It’s so interesting to me to see how much things have changed in the real estate industry over the 20+ years that I’ve been in the business. One of the most striking things to me is how important marketing is today and how many more venues we have to market properties than we did way back when. The internet is a critical component to our marketing efforts – EWM has affiliations with several different companies, so everything that goes into the MLS automatically gets sent to Trulia.com, Realtor.com, Yahoo.com, EWM.com and a variety of other websites that we know consumers rely on for real estate searches. EWM is partners with Christie’s International so all of our listings go to their website as well. I also create individual websites for each one of my listings. In addition to all of the internet marketing that I do, I also send Email campaigns to a list of local agents, post all of my listings on JustAskBoo, run ads in the Herald every Sunday, create beautiful brochures, make phone calls to any realtors I think would have interested clients, get professional photography done of every listing, and the list goes on and on. I have always believed that when I get a listing, it is my job to put it out there to reach as broad of an audience as I can, and to help the sellers get their house sold effectively and efficiently. By the time someone makes an appointment to see one of my listings, they have already “previewed” the house on the internet, so I have to make an impression on someone before they ever step foot into a house.
Just this past week, I did a major marketing blitz for one of my listings that had just been reduced and was ready to be sold as a short sale. I posted it on JustAskBoo, email blasted my list of Realtors, made 20+ phone calls to various agents, held an impromptu open house on Sunday, had a Broker’s Open House Wednesday, and within days, I have 4 offers on the home. This just goes to show how productive a marketing blitz can be in this market, and what a difference it truly makes. As realtors, we no longer post listings on the MLS and wait for the phone to ring. Our marketing wheels are in motion long before the listing ever hits the MLS, and this is a perfect example of how marketing can be so effective.
