure that your professional status and your status as a REALTOR are clearly identified in all advertising. Article 12 |