In today’s age of social media, blogging and mobile technology, the rules for building a digital brand have changed. While many brands know they need to be digital, there are still gaps in understanding how to best build an online brand that leads to sales success.
Real estate agents can no longer compete if their branding strategy only involves hiring a marketing agency to design a compelling slogan and creative advertisements. Today, building a successful digital brand means engaging in digital conversations that generate engagement and connectedness with your clients, and for real estate agents, creating a unique digital brand is necessary to maintaining a competitive advantage.
Agents who know how to use digital tools beat out their competition
Over two thirds of adults now use social networking to share and get information about almost any topic, ranging from a new product, to décor advice, to the most intimate issues that matter the most to them, which means that the majority of our social and business transactions now begin with an online touch point. Whether it’s an email or text message to set up a meeting, seeing a social media post about an upcoming event, or researching a company or person online, today’s consumers and clients expect brands to have a digital presence. And, digital branding isn’t just about making a sale. For real estate agents, it’s exactly like the relationships you develop with your clients – a digital brand is about developing an emotional connection that translates into trust.
3 ways a digital brand boosts sales success
Connecting online with your clients is one of the fastest ways to grow your contact list.
Every real estate agent knows that their contact base is their own personal goldmine. While you may have a great database of current and past clients, one of the fastest ways to generate leads is by expanding your online contacts through social media, your website and a blog. By using a web-based real estate CRM like IXACT Contact, agents can automatically capture leads from their website to nurture and convert that lead into a client before their competition. Plus having the “Social Intelligence” feature, one click allows the agent to pull up a comprehensive summary of contact’s social media footprint. This allows you to make it easier to engage in digital conversations with real-time data on hand.
Creating personalized online touch points bring you closer to your clients.
Social media has transformed how consumers expect brands to interact with them. Building a successful digital brand now means creating personalized, targeted digital experiences for your clients. By delivering relevant information to your clients through social media, blog posts or e-newsletters, you can build deeper relationships with your clients that bring you one step closer to making a sale.
Generating a good online experience translates into sales success offline.
By using digital metrics from CRM reporting, agents need to ensure they are delivering the right digital experience for their clients. Statistics from McKinsey & Company show that brands with a strong digital presence converted consumer online awareness to sales at a rate 2.5 times greater than those who lacked a solid online presence.
So where to start? Here’s 3 tips to building a successful digital strategy:
- Create a content marketing strategy that delivers valuable insights, engaging experiences and storytelling to your clients. Content marketing tools like e-newsletters, social media and blogs are some of the best channels to deliver personalized, relevant information to your clients. Content marketing is a great way to build awareness and credibility for your digital brand. Get started by using professionally designed and written e-newsletter articles.
- Be multi-platform. Today there are so many different channels that your clients receive information from. Your digital presence needs to be spread across these channels, but pick the ones that make the most sense for you and your client base. If you are visually creative, think about using social platforms like Instagram and YouTube. If you have expertise or a specialization within the industry, consider a blog. Most importantly, tie all of your channels and digital platforms back to your agent website.
- Use online campaign reporting to hit your targets. Stop guessing if your investment in your digital brand is working. Use campaign statistics such as open rates, click-through rates and social media engagement to understand if you are hitting the mark or missing the target. Digital metrics will help you identify your hot leads and who is generating you the most referral business, which helps you to convert your leads into sales.
Gain a competitive advantage and start building your digital brand today.
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