In this article, I will share the ten best real estate farming ideas to plant, nurture and cultivate new real estate leads for your business. Plus, the types of farming most agents use and how to pick a farm area in your neighborhood so that you can make the most of your marketing budget. But first, you need to understand what is real estate farming and why agents love them.
What is Real Estate Farming?
Real estate farming is a hidden marketing strategy that helps you plant, nurture, and cultivate your property leads which will ultimately grow into future prospects. Use this lead generation method near your house or office where your connection to the community is strong, influential, and known.
There are two types of real estate farming, niche farming, and geo-farming.
- Niche farming: It means focusing your lead generation efforts on a specific niche targeting first-time buyers, buyers and sellers in a price range, move-up buyers, downsizing sellers, and others.
- Geo-farming: It means targeting a specific area or neighborhood. It may include an entire town, ZIP code, or a division.
It’s up to you what you should choose in your farming, but most people focus on niche farming with a combination of geo farming.
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Ten Best Real Estate Farming Ideas
Before you use those ten farming ideas, you must know how to pick a good area to plant your seeds. Here is the list that will help you do so.
- Select a farming area close to your home or office.
- Focus on a specified niche.
- Research your targeted farm area well.
- Use geo-farming but with set boundaries.
- Know who your competitor is and
- Compare multiple areas.
If you first do these practices, lead farming will become easy as you will know what method to use to attract potential buyers. So here are those ten best real estate farming ideas for you to use.
1. Participate in Neighborhood Events
I hope till now you have chosen a geographic area and a target audience. Now look for events that will take place soon, and know if you can attend the event as a speaker. If yes, that will be good, as you can share real estate tips, trends, and other insights specific to the neighborhood.
If not, use some banners and hung them in front of the audience to let them know your best offers. Your goal is to present yourself in the best way possible. So people know you and start to trust you, and you will put the seed successfully in their minds that will nature one day.
2. Use Door Knocking
Door knocking is free, and anyone can do it. You can knock on people’s doors and inform them about you and your business. But that does not mean you knock on doors randomly. Research first and create a list of the probable clients who might be interested in dealing with you.
Select those people, knock on their doors, and leave a business card or an ad that they can look at in the future if they think you can help them. You can also use door hangers for those who are not home right now. But in-person talk will be more effective than a door hanger.
3. Make a Partnership with Local Businesses
Local businesses have an amazing relationship with local residents. You can use that trust as real estate farming ideas. Businesses like grocery stores, medical shops, boutiques, salons, and good restaurants have loyal customers. If they recommend something, people will not refuse it completely. Make a deal with those shop owners and farm your business in every way possible.
4. Use Just Sold Flyers
You can send physical mail to potential clients, just sold or just listed homes, with a little detail about them. But here, you must be very choosy on who to send and who to not. These will cost you money, and you don’t want to spend money without any ROI. Show some evidence and let them know about your new listing. Inform them clearly, who you are and how you can help them and gain their trust. Otherwise, it may not work.
5. Find a Local Sponsorship
You may have seen local occasions like social work, local festivals, sports teams, school events, a political speech, or any public gathering in one place, and some banner ads are telling you to buy something. Those are a form of local sponsorships that agents use to advertise their brand and put a seed in the mind of their buyers.
But there are expensive, as creating those banner ads will cost you dearly. But it works. You can also use t-shirt printing, flyers, and program pamphlets to do the same thing.
6. Go for the Direct Mail
Try direct physical mail. Although I have mentioned it earlier, I want to specify it in detail. You will send offers, listing info, and other promotional materials to potential customers to grab their attention who may call you or come to your office.
For example, you have found out that the owner is having trouble selling the house. He is super motivated to sell the house as he needs money instantly. You wrote a direct mail telling him, We buy houses for cash within a week, or you can go personally we will buy your house for $60,000 (assuming). Let us know if you are interested.
These kinds of problem-solving messages will attract their attention, and if they think you can help, they will call you and negotiate the price, and you will do your due diligence and buy it.
7. Put Ads in the Local Newspaper
Not all newspapers will let you put real estate ads on them, but a few do. It is one of the neglected real estate farming ideas. You can use them and make a mark in the buyer’s mind.
Partner with all these publications that suits your reader by offering to write a weekly column on the side of the page that features real estate tips and resources. But focus on proving value, not just placing the ad. Run the ad for a few months so that people can start to recognize you.
8. Host a Free Webinar
Free things attract people. Offer them a free webinar where you will talk about common home buying mistakes and tips and answer their questions. You can also post the webinar as a YouTube video and gain subscribers.
All this free thing is only to bid trust in the market and make people know you. If they trust you, you have successfully delivered the seen in the mind, which will convert later in one day.
9. Check the FSBO and Expired Listings
Find FSBO (for sale by the owner) and expired listings in your targeted area and stay in contact with them. You never know when they change their mind and be ready to sell the house. The MLS data can help you find those expired listings and why they did not sell. Ask the agent and find those homes and plant your farming seed.
10. Host Open Houses
Host open houses for home buyers and agents and let them know who you are. It will allow you to meet neighbors, owners thinking about selling their homes, and agents looking for networking opportunities. Hosting an open house will let people know you personally. It will increase your brand value.
Last Words
So these are the best real estate farming ideas you can use to plant a seed in the mind of your prospect and later in time, make them a quality customer. The process is long and expensive. Do your due diligence before you make a move. Go for niche farming with a combination of geo farming and find a good neighbor to plant seed. I wish you the best of luck. Thanks for making it to the end. See you soon.
