THE DIGITAL MARKETING STRATEGY THAT TURNED MY PROPERTY MANAGEMENT BUSINESS AROUND

Marketing, prospecting, social media, and now digital marketing so many buzzwords, so much to do. It’s very easy to get overwhelmed, confused and you’re not alone if you are feeling fearful about where to go and what to do next. Digital marketing turned my business around at a time when my rent roll growth was stagnant, my finances were under unbelievable duress and I was seriously contemplating giving it all up and going back to work for someone else. Now I’m going to hit you right between the eyes in this blog … and share with you the steps I took to turn my business around and start a new business using a digital marketing strategy. And it’s not my own strategy … I’m not that smart … but I took the strategies of all the most successful online marketers and entrepreneurs and used the bits relevant to real estate and property management … and to my surprise it actually worked … So are you ready to learn the exact strategy I used to turn my business around?

First, let me tell you where I was at before I implemented this digital marketing strategy. I hit a point where literally there was no managements coming in this was in end of 2018/2019, but I was losing managements. The sales market had slowed right down as well, but guess what kept increasing, you guessed it the bills and expenses. I was really struggling financially and need to boost my cash flow… big time. So I looked at my marketing, because honestly marketing is really the key to growing any business, not just a property management businesses. My traditional marketing was going ok, although it probably wasn’t as consistent as it need to be. I had letters going out, I was asking existing landlords for referrals and I was working with the sales team for referrals as well. But I asked myself ‘what more can I be doing? What is new? What is different now to a few years ago? And I soon realised after doing A LOT of research there was a whole new world of marketing I knew very little about ,but I knew I had to learn more about it and that was digital marketing.

I love marketing! Part of my early career was as an international marketing manager for a large accounting firm in Hong Kong. I moved there when I was 21 for an adventure and ended up staying for 4 years and I had some pretty cool jobs, but I’ll save that for another blog. How I got that job so young is beyond me, but I loved it and I was very good at it. Remember this was marketing before the internet … jaw drop moment I know …can you believe that … yep I’m really that old. I was working in corporate before there was internet, I actually had to convince my boss at the time back in 1995 why our business needed the world wide web as it was originally called. Anyway, my point here is I’m a marketer, but I hadn’t kept up with the times and my business was suffering because of it.

I took a deep dive into online marketing, started to educate myself, followed as many experts as I could, Amy porterfield, Russell Brunson, Brendon Burchard to name a few. I listened, studied and learnt what they were doing, and even though they aren’t in real estate or the property management space, the principles of digital marketing are universal and they apply across most service or product based businesses globally.

Digital marketing or online marketing  basically refers to advertising and marketing  delivered through digital channels to promote brands and connect potential customers using the internet and other forms of digital communication such as: Search engines or Websites.

So let me break down my digital marketing formula for you.

1. SEO

All digital marketing starts with SEO or search engine optimisation, and if you’d like a deep dive into this then check out my blog on How to use SEO, Google Reviews and your Website to grow your Business Organically. If you can’t be found online how can anyone do business with you. More and more of our potential clients are searching for a new property manager online and if you aren’t showing up on page one of a google search, but your competitors are, then chances are you’ll be missing out on a lot of leads and new business.  Your website developer will be able to set up your website for SEO optimisation, but writing and posting regular blogs are also a great way to boost your SEO without the huge expense.

 

2. Website

Once a potential lead or client has found you online the next thing they are going to do is check out your website, which these days is essentially your online business card. But a website shouldn’t be a set and forget. Look for ways to encourage visitors to your website to interact or connect with you further. What we really want is for visitors to leave their contact details, so we can build our email list or database. Traditionally we asked visitors to subscribe to a newsletter, but that’s not the only way to get their details, you can get way more creative than that with a pop up offering a free property report or appraisal, or a lead magnet, like an investor report, in exchange for their details. I’ll dive into lead magnets a little later so stay with me here. Your website needs to be set up with a few key elements as well including, a call to action on the first page, like a phone number or email link, what services you provide, your location, an opt in offer, like an appraisal request and social proof. It should also be super easy to navigate, and it needs to demonstrate trust and expertise from the get go, forget the fluff. Super important, it also needs to be optimised for mobile since 90% of people access the internet on their mobile phones. Websites are also important because you own it. Meta owns your social media platforms and they could be gone tomorrow along with all your followers and content.

 

3. Google Reviews

Following a stalk of your website, a potential new client is going to want social proof. Just like when you want to try a new restaurant or Airbnb, your lead will do the same. A lot of websites now have their google reviews feed directly into their website, which is great, because the lead doesn’t have to leave your website, but some people don’t trust that and will want external or third party validation. These leads will head on over to your Google reviews, the more you have the better, make sure you have a selection of tenant, landlord and sales ones if you are a sales agency. Don’t worry about the occasional bad review, it makes you look more authentic. No one is perfect 100% of the time. Start worrying if you are getting bad ones consistently though because your star rating will go down and you really don’t want that. Let me tell you I went hard out accumulating Google reviews before a lot of others cottoned on to their importance. At one stage my real estate business was the most reviewed in both office locations and it exploded my lead generation  and rent roll growth. Even now a lot of leads follow the journey I’ve just outlined – they Google for a new property manager, they check out the website and then the Google reviews. Start asking your new leads how they found you. If you’re not doing this strategy I can guarantee you’ll be missing out on leads.

 

4. Social Media

You absolutely must be set up on the social media platforms relevant to your ideal clients. Social media is not all about how many followers or likes you have, but again it is about providing social proof and building on that know, like, and trust factor. I’ve already done a couple of blogs on social media so go back and take a read of those if you want a deep dive on the ins and outs. The content you are posting is critical. You need to have a delicate balance. I call it the 3 P’s of posting – People, Property and Personality. You want to show your people or your client testimonials, you want to showcase your properties, and you want your personality to shine, you need to be authentic and relatable and share your beliefs and values as that ultimately is why people will want to do business  with you. The big thing with social media is it is free for anyone to set up.

 

5. Facebook / Google Ads

Whereas Facebook and Google Ads you have to pay for, but they are still inexpensive when you compare it to what we were spending on newspaper advertising for years. I absolutely despised Facebook and Google ads for the longest time, but I’ve really come to appreciate the power of them since spending  time and energy understanding how they work. Google ads are a form of search engine advertising  and they  appear with people search for services like property manager in your location, at the top of the search results, before any of the SEO optimised content or websites. So, you essentially pay for results when people click your ad, call your business, or visit your website. Facebook ads will appear in your social media feeds as sponsored content. The beauty of Facebook ads is that you can expose your brand to audiences you never previously would have been able to get in front of. Last week’s blog topic was on Facebook Ads for Beginners.

 

6. Content Marketing, Lead Magnets and Nurture Emails

One final element of the digital strategy is content marketing, lead magnets and nurture emails or SMS. If you are zoning out right now, come back to me. I get it. There’s a lot more to this digital caper than a flashy website right.

 

Content Marketing – is basically sharing information online that your ideal leads or clients are interested in. This might be educational, inspirational, motivational  or just plain honest and authentic content about everyday life, or maybe a combination of all of the above. Many successful online marketers have been using it as part of their digital marketing strategy for years, guess what we can too. Start with a monthly or weekly blog or video and go from there. The key to content marketing though is consistency and relevancy, you need to build it into your marketing strategy and it’s not a short term strategy. It gains momentum and a life of its own the longer you are doing it. It also needs to be valuable to your ideal clients. It is a great way to build that trust and expertise I’ve been harping on about.

Lead magnets – are basically pieces of content you can share with your audience in exchange for their contact information. Like an investor report, a guide to maximising the rental income on your investment, a understand your legislation guide. There are so many options, you can also use these as part of your Facebook ad campaigns as well.

Nurture Emails  – the important clincher if you like to the lead magnet is to then continue to nurture the lead with the goal of turning them into a paying client. Have you ever gone to buy something online and then got to the checkout and changed your mind? Then a string of emails show up in your inbox selling the benefits of the product or service you almost purchased? You start feeling like it is a sign from the universe, and eventually purchase the damn thing. That is the power of a nurture email, even though a lot of people think emails are just spam or dead, let me tell you they are not. If you deliver relevant content that will actually help your potential lead, you are sharing with them something they need to know, learn or experience? Nurture emails are utilised by every successful online marketer on the planet, and they are successful in turning leads into paying clients because they do them right, not just spam them.

So there you have it, a digital marketing strategy all laid out for you. Now if that all seems a little overwhelming and confusing then I invite you to join my upcoming  online free workshop where I’ll break down digital marketing for you, so that you’ll be able to grow your personal brand, boost your business profile and grow your property management business and rent roll. JOIN THE SOCIAL MEDIA WORKSHOP HERE

 

Can I ask you a quick favour before we dive into today’s epic episode, we all know how important reviews are for business these days and mine is no different … if you could spare just a minute to follow, rate and review this podcast it would mean a lot to me .. in fact what would get me super excited is if you take a screenshot and, share it to your social stories and tag me in it!!! This year has all been about building new connections and I’d love you to be part of mine …

 

QUESTIONS:

 

1. Thank you for joining me on the Property Management Podcast. Now before we dive in can you please tell our audience a little bit about yourself and how you got started doing what you do now.

 

2. Now I love personal development. Can you share a tool, resource, book or podcast that you think will help our listeners.

 

3. How can our audience connect further with you?

 

Thank you so much for joining me on this episode I am very grateful for our conversation.