For real estate agents, an FSBO seller can either be an opportunity in disguise or a thorn in your side. As the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) trend becomes a part of American culture, uninformed FSBO sellers multiply but have the incorrect perception about the home selling process - which is why they need you! Now is a great opportunity to learn how to take advantage of the FSBO sellers' market.  Who knows, they could be your next niche market!

In this article, we will identity 4 FSBO seller heart aches: Negotiating the right price; comprehending completing and submitting paperwork to the correct entities; getting off the marketing at a reasonable length of time; having enough time to devote to all aspects of the sale - and offer tips to overcome them. 

Ask any successful real estate agent, they'll tell you that one of their biggest secrets to running their business is effective budgeting. Through proper management of their finances, agents like yourself are able to control their money, instead of wondering how they spent it all. Your money is the most important aspect of your real estate business, so it is important for you to plan, track, and optimize your budget throughout the fiscal year in order to be financially successful month over month and year over year.

In this post, we will discuss real estate budgeting benefits, planning, tracking and tips to optimize every penny in a real estate business. Now is the best time for you to start planning for 2019, so you can hit the ground running when the ball drops and champagne pops on New Year's Eve.

When it comes to Google, every real estate agent wants to be on the front page of the search engine results list (SERL). They try to make their way there by implementing search engine optimization (SEO) strategies, spending countless hours adding keywords, captions, meta tags and descriptions to their website pages as well as other tactics, but yield zero results! 

With so many real estate agents competing for the front page of Google within each market, it can be time consuming for you to out rank the competition. So here's an easy real estate hack that will boost your visibility to the front page of Google’s SERL.

Ho-Ho-House hunting and merry escrow! It's the holiday season, which means it's time to figure out your client appreciation event! Why? Your network is full of low hanging real estate leads, which is the best way to generate referral leads. Plus, the contacts that you gather will help you gain momentum into 2019, so you can get a head start on the new year. Whether you are a rookie or veteran agent, hosting a client appreciation event will increase your brand awareness, reputation, and trust with members in your local market. 

There are hundreds of good ideas to generate referral leads during the holiday season such as holiday caroling, hosting a cookie swap, or hosting a canned food drive but hosting a reverse pop-by for your clients will give you the opportunity to talk to all of you clients and they have the chance to mingle with each other.

Picture this – It’s December 2018 and Linda has a tight budget because she spent a little too much money during the summer when the real estate market was good. It’s the slow season in her market now and not a lot of people are looking to buy or sell. On the plus side, she has a couple of leads, but they might not purchase until January. To her surprise, Linda might not be able to afford presents during the holidays or pay her mortgage. Linda starts to feel uneasy and stressed out about the pickle she’s gotten herself in.

Most real estate agents have a story like Linda's, and like most agents, if she had planned for the slow season, she could afford presents and pay her mortgage. Benjamin Franklin, the Father of Time Management, used to say, “Failing to plan is planning to fail” and it’s true! If Linda planned properly, she would have prioritized her tasks, allocated her budget efficiently, and she wouldn't be in a pickle.

In the past year, Z57 Inc, has made several internal improvements to provide real estate agents with the best tools and knowledge to help them be successful in their business. Focusing on our client's success, we've increased customer satisfaction by making changes suggested from our clients, enhanced product utilization with the Z57 Help Center, and invested in our client's success by launching the Z Academy.  

If you’re a new agent or if you're just having lead generation problems, you’ll find success by focusing on one target market, one persona, or one niche because that will be your PERFECT client! Personas are all about marketing to the right type of lead, rather than wasting resources on consumers who aren't a good match. For example, marketing to someone that has shown interest in purchasing a home, as opposed to someone who isn’t.

According to HubSpot, a persona is, “A semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers.” Creating a persona will help you determine how to position your real estate brand, the tone of your messages, the appearance of your website, types of content, and lead generation strategies that they will prefer, understand and consume.

Thanksgiving is the time of the year to show your appreciation for family, friends and your community. As a real estate agent, that includes your leads, current clients and past clients.  Your past clients have the most potential to produce referrals for you, so we are going to examine a few ideas to help you generate referral leads during the Thanksgiving holiday.

After reading this article, you will know referral generating strategies that have been proven to produce results. By applying these strategies, you will create opportunities to generate referral leads, collect testimonials and nurture your network.

Do your posts align with your branding? Is the tone in each message consistent? How does your audience respond to your content? Performing a social media audit on your marketing portfolio will help you examine all your social media platforms, their progress and how they contribute to your branding. Doing so will allow you to identify gaps and opportunities for growth in order to optimize your marketing portfolio to increase followers, engagement, and lead conversions on social media.

After reading this article, you will know the opportunities available on social media to improve your business, know your most successful content, the best times to post and the channels have the most opportunity for lead generation, which will help you increase engagement and convert more leads!