Top 10 Email Marketing Tips for Realtors

Like many small business owners, most real estate agents have one or two go-to email templates that they trot out from time to time and send to their entire email list. In order to be effective, real estate email marketing requires more thought and attention than a standard, blanket message.

In order to make your real estate email marketing as effective as it can be, take some time to better optimize it and set up a system that will improve your open rates, engagement, and conversions.

1. Choose the Right Email Marketing Service

There are a variety of email marketing services to choose from, including MailChimp, Constant Contact, and Campaign Monitor. In addition, many CRM products integrate email marketing services into their platforms in order to streamline communications. If you already have an email marketing service that you enjoy using, stick with it. However, if you are choosing a service for the first time, you will want to consider some of the following details:

• Pricing categories and structures

• Audience size and differentiation

• Video and media embed capabilities

• Ease of use and design

• Effectiveness at circumventing firewalls and spam filters

• Additional features like landing pages, automations, platform integrations, and promotional messaging

2. Use A/B Testing to Boost Open Rates

When you are attempting to get more eyes on your real estate email marketing campaign, you need to understand what makes people open your email. A/B testing can help you improve your open rate by allowing you to send your message with a variety of subject lines, on different days, and at different times. All of these factors can affect the number of people who click on your real estate email.

3. Differentiate Your Audience for Different Messages

Rather than have one large audience and sending them all a generic email newsletter or real estate email marketing campaign, choose different audiences for different messages. You can have a group for real estate leads, clients who are currently buying and selling, past clients, and referral sources. You can also communicate with fellow real estate agents and brokers in order to highlight current listings or to stay on their radar for co-listing and referrals.

4. Develop Automations to Stay Top-of-Mind

Rather than create a new email blast for ongoing audiences, develop automated drip campaigns in order to stay in touch with current clients and cultivate real estate leads. You can create automations for the following scenarios:

• Open house attendees

• Geographic farming

• Expired listings

• FSBOs

• Potential buyers

• Potential sellers

• Past clients for testimonials or referrals

• New listing process

• New buyer process

• Mortgage pre-approval and approval process

• Property management process

Start out your automation with deliverables every day or two, then weekly, then monthly. Don't get discouraged if you don't get a response right away: real estate decision-making can be a slow-burn, requiring months or even years of planning. After several months, transfer non-responders to your ongoing monthly newsletter or other SOI communications.

5. Create Original Content to Keep Engagement High

Rather than a series of sales pitches, value-added content can engage your current email marketing audience and inspire them to become subscribers or social media followers. Share your blog posts, videos, or podcast episodes in your email blasts in order to drive home your expertise and industry influence.

Creating and distributing your content through your email platform keeps your communication from coming across as a boring sales pitch and turns it into a valuable resource.

6. Use Visuals and Video to Keep Them Looking

Use royalty-free, hi res photography and video throughout your real estate email marketing campaigns. Develop a series of video tutorials for a drip campaign for first-time home buyers. Develop a series of infographics to communicate steps of the closing process for your sellers. Visual elements increase engagement and help to communicate difficult information more effectively than long blocks of text.

7. Track Engagement to Reach Out More Often

Take a look at who is opening, sharing, clicking, and otherwise engaging with your real estate email marketing. As you identify your most active audience members, you can begin to create ways to connect with them on other platforms. Follow them on social media, create a pop-by promotional gift, or reach out to them to meet up for coffee.

In addition, tracking engagement can help you better define the topics and content strategies that you should continue to optimize. Track click-throughs to find out what blog posts or videos are getting the most traction with your audience. Track sharing to find out what value-added content inspires them to reach out to others.

8. Re-send to Non-Openers for a Second Chance

Some platforms like MailChimp offer you the ability to re-send your email marketing campaigns to non-openers in order to give them a second chance to see your message. If you sent your original message on a weekday afternoon, try sending your follow-up on a weekend morning. Over time you may be able to develop a schedule optimized for your most engaged readers.

9. Consider a Dedicated Landing Page

Rather than directing email openers to your website, consider a series of dedicated landing pages optimized for specific audiences and providing additional opportunities for engagement and messaging. You might want to have one for buyers, one for sellers, or a variety of landing pages for different neighborhoods or niches. The more specific you can make your marketing and follow-up, the higher your chance at conversion.

10. Be Consistent

Develop a schedule for your real estate email marketing and send out value-added content on a consistent basis. Don't wait until your lead funnel is low or the real estate market has slowed. The more you optimize and automate your email marketing, the better you will be able to keep up with it throughout the year, no matter how busy you are. The more consistent your messaging, the more you can stay top-of-mind with your email audience.