Social Media Marketing For Real Estate Agents

It goes without saying that social media has become one of the most prominent forms of media today.

There are currently 4.76 billion people who use social media.

And, 137 million of them just came online in 2022.

Social media marketing (“SMM)” must be part of your digital marketing plan if you want to take advantage of this audience.

You also need to utilize social media marketing if you want to stay ahead of your competition. A study from 2022 found that real estate agents obtained 46% of their leads from social media.

What is Social Media Marketing

Just like it sounds, SMM is the process of leveraging social media to achieve a marketing goal.

You may want to sell a specific number of products or sign up a specific number of people for a service. SMM using social media as your method of doing that.

Social media marketing normally falls into one of four categories:

• Creating, optimizing, and maintaining your profile;
• Posting content (photos, videos, etc.);
• Engagement (with followers and others);
• Advertising (promoting your content or running ad creatives).

As a real estate agent, you want to use social media marketing as a way to brand yourself (make your name synonymous with being a professional real estate agent) and get more clients (draw potential buyers and sellers into your sales funnel.

What Are the Best Social Media Channels to Use?

Ugh. I hate this question.

The reason is that the actual question should be “which social media channels should I use?”

The fact is each social media site has its advantages and disadvantages. You will be able to get qualified leads from all of them.

So, you just want to find the one(s) that have your target audience. As a guide to help you, here’s an infographic showing you some demographics for some of the most popular sites.

For real estate agents, the three most popular sites I recommend are Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Yes, TikTok is fun, but it doesn’t generate the type of qualified leads you receive from these three.

What the Hell is YouTube?

Yes, we need to talk about YouTube.

Is it social media or a search engine? Well, it’s kind of in its own category.

As a search engine, it ranks 2nd in amount of search traffic. That means only Google gets more search queries. However, it has the same capabilities as most social media sites as it allows you to like, share, and comment on videos.

I like to talk about YouTube when I discuss social media marketing as it is all part of posting content and engagement after the fact. Regardless of what you want to consider it, make sure you utilize it in your social media marketing campaigns.

How Often Should You Post?

For content creation, there are conflicting theories on when to post and how much to post. I am not going to waste your time going over them all because they constantly change and none of them are proven.

You see, social media is run by algorithms.

Yes, it is better to have your followers online at the time you post, but your content will still be fed to them if they follow you. Social media doesn’t close at midnight and re-open at 6am.

There is no set formula you can use to ensure the maximum number of views or engagement. However, there is one tip that seems to be common amongst social media marketers:

Post consistently.

This is a metric that is measurable.

If you do not post regularly, you will not have engagement. You will also be seen by the algorithm as someone who isn’t very active. When this happens, your content is unlikely to be sent to a large number of viewers.

How often is “regular” or “consistent?” Again, this is debatable amongst marketers.

As a real estate agent, I would say posting several times per week is a good start. You will start to see engagement and can adjust your posting accordingly.

Okay, I know that some of you will still search for best times to post on social media. If you are going focus on specific times, use this guide put out by Hootsuite.

Social Media Scheduling:

Okay, so you created a social media schedule to stay consistent. However, you cannot guarantee you will be online during the dates and times you scheduled.

How do you solve that problem?

Simple. Use a scheduler.

There are a number of platforms such as Hootsuite that allow you to schedule your posts across all social media platforms. So, you can post a video, add captions, tags, etc., and then schedule the date and time you want it to post on any of your social media channels.

This is a great option, especially when you go on vacation after selling that seven-figure house in Malibu.

I do want to warn you, though. As with all marketing tools, do not rely solely on a scheduler. You may start to get lazy and stop putting out fresh content. You will miss out on new trends to capitalize on as well.

So, use it sparingly, but also post new content as it comes to mind.

Also, since I am recommending Instagram and Facebook as the top platforms for real estate agents, make sure to take advantage of Meta Business Suite. It is a platform by Meta that allows you to create, schedule, and post content on both platforms.

Tips and Tricks for Social Media Marketing:

There is no set of rules that can be followed across all avenues of SMM.

Why?

Because each social media platform is different. What works with one platform will not work with another.

In my real estate digital marketing course, I give in-depth tips for each social media platform. If you are looking for some real-time advice on social media marketing, I recommend Hootsuites’ social media trends reports.

I would also recommend following Corey Walker on Instagram. She is the co-author of the book Instagram for Dummies. She was a guest on my Marketing Impact Podcast recently where we discussed using Instagram for advertising.