In this webinar, Lori Ballen discusses the top strategies for lead capture that have been proven to work time and time again in the real estate industry.
Lori runs a real estate business, as well as an online marketing company. She is constantly studying the latest changes in online marketing strategies and implements them in her own business so that she can bring the successful methods to you.
Skip the trial and error process and reap the benefits of these top lead capture strategies that really work.
Time Tested Lead Capture Methods
To me, lead capture is easy. I don’t find that challenging at all. If we give people value, and we provide what they want, they’ll register to get the information. So, I don’t find that challenging. Where it gets a little sticky is in how you get the registration, where it’s offered, when it’s offered, what the form looks like, and what fields are on the form. Those are where things start getting very interesting.
I own three businesses. I have the real estate business. I own a website development company for real estate agents that’s called Ballen Brands, and I own a weight loss coaching company. I shed 50 pounds this year myself, and then got certified as a Ketogenic Lifestyle Coach. The reason I tell you this is because all three of those require massive lead generation and constant attention on generating leads. I spend all day, whenever I’m working on these businesses, lead generating. I focus on lead capture. What I find is there are very common strategies across all niches, it doesn’t matter where we are. These lead capture strategies, work across channels, across industries, across verticals.
Who Are Your Clients?
However, I am going to show you a specific real estate website because most of you are real estate agents. For my Las Vegas real estate business, I have a BREW (Ballen Real Estate Website). This is a WordPress website that is built by my company at Ballen Brands. It’s SEO structured. I built this website to rank on the search engines because that’s my specialty. We also have customized the BREW for pay per click marketing, which would include Facebook marketing, Google marketing, or any of your social channels. These are the things we do every day.
What I want to show you are a couple of things. What I want you to understand first is the strategy, and then I’m going to show you the actual lead capture that I’ve chosen for a couple of things. If I were to ask most real estate agents, “Who is your client?” They will say, buyers or sellers, because they really don’t have any understanding of what age group they are targeting? Are they young families? First Time home buyers? Investors?Move up or move down? Are they out of town relocators? They don’t really have a good understanding of what their client base is unless they’re working a really strong sphere of influence. Those people usually know.
This isn’t across the board for all real estate agent, but it does ring true for most real estate agents. I know because this is what I do and real estate agents are my clients. So, we talk a lot. If you have a great sphere of influence, you usually know who your client base is, but a lot of people don’t. It’s really important. Ask yourself, “Who are my clients?” Then ask yourself, “Are they clients I actually want? Is this the ideal client I want? If not, who is?”
Finding Your Niche
I built a website very specifically for this exact reason. I was talking to one agent on my team, David, who’s really absolutely fantastic, a real go-getter, loves to be in the field, loves that I lead generate for him, and all he has to do is work with clients. He’s very social and wants to be out there working with clients, and I want to be here by myself lead generating. So, it works really well. I was talking to him about where he wants to go, and he mentioned luxury. He got his luxury certification, and we’ve talked about a lot of that. When we looked at a luxury market in Las Vegas, we were eyeballing what fits into luxury and high rises kept coming up.
I did some pay per click marketing and some Google organic marketing, and we got some high rise buyers. David closed and it turns out they were three times our average price range. I went, “Huh, well there’s something to this.” I said, “I think one of our ideal niches is the high rise buyer.” I contacted my team over at Ballen Brands and said, “Build me a high rise website.” By the way, when I say build me, I’ve designed all of the functionality of the website, of what I wanted it to do, and they put it all together, which is fantastic. I’m not sitting here messing with the nuts and bolts of the back end of WordPress all day long. My team does all of that.
What Does Your Client Look Like?
Once you’ve figured out who your clients are, then you start doing all your lead generation for that person. Once you’ve figured that out and said, “Okay, my ideal client is the high rise buyer.” Now, you’ve got to create an Avatar of what that buyer looks like. All of my sellers come from the web or from real estate agent referrals through Facebook, real estate agent referrals, Google, organic paid, that type of thing. So, you say, “What does that client look like?” We looked at the high rise buyer and saw that we have a lot of out of town people buying high rises. That’s really popular for Vegas.
Suggested: How to Find Real Estate Leads in Listings to Leads
In general, people come from out of town. We have a lot of investors, a lot of these people own multiple properties in multiple places, and they have some very common needs, problems, and questions. When I’m looking at what kind of value am I going to provide for somebody who is looking at high rises, we’re going to cover a lot of the financials. A lot of the investments or a lot of the financials around renting that property back out, how that works, which condos allow for that, which ones, high rise units, don’t. We can do that by offering a free report or a free market report around a specific high rise unit or around that zip code or around that area.
Let’s Talk About Home Sellers
Let’s take a look at how we capture leads for real estate. That personally for my business, generate a large amount of our business. One of these, for sellers, raise your hand if you’re interested in sellers. So, let’s talk sellers, right? Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll show you the inside secret here. I really don’t have any secrets. I give everything away, right? Anybody who knows me knows I tell everything. What I do is write a blog that is catered to the client I’m trying to reach. In my case, when I think sellers, general sellers, I’m thinking, “What do sellers want to know?”
Well, I didn’t have to guess, and I’m not going to show you how I did all this today cause that’s another Webinar. I didn’t have to guess. I actually went in all my SEO software, and I pulled up all the seller keywords that exist that are ranked by Google in any capacity or the other search engines. I found everything that people Google. I do that through my SEO software. You can also do that by searching Quora for questions. There’s another site called answerthepublic.com. That’s really cool where you can see a bunch of people’s questions. My SEO software is a little more advanced and gives me cost per click, and how many people are searching it, and the competition level. So. the one thing that kept coming up over and over was closing costs.
Content Should Answer Questions
“How much is it going to cost me to sell my home.” See, everybody thinks, “Oh, I just need a market for the keyword home value estimator or home value estimate or instant home value or what’s my home worth? That’s really not the case. What you do is rank, run ads, or run social ads around how much somebody is actually going to get when they sell their house. Their question is, “How much does the real estate agent cost me?” “What can be negotiated?” “Does the seller pay concessions?” If they’ve never sold a house before, they’re really Googling all this stuff. I sat down, and I wrote a blog — Closing Costs When Selling.
If we do a Google search for closing costs in Las Vegas, we’ll see some paid ads at the top. Then, there’s me organically, typically ranking number one, at least in my area, even in an incognito window or a computer I’ve never used. Generally in the top few for most areas that would be searching to sell a house here. Sometimes, just in general, I am ranking high for other states. I get home value requests from all over the nation. What I do is sit down and write a blog post that caters to that person.
Create a Call to Action
I’m asking myself what kind of value can I provide to this person that they would register for? Because what we want to do, and people hate the word capture, but that’s what it is. It’s lead capture, you’re not capturing the person, you’re capturing information. What can I offer them that they’re going to be willing to register for? I make my blogs very value focused. I’ve got a video for them. I’ve got everything put together in content that is easy to read, mobile responsive, clean, easy on the eyes, and has lots of spacing. I’m really creating a great piece that they’re going to read. You’ll notice right up top I have a call to action. What’s important is that our call to action is being offered to the right audience, the right offer, the right call to action, to the right audience.
All of those things are key. Before you figure out what form to use, what will be on the form, and what color it will be, you must know the niche. That is one of my specialties, figuring out who’s the niche, who’s the audience, what is that niche the audience wants, and what kind of value can I give to them that they’re going to register? Obviously, we’ve got a killer system at my company that we built through Infusionsoft where we use text and auto dialers. All of these messages are prebuilt and have been tested and measured. They are sent to that buyer or seller to get them to respond to us. We call that Autopilot ISA. So, that’s a conversion piece that comes in after the fact. So, let’s take a look.
Listings to Leads
Don’t everybody click on this and fill this out, please. I’m going to show you how to get a sample of how this works. If I Click on this, what’s your house worth? Get an instant home value based on your property address. This page is actually formulated, it’s on our BREW from Ballen Brands, but this here is an embedded landing page provided through something we pay for called Listings to Leads. I’m going to give you the link to this right now so that you can go on, set up your free trial, and try out how this works. What you do is, you go to ListingstoLeads.com/ballen, that is my link. I do receive a benefit for you signing up. I always like to disclose that.
You receive an extended free trial when you sign up for this. They gave us a farther trial. Everybody go to sign up for this. If you don’t have it, do the trial so that you can see all these landing pages work. There’s more than just this home page. If I get a listing online, it’s coming through here. I’m telling you, it’s incredible, but it has to be done in… you know, everything I do supports everything else that I do. There’s not one thing that’s a magic answer. There’s not one thing that I would say, this is the reason everything works. It’s not just because I rank high on the search engine, it’s not just because I’m running a paper click ad or just because I nailed a Facebook ad or just because of a landing page. It all works together, right? All of you guys that are my clients know that we provide all the resources to teach you how to do this because it really is important that you kind of get this whole marketing, all the marketing funnels working together so that they’re super, super powerful.
Lead Pages
The question somebody just asked me is, “Do I like this more than Lead Pages?” I do use this more than lead pages for real estate. Yes. I liked the way it integrates. I liked the way the landing pages are already done. I was finding lead pages was slowing down my website. It didn’t embed the way Listings to Leads does. You use a plugin and then it would give you a special url so it would be part of your domain, but every time they would hit it, it would slow it down. I don’t know if things have changed. My marketing director, Sabrina, for all three of my companies, she loves lead pages and she uses it for certain things and I use it. Here’s an example of Lead Pages for those that are going, what is Lead Pages? I’m just going to have to give you a non-real estate example because that’s what I have in front of me. This is a lead page that I built on Sunday.
It’s for my coaching program, but it’s beautiful. It’s clean. Why did I choose lead pages for this one? Because I wanted a certain kind of template and so I went for this where our Listings to Leads is all real estate related, 100 percent specifically real estate related, and it integrates with the BREW. So I think there’s a time that you might use Lead Pages and there’s a time that you might use that you would use Listings to Leads, but let me tell you, this Listings to Leads, they have open house flyers and Facebook ad landing pages, and your listings funnel in here automatically, and you can blog using their platforms. It’s incredible, ivr and texts and all kinds of cool things. So, definitely check that out. It’s different.
Clicky Analytics
The other question is, “Could you cover Clicky?” I’m not able to cover that today, but you can send a message to my team — team@ballenbrands.com and they can shoot you back a Clicky video that I’m sure we’ve done to help you figure out what it is you can’t get. Get work in there. If you’re a client of mine and you have a BREW, definitely reach out to my team if you’re looking for how to use Clicky. Because we’ve only got a limited amount of time today, but I appreciate that.
They fill out my home value estimator, and they get an instant home evaluation. Yes. It’s powered by Zillow. Boo. Oh, well, I got over that a long time ago. It’s free. I mean, I’m not paying Zillow anything. It’s all done through Listings to Leads, but what I do have is an immediate email that goes out to them and telling them why this home value estimator is not as good as having a real estate agent talk to them. I also have a text that goes to them immediately through my Autopilot ISA campaign that says, “Are you interested in selling?” And then it follows up with text after that, and this is how we get our listings. I think we had four that just closed. Maybe it’s three that closed, and one is still in escrow. All that came from this exact thing. They Googled, “How much is going to cost to sell my home.”
Suggested: How to Add a Landing Page for Listings to Leads
Or they Googled, “What are closing costs?” Or they Googled, “What’s the real estate agent’s commission?” They found my blog. They filled out the instant home valuation request and yes, my systems track every piece of this. I can see what page they came in on. I can see what pages they visited after that. I can see where they registered, I can see where they exited, so we have all of our data and check, which gives us the ability to scale, gives us the ability to teach better because we know what works. We can see what works.
Required Form Fields
Someone asked, “Are all the fields required?” Exactly why you’re here. Good question. Yes. I made them required, and you do have the option to choose that. Here’s what you have to know. If you only ask for an address and an email, you’re gonna get way more registrations.
Your registrations will go through the roof. I can’t remember what it was. I got like 2000 home valuation ads off of a very small ad budget spend when I was first starting with Listings to Leads because I didn’t require all the fields. I only ask for their address and an email, but those are so much harder to… You have to spin them through and try to dig up the phone numbers and all that. Most of our listings that actually come from this are responding to our text, not our emails. So, there really is a reason to have that phone number with texts being such a big part of conversion today. If you’re not using text yet, really start thinking about it because for me it’s, it’s absolutely a game changer.
A Focus on Internet Searchers
I’m asked, “What is your experience with markets $500,000 to over $2 million?” No, completely different strategies that I will be really honest in saying that most of our listings that come in off the Internet are more of the bread and butter range, which is my favorite personally. I live in the bread and butter range, which bread and butter range just means whatever the average price ranges at the time. In Vegas, our average pricing right now is like three something and that’s going to be our average listings that comes in off the internet. I have not spent a lot of time marketing specifically for luxury buyers and sellers ourselves. And in my experience, the higher end they are, the more they’re going to a person rather than the Internet to find an agent. For me, this is pretty much your bread and butter kind of marketing right here.
Simple Lead Capture Pages
We’re going to do get your average price ranges. So yes, I require an address, name, email, and phone number everywhere that it’s allowed to be required. Now, here’s the caveat, and I can’t tell you 100 percent today for sure without looking. We also allow for Facebook and Google logins. Okay, so it looks something like this. Let me show you this on the IDX Side. I wanted to show you this anyway. We’re on my website. This is the strongest lead capture for buyers, is either to give a free list or free report, something like that with a simple lead capture page. It generates a bunch of people downloading your free stuff. That’s a great thing. Home buyer’s kit, first time home buyer’s kit, 10 ways to raise your credit. I mean I got a ton of them. Those are all still very popular, and they do really well on social media, by the way, more than they would on pay per click Google, but those are great for social media clickbait as somebody called it.
Property Registrations
My favorite one though is when they register for properties, because I know I’ve got a potential buyer. They still may be way early in the game. They could still be two years out. They still may be Lookie Lous but I know they’re looking at properties, and I’ve got great campaigns for those, so here’s what I do. They come in, and they look at a property, they click on the house. Now, I’ve tested this, guys — upward, backward, forward, upside down, inside out. My team and I, Jeff and I especially, have gone through here and tested what people will register for and what they won’t register for. Principal Flyers, like a joke that doesn’t even need to be on there anymore. Things have changed so much, haven’t they? They will bounce off, well they are going to bounce off anyway.
You’re only going to get probably up to about a 10 percent capture rate, but your averages are probably going to be more like three to seven depending on where you’re getting your registration and what IDX you’re using, and that type of thing. So, you’re still going to have a 90 percent bounce rate regardless for those of you that are more technical and understand that, understand that terminology.
Forced Registration with Purpose
You want to make sure you’re getting the highest capture rate you possibly can. I tested if they would register for the search results, I tested, if they would register for the maps, guess what they registered for? It’s photos. So, today in 2018, what everybody thinks is valuable is photos of the property. And believe me, have I tested that? So what I do is when they click on view photo gallery, they’re looking at the first one, I’m letting them look at it for free. Right now I’m kind of playing with where to force. It’s still first property, a second property, and a third property. We’ve got a lot of tests happening right now. I’m testing something right now where I say I’m okay with a little bit fewer leads if they’re higher quality leads or we’re letting them look a little bit farther than we were. I think it’s forced onto properties. Right now, I’m letting them look at one property and then they have to register.
Registering with Facebook & Google
You see this Facebook and Google, this is where it gets very interesting. This is growing. We’re going to see this more and more and more that people are signing in through their other channels because they don’t want to have to fill out forms and this makes it quick and easy. They can click a button. We’re getting a lot of these, and we’re getting these leads that are coming in with still a phone number. If I were to click here and Facebook has changed, you know there’s a lot of things that are changing.
If I were to click right here, select an account, please select a provider, and I’m going to say I’ll go ahead and register with Facebook. I’ve already registered. So it’s logging me in automatically. Then it’ll ask them for information. You can still, wherever you can require a phone number, require a phone number, but if they are logging in through a certain social channel that doesn’t have that ability to require a phone number, you’ll get some that just have the emails and whatnot, but you can choose like I use IDX Broker.
IDX Broker Benefits
IDX Broker is my favorite IDX provider for a million reasons. The main one originally was because it gives me the IP address, and I’m able to track where that lead came from. To me, that’s the most important thing I could possibly know. Meaning, did they come from Google organic? Did they come from a pay per click ad? Did they come from Facebook? Did they come from a Facebook ad? Did they come from my Facebook business page or my personal page? I need to know all that information so that I can scale and track and you know.
For me, that’s a deal breaker. If the IDX does not provide an IP address, I’m not using it. I need to have it, and Listings to Leads does as well, by the way. So then my systems or my people can look up where that lead came from, we track it, we store it, and now when that turns into a sale, we can assign a certain ROI dollar to our activities and it’s really important. Also, I chose IDX Broker because of the customization abilities and the way I can change all the templates and the colors and the lead generation options.
I could change this registration’s setting to say register at first land, register the photo gallery, register at an advanced search, register at a map search, register after… I mean there are so many options, but I’ve tested it. And this is the one. This is the one for me. So can you believe we’re out of time? It is 11:30. I am one of those people that believe in the value of your time. I started on time, and I end on time. So, I look forward to getting to know more of you in the future.
Need a Real Estate Website? Got Questions?
If you’re looking for a real estate website, reach out to us at ballenbrands.com, send us an email at team@ballenbrands.com, or give us a call at 702-917-0755. Looking for the tools mentioned in the webinar? Visit loristools.com for a complete list of Lori’s recommended tools for lead generating.
Recent Posts
17 Essential Questions About BREW
Dive into these key insights to discover how a BREW can transform your website into a powerful marketing asset, driving sustained growth and success in the competitive real estate market.
Top 9 Revolutionary Features of Listings to Leads: Transforming Real Estate Marketing for the Digital Age
Give yourself the upper hand by learning to navigate the landscape of digital marketing tools and strategies that can amplify your reach, engage your audience more effectively, and set you apart in the bustling real estate market.
101 Real Estate Blog Ideas: Unique Ideas to Stand Out
Unleash your creativity with our 101 real estate blog ideas. Engage your readers with unique insights on local markets, property showcases, client stories, and more. Dive into the world of real estate blogging and set your professional potential soaring
17 Essential Questions About BREW
Dive into these key insights to discover how a BREW can transform your website into a powerful marketing asset, driving sustained growth and success in the competitive real estate market.
Top 9 Revolutionary Features of Listings to Leads: Transforming Real Estate Marketing for the Digital Age
Give yourself the upper hand by learning to navigate the landscape of digital marketing tools and strategies that can amplify your reach, engage your audience more effectively, and set you apart in the bustling real estate market.
101 Real Estate Blog Ideas: Unique Ideas to Stand Out
Unleash your creativity with our 101 real estate blog ideas. Engage your readers with unique insights on local markets, property showcases, client stories, and more. Dive into the world of real estate blogging and set your professional potential soaring
