It's not just about Zillow. How do you become Zillow proof, other agent proof, discount broker proof? There are different type of agencies that are trying to work and change the way that our industry is being done. It's not just how to beat Zillow. It's so many different industries. So now more than ever, we need to really be thinking about how do we position ourselves differently from our competition.
What do you hear all the time? You hear that in real estate, you guys are a dime dozen. They are constantly trying to beat you up on your commission. They're not respecting you, not respecting your boundaries. They're not treating you very well. In many cases, you're having to take your schedule and work it around them instead of the, the opposite, because there are so many real estate agents and so many lenders out there, we are a dime of a dozen in most cases.
How To Beat Zillow By Doing Things Differently!
So if you really want to know how to beat Zillow? How do we make sure that these new entities that are changing though, real estate's been being done for years and years do not take over our jobs. Well, you completely have to do things different.
When you go into a listing appointment or you meet with a buyer, you're saying the exact same thing that everyone else is saying, right? You're talking about how you're gonna do an open house and how you're gonna put the home through brokers tour, which by the way, we all know that brokers tours do not work. Right? When you have brokers tour, you're calling your brokers and saying your other agents saying, can you please you to this house? I need to make sure there's a lot of cards so that when the seller comes home, they know that I'm doing my job.
And listen, I know some you out there kinda like, oh, Krista open houses. They do work ,and so does door knocking instead of cold calling, listen, guys, I'm not saying that it doesn't work. What I'm saying is that it's not the most efficient, effective use of your time. And quite frankly, it's not what's best for your client. Do you think it's best for your client to be having the neighbors walk through and pick, pocket them and bring in the coronavirus or whatever else?
No way and see all their stuff and expose them to what's going on in there. No, it's not dangerous. And it, maybe you can pick up, you know, 3, 4, 10, maybe even 20 people in an open house that, you know, 99% of them are not qualified or can't purchase or ready to purchase. But if you mark it online to the masses, you're literally exposing their home to hundreds of thousands of people getting mass comments, mass views, mass exposure.
Change Or Die Is How To Beat Zillow
Don't you think that's a lot better than doing an open house. You know, you do, you have just been like pretty much brainwashed and taught that brokers tours and open houses and cold calling and sphere of influence, that's how you do real estate.
No, no, no. That is not how you do real estate! You need to evolve just like the travel agent, who we never thought would be extinct is now gone because they did not evolve. The only travel agents that are still around are ones that are completely doing things differently, and they're specialized. When you want to go and get brain surgery, are you gonna go to the general practitioner? Are you gonna go to the brain surgeon? You're gonna go to the brain surgeon and did you know, the brain surgeon works 10 times less and makes 30 times more than the general practitioner.
I want you to become the brain surgeon of real estate and of mortgage lending. That is how you stay discount broker proof and Zillow proof and from any other brokerages that are trying to take your business. You either change or you die and that's the truth. I know that open houses can work, but are they really the most valuable way for you to spend your time? Is it really in the seller's best interest to have random strangers walking through their home? In most cases, they don't have an agent working with them. They haven't been pre prequalified, and it's pretty much your neighbors, lookie loos, trying to see what things that you have or haven't done to your property.
So if you are going on a listing appointment or on a buyer appointment, you're saying all the things that everyone else is, you are a diamond dozen. You're not doing things differently to become other agent proof, other come proof, discount, broker proof, Zillow proof. You have to have your unique, competitive selling proposition. Now people talk about this kind of stuff all the time, but it, you really have to understand me here. What are you doing differently? What are you saying when you go on a listing appointment? Because according to the national association of realtors, think the average is the average person interviews 2.6 agents.
How Are You Different Than Zillow and Others?
So when they're interviewing the other 2.6 agents, what are you saying to make yourself stand out amongst what everyone else is saying? How are you showing that you are different?
How are you showing that your marketing capabilities are not just the old school tactics and techniques that we were taught to do from our broker and our team leader that probably hasn't even sold real as state or haven't sold real estate in a very long time, or they're teaching us to do things like open houses and, and cold calling and door knocking and sphere of influence and, you know, going to the network marketing events and doing pop buys.
They're doing all of those things because we didn't have something called the internet or social media or video or Google. We didn't have those things in the past when we were told to do those other types of things.
Do you know that according to one study the average person that is going to make a large investment or they're gonna make a big purchasing move or a big change.
They typically do research for 179 days prior to actually taking action or making that move in real estate. When you're buying a house or getting a loan, that's one of the biggest transactions that you're ever gonna make. So research shows that on average people start researching 179 days. That's six months, six months prior to them making the move.
If you have to get a nose job, okay. Or if you have to do something, you know, like you're getting a divorce or you really need to find like the us trust attorney ever, or, you know, you're getting married for that matter. Don't you do research or do you just like call Mr. Joe blow? And when you do research, what are you looking for? You are looking for people that are saying things that are like, wow, that's different.
How To Beat Zillow By Using Social Media
Can I tell you how many times I've gone on a listing appointment? I've said, listen, I'm sure that everyone else is probably telling you that they market on social media. Well, according to my own research, do you know that 99.9% of agents are not utilizing social media correctly? They might be doing things like posting on their personal page and posting on their personal, on their business page. But sweat, that's not enough. But here's why Mr. Mrs. Seller, because Facebook is a business. They make their money by people marketing and advertising on Facebook. So in order for me to expose your house to the masses, and by the way, Mr. Seller, did you know that 67% of buyers will walk through a home that they see online, according to the net national association of realtors.
So what does that tell you that tells you that my, it is my moral obligation, my fiduciary obligation to get your home online in front of the masses, because if 67.7% are more likely to walk through home, they see online, I've got to get your home online. I don't need to be doing an open house or doing a broker tour. I need to be doing that.
So when somebody tells you their marketing on Facebook or Instagram or any of these things, you need to make sure that they are showing you the amount of views they're getting the amount of watch time. How many hours is somebody watching that content? How many engagements that means a like, a comment or share are they getting.
Mr. And Mrs. Seller, here are my stats. As you can see on this video right here, we had 555 of hours of watch time. And you can see right here, it shows that we had 196,000 people view this property online. Now that Mr. Mrs. Seller is how we're going to get you the most amount of money and the very best terms for your property.
Now back into YouTube mode for you as listing agent, a buyer agent, or a mortgage professional or a mortgage officer… understand this. That was just a really quick one or two minute clip of the things that I talk about when I go on a listing appointment, right? We show how we utilize innovation, technology, video, and social media to drive traffic to our listings.
We talk about things like landing pages, pages, and funnels, and how we target people, how we do geographic local, targeting, how we can target people that viewed a property three to six months ago, because according to NAR buyers usually take about three to six months.
They're looking three to six months beforehand, how we can target people that watched a video three to six months ago, that was a four bedroom, two bath home and now show them this house that is that four bedroom, two bath home?
What Digital Marketing Strategies Are You Using?
Digital marketing strategies are the real way to reach the masses. We show people and agents how to get views while they snooze, how to create binge-worthy content about their community and their home. We're talking about the neighborhood and things to do, and just about everything a buyer needs to know, and we're doing it all online, and we're showing them how omnipresent we are as a real estate agent, so we can target to both people in the neighborhood and outside of the neighborhood.
Now, the audience I've built is also going to benefit the seller, but also we can utilize my digital marketing skills that I've spent hundreds of thousands dollars to learn how to do to market their home and get their home mass exposure. Did you know that less than 3% of homes sell with open houses? But why are so many agents doing them?
They're doing them because they have not been trained in this highly comprehensive, digital marketing strategy that I'm talking to you about right now. Okay. So also you wanna ask your agent how many homes they've sold now. Everyone, if you haven't sold a lot of homes now, now we're talking about how do we become a Zillow proof? When you go on a buyer appointment or a seller appointment, you're completely changing the conversation you are being prolific.
You need to talk about things that others aren't. Bringing up things that most agents wouldn't even think about because they don't have the experience or know how to do so is what you're doing. That's how you show yourself that you are different and have a unique, competitive value proposition and not doing what everyone else does.
This, I want you to think about way back when, when I first got into the real estate industry 20 years ago, and I've sold over 2,300 homes. I remember thinking, oh, okay. What, what are everyone else doing? Like, what's everyone else doing? Right. So back then people were selling. They were doing like black and white flyers. So what did I do? I created four page colored brochures. And then I would take a CD. And I put the CD on the sign with like 50 pictures in that little CD where they said these little CDs.
Market Where Zillow and Others Aren't Marketing
I also would market my properties on television. At the time I marketed myself and my properties at the movie theaters. I did things that other people were not doing so that when I went on a listing presentation, I would beat out my competitors. I'd attract a higher price listing and get a higher price commission. That is how you beat out your competition, whether it's Zillow, realtor.com, a discount broker, listen to this guys.
People are beating you up on your commission. And, and, and people are making the real estate agency extinct because real estate agents are not adapting to technology and innovation. Quick enough, blockbuster was around for years. I used to love going to blockbuster. I mean, when I got divorced, one of my favorite activities to do with my daughters on Friday nights was to take them to Blockbuster and let them pick up the movies and let them get their fun stuff.
But my point being, you never thought blockbuster would be gone. But now all of a sudden blockbuster is gone because Netflix has taken over. What else has happened? Wow. All of a sudden taxis, Uber found a more effective, efficient way to actually the needs of the, the person that needed the taxi. And they're kind of wiped out. Taxis Ubers are everywhere, right? Even think about like Amazon they wiped out thousands of retail stores because it's meeting the needs of clients. It's showing up differently. It's doing things different. It truly is creating their own blue ocean right now. All of you are, are scrambling to try to beat out your competition. You it's like, there's like millions of you all over.
Realtors… Realtors Everywhere!
Everyone knows a real estate agent. Everyone knows a mortgage broker. They know multiple of them, right? Like everyone knows like fit. So do you call, they call the cheapest one, or if they get in front of the one person, that's completely like truly, truly doing things differently, adding the most value. And they're able to take that information and be able to demonstrate it right in the right manner. Bam. That's how you start beating off the competition. So how do you be, how do you become Zillow proof?
Your online presence is different and you get more exposure. You add as much value as possible and you educate yourself. Give as much value to your clients as you can, and learn how to market. Consider you whenever anyone thinks about real estate or their community. By talking about your community, you attract business.
When people think about real estate or lending, you want them to think of you constantly. People will remember you because you're everywhere. Your market is dominating online and through social media. You're not only unforgettable, you're impossible to beat. You become discount, broker proof, Zillow proof, and any other agent proof that way.
Also, while you are here, if you want some other tips about how to beat Zillow then check out this video where I interviewed the “Zillow Killer” AKA: James Rembert
