How to Utilize Facebook to Generate Leads and Traffic as a Real Estate Professional
Real estate professionals generate leads using a tried-and-true, reliable method: advertising. It often takes agents and property managers years to establish an effective advertising program that makes more money than is spent. In today’s rapidly changing digital world, there are so many places to advertise, and it can be overwhelming to decide where to put your ads.
Facebook Business is an excellent place for real estate professionals of all experience levels to advertise their services and connect with prospective clients. Facebook is an excellent platform for a few reasons. First, they have a user base of over two billion, larger than any other social media platform in the world, meaning you’ll have the ability to connect with a significant portion of the global population. Second, Facebook has mastered the art of targeting ads. Instead of your advertisements being sent out to the general population, you can focus your advertisements on those who are most likely to use your services. Lastly, Facebook re-targets ads. You can create specific ads for people who have viewed your website, browsed your Facebook Business page, or interacted with your posts. This combination of breadth and depth makes Facebook Business an excellent resource for real estate professionals to utilize, no matter where they are in their career.
It’s important to note that Facebook has changed its advertising policy recently. Previously, real estate professionals could target ads based on users’ zip codes. This is no longer possible because of the updated privacy policies. Now, ads can only be targeted towards those in a 15-mile radius, which is less effective than zip codes. Additionally, user demographics like gender, marital status, or income cannot be specified either. Instead, only certain interests can have advertisements targeted towards them. Tech-savvy agents know that home-related interests can be targeted, like followers of the Zillow or Trulia Facebook pages, which is a clever way to bypass these changes and connect with a relevant audience. Many real estate professionals swore off using Facebook after these changes, meaning there is lots of room for new talent to advertise on the platform.
Read on to learn about how you can easily get started posting your own ads as soon as possible.
7 Easy Steps to Get Your Ads on Facebook Today!
1. Solidify Your Brand Identity
Before you even begin creating Facebook advertisements, it’s important to have an established brand identity. For real estate professionals, this typically includes a logo, headshot, Facebook business page, and website. It’s essential to send a clear and concise message to viewers through your brand identity. You want anyone seeing your advertisements to perceive you as trustworthy, professional, and hard-working. It’s especially important to create a Facebook Business page, since this is how you’ll create your ad campaigns.
2. Plan Your Advertising Strategy
Once you’ve established your brand identity, it’s time to begin thinking about types of ads you’ll be creating. What type of leads are you hoping to generate, and how many leads are you hoping to gain using Facebook? It’s also important to think about where you want to advertise. The options include both (or either) Facebook or Instagram [5 Steps for Successful Real Estate Ads on Instagram]. For first-time users, we recommend utilizing both platforms until you’ve established an effective strategy that exclusively uses one platform.
3. Determine Your Campaign
Facebook advertisements are created using ad campaigns. Simply put, a campaign is the objective that is set to fulfill a certain marketing objective. Campaigns are made up of multiple ads that are designed to fulfill that objective and can include specific re-targeted ads for those who have interacted with your content or visited your website before. You’ll have to define your campaign objective, as part of creating your Facebook advertisements. Since Facebook redesigned their advertising program, real estate professionals can only select the “Special Ad Category.” For most agents, their ad objective is either traffic or lead generation.
4. Define Your Budget
How much are you willing to pay per lead? The amount Facebook chargers per lead varies dramatically, from a few dollars to over one hundred. The easiest way to determine your budget is by first determining how much you typically make per closed deal and dividing this by how many cold leads are turned into warm leads (this is your closing ratio). It’s important to note that Facebook’s advertisements are based on a bidding system. Advertisers bid on how much they’re willing to spend in order to reach a certain number of users. It’s a lot less complicated than it sounds, as the entire process happens automatically. Campaign bid strategies are a bit more complicated, so to make it easier for yourself, we recommend setting it to “lowest cost,” meaning Facebook will create your advertisements for the lowest possible cost.
5. Organize Your Intended Audience
With over two billion users, Facebook has an incredible variety of people to advertise to, many of whom are looking to be connected with real estate services. The beauty of advertising on Facebook is that the algorithm will share your ads only with those who it will be relevant for. You can specify what kind of people will receive your ad campaigns. Facebook no longer allows agents to advertise based on zip codes, but you can drop a pin on a map and send your ads to those within a 15-mile radius of that spot. It’s the next-best way to advertise based on location. You can also have your ads shown to those who speak the same language or languages as you do. Lastly, you can choose to share your ads to those with specific interests, like Zillow or Trulia, so your content will be sent to those who are looking to buy or sell their home.
6. Design Your Advertisements
Now’s the fun part! There are a few options for the types of advertisements you can share on Facebook. Remember, Facebook is a visual medium, so photographs and videos are often the most effective way to advertise on the platform. Carousel ads feature multiple photos and are considered to be the most engaging. Single photo/video ads are self-explanatory. Collection ads are another option, but they’re most effective in retail contexts. You can upload any copy and photographs/videos to the platform to share your services.
7. Create a Landing Page
The last part of the Facebook advertising process is creating a landing page. This is the place that users will be redirected if they click on any of your advertisements. Usually, a landing page is a place on your website that will provide viewers important details about your services or for contact information to be shared. Your landing page might depend on your campaign strategy. For example, if you are running a lead generation campaign, you’ll want your landing page to connect with viewers and encourage them to leave their information so you can reach out to them later.
5 Types of Facebook Ads to Stand Out from the Competition
1. Host a Live Tour on Facebook
Facebook Live is an excellent way to connect with viewers while advertising your services. Sharing a beautiful property can hook your audience and get them excited about your listings.
2. Offer Exclusive Deals and Promotions
One of the most effective advertising tactics is offering deals and promotions that are exclusive to your Facebook audience. For example, you could share a list of off-the-market properties in return for your audience being added to a mailing list, benefiting both parties.
3. Create Helpful Content
Why should your audience care about the advertisements you share? If you provide useful and important information on Facebook, like house-hunting tips, home repair services, or promotions, your ads are more likely to be interacted with.
4. Share Floor Plans
Rarely do prospective buyers get a bird’s eye view of a property. Sharing floor plans can be a great way to create unique and effective advertisements on Facebook.
5. Use 3D Content
If you utilize 3D technology in your marketing plan, you should share this on Facebook as well! 3D tours are engaging and compelling. By integrating 3D home depictions, you’ll increase the amount of traffic generated to your website.
Overwhelmed by digital marketing and looking for some help? Listing3D has got you covered. With our exclusive marketing packages, we use the most up-to-date technology to advertise your work to the biggest and best audience. Our packages include immersive virtual tours (created using 3D cameras), video teasers of the property, a 3D Flyer with a scannable QR code, and a landing webpage with all of your contact information, helping future clients easily contact you. With your talent and our technology, we’ll advertise your listings far and wide to help you sell your properties faster and more efficiently.
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