21 Blog Posts That Keep Realtors Top of Mind
Whether you have the benefit of a real estate brokerage marketing team to help you or you’re going it alone, you’ll have moments when you’re struggling to come up with enough content ideas to keep your digital presence relevant. We suggest bookmarking this list for those moments – these blog post ideas will help you demonstrate your expertise and bring you to the attention of new real estate clients.
1 - Neighborhood spotlights
These are a hit among newcomers to your market and locals alike. What are the various neighborhoods in your city? Do one roll-up post summarizing all of them, and then create individual ones for the neighborhoods you predominantly work in.
Talk about what draws homebuyers to these places – the amenities, local hot spots, and any other attributes that set that neighborhood apart.
2 - Hidden gems
What amenities are within a stone’s throw away from your market? Whether they be day trips to national parks, waterfalls, or shopping, these types of posts will bring you to the attention of potential buyers that are thinking of moving to your area.
For these posts, you can highlight your own adventures or piggy-back off local tourism boards and economic development organizations. Compile a top-10 list, write a guide where you recommend time of day or year to visit, and share images.
3 - Community events
You can set up Google alerts for events and volunteer opportunities in your community. Compile things for all ages to give potential clients a sense of what their weekends might be like if they purchase a home in the neighborhoods you work in.
Think beyond physical spaces here – you can also point interested individuals to the spaces where their potential neighbors congregate digitally. Link to relevant Facebook groups, Reddit communities, Twitter hashtags, popular Meetups, and Nextdoor.
4 - Testimonials
Typical testimonials involve a short paragraph attesting to your work, but image and story-driven testimonials are far more engaging and convincing.
Closing day and key transfer is a great opportunity for photos! For clients that are willing, these are valuable ways of getting social proof for your services. The photos work well for your social media profiles, and you can delve into the broad details of the transaction on your real estate blog. Answer questions such as:
What lead your clients to buy or sell their home now?
What were some concerns they had?
How was the buying or selling process for them?
How did you help close the deal?
These details will help potential clients see that you’ve helped others in their situation while still respecting the privacy of your past clients.
5 - Behind the scenes
There’s a lot of ambiguity, especially among first time home buyers, about how Realtors can assist them. This is your opportunity to show off your hustle and your human side alike.
When you’re parked on the side of the road jotting down notes while talking to a client, waving your phone around trying to get service for a FaceTime showing, or are putting together a welcome basket for new homeowners, these are your opportunities for home buyers and sellers to see the behind the scenes work and human stories that go into the transaction.
6 - FAQ posts
When you are lead prospecting, what are the questions that come up over and over again? If you’re being called or emailed with these questions there is also a contingent of people out there looking for these answers via search engines. Help them get this information by jotting down these common questions and answers, providing the local context, linking to resources, and ending with a call to action to call you for more.
7 - Home trends
Given the sheer volume of pre-existing content in this space, you don’t necessarily need to be creating original content here. You can simply create a post mentioning current trends and linking to other blogs. These can be a mix of big names such as HGTV and DIY influencers, but don’t forget to add local companies into the mix for search engine optimization.
You can create a post for each room, and also talk more generally about the direction of trends – for instance the wallpaper comeback, 70s style, and emerging Japandi trends.
8 - Preparing a home for sale
From removing family photos so homebuyers can envision themselves in the space to decluttering, there are a lot of obvious and not-so-obvious steps involved in getting a home sales-ready. Post about the steps you recommend to get prepared and maintain a showing-ready home.
9 - Which home renovations retain value over time
Some homeowners will be juggling with the ‘renovate or sell’ question, and an important part of the equation is whether home renovations will recoup the investment when it comes time to move on. Talk about the renovations that retain value, and ones that deter future buyers. As alternatives you can also talk about quick ways to refresh a space, and the value of redecorating vs. renovating.
10 - National housing trends
You can access free monthly statistics and presentations from the National Association of Realtors and Canadian Association of Realtors. Highlight the trends being talked about, and compare and contrast with what you’re seeing in real time.
Pressed for time? The associations will typically publish highlights to their social media accounts. Repost these to your own accounts, but be sure to add in some context of your own.
11 - Local housing trends
Your local real estate association will have specific data and projections for your market. Publish highlights to your blog and socials. You can also re-post or reference local news stories on the housing market.
Whether you’re using statistics or news pieces, be sure to add in context. For example did you have a recent client interaction that highlighted how much of a seller’s market it is right now? Talk about this, and pitch how you handled the situation to the reader.
12 - Just listed houses
Don’t just link to the listing on your MLS. Actually upload the images, paste the listing details, and write out some of the highlights you’d point out during a showing. If you’ve yet to sign your first client, ask permission to post houses that other agents in your brokerage are selling. If you’re a buyer’s-agent, post just-sold houses. Instead of talking about the home’s attributes, talk about the buyer’s preferences, needs, and wants, and how you helped them find a home that met these criteria.
13 - Seasonal upkeep
Between spring cleaning, winter-proofing homes, preparing for weather events, and tax season home appraisals, there’s a lot of seasonal upkeep involved with home ownership. You can share seasonal ‘spring cleaning’ or ‘winter-proofing’ checklists, but we suggest you take this further. For instance if your winter-proofing homes checklist has 10 items on it, take each item and create a separate post. Take ‘cleaning gutters’ and create a post with the do’s and don’ts, link to local companies that can assist your clients with the task, and talk about why it’s important to do this regularly. Repeat this for every item on the checklist.
14 - Moving tips and tricks
Your potential clients may be simply moving down the street, or hauling their belongings across the world. Post a moving checklist with general advice like having a kit with snacks, soap, toilet paper, and tools handy on moving day. Create a separate post for out-of-towners with recommended short term rentals, affordable dining options, and other helpful resources for when life is in limbo.
15 - Your services
While these will be highlighted separately on your website, create posts describing the various aspects of your job in-depth. For example, talk about how you work as an advisor to understand your clients’ needs and help them narrow down neighborhoods and home features. Or how you create a Current Market Analysis for clients’ homes, and how this helps them price their home for sale or weigh those ‘buy vs. renovate’ decisions.
16 - Homeowner pain points
As you’ll know from talking to real estate clients about their home needs, wants, and future plans, there are some situations that annoy homeowners that may never have occurred to them when they originally purchased a house. For instance one Realtor told us about a repeat client whose main pain point was that there are no sidewalks on their street for their toddler to ride his tricycle on. Sidewalks never came up as a potential ‘must have’ until they ran into the issue.
What are some of the pain points you’ve come across? Tell the story behind them. Give people something to think about that they may not have otherwise considered.
17 - Buyer and seller mistakes
We recently came across a homebuyer nightmare story where a family hauled their belonging cross-country, only to find the tenants living in the home they intended to move into hadn’t been served an eviction notice. The family couldn’t move in. While this could be chalked up to a ‘real estate lawyer’ mistake, the homebuyers had no idea that this was a situation that could happen. While this is an extreme example, it’s important to talk about the range of possible scenarios home buyers and sellers may encounter, how they can pre-emptively protect themselves, and what their next steps should be.
18 - Navigating buyers/sellers markets
How do you recommend clients navigate hot buyer or seller markets? What are some strategies they can employ to ensure a winning bid? What are the current trends - are buyers offering way over asking and still being outbid? Are sellers’ homes languishing for months with little interest? Talk about the dynamic situation you’re seeing in real time on the ground.
19 - Social polls
You can create polls on your newsletters, social accounts, or directly on your website. Use these to take a pulse of your audience. Ask anything from whether people are holding off from buying in a hot market to whether or not they like a current home trend. You can then post about the results with comments on how this compares to what you’re seeing.
20 - Dream houses
Dream big! Talk about the luxury homes and features you see on your market and elsewhere. Post round-ups of ‘one day’ houses, or talk about any ‘wow’ experiences you personally had walking through a home.
21 - Talk about the process
For buyers: What’s involved in a home search, from start to finish? How long does it usually take to find the perfect home? How many showings and listings did your clients comb through before finding their next home?
For sellers: What’s involved in the home sale process? How many showings can they expect in the current market, and how long are homes sitting before selling? How do they receive bids, and how long will they have to decide?
Buyers and sellers: What are the highs and lows of the home buying and selling process? How do you coach people through these?
Final Thoughts
Creating relevant and timely blog and social media content is a great way for real estate agents to expand their sphere of influence and set themselves apart. Blog and social media posts represent an on-ramp to your real estate sales funnel. By adding references to your local market and personal experience as well as a call-to-action to get in touch with you, great content will drive high quality leads.
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