Using Facebook Targeted Ads to Better Market Your Business

Facebook’s ad targeting system is among the best targeting system out there in terms of deliverability and cost effectiveness.  Through Facebook Pages, Real Estate professionals can directly market to their target demographic by placing ads within their prospective client’s Facebook interface.  With 80% of home buying interest today starting online, it would seem reasonable to make an effort to get to the word out on your property through a platform that has become respected among all social circles and walks of life.  It is for this reason that Facebook is the reasonable choice above other social networks.

Though Facebook is technically the second largest social networking site with 100 million active users (News Corporation’s MySpace still holds the first place title), it has become the cleaner alternative to the corporate-backed, ad-ridden, unprofessional landscape of MySpace.  This puts Facebook in a position to learn from MySpace’s mistakes – let everyone market on the platform instead of just larger companies.
Everyone from photographers to real estate professionals to vendors have started to use Facebook’s easy-to-use ad developer to place ads directly into a desired user’s homepage.

The site allows for advance targeting – target by age, gender, location, interests, whatever you want.  It also allows for you to attach friend-to-friend interactions about your ads; friends of the target will show up as referring your business to them through your ad, which helps attract attention and credibility.
Facebook is also flexible on how your purchase ads.  Their system allows for both CPC (purchase clicks) or CPM (purchase impressions) styles of payment.  Their CPC method allows you to bid on a cost-per-click, with the higher the bid equaling more impressions on the site.  They also let you set a limit per day on each ad, allowing you to increase and decrease the ad rate according to your budget.

A great feature of this ad system is Facebook’s “trusted referral” option.

From Facebook.com: “The ads can also be shown to users whose friends have recently engaged with your Facebook Page or engaged with your application. Facebook Ads are more likely to influence users when they appear next to a story about a friend’s interaction with your business.”

This is great if you want to start building within a network of friends who have shared interests.  So say you’re a photographer and you have a business selling real estate photography.  If you tell your clients to become fans of your business on Facebook, you can advertise directly to their associates, using your clients as referrals.
The end result of these targeted ads is delivering your message directly onto a prospect’s facebook homepage, which means (depending on your bidding settings) that your prospects can see your ad every time they refresh their homepage.  This is a great way to advertise yourself as a professional in your field.

Facebook Advertising Info

Why Twitter?

Twitter is becoming the go-to tool to answer the one question on everyone’s mind: What are you doing right now? The two-year-old micro-blogging platform is quickly becoming known as an app that many people have heard of, but only a handful have mastered.

For those who don’t know, Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users’ updates (otherwise known as tweets).  Updates are displayed on the user’s profile page and delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them.  Users can receive updates Twitter’s website, SMS, RSS, email, or through an application such as Twitterrific or Facebook.

The question that real estate professional should be asking is: How can this be useful in selling a property? Twitter can be used to take a pulse of the home-buying community. Agents can search twitter to find real estate buyers in the area and get a sense of exactly what they’re looking for – thoughts, opinions, open house, time preferences, whatever.

Once you’ve found out what your prospects are saying, start a conversation. Set up a profile. Get a nice looking picture and fill out the required fields so that people can get a sense of who you are. Next, start following people. Following people allows for other people’s “tweets” (twitter language for messages) to automatically update to your home page. This lets you see exactly what someone is looking for.

You can search other people’s tweets by using tools such as TweetScan. Search for “Open House” or “Trulia” to see who is looking for property information or homes for sale. If someone is looking for a home, they might be posting their thoughts on their home-buying process. Use this to help them find the property they need…

If you have an iPhone, get one of the free twitter applications built specifically for iPhone users.  This will help agents who are constantly on the move showing properties.  You can even sync your twitter account to interact with your Facebook status, enabling you to reach an even larger audience with information on property locations and local real estate news.

This method of interaction with clients also puts a friendly face on a stressful buying process — It allows clients to get a better sense of who is helping them to make what will most likely be one of the more expensive purchases of their life.

Use your own profile to act as a real-time advertising platform; let your followers know what properties you’re showing and give some juicy details. Have fun with it! Twitter is a great way to get into the head of clients and find out what they’re really looking for.

PP.com’s Twitter Profile

Twitter Home

Click here to check out a great example of how Twitter can be used with to interact with customers in real-time — from seomoz.org

Official Company Blog

PropertyPreviews.com, the creators of the free video creation service for real estate agents, has just launched the official PropertyPreviews.com Blog. This blog allows Real Estate professionals to expand their knowledge on low-cost, successful ways to manage their online marketing and learn about emerging real estate marketing trends.

The blog features articles on topics such as marketing properties online, real estate photography, relevant real estate news, as well as articles geared to help agents and REALTORS® increase the perceived value of their properties. Contributors of the PropertyPreviews.com blog focus on helping real estate professionals find focus in a sometimes overwhelming online landscape, and how utilizing online tools can help sell properties better and more efficiently.

About PP.com

PropertyPreviews.com allows you to quickly and easily upload your real estate photos and create a compelling and engaging video presentation of your property in three easy steps. Your online real estate video can then be distributed throughout the Internet to a variety of video hosting sites – all with just a click of a button!