Latest News

Our Services

Need help? Let’s talk!
1800 432 742

Our Services

Real Estate Software

iDashboard is real estate software you’ll love – you can use it to manage your listings, upload to over 70 portals and manage your contacts.

Real Estate Websites

Simple, brilliant, elegant: real estate websites as-a-service. Get your agency up and running with a beautiful new website without the hassle.

Project Websites

Developer? Project marketer? Whether its a sub division, strata units or apartment block we can help with a dedicated project website.

Agent Profile Websites

Enhance your digital profile with your very own agent website. Highlight who you are, your results, testimonials and much more.

iProperty.com.au

Find the latest homes for sale and rent, as well as market news and helpful tips whether you're buying, selling, renting or looking to invest.

Saturday, 20 April, 2024
Facebook Twitter Rss
iDashboard Real Estate Websites and Software Technology Blog

Home

Monthly Archives: August 2016

Hashtag

Instagram Hashtags – What Every Real Estate Agent Needs To Know

HashtagInstagram has grown over the past few years to become a hugely popular social media channel, and now Real Estate Agents are Enhancing Their Business with Instagram.

With engagement stats through the roof, it’s the go-to network for brands who want to use visual stimuli to attract their audience. That’s exactly why it’s perfect for real estate professionals. After all, what better way to promote a listing than with some beautiful pictures?

Although initially seeming simple, however, Instagram can be a cruel companion to its unexperienced business users. We’ve produced this short guide to teach you the ins-and-outs of Instagram. Take these tips on board to start getting your brand the online attention it deserves.

So, what’s a hashtag?

It’s always good to start with the basics. A hashtag is a phrase made up of words, letters, numbers (and even the occasional emoji), preceded by the hash symbol – #.

Hashtags are used on Instagram as a sort of filing system, as they serve to categorise user content. If you see a post with #happyfriday on it and you want to browse similar posts, you can click on this hashtag. This will take you to a feed packed with the other most recent posts that included this hashtag, too.

If you add in a hashtag to your post, it’ll make it visible for anyone who’s searching that particular hashtag.

Why should I include hashtags in my post?

Users search for hashtags based on their interests. By adding relevant hashtags into your post, you’ll be able to immediately get your brand in front of your target audience.

Adding in hashtags makes your business profile more discoverable on Instagram, driving more traffic to your profile page and inevitably resulting in generating more followers.

Although social media marketing is a combination of art and science, this aspect can be brought down to a numbers game. Posts that include at least 1 hashtag are – on average – 12.6% more likely to attract audience interaction.

How do I add a hashtag into my Instagram post?

You can pop a hashtag into your post as both a caption and a comment. As long as your account isn’t private, adding a hashtag will make your post discoverable on the relevant hashtag page.

You can add a hashtag by doing the following:

  • 1) Upload or take a photo or video
  • 2) Decide on a filter (if any), then type # plus your desired text in the caption field
  • 3) Hit OK
  • 4) Choose SHARE

If you’ve already made the post, don’t worry. By clicking the 3 vertical dots in the top right of a post, you can click edit and add the hashtags in retrospectively. You can also hit the speech bubble under your post and add your hashtags in as comments.

How do I know which hashtags to use for my brand?

The hashtags you use will be dependent on the business space you work within. For real estate, you’ll want your hashtags to be based around topics like property listings, housing, and city attractions, to name a few.

If you’re looking to discover hashtags that’ll work for your business, the following steps will help:

1) Go with what your influencers are using

Take a look at the types of hashtags that prominent thought leaders in your industry are using and follow their lead.

2) Snoop on your competitors

Competitor observation is a great way to learn the do’s and don’ts of social media marketing. Take a look at some of their posts that have gotten high engagement and make notes of the hashtags they used.

3) Take a look at related hashtags

If you have hashtags that are already working for you, see if there are any others that are commonly used alongside it. If so, they could be worth checking out also.

Below is a list of  commonly used hashtags for real estate:

Real estate hashtags

#RealEstate
#ForSale
#NewHome
#HouseHunting
#MillionDollarListing
#HomeSale
#HomesForSale
#Property
#Properties
#Investment
#Home
#Housing
#Listing
#HomeInspection
#OpenHome
#Renovated
#JustListed
#JustSold
#JustRented

Branding hashtags

#YourName e.g. #JohnSellaot
#YourOfficeName e.g. #ABCRealEstate

Event hashtags

#OpenHome e.g. #JohnsOpenHome
#RealEstateConference e.g. #AREC2016

Bonus hashtags

Use creatively worded hashtags to find tweets from potential clients who might want to buy or sell a home. Here are a few additional hashtags to consider.

#WantToMove
#HateMyHouse
#BuyMyHouse

4) Make the most of Instagram search

By using the search function for a brand keyword, like ‘real estate’, you can select the ‘tags’ tab to get a list of associated hashtags. Bear in mind that while a load of posts on one hashtag means you have potential to get some serious views, it can also mean your post gets buried pretty quickly. For that reason, it’s good to pair popular hashtags with more niche ones.

How many hashtags should I be using?

Sure, hashtags are a great way to connect with a new audience, but that doesn’t mean every post should have 40 of them. It is, however, good to include several.

One study from TrackMaven found that posts with 4-5 hashtags in them generated an average of 22 interactions, whereas posts with no hashtags only received an average of 14.

Targeting the most popular hashtags might get you quick followers, but it’s likely to just be a vanity number. These people probably won’t engage with your brand as there’s a high chance they’ll be spammers or just looking for a follow-back. For this reason, you should let the content in your posts define which hashtags you go for.

Should I be using brand hashtags?

These are unique hashtags that are specific to your brand or the campaign you’re currently running. If you’re looking to produce a showcase of your company, brand hashtags are well worth investigating.

By encouraging your audience to use your brand hashtag in their posts, you can easily stay in touch with your fans and drive engagement. If you’re running competitions too, it’s also a great way to keep tabs on who’s entered.

If you’re still struggling to gain followers on Instagram, check out our Essential Guide to Getting more Instagram followers as well as our 5 Easy Ways to Grow Your Instagram Following in 2016.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software iDashboard as well as responsive websites, and more.

AirBnB

Airbnb Revolutionises The Rental Market With New Partnership Plan

AirBnBIn a recent partnership with a large listings advertiser, Airbnb have truly changed the rental game.

The deal, which allows renters to try out an area before they rent, means they can get to know a neighbourhood before committing to a lease. In just a few clicks, potential renters can take a new property for a test drive in just a few clicks on the rent.com.au website.

The move shows Airbnb’s determination to strengthen their hold on the rental market. CEO of rent.com.au, Greg Bader, says the idea is for people to “test drive their new community”.

“We can all look at the photos and descriptions on our website and that gives us a good idea of the property we are moving into, but it doesn’t really paint the full picture of a new community,”, said Greg.

“Airbnb is a great way for people to get a real taste of what their new location is like and offer instant community connection. Entering into a new lease is a big deal in terms of commitment, so why not take the time to really make sure an area is for you?”.

Greg agrees that renting can be a scary process for many people, which is why the recently-settled agreement will work so well.

“Whether for a weekend or a week, holiday or work, move in and get a feel if a place is right for you. Explore, experiment, suss out the clubs and pubs, check the commute to work, time the school run, or just chill at a local café.”

The benefits aren’t just for prospective renters, however. The new deal also offers a special incentive for private landlords.

“We also see benefits for private landlords in securing long-term tenants or extra income. Rental cycles vary for different landlords, so if there is a student focus, for example, there is real probability of vacancies over the Christmas period, so why not list on Airbnb to cover those periods?”

With the sheer volume of options presented to renters, the new agreement will definitely be a game-changer for the property market in Australia.

Do you need to get your properties uploaded to rent.com.au? With iDashboard you can easily upload your rental properties to all the major rental websites, so that you can manage your rental stock all from one centralised system.

What are your thoughts on the Airbnb deal? Let us know in the comments box below.

Real Estate Blogging

5 Essential Tips For Real Estate Bloggers

Real Estate BloggingSuccessful content marketing is not what it used to be. The days of magazine ads, billboards, and catch phrases are over. Say hello to targeting the right media platforms and specifying information to the nth degree, all whilst being funny, engaging, and attractive.

Writing for online content marketing is harder than dating

Just like dating, if you want a wide audience and to appeal to those available on the market, you have to get to know them and what they want.

Enter US-based content analysis platform Buzzsumo. Their recent study of over 100 million blog post uncovered the formula for success.

These are the key pointers that every real estate company should be implementing in their content marketing and they really couldn’t be easier – take a look.

1. Define Your Image

People love pictures. Why do you think that Instagram does so well? No one cares what the Kardashians are thinking, they just want to see photos of them.

Even a single video, infographic, or photograph in a post can lead to a higher number of shares across social media.

For that reason, it’s time to get in touch with your best graphic designers, photographers, videographers and retouchers to ensure that your real estate company/client has the most attractive images for your target demographic.

2. It’s all in the headline

Click-bait journalism has been around since the dawn of the news industry. Splashing a title in big bold has never been enough; you have to say something that draws the reader in.

Words like How, Why, and What are the most appealing to those on the other side of the screen. Piquing curiosity is an essential tool in garnering readership. The psychology behind this technique surrounds the idea that everyone wants to be in the know.

Let potential readers know that you have the answers to the questions by advertising it in your headline.

3. Go long, and go far

Contrary to online news journalism, the most shared articles are those over 1,000 words in length. Researchers are even suggesting trying to make each piece between 1,500 and 2,000 words long.

However, this does mean a bit of extra work for the writer. The content of these articles need to be on point, with every sentence contributing to the topic. Although this can be a difficult task, it’ll keep the reader engaged and help you to build your brand authority.

If you can’t find the information for a long piece, then go with a listicle. Everything should come in top fives according to High Fidelity, but if you’ve got enough content, turn that into a top 10. Think of it like a cheat sheet for your audience.

4. Make the most of the pros

One great way to increase your article’s shares is by quoting or referencing prominent figures in your target industry. After this, spark conversation with them and their fans by tagging them in your social media promotions.

You could also interview a leading professional on the subject matter. If you can do this with a  positive spin, you’ll increase the likelihood of them sharing it on their own social media channels. Although it requires a bit of effort, techniques like this have been shown to increase traffic to posts by 30%.

5. Rinse and repeat

Not everyone will see your post the first time around. Buzzsumo recommends leaving it a week or so, then reposting the content to capture any extra readers. At the end of each business quarter, you can also go back and review the content you’ve posted. Collect the highest-performing articles and share them with your readers again to drive that extra traffic.

Investing in content is essential in today’s market. Everything is done online either from a laptop, tablet, or phone. Aesthetics comes first, but must be closely followed by readable, well-written content. This is a huge bonus for writers and tech nerds alike.

If you’re having trouble writing your blog posts, check out our Twelve Steps to Writing a Great Real Estate Blog.

Every industry, especially real estate, is online. If you’re looking to develop a visually-stunning site, take a look at what iProperty has to offer today.

Photography Tips

7 Pro Tips To Nailing Your Real Estate Photography

Photography TipsHere at iDashboard, we know that snapping the right photos is an integral part of any successful property listing. Getting your pictures just right, however, isn’t always easy. To help boost your photography skills, we’ve created a list of the top 9 tips straight from professional real estate photographer, Scott Hargis.

Scott is a professional real estate photographer and gets work all over the world from clients who want to advertise their properties in the best possible light. He also runs workshops periodically to impart his photography knowledge on other budding professionals.

1) Getting a feel for the property is essential

Scott believes that the best way to advertise a property is by helping viewers to picture themselves living within it. Being able to experience the best features of a property through the photo is key.

“I care less about what a room looks like and more about what a room feels like and clients respond really well to that – they say, ‘I recognise how the house feels’.”

“Everywhere real estate agents want you to go wider and wider but that is not what attracts clients”.

Despite being on of his primary focuses when photographing properties, Scott admits that it’s not always easy: “Because I’m into technique in a big way, it’s difficult to push that to one side and just really experience what it feels like to be in the space. This is what you need to do to create feeling”.

2) Make sure your equipment is up to scratch

With a huge growth in photography technology in recent years, Scott agrees that Australia is on par with global standards. This makes it harder than ever for real estate agencies to keep up. To ensure you’re producing photos of the highest quality, Scott suggests that you invest in the equipment to match. Prior to a shoot, he also suggests you run through this technical checklist to make sure your photos are:

  • In focus
  • Well lit (by adjusting aperture and shutter speed)
  • Colour-balanced
  • Of an appealing composition
  • Abiding by architectural rules (your lines match up)

3) Learn from Da Vinci

Leonardo Da Vinci utilised light in his paintings to control where his viewers’ eyes were drawn. Scott says that the same applies to real estate photography.

“We think about the photo as if we were painting a picture. We use the rule of thirds, leading lines, and sophisticated light to direct the eye and create a captivating picture”, he says.

The goal of any advertising is to gain the viewer’s attention and maintain it – this is no different with property photos.

4) Decide the purpose of your photos

Scott states that the end purpose of the photos dictates what sort of shots you should be taking: “If the images are going in a printed brochure or strictly online… all of this impacts how the images should be shot and which image should be used where.”

“I advise which photos are best for which medium and which short is the hero shot, as that’s not always obvious to the agent”.

5) Real estate photography is like online dating

Yep, you read that correctly. Scott believes that to attract someone’s attention, you really need to sell the property’s features in the best way possible:

“People swipe, playing hot-or-not, so you have to edit the picture and use the money shot that will catch someone’s eye.”

6) Photographing properties is like commercial art

Regardless of the property you’re working with, there’s always going to be that one winning angle – it just takes time to find it.

“When I arrive I don’t even pick up the camera”, says Scott, “I take a slow walk around and just look. This applies to outside – I might even walk down the street to find the right angle.”

“More looking and less clicking I always say – it pays off massively and you save time.”

7) Go the extra distance to achieve the best results

Scott says that some of the best photography teams he’s worked with are the ones that put in the effort.

“The were doing things I have not known anybody else to do – moving tables and sofas, straightening chairs.”

Achieving that perfect shot is all about working with the space you have. If the property’s current setup doesn’t do it for you, don’t be afraid to move things around a bit and experiment a little. It could pay off massively for the impression your audience gets from the photo.

Having the right equipment will help you with real estate photography, but it’s really about capturing the mood of the property and allowing your audience to picture themselves in it. As Scott recommends, take time to get a feel for the property, work out what you want from your photos and don’t be afraid to experiment.

Hiring a photographer is often overwhelming, because there are so many to choose from. So we’ve put together a list of tips to help simplify the process, so you can find a qualified photographer who will take stunning pictures of your property, click here to view these helpful tips.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software, responsive websites, andmore.

 

New Website - Blog

New Barnett Real Estate Website

iPropertyNewWebsite-01Barnett Real Estate was leaving an international franchise group and came to iProperty looking to provide their new company with a modern & responsive website design, incorporating the branding and colours of their new company.

The new Barnett Real Estate website is completely responsive; working on Desktops, Tablets and Smartphones allowing their staff and visitors to access any property any time.

The new interactive home page contains a great list of ‘must-have’ features, this includes:

  • Property Search Panel
  • Featured Property Gallery
  • Latest Listing on Home Page
  • Recent Testimonials
  • Market Appraisal Request Interactive Form
  • Latest Sold Properties
  • Latest News and Updates
  • Property Videos
  • Buyer and Renter Email Alerts Signup/Login

Along with this fantastic new home page, the website boasts a revamped property grid list view, property information pages, interactive forms and many more professionally designed features.

We wish the team at Barnet Real Estate all the best with their new website and look forward to our ongoing relationship.

If you are looking for a new website, wether you are starting from scratch or want to upgrade to a modern responsive design, contact iProperty today.

imac-barnett    ipad_barnett

Video-Blogging

10 Video Styles That Should Be In Every Real Estate Marketing Plan

Video-BloggingMore often than not, the real estate agencies that win the most clients are the agencies using the most creative tactics.

To get ahead in a continually-changing industry, you need to be willing to try new things and that might mean stepping out of your comfort zone once in a while. By taking advantage of the numerous different video strategies at your disposal, you can gain that added edge.

So, what are the best video marketing strategies? We’ve prepared a run-down of the top 10 so you can choose the ones that’ll work best for your business.

1. List videos

The animated cousin of the list article, list videos gain huge reception online. By parading your top properties in a countdown list video, you can gain top-of-the-sales-funnel leads surprisingly quickly. In addition to this, you can push your existing leads down your sales funnel by getting them to call you if they see a property they like.

With tools such as Magisto and Camera Plus, creating YouTube-ready videos from the convenience of your smartphone is easier than it’s ever been.

2. Interview videos

Remember all of those satisfied clients your real estate agency has? If only there was a way to leverage their positive reviews as a video-style sales tool.

Guess what – there is. By contacting some of your recent clients and asking them to answer a few of your questions on camera, you’ll be able to compile a montage of positive feedback. This is a fantastic sales tool and a great way to overcome any objections potential clients might have to using your service.

3. Recycled blog post videos

If you already have a blog up and running, you don’t always have to create brand new content. You can put your older content to work too by repurposing it in a blog post recap video.

Do some analysis on your website’s posts over the past 6 months and see which ones have gained the most traction online. Pick the top 3 and create a summary video around each topic. There you have it – 3 pieces of video content with minimal research required.

You can also produce short snippet videos that summarise the blog posts you create, with links to the longer posts in the video description. This can be a great way to leverage interest from your time-poor audience.

4. Advice videos

These pieces of content go down an absolute storm. Why? Because you’re providing an answer to the questions people are searching for online. If you can optimise them for search engines and get them to rank in the results pages, you’re going to drive some serious traffic.

Ask one of your more experienced agents to present a short 5-minute video on a problem your buyers or sellers face most often. You can even produce this in the list video format, with a topic such as ‘5 pieces of advice for prospective buyers’, for example.

5. Special offer videos

Don’t worry, we don’t expect you to give away a house. By sharing a giveaway with your audience, like a piece of content that would appeal to them, you can really get their attention.

By adding a call-to-action (CTA) link in the video that drives traffic to a signup form on your website, you’ll be able to capture information about them in exchange for the giveaway. If you can drive the traffic to a dedicated landing page – even better. This way, you’ll be able to completely design the page around getting them to download the content and you’ll also be able to track the traffic much more easily.

If you’re interested in creating a dedicated landing page, contact iProperty today.

6. Review small businesses in your area

Have a meeting with your team and pull together a list of the local small businesses that you buy from often. These small businesses that you and your local market use often act as an excellent channel for your real estate marketing.

The aim of these videos isn’t to directly plug your service – quite the opposite. By placing the focus on them, you can show your target market that you’re truly embedded and invested in your community. Displaying this local knowledge and commitment will work wonders for your local brand authority. You’ll probably get some kudos from the businesses you’re promoting, too.

7. Behind the scenes videos

One thing that your audience will love is getting a sneak peek into your office and learning who the people at your company really are.

By doing this, you’ll be adding a face to your brand, which will make you that much more memorable to your target market.

Try creating a video that takes them on a quick tour of your office, introduces them to a few of the agents they might work with and gives them a bit of background about your agency. The great thing about this is that often, you can just take the copy from your website, patch it up a bit and use it as the script. Since it’s a natural, informal insight, it’ll require minimal effort and setup on your part.

8. Property and neighbourhood tours

Putting photos of your listed properties online is a good start and a dedicated web page for your more unique properties is even better. If you can tie a property and neighbourhood video tour into that mix, you’ll be working real estate marketing magic.

By creating a property and neighbourhood tour video, you’ll be able to give prospective buyers a closer look into your listings and explore their features in much more detail.

Your properties might be appealing to your audience, but if you can give them an overview of the neighbourhood amenities, such as shops and schools, they’ll be more inclined to book a visit in person. Property and neighbourhood tours are a fantastic way to help prospective buyers start building a connection with a property, so they’re an idea well worth your time.

9. How-to videos

As you’ve no doubt seen on your journeys across the internet, how-to videos have surged in popularity over the past few years, generating a huge amount of views for the users that post them.

Why? This is largely because they present themselves as an effortless way of finding out how to do something. In a detail-heavy industry such as real estate, many will see how-to videos as a blessing.

Put a how-to twist on your videos and cover popular topics in your buyer/seller markets. Just make sure that the topics you choose don’t have too much competition, or you could have a hard time getting your video seen.

10. The brand promo video

All real estate videos are important, but this one stands at the top of the ladder.

A brand promo video is your key to advertising your real estate agency and presenting yourself to the online market. By producing one that’s high-quality and encapsulates the core beliefs and services your agency offers, you’ll be able to vastly increase your target audience’s awareness of your brand.

Don’t be fooled by the high production costs. A brand promo video will be the single most versatile piece of video content you’ll create, meaning it can have several different applications for your business. You can link to it in email campaigns, post it on social media, or host it on a banner at the top of your website to give your audience a quick and engaging way of learning what you’re about.

It doesn’t have to be overly long either. Try and summarise the key points you want to communicate, break it down into sections and cut it to 5 minutes or less.

Still not convinced? Read our article on Why Video is Important for Every Real Estate Agent.

It’s important to know where to begin and how to create high quality real estate video content that connects with your audience beyond just real estate. So click here to read some simple steps to get you started.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software, responsive websites, and more.

 

Open-House

10 Quick Wins For Making The Most Of An Open House

Open-HouseAn Open House event can be one of the most  crucial make or breaks of any real estate sales process. By making sure you maximise the opportunity from these events, you’ll be able to make the most of the buyer market and bring in more competitive offers.

So how do you do it? We’ve prepared this article to give you the 10 quick wins you can make on your open house events, to give you that added boost over the competition.

1. Post visually-focused content that highlights the property’s strengths prior to the listing

You could have the best property in the world, but if no-one knows it’s on the market, you’re not going to get many viewing requests. By producing a visually-heavy blog post prior to the viewing, you’ll give your target market a great overview of your property’s best features.

The blog post doesn’t have to take more than 20 minutes of your time and it’s a maintenance-free way of bringing in those leads. Make sure to cram it full of high-resolution property pictures.

2. Boost focus with a single-property site

If you’re selling a particularly high-value property and really want to flaunt its features, creating a single-property site might just be the option for you.

Placing a focus on a property like this is well worth your time. Not only will it allow you to showcase the property’s best features, it’s also a great way for you to build your brand reputation in the market.

With iHomes you can easily create single property micro-sites, click here to find out more.

3. Make the most of email marketing

Email marketing is well-known for being the most cost-effective marketing method out there. By creating a weekly newsletter-style email showcasing your latest listings and sending it out to your buyer leads, you’ll be able to get your properties in front of a much wider audience.

You can use a real estate CRM tool, such as iDashboard to manage your leads and email campaigns. Send out visual snapshots of your prime listings, coupled with one or two blog posts you’ve created, on a weekly basis.

Don’t forget to make the most of the subject line. It’s the most important part of the whole email, so choose something that’ll grab your list’s attention. Consider mentioning the open house and that you have properties that are immediately available.

4. Keep in touch with your buyer market on social media

With hundreds of millions of monthly active users, you can bet that your audience is spending time on social media. By posting pictures of your top properties, with links to the listings, you can capture any interested prospective buyers. You might even want to consider short tour videos for Instagram.

Since these are leads that you might not already have in your database, remember to add an email sign-up box on each of your listing pages.

5. Video your open houses to help promote your next one

There’s nothing worse than turning up at a desolate open house, with no-one but a lonely agent stood in the corner stirring the punch bowl.

Convince your audience that your open houses are worth their time by creating short video montages and posting them on social media.  This will work for you both ways:

  • You’ll attract prospective buyers by communicating that you have properties that gain a lot of interest.
  • You’ll also be able to show prospective sellers that you put in the effort when it comes to open houses, so you might even get some seller leads from it, too.

6. Target local buyers for your open houses using Google AdWords or Facebook Ads

The insane amount of data Google holds makes it a real estate agent’s dream when it comes to targeting local buyers. Set up an AdWords campaign based on local search terms relevant to your property and drive leads directly to your listing page.

AdWords is of double benefit too, because you don’t pay per ad view. Since you only pay for each click made on your link, you can save your precious budget for making your listing page look beautiful and leave it to do the heavy lifting.

Facebook Ads also allow you to cater who will be displayed such adverts, so you can setup your ads to target audiences based on age, gender, location, the devices used to access Facebook as well as pages they make like.

7. Growing your database

Open Homes or Private Inspections are a great way to add clients to your database, so make sure you collect as much information as possible from those people attending viewings. Your database is your future business garden, first we must plant the seeds, which is collecting the contacts data and entering them into your real estate CRM. Next we must water our garden, which is corresponding with your database, through email alerts, SMS’s and informative newsletters. With enough seeds and nurturing of our database, your business will be grow.

Still wondering why you should put your buyers into your CRM? Click here to read our helpful article which should help solidify how important it is.

With a tool such as iDashboard for iPad, getting your Open Home attendees into your database is easier than ever.

8. Communicate with the competition

It doesn’t always have to be a hard battle against other agencies – sometimes it can be worth working with them. Build contacts in a few local buyer’s agencies and provide them with a schedule for your weekly open houses.

It’s in their best interests to arrange sales, too, so a bit of mutual back-scratching could work out well for both parties.

9. Get your open house online with a virtual tour

With the constant rise in video technology, you should be making the most of it. There are several companies that now offer 3D imaging of properties, so why not get it set up for your listings?

3D virtual tours are an excellent way of giving your buyer audience a taster of what they can see at the open house, as well as showing those not attending what they’re missing. Who knows, you might even change their minds.

10. Work with the home-staging pros to show your listing at its finest

A very small percentage of buyers make an offer after only one visit. Many will go back to the agent after and request a second visit in private, so they can gather more information on the property.

Getting to this point is the goal. Getting there will be a lot easier if you make the property look stunning for when they first set foot in it.

Hire a professional home-stager to make sure your listing is cast in the best professional light prior to sale. These stats show just how worthwhile this can be:

  • 32% of buyer’s agents believe that staged homes have a positive effect on the offer price their clients propose.
  • 81% of prospective buyers believe that a staged home makes it easier to see themselves in the property.
  • 46% of buyers are more open towards attending an open house event if the home has been professionally-staged.

By making sure you follow these tips, you’ll be able to boost attendance to your open house events and increase the chance of getting offers as a result.

Looking for a way to keep track of your real estate leads? Find out what iDashboard can do for you.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software,  responsive websites, and more.

New Feed Sticker for iDashboard Products

New Outgoing Feed: Realestatebookings.com

iDashboardNewFeed-01iDashboard welcomes Realestatebookings.com to our family of portal sites that we upload properties too.

About Realestatebookings.com

Our tried and tested real estate software has been built to work throughout the entire marketing cycle, making sure your prospective clients are engaged at every step along the way. With the evolving digital world we live in today, we bring your Digital Real Estate office to the forefront. Real Estate Bookings is the perfect whole office lead generation platform for connecting with prospect Vendors, Buyers, Landlords and Tenants.

FIRST IMPRESSION

A prospective client’s first interaction is often via online. Engage with a fast, branded and personalised reply to their enquiry

OPEN HOMES

We want to ensure that your prospect clients are cared for every step of the way! With our software you can track attendee/s, aiding further follow-ups.

ENGAGE

Your clients are vital to the success of your business. We make sure that you can effortlessly nurture your leads throughout your campaign!

ENTIRE OFFICE

Residential Sales, Property Management, and Commercial real estate. We grow with you, our platform can easily extend into other departments.

GROW YOUR DATABASE

Consolidate enquiries from online and offline channels. Capture all leads for your business

EASY SETUP

Trouble-free setup without needing change your existing IT systems! We can assure you that there are no sneaky hidden costs!

This information has been sourced from Realestatebookings.com

To send your properties through to Realestatebookings.com from iDashboard, simply setup an account with them and they will contact us to activate your property feed.

Social Media

SEO For Social Media – A Real Estate Agency Guide

Although Google technically doesn’t pull data from social media profiles right now, there are still plenty of reasons why real estate agencies should be optimising their profiles for search engines.

Google has made hundreds of changes to the way it provides search results over the last 12 months – often without warning. This means that it’s far better to be prepared than to be caught off-guard when your page rankings sink.

As we know, targeted keywords are the main focus of SEO, which have bridged out to include search context, well known phrases and any questions the audience might be asking.

One recent game-changer has been the introduction of voice search, which has completely altered the way people search. This means that real estate agencies need to change the way they optimise too.

In this post, we’re going to walk you through the why’s and how’s of social media optimisation, with a few bespoke tips along the way.

Why should you optimise your social media?

As we’ve discussed, if search engines aren’t yet trawling social media to determine relevance, why bother optimising? That’s because, with their rapid growth, social media networks have become search engines in their own right.

Making sure your page contains the relevant info will mean you’ll be found far more easily. When users search Facebook for local real estate agents, you want your page to appear.

With the review culture that’s been created by companies like Amazon and Yelp, users often want to hear about other’s experiences with a brand before engaging with them themselves. Having your social media page pop up in search results is a great way to boost the trust they have in your brand.

Optimising social media will also attract casual browsers who see social media as their preferred channel. If a Twitter user sees your profile in Google, they’re likely to click through and browse. By seeing common search terms in your recent tweets, you’ll become instantly relevant to them.

Make your bio’s work for you

Of all the tactics you can employ to optimise your social media profiles, the one step you want to focus in on is your ‘bio’ or ‘about’ sections.

These areas on your page are an excellent way of telling your audience exactly what you do, in clear and concise language. The issue is just that, however – you’re only given a small amount of characters to work with. Sit down and think what keywords encapsulate your brand perfectly, then rework that into an intro. Make it creative to capture the attention of your browsers.

An example

To give you an idea of what we’re talking about, here’s an example. Say you’ve done some keyword research and you’ve discovered that ‘furnished apartments Sydney’ is generating a lot of searches. Your Twitter bio, however, currently says:

“Looking for a house? We’ll find you a home”.

It’s a nice slogan, but does it really say much about your business? Sadly, no. Instead, something like this might work a bit better:

“Selling furnished apartments in Sydney every day. Check out our website for this week’s listings: [link to site]”.

It might not be the catchiest, but it’s clear, concise and directly targets the majority of your search audience. By doing this, you’re going to attract a lot of the right attention.

“Content is King”

If you ask a social media expert, most of them will tell you that the best way to grow and nurture an audience is by providing them with great content. For real estate, this is no different.

If you’re posting photos of your listings often, go the extra distance – consider hiring a professional photographer to get some top shots of the properties. When stood next to your competition’s standard front-house angle, they’ll definitely stand out.

Another excellent method is by answering your audience’s questions. Do a bit of research into the problems your target audience faces around real estate and produce blog posts that answer those questions. It all comes back round to trust – by providing them with answers, your audience will deem your brand to have authority within the industry, increasing their trust in you. When they’re in the market for your services, they’ll be more likely to go with you than your competitors who aren’t using content marketing.

Make the most of Facebook

When compared to the usage stats of other popular social media sites, Facebook absolutely crushes them. If your real estate agency isn’t on Facebook, you’re missing out on a valuable resource.

Take a look at the Notes section on your page and add some in for the areas you serve. Within these notes, list the properties you currently have for sale, alongside prices and links to the listings. Add in some keywords to the body of the content and you’re good to go.

If you’re using Twitter to advertise your listings, be sure to include your keywords at the start of your tweet. Google search results only display 20-30 characters of a tweet, so it’s essential that you get your message across very quickly.

If you’ve got YouTube or Vimeo profiles for your real estate agency, make sure the title contains the relevant keywords and, where possible, try to provide transcripts for the videos in the ‘about’ sections.

Get your story straight

Remember, if you’re going to optimise your social media profiles, you need to make sure they match each other. Increasing brand awareness is great for your business, but if your Twitter and Facebook pages are saying different things, you could end up confusing potential customers.

Your website and social media profiles are your real estate brand’s voice online, so be sure to use it to its best. Link content back to your website where possible and make sure those links include keywords.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software,  responsive websites, and more.

Big Data

Using Big Data To Beat The Competition – A Real Estate Guide

Big DataWhen the primary focus is sell, sell, sell, don’t forget about the data your real estate agency already has.

Why? Because it can play a huge part in getting you ahead of your competitors.

Making the most of big data can get your brand seen by more people, help you target the right people and gain you more listings.

So what’s the big deal?

Put simply, big data is when businesses collect information about their audience using both traditional and digital sources. By collecting the right data, you can gain powerful insights into your audience’s personality. Knowing this will help you to understand how they’ll react to certain stimuli, meaning you can adapt your campaigns to each individual’s characteristics.

As the name might give away, big data does provide an infinite amount of information, but this doesn’t have to be intimidating. By selecting core sections of the data, you can focus your analysis and generate impressive results.

Although the collection method is also important, how you analyse the data is crucial to getting the results you want. By picking out certain aspects of the data, you’ll be able to seriously boost your knowledge of the local area, which will give you a significant edge over other real estate agents.

Okay, so how do I collect big data?

There are several popular methods used for collecting big data. Take a look at the list below and decide which work best for you:

Email surveys

Straightforward and easy to execute, the traditional survey is a strong method of gaining data from residents of your local area. By asking for answers on a scale of 1-10, you’ll be able to quantify the results into data for analysis.

If you haven’t surveyed your local population before, you might find the results surprising. This is a valuable method of gaining an insight into your local community and will help to give you an idea of whether you’re marketing your business to them correctly.

By developing an understanding of your community’s advertising preferences, you’ll be able to get a picture of who you should be targeting with your property advertising. If you collect enough data, you’ll be able to break the results down into age groups for increased campaign targeting.

Keep your survey short and to the point and test it on a couple of participants before emailing it out to your database. If you’re concerned about people ignoring it, try offering an incentive like a competition entry or a giveaway.

Tracking your audience online

If you’ve got a website, why not make the most of it? By activating a tracking platform, such as Google Analytics, you can gain powerful insights into how your online audience interacts with your website. Among many other features, Google Analytics will show you which pages your visitors are looking at, how long they spend on each page and which page they exit your site from. Over time, you’ll notice patterns emerging with your audience’s viewing habits, which you can action and use to improve your site.

For example, if visitors are spending a long time on one particular blog post, it could be worth creating more content of a similar topic. If a large percentage are leaving your site – known as bouncing – on a particular page, perhaps it’s time to add in some additional site links to continue their journey.

This data can also help you to drive online advertising performance. If one of your online pages is already converting well, it could be worth setting up a pay-per-click campaign with Google to drive additional traffic to that page. As the name suggests, you pay every time a person clicks on your ad, so it’s worth working out the costs and what ROI you expect before setting this up.

Make the most of existing market statistics

You don’t have to collect all of the data yourself. Tools such as CoreLogic are among the best data resources in the industry for real estate agents. Years of research have gone into the data that Corelogic provides, making it an invaluable resource for your analytics.

Aside from Corelogic, the Australian Bureau of Statistics provides profiles of whole communities, which can be useful if you’re looking for a broader overview.

Listen to your customers

By far, your current customers are your greatest assets. By generating a feedback form and sending it out via email, you’ll be able to find out why they chose you and what areas they feel you could improve in. By collating this data and analysing any emerging trends, you’ll be able to reshape your services to better suit future buyers.

So I’ve got my data – now what?

The possibilities for what you can do with big data are literally endless. It can be easy to get overwhelmed by it, so the best way forward is to ask yourself the following:

  • What do I want to know?
  • Why do I want to know it?

For example, you might want to know which region gives you the most web traffic, so you can target your next marketing campaign to that location.

Once you know what you want from your data, you’ll be able to set about analysing it. Considering the workload involved, it could be worth outsourcing the project to a professional data agency, or hiring an experienced analyst to gather your results for you.

By utilising big data, you’ll be able to find out more about your target audience than ever before. Use it to optimise your campaigns and watch your ROI increase.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software,  responsive websites, and more.

iPropertyNewWebsite-01

New Narooma Real Estate Website

iPropertyNewWebsite-01Narooma Real Estate has returned to the Real Estate scene after selling the business back in 2005.

Along with a great new look, Narooma Real Estate required a fantastic new website and one that would work well across all mobile devices. This is where the team at iDashboard stepped in, creating them an awesome new website for their return to business.

The new Narooma Real Estate website is completely responsive; working on Desktops, Tablets and Smartphones allowing their staff and visitors to access any property any time.

The new interactive home page contains a great list of ‘must-have’ features, this includes:

  • Property Search Panel
  • Featured Property Gallery
  • Latest Listing on Home Page
  • Recent Testimonials
  • Market Appraisal Request Interactive Form
  • Latest Sold Properties
  • Latest News and Updates
  • Property Videos
  • Buyer and Renter Email Alerts Signup/Login

Along with this fantastic new home page, the website boasts a revamped property grid list view, property information pages, interactive forms and many more professionally designed features.

We wish the team at Narooma Real Estate all the best with their new website and look forward to our ongoing relationship.

If you are looking for a new website, wether you are starting from scratch or want to upgrade to a modern responsive design, contact iDashboard today.

MC_macMC_ipad

LinkedIn Tips

Grow your Brand on LinkedIn with these 5 Essential Steps

LinkedIn TipsWhen compared to the other social platforms available, LinkedIn tends to stand out. In contrast to most, it’s completely based around developing professional relationships and is an absolute goldmine for reaching key decision makers within your industry.

With over 45% of LinkedIn users falling within the top industry ranks, LinkedIn is the best channel to choose for reaching knowledgeable and experienced professionals. And when you consider that it now holds an audience of over 430 million, LinkedIn starts to seem like a pretty good place for your brand to be. So how do you build a presence on LinkedIn? We’ve prepared a 5-step guide to get you started.

1. Content Creation is Key

LinkedIn places a huge emphasis on the importance of user-generated content. Since its creation, over 3 million posts have been created and shared on the site. You don’t always have to rely on a catchy headline and the right posting time to get your post seen, either. If a piece of content gains traction quickly, LinkedIn will place it in the spotlight in one of their content categories, meaning it’ll get seen by thousands of readers within minutes. This is a fantastic way to target a new audience who otherwise wouldn’t be reading your posts, so creating content regularly is an excellent way to gain brand recognition.

To help you plan out your content before posting, think about the following questions:

  • How regularly should we post content?
  • What sort of topics should we be covering?
  • How can our content inspire people?

2. Use SlideShare to your Advantage

Sadly, a lot of SlideShare content online is pretty boring. It’s often used as a storage vessel for PowerPoint presentations, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Some of the best LinkedIn posts we’ve seen have utilised SlideShare to display content in an alternative, more vibrant light. If you’ve just released an e-book or a new blog post, SlideShare is an excellent way to get your content out there from a different perspective. LinkedIn discuss this in greater detail in their Sophisticated Marketers’ Guide to LinkedIn.

Some of their beginners’ tips for starting out with SlideShare include:

  • Create a SlideShare profile page
  • Research keywords to use in your title thoroughly
  • Design an enquiry form to capture any business leads 

3. Make the most of LinkedIn Sponsored Updates

If you’re struggling to get your content seen by the right people at the right time, LinkedIn Sponsored Updates might just come to your rescue. Offering the ability to get your content in front of highly targeted audiences, these updates are available at a relatively affordable price. Backed by LinkedIn’s impressive user database, some of the demographics you can target include:

  • Age
  • Location
  • Industry
  • Job title
  • Group

Although you can promote posts from the very start, it’s advisable to only sponsor your top posts. Pick a piece of content that’s performing better than the rest to make the most of your budget and increase your chances of generating leads.

4. Showcase pages display the best of your brand

If you’re feeling boxed in by your LinkedIn company page, it’s worth checking out Showcase Pages. As the name might suggest, Showcase Pages attach to your company page and are a great way of showing off your brand’s best products and services.

Coupled with LinkedIn Sponsored Updates, Showcase pages can be used to target specific industry segments whilst still maintaining a direct link to your brand’s existing online reputation. 

5. Create and Launch Ad Campaigns

LinkedIn’s Text Ads will complement any existing Sponsored Updates and give your marketing campaign that added boost. Just as cost-effective as Sponsored Updates, Text Ads are a great means of extending your brand’s reach on the platform, offering you a range of targeting options.

If your budget can stretch slightly further, you might want to consider both Sponsored InMails and Display Ads:

Sponsored InMails

Think of it like email marketing for social media. Linkedin Sponsored InMails allow you to get your brand’s message directly into your audience’s inbox.

Display Ads

Your ads will be served to your selected audience on the LinkedIn pages they visit. Coupled with the fact that LinkedIn only displays 2 page ads at any one time, your ad will get a decent share of the exposure.

Although not the place to be if you’re trying to target the youth market, LinkedIn is a powerful platform with so much to offer marketers. If you follow the tips above, you’ll have no problem getting your brand in front of the right people. For more tips on using LinkedIn check out our article The 6 Most Important LinkedIn Tips for Real Estate Consultants.

For more helpful real estate tips and information like this, check out our blog. You can also follow us on Facebook.

At iProperty, we provide leading online property management and real estate software,  responsive websites, and more.

Shopping Basket