Content Marketing 101 for Real Estate Agents in 2021

Content marketing is the future of marketing.

It doesn’t involve pop-ups, disruptive advertising, cold calling, junk mail, or door knocking.

Instead, it gives value first, allowing companies to build trust and brand awareness with their customers first.

I believe as the 21st century continues, consumers will have ever higher expectations of the brands they do business with. Calling expireds will earn a customer for a transaction. Content marketing will earn customers for life.

• What is Content Marketing?
• Types of Real Estate Content
• Where to Get Content Ideas?
• Content Marketing Strategies
• Content Marketing Resources
• Conclusion

What is Content Marketing?

The dictionary defines content marketing as:

a type of marketing that involves the creation and sharing of online material (such as videos, blogs, and social media posts) that does not explicitly promote a brand but is intended to stimulate interest in its products or services.

Another term closely related to content marketing is “inbound” marketing. Instead of chasing customers, you are attracting them to you.

The opposite of content marketing is “outbound” marketing, or paid advertising like pay-per-click (PPC) on Google or Facebook ads, cold calling, or traditional advertising like print, billboards, and direct mail. These advertising efforts are all about getting to the sale up front and quickly.

Content marketing instead is about playing the long game. It is first about giving someone something of value for free, and then earning their business after you’ve earned their respect and trust.

If you want a deeper dive into what content market really means, the Content Marketing Institute is another good place to start.

Inbound marketing can be one of the best sources of leads for real estate industry professionals. It’s certainly my personal favorite.

Pros of Content Marketing

• Long-lasting. Once a content marketing project is put into place, it usually works without you having to spend money or continue working on it. People are on your site, watching your videos, etc, while you sleep!
• Scalable. The time and money spent on a piece of content seen by 1 prospect is the same time spent on content seen by 100,000 prospects. Quality content that gets seen can 5x, 50x, or even 500x your investment without any more effort on your own part.
• Cheap to DIY. Not all quality content is cheap, but there are some very cheap content marketing strategies that require little or no money if you do it yourself: a YouTube channel, blog posts, and more can all be done for little to no money.
• Hot, already nurtured leads. When building an audience with content, often your leads are already familiar with you before they even reach out. You’ve essentially already been having a conversation with them through your videos, writing, or podcasting. They already know they want to work with you and are ready to go!
• Better customers. This is subjective, but I personally think that the types of folks who pause to study their real estate decisions tend to be better customers than those who impulsively sign up on a forced registration window, or call on a soliciting postcard. But that may just be my bias as a proud content marketer, myself.

Cons of Content Marketing

• Can take a long time to see results. Content marketing is about building an audience. Usually, that is measured in years, not weeks or months. If you need a faster start, many content marketers might supplement their efforts with paid advertising in the early days, until the audience, SEO, and word of mouth is large enough to take over.
• Expensive to outsource. Writing a high-quality blog post or creating an insightful video with yourself is free. Getting someone else to create a product of similar quality is not free. The kind of quality of blog post I write for my own website quite seriously would cost $150-$300 per article to get someone else to do it to the same standard (it takes me on average 6 hours to write a post). Just 10 great articles could set you back $1000s.
• Difficult lead attribution. Did that lead come from your blog? Or did they see your YouTube and come to your page? Or did a friend share your post on social media and they found you there? Or maybe they’re a podcast listener but you wouldn’t know because they just called you directly. Developing solid metrics for an ROI on your content marketing efforts is much more difficult than PPC alternatives.
• Quality or bust. Quality doesn’t mean expensive Hollywood productions. But your content has to give value to your audience. A lot of value. There is simply too much content on the web that you need to stand out in the top 5%. A 500-word generic post about home decorating is a complete waste of your time.

Types of Real Estate Content

I’ve written a full list of content ideas for real estate. Below are introductions to some of the main ideas.

Blog Articles

The first thing that comes to mind when one thinks “content marketing” is probably real estate blogging. Real estate websites often feature blogs about the local community and how to sell or buy a home.

These can attract leads by ranking organically in the Google search engine results, or can be shared on social media and email newsletters.

I wrote about some of the top real estate bloggers and the kind of traffic and business they are earning from it.

Video

Netflix started as a content distributor. But they realized they were at the mercy of their content providers, and decided to get into content creation themselves.

I guess that’s not quite the same as what most people think of as content marketing. The content is the product in Netflix’s case, whereas for agents the video instead leads people to the product – real estate services. Though it’s conceivable to do both, as in the case of HGTV shows or other content that is itself valuable.

Not just YouTube but Facebook Live is another variety of content marketing.

I wrote about some of the agents who are crushing video and building an audience on YouTube.

E-Books, Courses, and Guides

Guides and e-books one-up your blog post in that they make great lead magnets. Want the content? Let us know an email to send it to you!

Voila. You’ve got emails.

When we think of guides we often think of 40-page white papers full of how-tos and in-depth info. But lead magnet guides can be far shorter. A well-done buyer or transaction checklist can be enough.

Infographics and Market Statistics

Want credibility as the local subject matter expert? Market updates are examples of a way of providing value to people.

A well-done market update can also be a lead magnet – exchanged for an email.

Meanwhile, visual content like infographics tend to be higher engaging forms of content that can keep potential clients reading and interested.

Listings

It’s so commonplace that we think past it as agents, but listings are a form of content.

Why are buyers on your website? In many cases, it is to look at homes. That is the “content” that is bringing them to and keeping them on your website.

Zillow and Realtor.com are technically content marketing when they syndicate listings to their site. They don’t make money on the listings. They make money advertising. Listings are just the content that get people there.

To get listings on your site requires an IDX or VOW feed from your local MLS.

Others

• Email Content. Email marketing is often considered a different discipline than content marketing. But your email content is …. content. It is absolutely in the content marketing umbrella and something one should consider when developing a content distribution strategy.
• Webinars / Seminars. This is a classic example of giving before you get. Be helpful. Solve a need. Provide value upfront in the form of a first time home buyer class, or VA loan seminar, or something that would fit with your niche and local community.
• Forums. The cheapest form of content is user-generated content! And forums are the obvious example. I am not aware of a real estate agent successfully implementing much user-generated content into their site. But you can take advantage of answering other people’s questions on sites like Quora, Reddit, or Bigger Pockets.
• Local Podcasts. Check out the Seattle Real Estate Podcast, at over 500 episodes. Podcasts can be a lot of work and are not exactly evergreen content, but pairs well with a video-centric strategy.

Where to Get Content Ideas?

There is no excuse to not have ideas for content.

I previously mentioned my article about blog ideas. Those make great content ideas for any medium – video, email, etc. For local real estate, you can write about:

• Neighborhood profiles
• Explaining the contract
• Pros and Cons of types of properties (singly family versus duplex, etc)
• Local builder profiles
• Market updates
• Loan types
• Local Places and Events
• Steps of the transaction
• Types of real estate niches (e.g. probate, foreclosures, new construction, etc)
• Local vendor profiles (e.g. inspectors, lenders, title, HVAC, etc)

If you’re still short on ideas, Neil Patel shares 101 ways to source content ideas.

Content Marketing Strategies

The best thing about focusing on content marketing in your business is how easy it is to repurpose content, allowing you to multiply your efforts.

Consider if you had a podcast. Not only is your podcast reaching out to podcast audiences, but you can also film your podcast, making it into a shareable YouTube or even Facebook Live video. Then, you can take the highlights of your podcast and distill it into a blog article. Next, take the top 3-5 quotes or tips from you or your podcast guest and share it on Twitter or other social media. A single piece of content can fill many content distribution channels and enable you to reach out to the widest possible audience.

Compare that to paid advertising, where you have to pay for every appearance of your content on every channel.

Hyperlocal Content

Whatever content you create, chances are it isn’t going be of much use to national audiences (though I know of a few exceptions of agent generated content that rank for national keywords).

The competition is too fierce for that kind of traffic.

And, real estate is local. You want to appeal to people buying and selling in your market.

Hyperlocal content is focused on your community. The downside of hyperlocal content is that it appeals only to a very small niche of people. There are only so many people searching about USDA loans in Copperas Cove, TX.

But the pro of hyperlocal is that the traffic can have a higher commercial intent, is easier to rank and get attention, and more directly helps your consumer.

I’m not sure where the line between “hyperlocal” and “local” is, other than I generally think of hyperlocal as profiling individual neighborhoods, restaurants, parks, etc, while “local” is slightly broader, looking at a city or region.

It’s Not Just About Lead Generation…

When we think of content strategies, we usually think of inbound marketing that is passively generating real estate leads.

But there are other types of content not targeting new business opportunities but your existing business.

For example, maybe you get your leads through PPC and referrals. But you may still want a useful Buyers Guide or Sellers Guide to provide to your clients to prepare them for their journey. That is business content designed to improve your user experience (UX), not your lead generation, per se.

Content Marketing Resources

I love content marketing. It’s a big part of why I started this site. I enjoy writing about real estate, SEO, and watching visitors come and get value from what I’ve built. As such, I’m somewhat pleased with the knapsack of content marketing tools I’ve collected along the way. Allow me to share with you!

Publications

Content Marketing Institute

The Content Marketing Institute is an online magazine that features numerous articles on….content marketing, obviously. Their stuff bleeds over into digital marketing in general. But they are one of the kings of the roost when it comes to the marketing world.

HubSpot

HubSpot is more than just a free CRM. They are more than just a marketing platform company.

They are also rabid content creators and industry leaders in the content marketing realm. They are the hosts of the Inbound conference which we will mention shortly…

Constant Content

Constant Content (not to be confused with email marketing tool Constant Contact) is a website I only recently discovered, but that has lots of great articles on producing hyperlocal content, developing marketing campaigns, and more.

Others

• MozLocal: How to Create Authentic Hyperlocal Content At Scale

Conventions

Are you convention-ed out by all the real estate conferences that seem to be happening every week?

No?

Awesome! Because here are a few more you can add to up your content game.

Inbound

HubSpot puts on the Inbound Conference in Boston, MA each year. It is probably the largest content marketing event each year, and has featured top class speakers in the past like Michelle Obama.

If you could only make one content marketing event, this would probably be the one you want to check out first.

Content Marketing World

Sponsored by the aforementioned Content Marketing Institute is Content Marketing World, always hosted in Cleveland, OH.

CMW features over 3000 visitors each year and has a hefty list of events and courses during the 4-day conference. Content Marketing Institute also puts on a ContentTECH Summit and Content Marketing University.

MozCon

MozLocal is a fantastic SEO resource for Local SEO, and something I would check into if blogging is going to be your lead generation strategy of choice.

They also have a conference that focuses not only on SEO but on creating local content that can rank for SEO.

Conex

Conex is another conference put on by Uberflip, a company designed to coordinate your content marketing efforts into a seamless user experience for your buys and sellers.

Like Uberflip, Conex focuses on not just content marketing but the “experience” of content, and especially important consideration in a “belly-to-belly” industry like real estate.

Products and Services

Not interested in the DIY path? There are companies that can run your content campaigns for you. A few below!

Keeping Current Matters

Keeping Current Matters is a content company targeting the single agent or team who wants to put a significant chunk of their content generation on auto-pilot. Membership comes with prepackaged buyer and seller guides, daily blog posts to re-purpose to your website and social media, and monthly market updates.

LiveBy

LiveBy is a hyperlocal page generator, so to speak, for your website. They can create neighborhood and community pages with data points like market trends, schools, active listings, and neighborhood maps. It is far more robust than any IDX solution out there, and without needing a chunky developer budget to create something similar. You can easily add it to your existing website’s neighborhood pages.

Contently

Contently is a full service, enterprise content manager that promises to help you strategize and implement your entire real estate content marketing strategy. They have consultants and the relationships with talent to create a professional and quality content marketing engine.

Upwork

I imagine you’ve heard of Upwork! It’s one of many sites you can find freelancers like real estate writers, graphics artists, video editors, and more. If you are willing to be a little more hands-on with your content but want to outsource the repetitive stuff, Upwork can be a great resource to get help.

Conclusion

Real estate marketers have to be all-in on content for it to work. There is no way to half-ass it and see results.

But the payoff is a lead generation system that you own, works when you sleep, and becomes one of the most efficient means of generating leads.

Updated May 17, 2021; Originally published August 6, 2019