Investing in YOUR Online Sales Funnel The Complete Guide for Real Estate Wishpond W INTRODUCTION The People who Actually Pay You Anthony Hitt (CEO of Engel & Völkers North America) has a quote which is as true in modern online marketing as it was when he said it about phone calls and mailouts “To be successful in real estate, you must always and consistently put your clients first When you do, your personal needs will be realized beyond your greatest expectations.” The quote framed the way the most successful real estate agents and developers did it in the 90s and 2000’s, and continues to define them in modern online marketing That’s why we created this ebook When you want to create a product that generates a buzz, inspires others, and sells successfully, you so first and foremost with your end user in mind For real estate, that product is you The way to stay ahead of the curve in the competitive real estate market is to consistently and visibly provide value to your prospective clients - and to ensure you’re getting something in return This ebook will guide you through doing that well, online I’ll also take a comprehensive look at optimizing your online marketing efforts without spending your entire budget and half your lifetime This ebook is your guide to uncovering the online marketing formula that works best for you, but more than that it is your guide to finding the formula that works FOR you, even when you’re not paying attention Let’s get rolling Yours truly, James Scherer Marketing Strategist, Wishpond TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER CHAPTER Introduction to an Optimized Sales Funnel Getting the Most out of Paid Advertising CHAPTER CHAPTER Creating a Landing Page Retargeting Bounced Traffic CHAPTER CHAPTER Email Automation Calculating ROI Conclusion Chapter 1: Introduction to An Optimized Sales Funnel An optimized sales funnel is one which, once set up intelligently and completely, takes care of you when you’re not looking Let’s try a short experiment Answer these two questions (no need to write them down, just go over the answers in your head): Do you feel that online marketing only works when you’re doing it 24 hours a day, days a week and paying through the nose? Are you currently able to track the ROI of your online marketing efforts to determine exactly the value of your dollar? If your first answer is an emphatic yes and your second is an emphatic no, then we need to work on an automated and optimized sales funnel A Complete Sales Funnel An optimized sales funnel consists of an entirely automated strategy which: ● Collects traffic (either paid for through advertising or organically through content) ● Drives traffic to a landing page designed with a single conversion “Ask”, and equipped with a retargeting pixel which shows bounced traffic further ads to convert them at an optimal rate ● Delivers content-focused and sales-focused timed emails to nurture contacts towards a final sale Advertising & Content Marketing Landing Pages & Remarketing Email Automation Final Sale A Complete Sales Funnel Let’s break it down into bite-sized pieces (all of this will be covered in-depth in later chapters): Top of Funnel: Advertising and content creation expose your prospective clients to your brand Your optimized advertising campaign has been tested to deliver optimal ROI and your content (once created) can be utilized to generate organic traffic and leads until the information is obsolete Middle of Funnel; Each promotional strategy (paid or organic) drives traffic to a page optimized to get a single conversion from that traffic Landing pages are used to get contact details Remarketing campaigns are used to reconnect with traffic that bounces from your pages Bottom of Funnel: Timed and automated emails (optimized with tested subject line, length and content) are sent to the leads generated by your landing pages These emails either nurture leads towards a final sale or (depending on the landing page) arrange a good time to meet or call The “Aha!” Moment Many real-estate agents find that there is a certain action which prospective clients consistently take before converting to a contract or deal This is referred to, in some circles, as the “Aha” moment Driving a prospective customer towards this action can be a good way to design your sales funnel - optimizing it for a single Ask which you’ve found (and proven) to result in a conversion For instance, if you’ve found that a certain piece of content you’ve created (a video series discussing the benefits of passive income real estate, let’s say) elicits more final conversions than another piece of content, you need to devote more time, energy and resources to promoting that content than you a piece which doesn’t result in the same kind of conversion rates I’ll get more into optimizing your sales funnel based on “Aha” moments in Chapter Why Should I Produce Content? Consider the reason your clients hire you Why are you worth your commission? Because buying or selling a home is hard It’s time consuming, frustrating, confusing and the stakes are high You make it easier You facilitate the easy processing of what is often the largest purchase (or sale) of a person’s life But you need to convince prospective clients that hiring you is worth it You need to be an authority, or else why should they trust that you’ll ease any of their real estate aches and pains? Content does this Consistent, high-quality content increases the breadth of your brand (you) online, increases your reputation and makes you a sector authority People looking to learn how to intelligently sell their home learn from you Who better to help them when it comes time to buy, sell, rent or invest? Chapter Key Points An interconnected online sales funnel allows you to see the value of each step independently and in conjunction with the steps above and below it An automated sales funnel allows you to sit back and watch the traffic and sales roll in, only interfering when an update or change needs to be made Creation of lead-generating content not only acts as a first touchpoint for your business, but improves your status within your sector and spreads brand awareness Wishpond W Remarketing Some landing page providers (notably Wishpond) automatically collect data from traffic that bounces from their pages This means that, at any time, you can remarket to that bounced traffic It’s also noteworthy that, when traffic which has bounced from a Wishpond landing page returns to that page (after being remarketed) they will automatically stop receiving remarketing ads Chapter Key Points Retargeting works best when prospective clients are shopping around in your sector Exposing them to you more than your competitors is how you win the contract Test the cost structures to determine which gives you the best bang for your buck Ensure you’re limiting and rotating your ad impressions and design Don’t show the same ad times a day to the same prospect or you’ll win nothing but hate mail Wishpond W Chapter 5: Email Automation Once your landing page has captured a lead (whether organically or after a remarketing campaign) you have a couple of primary options: ● Hit them with a sales call ● Butter them up with value The correct course of action will depend entirely on what your landing page offered, and what you’ve found to be a prospective customer’s “Aha!” moment Either way you’ll need to send at least one email, and automating that response is one of the best ways to save you time and energy Let alone sending 7-10 emails, each optimized for a final sale and triggered by time or action Let me explain how email automation works, and why it might revolutionize the way you communicate with prospective clients Automated Email Campaign Email campaigns consist of a series of timed personalized emails sent to people after they take an action, such as completing a signup form on your landing page It's one of the most successful ways to convert your leads into sales The key to a great campaign is to sell your products or services indirectly The emails themselves should provide free content that is valuable to your leads, and tie in with a service you provide By sending an email every 3-7 days, you keep your leads engaged and create dozens of soft-sell opportunities to convert the sale An Example Email Campaign for Real Estate A prospective client sees your Facebook Ad promoting your lead-generating checklist for identifying the right property for investment They click through on your landing page and provide you with their basic contact information (name and email address) They receive their first automated response, a personalsounding letter from you thanking them for downloading and introducing yourself You also let them know that if they have any questions you can be reached at this number or that email address Two days later they receive another email, this time asking them if they have any questions about the checklist and and letting them know you have an upcoming webinar on real estate for investment purposes They sign up for your webinar on its customized landing page, adding their phone number and address in the form This information is stored in Wishpond’s contact database automatically They love your webinar, and engage actively in the Q&A afterward, asking you personally about the services you provide to investors An Example Email Campaign for Real Estate You look up the name of the active webinar attendee as soon as you’re done (as you’ve never, actually, interacted with them in any way before) You note that they’ve downloaded an ebook and you have their address, phone number and name With this knowledge you determine if an unsolicited phone call would be beneficial or if you’d rather send another email prompting a time to set up a call If they don’t respond to your email, they automatically go back into the timed email campaign which delivers more valuable content and continues to soft-sell and nurture them towards a final conversion For more about testing your email automation campaigns to optimize for open-rates and conversions, check out the comprehensive guide Chapter Key Points Test the tone of your emails to determine what works best for you Do your open-rates increase if you’re casual and personal, or more formal and professional? Spend time on your email subject line, as it’s the most influential component which can make or break an email campaign Time your emails carefully to ensure you’re neither spamming your prospective clients nor letting them slip through the cracks Wishpond W Chapter 6: Calculating your ROI The strategies within this ebook are the strong foundation of your online marketing sales funnel With the help of a third-party software provider, you’ve created a funnel that can be tweaked (different ad audiences or keywords, different landing page forms, offers, and designs, different times, copy and subjects for your emails) And you should that You should test everything But first you need to know what your numbers mean and be able to calculate the return from your investments at every step Unless you know the value of your dollar, you can’t know what needs to be optimized, changed, added or removed This chapter will break down the math behind your marketing ROI, giving you a walkthrough of each step of your sales funnel Calculating ROI from Top to Bottom Rather than exhaust us both with a thousand different numbers and equations, I’ll simply break down the ROI of a real-world sales funnel from top to bottom Here are the stats from one of Wishpond’s recent Google Ads over the course of two weeks ● Impressions = 724 ● Clicks = 35 ● Cost = $79.77 ● Click-Through-Rate = 4.83% ● Cost-Per-Click = $2.28 I acknowledge that the real estate market is different than the one which provides software tools for it, but let’s go with these numbers for the sake of argument This ad drove 35 people to one of our landing pages The page converts traffic at 12%, and our remarketing ads generate a click-through-rate of 5% over two-weeks running, meaning we got another 1.5 leads from our remarketing efforts Calculating ROI from Top to Bottom We can combine our landing page conversion rate with the remarketing campaign to give us 5.7 leads from our traffic sources and landing page Ad spend was $79.77 and retargeting spend (at CPA) was $4.50, for a total of $84.27 That comes out to $14.78 per lead ($84.27 divided by 5.7) You still following? Extra Costs: Wishpond provides all the services listed above (and everything within this ebook as a whole) Our services start at $69.99/month, or $35 for the two week period we’ re talking about So that’s our email automation campaign and landing page and remarketing setup covered for less than 70 bucks Our email automation campaign converts between 20 and 40% of leads to a final sale, depending on source and “Ask” So let’s say that of our original 5.7 leads convert for $69.99 each The cost of those two clients equals $154.26, and we’ll make that money back in less than two months Calculating ROI from Top to Bottom As you’re making commision on homes or investments, your profit margins (and conversion rates) are extremely different from our own, but the math behind calculating ROI remains the same If organized intelligently and completely, online marketing can deliver a trackable ROI unheard of within traditional avenues Consider that each lead you generate from an ebook could be worth thousands and thousands of dollars to your business Consider that, even if you’re spending hundreds of dollars to drive that prospective client to your page, and hundreds more driving them to a final sale through remarketing and automated email campaigns, you’re still likely to see an ROI of 1000% or better Testing your Sales Funnel It’s essential that you test every step of your sales funnel to ensure it is, in fact, an optimized one Wishpond’s tools allow easy testing of everything from comparing image performance with Facebook Ads, keyword testing with Google Ads, landing page form fields and email subject lines that get the highest open rate Only through testing can you ensure you’re getting the most bang for your buck Guides to A/B Split Testing your Sales Funnel: ● Facebook Ads ● Google Adwords ● Landing Pages (and another one for good measure) ● Email Automation And here’s 50 A/B Test Case Studies to inspire you Chapter Key Points Before deciding on the value of a traffic source (ad type, for instance) look at the value of each lead or prospective client Does Google deliver clients who convert to a final sale more frequently, or does Facebook? Decide on a set value of your own time, and stick with it Wishpond W W Real Estate Resources ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● Social Media for Real Estate Google Adwords Glossary of Terms How to Optimize Keywords and ROI for Google Adwords Creating Facebook Ads that Convert (Webinar On Demand) 10 Real Estate Landing Pages Critiqued 40 Real Estate Lead Gen Strategies Remarketing Checklist The Complete Guide to Facebook Ads The Complete Guide to Google Adwords The Complete Guide to Landing Pages The Advanced Guide to Landing Pages Wishpond has also created a free, online Marketing Academy which offers complete walkthroughs of strategy as well as how to use our tools Check it out CONCLUSION Staying at the forefront of online-marketing strategy is how you compete in the ruthless world of real estate Your competitors are fighting for any advantage, but with the right sales funnel intelligently optimized, and with solid software behind you, you can stay ahead Everything you’ve read about in this ebook can be done with Wishpond, from online advertising to landing page creation, remarketing, email automation and contact management All on the cusp of what’s possible We’d love to talk to you about it Learn more about easy online marketing from a Wishpond Customer Success Lead today CHECK OUT WISHPOND SCHEDULE A FREE DEMO [...]... A Real- Estate Landing Page Critiqued Vision Investment Properties Canada is a real estate investment company that provides high-income property investment opportunities This landing page offered an ebook on the top cities for real- estate investment in 2013 A Real- Estate Landing Page Critiqued What I Like About this Page: The Form: When I first glanced at this form I wondered why Vision was asking for. .. Get the initial conversion by focusing on the initial conversion Everything else follows Why Should I Generate Leads? It’s a soft-sell - a way to get on your prospective client’s radar before asking them to commit Potential clients looking to buy or sell real estate are looking for information before they’re looking for an agent They want advice from industry experts (that’s you) The more discerning... budget Google will reward ads with better placement if they have a history of generating more traffic In other words, your ad will get better CTR and your cost per click for the same position can also go down Here are a few best practices for how to do that: 1 Use the keyword phrase that you're targeting in your headline If you are wanting clicks on "Manhattan real estate" , then have that in the title,... them) Online Courses or Seminars; ● ● ● How to Sell your House: The Free 4-Part Course What You Need to Know When Buying Your First Home: An Online Seminar Buying and Selling Real Estate in Retirement: What You Need to Know Video ● ● What to Look for When Touring a House for Sale: A Video Walkthrough of Potential Problems You Can’t Afford to Miss How to Prepare Your Home for the Market: 15 Expert Tips... start with a solid foundation How to Optimize Keywords and ROI for Google Adwords ○ Outlines 10 advanced strategies to increase the success of your keywords and improve the return on your Adwords investment How to Add a Conversion Tracking Pixel to your Adwords Campaign ○ Breaks down why to track conversions as well as the how and where of implementing the tracking pixel correctly within your website... "View Manhattan Real Estate Opportunities." 2 Try to also place the exact keyword phrase near the beginning of the description It could be something like "All Manhattan Real Estate listings, maps and more here." 3 Enter the Display URL This is usually the home page of your site It isn't necessarily where they're going, but shows legitimacy 4 Enter the Destination URL This is the link to their destination... Tricks Work the Ad Auction: Facebook Ads go through an “ad auction” before they go live on the social media website Your daily budget, along with the amount of competition trying to reach your audience, determines whether you win that auction Winning the auction is important (and is the basis for Facebook’s “Suggested Bid”) because it determines what portion of the “Possible Reach” your ad will actually... for downloading” or “Talk to you soon” page) As soon as they arrive on that page, your bit of gum pings Facebook to let the platform know a conversion has occurred For a full breakdown of how Facebook’s Ad Conversion tracking pixel can work for your business, check out the how-to guide Facebook Vs Google for Real Estate Google Adwords Price per Click: $.5 - $20.00 depending on keyword Targeting Effectiveness:... a Ferrari without an engine: it looks beautiful until you pop the hood and realize you’re going nowhere Whether you’re offering a lead-generating real estate walkthrough, ebook or a straight-up sales call, you need to design it with that “Ask” in mind Don’t send traffic to a website with a navigation bar distracting them with 10 different tabs Don’t send them to an irrelevant page of your website or... shadow of doubt that their investment was a positive one And that’s the true benefit of online, even more than the cost comparison: the ability to track what you spend and what it delivers for you This chapter will dive into the two primary forms of paid online advertising, Google Search Ads and Facebook Advertising Both platforms have benefits and deficiencies in equal measure While Google delivers