Why Creating Content Attracts Business

What is content?  Why is everyone talking about content and how does it apply to my business?

My goal of this article is to explain how and why creating real estate content works so that you can decide if this is a business practice for you.

Let me be blunt. If you want to attract business, especially online, you must create content.  In this article I want to give you an overview as to how it works.

Let’s go through the steps of exactly how it works.

Creating content allows you to sell without selling by sharing your expertise. How many times do you find yourself struggling to market your brand? What do you say? How do you say it?

“Hey do you know anyone who wants to buy a house (or insurance or refinance)?”

“Hey do you know anyone who wants to sell a house (or rollover a 401k, switch insurers)?”

This is prospecting, which is self serving. When you are always selling, it’s hard to attract business. Many agents are told this is the only way.

You are told you must make x amount of calls a day, 5 days a week.

This is the old school train of thought when it comes to marketing. I believe it’s these hard core sales tactics that are taught by the large majority of trainers and brands that is a major reason why 87% of newly licensed sales people do not make it 5 years in the business. It burns people out!

When you create content you take a different approach. Your main focus becomes serving vs. selling and this is exactly how you attract business. Creating content allows you to share your expertise and become the expert without having to say it. You take on an educators role. People want to work with experts, not rookies.  Content builds that authority.

Let me share a story…

I was sitting on my couch about 5 years ago after Easter dinner and felt like a whale. I looked at myself in the mirror and decided that I was going on a diet and wanted to get fit for the upcoming new year. I weighed 285 pounds!

I started researching everything I could to lose weight so I started searching online. I found site after site and was narrowing down my choices as I was determined to find the right plan for me.

I found a diet plan and workout to go along with it online that was on one of the first pages of my search.

Once I clicked on the ad, I was taken right to a sales page and pitched a product right off the bat. I was very close to buying it, but then this 30 minute infomercial came on tv for a product called P90X. I never heard about it before, but it looked intense.

I saw this dude jumping around that was like 45 years old, but ripped like a college kid. I remember feeling embarrassed about how good of shape he was in as I looked at the donut forming around my waste.

Anyways, I am in my living room depressed and tired watching all 30 minutes of this infomerical.  I learned about heart rates, plyo, 15 minutes abs, and many details of how to turn up my metabolism.

I ended up buying the MORE expensive P90X product because I felt totally educated and more attracted to it. It was the content in the infomercial that taught me about how the body worked for weight loss that really sealed the deal.

You see the 30 minute infomercial P90x created is content educating people on a good workout and how the body works.  I felt more comfortable as a consumer because the content earned my business and to this day I still drink Shakeology.

P90x, and its parent company- Beachbody, creates tons of content on Youtube, social media, blog posts all with the intention of attracting business through educating the public.  Their content identifies potential customers who are searching for a health solution online.

The 2 Ways Creating Content Works

Creating content in your business is no different.  If you started creating content consistently, you will begin attracting business as long as it’s good and gets found (2 totally separate blog posts).

Creating content helps you in two ways.  First, is that creating content allows you to keep your brand in front of your largest source of business, your database.  Over 60% of all business comes from referrals and repeat clients.

Above: Statistics for Realtor Referral Business via National Association of Realtors

You should always place your content in front of your database of contacts. It allows you to keep your brand at the forefront without having to always come off as a slick salesman.

You can post your content on social media, video email, and so on. Creating content is a way to consistently nurture your relationships.

The second way you can use content is to attract new potential clients.  The same way that I found P90x is the same way you can find new potential buyer and seller clients.

Let’s take this article you are reading right now.  Maybe you found me on Facebook, Pinterest, or Google. I purposely place my content so that it gets found by agents and brokers.  I want you to read this article so I can build a relationship with you and down the road you may become one of our clients (that’s my soft sales pitch).

I’m not hard core selling you anything, but I am teaching you about creating content.  You will ultimately decide if you like my style or if what I’m teaching can help you attract more clients.

I’m talking about doing the same thing for your business.

I’m not sure what kind of content to create?

There are two types of content to create:  First is educational.  This is content that you share your expertise on various topics in your industry.  It should be focused around the questions that typical buyers of your services would have whether you sell real estate, insurance, or financial services.  I can list many different topics for your to create content on. If you need some ideas, just shoot me an e-mail at inquiries@fginteractive.com.

The second kind of content to create is more for branding and staying on top of mind.  It can be holiday videos, location specific content, or just sold case studies to give you a few examples.  This kind of content allows you to share your daily story. You don’t create this kind of content to pick up leads, but more for nurturing your relationships and remaining on top of mind amongst your database, prospects who are not ready to make a move yet, and your local geographic area.

When you consistently remain on top of mind with the people you know, referrals and repeat business occurs. As people see this they think, “Oh wow, this guy (or gal) really knows their stuff! I’m definitely going to work with them!”

Heres my question to you.  Would you rather spend 4-5 hours a week cold calling, prospecting, and being one of 50 sales people  to reach out in the same week?

OR

Would you rather spend 1-2 hours creating a really good piece of content each week and then distributing it?  That’s what is comes down to.

Does this all make sense? Are you ready to create some real estate content? if you enjoyed this article share it with the world and help me get the word out!