Considering using real estate text message marketing to reach your clients?
If it wasn’t important to you before, it might be time to reconsider.
As physical, in person events decline, staying top of mind with your clients in a way that isn’t spammy, is going to be a necessity to keep many businesses afloat.
Using text message marketing can be a fun, exciting way to keep business moving forward with your clients in every season.
Real Estate Text Message Marketing
It’s happened to all of us at least once: you feel your phone buzz, you pick it up to see you received a text message.
Thinking it could be from a friend, you open it only to find an automated message from XYZ Company about their newest items in stock.
You roll your eyes, exit out of the message, and hit DELETE.
Nobody wants to be pandered to!
With SMS and text messages becoming popular marketing tools to tap into, how do you utilize these services without turning your customers off to products and services?
By now you may be wondering, “Well how am I supposed to send updates and sell when people don’t want this?”
Don’t worry, my process breaks down into five easy points:
1. Who should be on your list?
2. What content will you send out?
3. What CTAs will you include?
4. Think about character count
5. Frequency of texts
Let’s get started!
#1 Who should be on your list?
Since “everyone!” is too broad of a term, let’s skip right over that and narrow down our target audience.
When it comes to marketing, we need to market to “our” people; meaning marketing towards the ones we know need/want/see our product or services on a daily, weekly, monthly, or annual basis.
Staying in front of your people makes all the difference when it comes to SMS Marketing.
Generally, a good rule of thumb is to put your current clients on this list, then past clients, and finally potential clients.
Each of these individuals can a) benefit from your services or b) have already benefited from your services and know you’re excellent at what you do.
Make sure to ask your list to opt-in to receive your text messages to stay legally compliant.
#2 What content will you be sending your list?
Now comes the fun part – what are you sending to your audience? This is going to be completely up to you and your brand.
Are you big on promoting events? You can text information on upcoming events, including online events!
Are you hosting a giveaway or promotion? Yep, you can text about that, too!
Another key thing that you can alert people to would be updates in your business (including store hours or new location) or general life updates (“We have limited hours today due to snow/illness/coronavirus mandates”).
Whatever you need to send out, make sure it’s engaging and easy to read.
#3 What CTAs will you include?
CTAs, or calls to action, are fundamental in SMS Marketing as they prompt a response. It may take you a minute to think of an example, but CTAs are everywhere.
On website’s it’s the “Sign Up Now!” button on the bottom of the screen.
On Facebook, the CTA is the “Read Full Story” tab that pops up when you hover over an article.
Calls to action help us make a choice: click/read/sign up or click away.
A few great CTAs to expand your reach and engage can include “Sign up here”, “Want to know more?”, “Click the link to register”, “Schedule a tour”, and many more.
#4 Think about character count
We live in the day and age of quick response, quick TV shows, and quick everything else.
So it’s really no wonder that we want quick text messages. Nobody wants to read an entire novel in the form of a text (come on, that’s what email is for), so why should your SMS marketing be any different?
A standard text message within the US is considered 160 characters.
For iPhone users, this will show up as a full block of content.
For Android users, if the count is over 160 characters, it’ll show up as separate messages. Don’t send your audience multiple messages. Most everyone hates having their phone blown up.
Also, make sure you send the SMS individually, use a SMS third-party software service, so that if a customer replies to your message, they don’t accidentally “reply all” and alert your entire list.
As a general rule of thumb, keeping your messages under 160 characters is best as to not overwhelm the reader and also gets the sender right to the point.
Engaging content will be key in these messages!
#5 Frequency of texts
This final step is a little harder to pin down.
There is no set in stone figure of how often to text your customers.
For some businesses, 1-2 times a week is more than enough. For others, 1-2 monthly is perfect.
To find out your sweet spot, see what frequently asked questions you’re receiving from clients and determine if you clients need to know more about a specific product or service.
Once you determine your frequency, a spreadsheet is a great way to stay organized with your message sending.
After you begin your SMS Marketing, don’t be afraid to ask clients their thoughts on frequency.
Summary
If you’re still a little fuzzy on all the details of real estate text message marketing, that’s okay!
This list, which is by no means exhaustive, jumpstarts options and ideas for you to work through. I would love to chat with you if you’re needing a little extra guidance.
If you need to keep up with your customers
using a method with a 98% open rate, let’s chat.
Book a call with me here to discuss the different ways SMS marketing can help you stay top-of-mind and close more deals.
Want blog articles like these for your business? Check out my post: “Realtors: 5 Reasons Your Blog Posts Aren’t Working (and how to fix them)“.