Real Estate Marketing in Singapore

Currently real estate is the most talked about subject in Singapore and probably the most challenging too, in terms of, sales and marketing for the real estate agents.

In a recent article by yahoo Singapore, the total number of registered real estate agents locally are 30,830. The article states, more agents are slowly leaving this industry; close to 4000 agents did not renew their registration this year as compared to approx 3300 last year.

The author attributed this fall to poor sentiment in the real estate market, which has contributed to lesser earnings.

While reading many such articles, I came across some real estate agents success stories too. One of them was the news of 26 year old property agent turned millionaire by selling just one property.  As a marketer I was curious to know how this 26 yr old and others like her earned big bucks despite the competitive market. So I dug deep to see how she marketed her way up.

• Her offline strategy was clear- to find a route to reach to the crème de la crème of the society as it meant higher sales and greater commissions.
• She also believed that high-net-worth clients, usually know what they want and they use her services to only execute their plans.

Although most of her clientèle was by word of mouth and references but her digital strategy was well planned too.

• Her website shirleysengproperty.com has a clean look. She also has a section on expatriate resources.
• The content in this section is well keyword targeted which helps in SEO of the site. What’s interesting is unlike other agents she has included an expat guide, which acts as a good resource for to pull these expats onto her site.

Another interesting strategy is used by real estate agent Jack.

• The look, feel and appeal of his website jacksheo.com  are completely in sync with the current design trends.
• In addition, Jack shares valuable blogs on his website which helps attract potential customers via content marketing and SEO. Due to high volume of content on Jack’s site he has better chances of reaching out to a larger audience.

Another smart strategy used by Jack is covering the entire home page with real customer testimonials. This works wonders to build a positive social proof.

Here is a quick summary of marketing strategies online and offline used by both Jack and Shirley:

1. Target high net-worth individuals as much as possible, though this is achievable only after you have successfully completed smaller transactions
2. Get your past customers to recommend you and increase chances of word of mouth publicity. It also adds to your credibility
3. Create a website using your own domain name
4. Showcase as many testimonials as you can on the home page of your site
5. Share valuable articles and tips on property in Singapore to portray your industry expertise
6. Share articles not related to property but on other popular topics which can be useful for your target customers.

In my opinion apart from the above strategies, in today’s competitive market, agents should look at adopting or including more digital marketing strategies as a part of their overall marketing and sales process. Here are a few more which can add value and boost marketing.

• Be Social: Join relevant conversations on line. If expats are your target audience hang out online where they hang out and share insightful information about your industry
• Youtube channel: Making a video cannot get any easier than what is already today. As an agent you can start your own youtube channel, where every week you share some interesting stories, tips for your potential customers. A 3 min video is more impactful than a 300 word article
• Mobile friendly: Smartphone penetration in Singapore the highest globally with more than 85% of the populations using a smart phone.  This means if your website is not mobile friendly you are probably losing out on a whole bunch of potential customers.

Tags: marketing for agents, marketing real estate, real estate, real estate marketing