Selling a house has become a very difficult task for many real estate agents. In this highly digital world, direct marketing techniques are highly beneficial for staying ahead of the competition and reaching potential customers. For a highly competitive field like real estate, SMS marketing for real estate is a recommendable technique for promoting your business. Many people think text marketing is not an effective technique, but for real estate it is a simple and very helpful tool for promoting and advertising your business. With economic downturns and housing crises, it can be very difficult to sell even a single house. Highly populated countries need more properties and more places to live, which makes the real estate business very profitable in those countries.
In earlier times, real estate agents advertised their offers in local newspapers. Today, real estate agents are moving toward more effective digital marketing techniques. SMS marketing is one of these effective marketing techniques, delivering results that are about 90% better than many other techniques.
SMS Marketing vs Email Marketing: A Comparison
About 95% of the world’s population have their own personal mobile phones. For any business, sending bulk advertising messages to these mobile phone numbers is an effective way to grab the attention of potential customers. Although text messaging is an older technique, it is cost-effective, and for real estate, SMS marketing is an ideal choice.
What Is Real Estate SMS/Text Message Marketing?
Whenever we talk about SMS marketing for real estate, you should relate all the data above to your own real estate business, which will help you grow your business. Other marketing techniques are also useful; you should evaluate all of them and then move forward with the one that delivers the most profitable results. For a real estate business, traditional marketing requires more time, cost, and effort, while SMS marketing overcomes all these overheads.
According to studies, about 80% of people check their phone within the first 5 minutes of a notification beep, 30% take their phones in their hands while walking, and about 65% of people keep their phones beside them while sleeping. These figures show that the mobile phone has become a mandatory part of people’s lives. If a real estate business sends its advertising and promotional messages under its brand name, it will help promote the brand name as well as increase its potential customer base. It is the most effective and economical way of communicating. A large share of home and property buyers prefer receiving informational data from a real estate agent by SMS rather than by call or email. To do SMS marketing, first you need SMS marketing data that will be helpful to all real estate agents.
Also check: Real Estate SMS Marketing Data
How SMS Marketing for Real Estate Works
Although SMS marketing may seem like an outdated technique, it provides highly profitable results in various fields, and real estate is one of them. Text message marketing is one of the most effective ways to target leads. For a realtor, it is highly beneficial for scheduling appointments faster, advertising your brand, and sharing your listings. You can integrate your real estate marketing strategies with SMS marketing strategies, which will help you engage your customers through real estate SMS. Here are some key features of real estate SMS marketing:
Keywords
To start SMS marketing, you must have a keyword that is unique, readable, and easy to remember. A keyword is actually a word through which a customer can send you a relevant text. You can set up an automatic message on your keyword so that whenever a customer sends an SMS to your keyword, it automatically responds to that customer.
For example, suppose you set a keyword for a particular property, such as “luxurious home 1”. As soon as a customer texts this keyword, he or she will get all the details regarding that house via SMS.
Brand Short Codes
For SMS marketing, you can choose your brand’s SMS shortcode. That shortcode will help you send any SMS or MMS to your chosen clients. These shortcodes are 5- to 6-digit numbers known as branded SMS.
For example, the brand code for a particular real estate business might be 41010.
Automated Responses
An automated response is the auto-reply that you set on your particular keyword for a particular property. You should set keywords for each property you have for sale, and when a customer asks about a property, your automated response tool sends all the relevant data regarding that property to the client.
Automated response SMS messages could be of any type:
- New property
- Price update
- Thank you message
- Greetings SMS
- Offer details, etc.
Bulk SMS Sending
Whenever you have built a large list of loyal customers, you can send bulk SMS messages to all of them simultaneously. For a bulk SMS sending campaign, you should use software that enables you to send data to large numbers of recipients. You just have to customize an SMS, set your client database, and with a single click you can send it to the entire list.
MMS Messaging
MMS stands for “Multimedia Messaging Service”. It makes a very high impact when a real estate agent sends an MMS with text details of a particular property. Visual data always appeals to customers, and they try to explore things more attentively. Once you grab a client’s attention, it becomes very easy to guide him or her to the next step.
Texting Software for Real Estate
After finding your loyal customer contact database for marketing, the next step is to forward your message to these customers. There are many marketing tools that help businesses send their data to many clients at the same time. You can check our other articles where we provide information on contact databases and marketing tools as well.
SMS marketing tools will help you to:
- Have one-on-one conversations regarding a property with loyal customers
- Send bulk SMS messages
- Grab customer attention by using more effective data, etc.
Key Elements to Add to Your Real Estate Marketing SMS
You can customize your marketing SMS as per your needs. However, there are still some points you must keep in mind while customizing an SMS.
Some important things to notice in an SMS are:
- Address of your real estate business office
- Profile of your business
- Size of text (about 150 to 160 characters)
- Price of a certain property
- Visual content (home-for-sale images)
- Contact information for your office
- Link to a Google Map of the property location
- Link to your website
Example SMS Templates for Real Estate
Here are some example SMS messages that may help you:
- Hi “client’s first name”! Thank you for your interest. Kindly let me know when you will be free to discuss the property in more detail.
“Your business name”
- Dear “client’s first name”! Would this Tuesday be a good time for you to visit the house I have chosen for you?
“Your business name”
Benefits of SMS Marketing in Real Estate
Here are some benefits of SMS marketing in the real estate business:
Everyone Has a Cell Phone
About 90% of the world’s total population have their own personal mobile phones. Personal mobile phone availability makes it easier for companies to reach their clients. Not everyone has internet on their cell phone (needed for email marketing), and not everyone receives every call during the day, but SMS works around all these limitations. The SMS open rate is a highly effective factor in SMS marketing.
Instant Attraction of Buyers
Highly customized and to-the-point content always attracts loyal and serious clients. When you add informational content with some visual content to your SMS, clients will automatically be drawn toward you.
Low Time Investment
One click means “send to all”. You don’t have to send SMS messages to individual clients one by one; by using effective tools, you can save time and cost with just one click.
Rental Management by SMS Marketing
If an agent manages rental properties, SMS marketing is even more effective for him or her. If there is any issue in a certain area, the agent just has to write one SMS and send it to all clients in that region. Similarly, to collect rent, he or she just has to customize one reminder message.
Very informative article.