high homebuilder confidence real estate marketing

Homebuilder Confidence Highest Since 1999, Is Your Real Estate Marketing Plan Ready to Roll?

As a real estate professional, the reality that homebuilder confidence is at an 18-year high and may well continue to rise in alignment with a growing economy and building consumer confidence, it’s time for you to up your real estate marketing game.

Homebuilder Confidence at an 18-Year High

Builder confidence increased five points to a level of 74 in December on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) after a downwardly revised November reading, the highest level the index has reached since July 1999.” Read more at builderonline.com.

If you’ve been a real estate agent for several years, you were one of those who stuck it out through the real estate downturn and oh-so-slow recovery. You watched as some of your colleagues decided to change careers and left the industry, and now you’re watching as some of them return and real estate once again becomes one of the hottest industries, inevitably making it a top career choice for sales and marketing pros once again.

What you do now to take your real estate marketing to the next level can separate you from the rest of the pack and help you maintain an advantage over up-and-coming new agents. One of the most important ways you can do this is to see how real estate marketing has changed over the past 10 years since it’s last hey-day and change your marketing tactics accordingly. Plus, to capitalize on new home sales due to improved homebuilder confidence and increased activity, you need to adjust your tactics to reflect the difference between marketing pre-owned homes vs new construction.

New home buyers are navigating neighborhoods online.

To Win: Master the online marketing needed to put your services in the path of home buyers online.

Career realtors know that the new home buyers who drove from new home neighborhood to new home neighborhood in their cars in 2007 are doing this online in 2017. They navigate to counties, cities and neighborhoods where they want to live on computers, laptops and smartphones, a buying journey that often sees the home buyer using multiple devices:

  • Smartphones that make it easy to drive to new home communities once the buyer has narrowed their search and communicate with their real estate agent on short notice
  • Computers with traditional keyboards that make it easier to fill out applications
  • Computers, laptops and tablets with larger screens that make it easier for the buyer to study photos and feature lists
  • Devices of all types and sizes that enable home buyers to zero in on homes they want to buy in neighborhoods where they want to live using apps like Redfin, Realtor.com and Zillow – apps that send them notifications so they can respond quickly when new listings come online that meet their criteria

This is where our services and classes can help you shine. You can use our services to amplify your website, social media or email marketing efforts individually (or as a suite of services) or you join our real estate marketing club to access a monthly class/coaching session and a plug-and-play monthly real estate marketing plan and calendar. We can help you get found online, and position you and your agency online, directly in the digital home buying path of new home buyers.

New home buyers are buying direct.

To Win: Demonstrate the value you bring to the new home buying process over and above the process itself.

Let’s face it, homebuilders often have their own site and listing agents and new home builders don’t always employ the services of a realtor when buying. Depending on how thoughtfully designed the homebuilder’s buying process is, the buyer may not feel they need the additional support they might enjoy if they had their own agent to help manage the process. Some home builders even arrange financing, making buying a new home a one-stop process for the home buyer.

This is really important: What value do you bring to the table beyond process and paperwork? If home buyers don’t perceive the need for the services of a real estate agent independent of the homebuilder or homebuilder’s site agent, it won’t even occur to them they need one.

This is where strong social media and email marketing will be your best friend. These real estate marketing channels enable you to build relationships with and educate home buyers long before the buying process even begins. They will appreciate your advice, especially if it streamlines their journey. And all along the way you can point to the importance of the buyer having their own advocate in the new home buying process: YOU!

Your website is also important here. You can leverage your local expertise in adding blog content and web pages to your site that educate new home buyers about local home builders and new home communities.

Your search-optimized content can bring home buyers considering specific cities, neighborhoods, counties as well as home builders and new home communities to your website before and during the discovery, research and buying portions of the journey. Your knowledge of the local area and it’s amenities, schools, recreation, economy, services, shopping, healthcare and so on can bring out-of-area home buyers to your website before they even start looking at available homes for sale, whether new homes or pre-owned construction.

One of our long-time clients is a regional new home builder. If you’re a realtor who is interested in becoming a listing or site agent for a new home builder, we can offer you first-hand coaching about how to position yourself as an ideal site agent or how to grow your business as a listing agent for new home builders, with a team of site agents under your supervision. Reach out for more information or to schedule a personalized training session.

We would love to be part of your story.

We hold real estate marketing club meetings online and in the greater Seattle-Tacoma area that include coaching, education and a ready-to-roll real estate marketing plan for the next month. You can attend these classes and come away inspired and armed with a DIY marketing plan that gives you easy to understand and implement ideas for each and every day of the month. Work all, most, some or just the ideas that you feel will be most effective in helping to improve your real estate marketing efforts.

We also provide real estate marketing services where our team works the same marketing plan on your behalf, or you can choose a la carte services (website, blog, email, social media, etc.) to round out your own program.

Reach out for more information about our Real Estate Marketing Club or services – we would love to hear from you!

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