AIM digital marketing is now the industry’s leading solution for marketing beyond the traditional property portals. It’s there to help your vendor attract more buyers, of course, but there is much more to the product than this. AIM is a tool that can help the smart agent win more listings as well. Who doesn’t want more listings?
Before we get into the subject matter of AIM reports as a listing tool, it would be remiss of us not to also point out that AIM delivers huge numbers of digital ads into your local area – which is about the best thing you can do to ensure you are well known to prospective vendors and buyers. But this article is not about that…
It’s about one of AIM’s unsung hero features. The advanced reporting that you get with every AIM property campaign. This is a web or PDF viewable report that shows loads of useful information from the total number of ads displayed, the number of times people clicked on those ads, and the number of other significant actions and enquiries. It also includes demographic and geographic data. It’s about full transparency and most AIM reports contain some impressive numbers. It’s a tool most agents send to their vendors so the vendors can see how their campaigns are tracking, and of course, agents love them too. But they have another superpower…
How do you win a listing over your competitors? Usually, it’s because you made yourself stand out, you offered more or different from the other people pitching for the work. Differentiation is the keyword here. It would be unwise to assume your competitors are unpolished, so if you end up with near-identical proposals, it makes vendor choices harder. So doing things that help you stand out is a very smart strategy.
The reason you will have bidders for your client’s property is marketing – the tools you use to attract buyers (and of course future sellers in the process). Most agents agree that online marketing is the largest source of leads, and most agents simply rely on the traditional property portal listing to achieve this. So you can assume the baseline marketing campaigns will be very predictable, portals, brochures, signs, etc – nearly identical. Agents who embrace digital marketing beyond the property portals using both social media and google advertising cast a much wider net for their vendors, remembering that just one more buyer will recoup the vendor’s investment in digital many, many times over. These are better campaigns that work harder for the vendor. So imagine you’re an agent who can convince a vendor that you do a better job marketing, attracting more buyers. You’d be the better choice right?
We often hear “is agents are worried about putting their campaign costs up by adding other things like digital marketing to campaigns because they fear being seen as more expensive.” This is why many agents simply don’t offer digital marketing. We think this is short-sighted because nowadays you’re more likely to lose a campaign because you look out of touch than because your campaign is more expensive. But it’s a real worry for some agents, so how can you get ahead of this concern, and use digital marketing as a listing closer?
Firstly, you will need to use AIM to have AIM reports on hand. An AIM report is a URL you can easily get within Campaigntrack, and you can send this link to anyone – prospective vendors included. If you don’t use AIM, talk to us about our onboarding special offers…
Here is what you do… First, grab a URL for one or two of your last reports before you see your prospective vendor. Send them an email saying words like:
“Looking forward to seeing you soon. One of the things I offer is better marketing, which attracts more buyers, and one of my tools is digital marketing using social media and google ads. Here are a couple of links to some past reports for some of my past listings, which I thought you might like to see prior to our meeting.”
This simple email does so many things…
- It provides another discussion point.
- It establishes upfront you have a better strategy.
- It gives the vendor the ability to see what digital marketing is and see some impressive numbers.
- They already know what AIM is, when they see your marketing campaign quote, so won’t be surprised nor question its inclusion.
- It makes any agent who doesn’t use such tools look old-fashioned – giving you an advantage.
It’s as simple as that! So please consider this next time you do a vendor presentation. Remember you can always go in with more than one campaign and let the vendor choose. But nowadays, there are other things you may choose to forego before you cut out digital marketing. It’s the most transparent of your marketing tools, and with AIM, one of the best value components you can use for your vendor. Plus AIM will boost your own visibility in your local area, helping attract your next vendor as well as buyers… We call that a win-win.
