Are you wanting to make more connections with realtors in your area? You don’t need to rely just on in person meetings anymore. Online advertisements let you reach people 24/7. But first you need to learn how to target real estate agents in Facebook ads.
Back in the old days when I started my business, you had to make connections with Realtors in person if you wanted to reach them. Sure, you could do direct mailers or flyers, but those end up in the trash more often than you’d think. I would spend hours driving from office to office around town to bring them treats trying to get them to remember me. I spent hundreds each week on donuts, chocolate, and gas. Eventually it did work. But it took a long time and a lot of hustling. And a lot of money spent on food gifts and gas. These days it’s gotten a little easier, thanks to the internet. Even if presentations and in person meetings are a part of your marketing plan, you can supplement with Facebook ads. A little reminder of you that pops up on their Facebook feed a few days after they’ve met you (or better yet, when they need an inspector) can go a long way in keeping you in their minds. And that’s really the point of marketing when you really boil it down.
Here are the basic ways to target real estate agents in Facebook ads:
– Target by Location – First, limit your target audience to your geographic location. You don’t need any business from people across the country.
– Target by interest – We want to target people who like topics related to home buying. Things like Zillow, real estate investing, and new homes. It is likely that a real estate agent has engaged with content about those topics on Facebook.
– Target by job – you can opt to show your ad to people who have listed real estate agent as their job title.
– Target by audience – you can upload your email list of agents and serve ads just to them. You wont know exactly who of the list is seeing the ads, but they will not be shown to people outside the list. This is great for reminding agents who haven’t used you in a while that you exist. It’s also good if you go to a networking event and meet a bunch of agents. You can do a follow-up ad (called retargeting), so they feel like all of a sudden you are everywhere.
You can, and should, target your audience based on two or more of these factors. We will show you the step by step of how to do this in another article. The point of this is to get your brain running on ideas of how to reach people in your market.
One of the great things about Facebook is you can target people by many factors, so your ad gets to the people you want to see it. If you’re wondering how do I target real estate agents in Facebook ads, here’s the basics:
What is the point of a Facebook ad?
There are two main reasons we do Facebook ads targeting realtors:
1. Brand awareness – we want agents to feel like they see us everywhere
2. To get agents on to our website – if our ads entice them to visit our website, we know we can give them a lot more information. Looking at our sample report and reading reviews from other agents are our two main goals once they are on our site.
What to put in your ad
Remember, you’re targeting agents. You’d write differently to agents than to clients. Agents want to know two main things: that you can inspect a house well and that you won’t blow their deal. Including videos of you on the inspection is a great way to show your expertise. Since many agents often worry that a home inspection could cause the deal to fall through, they are often weary of us. This is a pretty big objection in their minds. One goal of marketing is to help people overcome objections they have. Explaining your communication tactic either in text or video will go along way to building trust with agents. We talk more about communication styles in this article.
Videos
Videos are one of the best things to include in a Facebook ad. This is true in general, but it’s especially helpful for home inspectors. Inspections are a pretty technical field, but it’s also a people oriented field. We need the home buyers to understand the information we are giving them and what it means. But that can be a large gap to bridge if the person has no knowledge of home construction. That’s why they hired us anyways. A video goes a long way in explaining what we do to someone who doesn’t understand because it’s visual. Showing how a home is inspected and the types of things we typically find is much easier through a visual than in writing.
Another reason videos work so well is that people feel more connected to other people when they can see them. It’s something about the eyes. Making that connection can be crucial. And thank goodness we can do it over the Internet. Sure, it’s not exactly the same as an in person introduction. But you can virtually meet hundreds of agents at once though a video ad.
Don’t be afraid of making videos
If you don’t feel like you’re good at making videos, you’re in luck when it comes to Facebook ads. People log into Facebook to see photos and videos of their friends and family. Most of what they see everyday is people taking photos and videos on their phones of everyday things. The content is not professional produced or anything near it. That’s what people expect from Facebook ads too. The more “organic” or natural looking your content is, the better. That means you don’t need any special equipment or lighting or even a special camera. Just clicking record on your phone is exactly the right thing to do. Hopefully that will take a lot of the fear out of making videos.
Types of videos
Here are some ideas for video ads you can create.
– Show how you inspect the house – This will make people more likely to buy from you because the product you sell is very clear. People are more likely to buy something when they understand it.
– Show your expertise in a way that speaks to agents – Videos that show you know the inner workings of a house are great. But when advertising to agents, you’ll want to show off your communication expertise too. Show them you’re great at customer service by showing how you explain issues to clients. Not blowing things out of proportion is key for agents. They want to know that you’re not going to recommend the buyers walk away over one broken outlet. (Although we never make any kind of recommendations to buyers about whether or not they should buy a house. We don’t know what they’re reasoning for buying it is. It could look like a terrible property to us, but they might want to do a total gut job on it, so many of the things you found wont matter. You never know.)
– Slide show – if you’re not quite ready to film a video, a slide show ad is a great option. Facebook will turn your photos into a slide show, which often looks like a video. A few photos of the same thing from different angles will look sort of animated when it’s in slide show format.
– Introduction video – Sit in front of the camera and introduce yourself and your business just as you would in person. This is great for building trust with agents. Putting a face to a name goes a long way to sticking in their memory. You can talk about your experience and the way you inspect homes. Be sure to talk about what makes you different from the competition. Be sure to add closed captioning option to these videos.
Photos
An eye-catching photo can go a long way too. You want to choose something that will stop their scroll. We all know how we can mindlessly scroll through Facebook. As they scroll past your ad, you want it to make them stop scrolling, take notice, and click. Some people use memes to catch people’s attention. Try to come up with something unique.
Instead of a video, you can use photos to tell a story. A carousel ad (kind of like a photo album) is a great way to show the steps of a process. This would be great for explaining what you do at your inspections. Or telling a story about how you helped an agent in a specific way. People love stories and a photo for each step is a great bonus.
Facebook ads are a great way to get your name out to Realtors in your business. You just need to know how to target real estate agents in Facebook ads. Play around with different settings until you get a good return.