A Realtor’s Guide to Email Marketing

Written by Posted On Thursday, 06 September 2018 11:56
A Realtor’s Guide to Email Marketing MailMunch

Over 3.7 billion people used email in 2017. This number is projected to keep growing, peaking at 4.3 billion users in 2022 (or more).

Some people may argue that email marketing is dead, but given the fact that email continues to be a primary mode of communication for personal and professional purposes, e-marketing can still be an advertising asset to the right company.

I did not mention email marketing in my post about a realtor’s digital marketing checklist. However, email marketing can be a foundational strategy for leveraging blog posts, social media efforts, and your website itself.

Email can give you access to subscribers in a fundamentally different way than, say, social media campaigns. As a realtor, you may even feel more comfortable managing an email marketing campaign, especially if you already have a tight-knit circle of clients and community subscribers.

Email marketing involves a bit more savvy than merely blasting your subscribers with monthly or quarterly newsletters. In this guide, I’ll walk you through what you should prioritize when crafting an e-marketing campaign.

Build Your Subscriber List

An effective realtor email marketing campaign should be directed to someone! Unfortunately, you will need to have a handful of client email addresses before you start dropping newsletters into your market’s inboxes.

This can be the sticking point for many realtors when starting up an e-marketing campaign. Many simply don’t have any subscribers, or some only have a few. If you have a few—great! Hold on to those.

If you don’t have any, start brainstorming ways to build your subscriber list. Some realtors request email addresses from first-time clients and ask their permission (in person) to send out insider or promotional information. Others may obtain addresses via promotions: some agents offer free e-guides or downloads in exchange for a subscription, for example.

Still others work with existing social media followers, providing incentives or sending personalized messages to followers requesting addresses.

Most email marketing campaigns begin with some strategizing in this regard. Don’t be alarmed if you’re in this boat; all e-marketers are at the beginning.

How many subscribers do you need to launch a campaign? The answer to this question will depend on the resources you’ve set aside to devote to e-marketing. Some e-marketing platforms base their package pricing on how many subscribers you have, for example.

If you’ve hired someone to tackle email marketing, it’s probably best to wait until you have a robust body of subscribers (at least in the hundreds) before you start sending out emails. Yet if you are handling e-marketing yourself and have less than 100 addresses, you may wish to start sending out trial newsletters.

Choose a Platform

Once you have a list of your subscribers, it’s time to select your platform. Providers like Mailchimp or SendinBlue give marketers an affordable means of quickly crafting email content and sending it out to vast bodies of subscribers all at once.

Many platforms will charge a monthly fee for services. Others may offer annual subscriptions, depending on your e-marketing needs.

Take some time to choose a platform that meets your needs and marketing aims. For many realtors, selection will come down to budget. Others will want to scrutinize consumer reviews and specific offerings—it is possible to find a platform that caters more to realtors, for example, and their particular campaign needs.

You may also wish to outsource e-marketing services. This will involve consulting a digital marketing agency, most likely. All of these decisions will hinge on budget and the ultimate end goal of your email marketing efforts.

Designate Campaigns

Now it’s time to think about your digital plan of attack. Do you anticipate sending out quarterly newsletters, for example, packed with information about property listings, latest blog posts, and upcoming events?

Or would you like to send out weekly or monthly e-blasts with quick snippets of information to certain clients? Perhaps both?

Designate the types of campaigns you’d like to implement, what you want to deliver, and when you want to do so. If you’re just starting out, it may be wise to choose a newsletter approach and plan to send these to subscribers over a generous period of time (such as once a month, or twice a quarter).

Once again, your e-marketing campaign specifications will have to do with your budget, your marketing aims, and the number of subscribers you currently have.

Deliver Appropriate Content

Content is always king, whether you’re writing copy for a social media post or sending a small email. Before you send off your emails, be sure their content is appropriate (that is, serving you well).

The best newsletters are ones that lure clickers to your website itself for more information. Others may offer a discount or incentive that ultimately benefits you (either with sales or with subscriber details).

For this reason, aim to give tidbits of information (not the entire piece); be sure to incorporate appropriate, compelling imagery and to strike a professional, friendly tone.

Don’t forget to link in your other marketing efforts when crafting content. Highlight your recent blog posts, for example, or give a shout-out to your in-house web designer who just gave your site’s property listings an uplift. Optimize your content for trending keywords so that your emails don’t end up in the trash.

Personalize

Subscribers are far more likely to click on a message that feels aimed at them, rather than at a general audience. For this reason, do what you can to personalize the emails you send out to your clients.

This may mean including your clients’ first names in individual emails—yes, you can do this!—or coming up with a unique, eye-catching, personalized subject line. When you do craft content, be sure to think about your target client (you may even wish to craft different campaigns aimed at different demographics for this reason).

Make sure every email is filled with your agency’s or company’s flavor, too. Don’t be shy about writing in a casual (albeit professional) tone.

I’ll be diving deeper into e-marketing tactics in coming posts. Stay tuned!

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Kate King

Kate King is a freelance writer, editor, and blogger. 

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