We’ve found three tools that make it easier to manage your social media platforms.
A strong social media presence is one way to increase the visibility of your business, expand your reach and generate new leads:
Buffer: Buffer is a relatively simple web application that allows users
to schedule social media posts across a variety of social network platforms.
Dually mobile and desktop friendly, the app optimizes posts for peak engagement
times (it also allows for customization) and best of all, its users receive salient
feedback, via analytics, to view social media post performance, improve results
and create data-driven reports for clients and managers.
Canva: That old cliché that a picture is
worth a thousand words rings true with Canva, an intuitive, easy-to-master
graphic-design creator that businesses can use to increase website traffic and
social media engagement. It uses a drag-and-drop format and provides
access to over a million photographs, graphics and fonts. You don’t need a
background in design to use the tool, and with more than 50,000 templates to
choose from, it’s easy to design just about anything,including those all-important info graphics.
Woobox: Engagement
and buzz are key when it comes to social media, and with Woobox, an
increasingly popular marketing platform, businesses can create contests,
giveaways, polls, quizzes, brackets, photo contests and more, all of which
encourage your audience to engage. Bonus: It allows businesses to seamlessly
integrate several social media platforms while running campaigns, plus it collects
and exports useful data that stems from those campaigns, an advantageous perk
that all but guarantees robust leads.
According to a recent study published by the National Association of Realtors (NAR), expensive home prices, coupled with high demand, are driving today’s youngest homebuyers to smaller cities.
“As
long as supply keeps up to meet demand, and prevents costs from rising too high
and too rapidly, these identified metro areas are likely to see an uptick in
purchases from millennial homebuyers,” says Lawrence Yun, chief economist
of the NAR. A robust job market and affordability are
two of the main factors that impact home-buying decisions by millennials, notes
the report.
Federal and state regulations don’t make it easy for title insurance companies to market and grow their business, but there are strategies to maximize their marketing efforts.
Federal and state regulations don’t make it particularly
easy for title insurance companies to market and grow their business, but
despite the regulatory RESPA obstacles, there are strategies that title
insurance companies can implement to maximize their marketing efforts.
Leverage Your Online Presence
Leveraging your online presence is paramount. By using the
right technology and social media platforms to create insightful, compelling
and informative content, you can generate – and keep – a captive audience.
The keytakeaway is to provide value to your readership, which in turn establishes trust. And trust is key to growing your business.
Additionally, regularly updating your website with a clear
mission, current marketplace trends, blog posts, analysis and data backed by
research shows that you’re an expert in your field.
Authoritative blog posts and engaging social media posts generate
the strongest leads, so it’s crucial to maintain a regimented and consistent
posting schedule.
If you slack, you risk losing the audience – and potential
clients – that you’ve worked so hard to connect with and cultivate.
Remember that homebuyers and sellers are a core element of
your target customers, and they’re more educated than ever before about title
insurance.
Savvy consumers compare title insurance companies, and if
you don’t have a go-to resource stocked with information, services and
products, you’ll miss your opportunity to connect with these people.
Good, Ol’ Fashioned Networking
As well, network at every opportunity, and taut your
services with lenders, real estate professionals and others in your field.
While social media and an informative website are critical,
word-of-mouth recommendations continue to generate leads.
Collecting e-mail addresses legally is also an effective way to market your services to the right demographics.
Deliver a Useful E-Newsletter
An educational enewsletter providing insight about relevant
topics – including escrow, property searches and title insurance protection – is
another proven way to reach your target audience and build a solid customer
base.
Use graphics and photos to illustrate trends and salient
points, and present simplified information that home buyers can easily digest.
These
are just a few ways to effectively market your title insurance company. Amanda
Farrell, who writes for PropLogix, offers several more ideas to jumpstart
your marketing efforts.
It can be helpful to have a baseline understanding of what intellectual property is; and how it can benefit you and your agency.
Intellectual property comes in many forms. Your company logo
is intellectual property. So is the name of your agency, any tag lines you’ve
developed and consistently use to identify your company, your color schemes, if
you have any – and content you’ve originated, like your website’s copy.
The good news about intellectual property is that it clearly
identifies and separates you from your competitors. What can be a challenge,
however, is challenges to your right to use your agency’s name or logo – if
another entity takes issue with the use and raises the question of your right
to its use.
IP lawyers know the ins-and-outs of intellectual property,
but it can be helpful to have a baseline understanding of (a) what intellectual
property is; and (b) how it can benefit you and your agency.
The World Intellectual Property Organization
(WIPO) is a helpful
website dedicated to intellectual property issues.
Who hasn’t stopped, looked up addresses (including one’s
own) – to determine what a property is worth, how it compares to similar
properties and whether or not professionals involved in appraisals really know
what they’re doing?
As Zillow and similar sights today embrace the added option of selling a
property and eliminating real estate brokers’ commissions, the conversation about accuracy is a fast and furious trending topic.
Don’t think you can download or even ask for someone else’s email address list unless you know for certain those recipients – each and every one of them – has opted into receive your content.
While some consider email “old-school” in the face
of loads of social media platforms and texting, beautifully built content
contained on your website, email still connects you to your audience in ways
social media platforms might not.
You need email addresses. You need new email addresses. You
need an email distribution list that is constantly growing and evolving.
Why?
Because engaging your clients and colleagues in a narrative
about your business, while also providing useful information, is powerful in
establishing you as an industry leader and establishing your brand.
But don’t think you can download or even ask for someone
else’s email address list unless you know for certain those recipients – each
and every one of them – has opted into receive your content.
To do otherwise, to poach or duplicate or take anyone else’s
email address list without first getting a recipient’s okay to receive – or
better, without getting the recipient’s email address directly from them – is
“spamming,”
and the implications are not pretty.
Spamming your audience could result
in getting permanently banned from your recipient’s inbox such as if she hits
the “do not contact” button or flags you as spam on her email client. Spamming
your audience can even result in getting yourself permanently banned from your
email management service.
When you think about it, sending
unsolicited emails is not even helpful toward getting your message to the
masses because these recipients have expressed zero interest in your offer –
they may not even know who you are.
You’re better off taking the slow and
steady approach to building your email database. Here are just a few ideas for building
your email database:
Create an
email subscription form for your blog
Promote
contests that require an email address for entry
Offer
downloads that are accessible only by volunteering an email address
Share a
subscribe link to your social media pages
Always tell your would-be subscribers
what they should expect. Do you email once per month or once a week? What type
of information is included in your distributions?
By building your email list the right
way, you’ll ensure you have quality contacts who are more likely to engage with
your message.
Successful public relations is all about relationships.
While securing a story in a prime publication is terrific, building solid relationships with the press is the golden ticket to getting that story published.
Think about it: Journalists receive dozens, if not hundreds,
of story pitches every day, most of them mass-produced pitches that end up in a
laptop’s trash bin, often unread.
To set yourself apart from every Mary, Marty and Michael
that pitches a story, you’ve got to earn and cultivate a trusting relationship
with the journalists that cover your beat and your business. To achieve that
goal, you’ve got to do your research and ensure that you aren’t making mistakes
along the way.
Suffice it to say that every detail matters. Here
are some ideas to consider as you aim to become a trusted member of the media
Major news outlets generally get three times the average amount of email in pitches alone. There is a lot of noise, and most of it is irrelevant to the topics that each journalist covers.
This blog contains general information only, not intended to be relied upon as, nor a substitute for, specific professional advice. We accept no responsibility for loss occasioned to any purpose acting on or refraining from action as a result of any material on this blog.
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