Select Your Target Client
You’ll want to choose a farm area that’s aligned with what you like to do. If high-rise, luxury condos are the direction you want your career to go in, then you’ll need to choose accordingly. If helping young families or first-time homebuyers brings you joy, that’s something to consider.
No matter your interests, it’s important to research and consider recent sales data from the farm areas you’re considering. Now is the time to zero in on more specifics. You should look at:
■ Average listing and selling prices: Get familiar with the area’s typical listing and selling prices in the past year. Armed with this information, you can help your clients understand how much negotiation room they might have in upcoming transactions. A large gap between listing and selling prices (in either direction) can inform your understanding of supply and demand.
■ Price trends: To understand market dynamics, consider how prices have changed over time for different property types, such as single-family homes or condos.
■ Average days on the market (or DOM): Know how long properties typically sit on the market
■ Current inventory: Monitor the type of current properties available for sale and unique property features.
Effective Real Estate Farming
Real estate farming works so well because it’s easier, not to mention much more affordable, to gain repeated exposure in a small geographic area. The well-established rule of seven explains that consumers typically must encounter a brand’s marketing messages at least seven times before making a purchase decision. While buyers and sellers may not be actively looking for your services now, real estate farming ensures that you stay top-of-mind until they’re ready to make a move. After winning business in a small geographic area, your referral business begins to build upon your success.
You’ve chosen your farm area and now what?
Usually a mix of in-person, digital and traditional outreach methods. Most importantly, build predictability. Pick activities you know you can consistently follow through on. Try thinking of your real estate farming plan in terms of annual, quarterly, monthly, weekly, and ad-hoc initiatives that whet your prospects’ appetite for more interactions with you.
Here are our top strategies for marketing your services to the homeowners in your farm, broken out into snail mail or traditional real estate farming, in-person farming, and online strategies.
■ Traditional real estate farming: Snail Mail
Before the internet, snail mail was one of the primary real estate farming strategies agents used to reach buyers and sellers in their neighborhood. Along with the open house, handing out business cards, and print advertising (plus some well-placed yard signs), sending snail mail has been a proven real estate farming technique for decades.
One might argue that it’s even more meaningful now, in an era when few of us receive any snail mail besides bills to pay and junk mail. Here’s why!
■ Postcards
This is the core of most agents’ geo-farming strategy. A monthly postcard is a cost-effective way to get your name out there and build your reputation over time in your farm area. It can also save you a ton of time if you choose to hire a company to label and mail them for you! If your budget allows, I’d recommend opting for a larger postcard — one that will stand out in the recipient’s mailbox.
■ Social Media Content
In terms of content, mix it up. Hyper-local market stats, such as any recently sold properties in the neighborhood, are always valuable and interesting. But I’d also include a real estate postcard with a testimonial from a happy client, one promoting a local community event, and one requesting donations to a local charity.
■ Brochures
Printed materials are no longer the go-to resource. But still they help to promote all your new listings and just-sold listings in the area. This will show potential sellers on your farm how successful you are and encourage them to work with you when they need to sell.
■ Handwritten notes
This one is tedious and time-consuming but worth it. When was the last time you received a handwritten note? Chances are, it was highly memorable because it’s such a rare occurrence. It’s more natural to do this with your own neighborhood because you can simply introduce yourself as their neighborhood real estate agent and include your business card. You can even outsource this to Handwrytten, a company that sends automated handwritten notes for agents.
■ Holiday Cards
Holiday cards are less common and this is why they are even more powerful. People are in a festive mood already, and it’s a super easy, non-sales-y touch. To stand out from the rest of the cards they’re receiving (and to avoid mistakenly sending a card for a holiday someone may not celebrate), I’d opt for an end-of-the-year “Happy New Year” card instead of a Christmas or Hanukkah card. You could also send a New Year calendar (we love fridge magnets) featuring your branding to keep you top-of-mind all year long.
■ Newsletters
An informative community newsletter is a great way to stay top-of-mind. One of the top agents in the Boston market mails a quarterly newsletter to his farm. It’s expensive (multi-page, full-color, high-quality paper) but worth it when targeting luxury neighborhoods. Your newsletters can be simpler and more budget-friendly, yet still impactful.
One of the best things about a newsletter is that there’s an implied understanding that the homeowners will be receiving your newsletters on a regular basis, whether that’s monthly or quarterly. They may even start to look forward to it if your content is relevant enough to keep their interest!
Examples of content you could include: market updates for the neighborhood; anything just listed, sold, or pending — even if it’s not your listing; sales price, DOM, inventory or other market trends you’re noticing. You can also include community events or events you’re hosting, spotlight a local business and interview the owner, and personal updates about you, your family and/or your pets.
■ Flyers
Like a brochure, flyers are a good medium for spreading the word about market activity in the neighborhood, upcoming community events, or charitable drives you’re hosting.