If you have been a regular reader of our blogs and articles, then you would know by now that our experts do not consider real estate agents as mere agents. They view them as independent business owners. As such, it is vital to start planning for the next step when it comes to your real estate business from the first day itself.
A lot of new agents in the initial days forget to focus on personal branding creation for themselves. They are happy being the representatives of the brokerage company and do not realize the host of benefits that personal branding brings to a business.
However, it is a must for an agent to start thinking about branding strategy from the early days so that when they are going to be running their own business, they do not get lost in the sea of competition. There are always going to be many real estate agents, but with a finely crafted and created personal brand, you can ensure that your real estate brand reaches the customers and captures a significant share of the real estate market.
In this guide we shall be taking you through the fundamental steps for real estate branding, so all new agents can get started on brand creation. It will be also helpful for those who already have a market brand presence but need something to improve their business.
Part A: Create Your Personal Brand
A brand in simple terms differs from a business. This is the basic principle to understand. So we are going to first focus on helping you build an identity for your real estate brand.
Define Real Estate Business Value
The primary step in this would be to clearly identify what are your business values? How are you going to present yourself to your clients? Values are integral as they leave an impression on the minds of your customers. However, remember, we are talking about your business values, what improvement or addition do you bring to their lives?
You could be a fun and ever-smiling agent, you could be the polite and professional one, or you could be the kind one who goes an extra mile for his clients. What adjective would they use to describe you? It is integral to establish this first so that the rest of the real estate branding elements can be in sync.
Define Your Real Estate Target Audience
The subsequent step would be to identify your target audience. Who are the clients with whom you have had the most success? Were they young professionals buying their first home? Do you always manage to get families a good selling price for their homes? Are you the go-to real estate agent in your city for a particular section of sellers in your community?
Identifying this will help you have a clear vision of your potential clients. This will guide you in creating content that attracts their attention and establishes your presence as the real estate agent they need.
Create A Unique Brand Identity
Once the above two steps have been completed, we can move on to the core of your personal brand. This is the aspect that everyone must carefully consider. This is the step of real estate branding where you are basically building what your customers will see and remember.
Create A Brand Name
Think of the popular brands, the one thing that is common is that they all have names that are short, easy to spell, and are meaningful. No odd pronunciations or numbers. Many of them have a geographical location, although that is not mandatory.
Come up with a name that is unique to your brand. Try out a few different combinations and pick the one that is the shortest and easiest to remember, so that your clients can search for you without any hassle.
Choose Your Brand’s Font And Color Scheme
It is crucial that you need to clearly decide which font and which colors are you going to utilize in all the professional aspects, such as business cards, real estate logo, website, and across your social media profiles. These have to be consistent across all materials, so make a document with all these details so that there is no confusion.
Take care to ensure that there is a proper balance between your real estate branding and all these choices that you are making. You do not want to accidentally use Comic Sans if you are trying to project a professional message.
Part B: Focus On Creating Your Real Estate Branding
Now that all the groundwork has been laid for your real estate branding, let us shift our attention to the marketing aspect. These tips will ensure that your ideas are reaching your future customers. The key here is to remember consistency across each of these aspects. They should all be a reflection of your core brand values and convey the same message.
Design Exclusive Graphics
Hire a graphic designer to design your brand logo. Clearly communicate with the designer what exactly is your target segment in the business. What are the colors you wish to use and how they should take your brand story forward? A well-designed logo can help you immensely in creating a unique space for your brand. Try out some logo ideas through a free logo maker, and present them as your idea to the graphic designer you hire later.
Create A Website
Today, marketing is not possible without a brand website. Online society plays an integral role in your success. Make sure that your logo is prominently displayed on your website pages. Use the same font in all your blog posts to build a seamless brand experience for your readers. A website serves the dual purposes of establishing your brand as well as marketing it.
If you do not wish to spend money on creating a site in the early days, you can consider registering on an online seller lead generation platform like Dorrmat. You can include all your real estate branding material on the exclusive agent landing page that is provided by Dorrmat.
Social Media Marketing
Another important channel for creating brand impression are social media platforms. Utilizing the power and reach of social media giants like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and more would help you garner more attention.
Brands use a variety of marketing strategies to stand out from the competition in the social media space. As mentioned earlier, it will give you a dual benefit of marketing and brand establishment.
The process is simple all you need to do is include the branding in all your social media posts, for example, you could record videos giving real estate advice, which can be used for video marketing, many studies have shown that those companies who have a clear identity in each video tend to have higher identity recall value for in the audiences’ minds. Video content is not only an engaging and easily consumable form of content but also it can be very beneficial for building your credibility and brand if used correctly. That’s why you should consider hiring an explainer video production company or working with experienced freelancers who have a relevant portfolio to your industry to look after your video development task.
Summary
For all real estate professionals, branding is a crucial aspect. Consistent use of your real estate branding in all local, offline, online, and other media platforms will form a coherent and consistent picture of your real estate brand. It will convey the core value and ideas of your brand, which will be a mark of quality for the buyers and sellers when it comes to selecting a real estate agent.