In the real estate industry, being visible is one of the biggest keys to helping maintain market share over other brokerages. Make inroads into increased visibility for your brokerage by developing unique and identifiable branding that remains consistent throughout your business. It's fairly common for a brokerage’s branding to falter or become out-dated. But fear not! Here are some branding best that can help brokerages check on and brush up their own brand.
1. Maintaining a Style Guide
With much of a brokerage’s marketing occurring through online channels like social, media-visual branding has become more important than ever. As a result, maintaining a style guide that ensures consistency on all marketing materials in terms of fonts, colors and style is critical to keeping up brand consistency.
Maintaining this style guide requires reviewing choices on an annual basis or possibly even more frequently. It also means auditing marketing materials that agents are using and ensuring that agents are following the style guide as well.
[To do: 20 Stunning Examples of Brand Style Guides]
2. Provide Proper Social Media Training
Social media has become an enormous channel for real estate marketing, and, with the opportunity to target individuals through readily-available data, be careful to fully optimize this lead-generating engine. However, social media can be a negative when not used responsibly. It is important to make sure agents understand that their personal views may reflect negatively on the brokerage’s brand. To combat this, training should take place to help agents understand what should be expected of them on social media.
[To do: 5 Step Social Media Training Program For Employees]
3. Stay in the Public Eye
To help reinforce your brand, a hosted, public event can go a long way to displaying your brand while also getting your company in front of the community. This is a great opportunity to get creative with your brand. Dream up an event that matches company interests – make it fun, or educational, or service-oriented. Next time a participant sees your logo? They’ll remember who you are.
[To do: How to Market Your Brand Through Live Events]
4. Agent Marketing Materials
While agents can utilize a style guide to help them create consistent marketing materials for themselves, another way to ensure materials remain brand-consistent is to provide agents with pre-approved marketing materials. Spending the time to create templates for different types of marketing materials will not only ensure that agents maintain branding but can also be a draw for potential new agents.
[To do: RealNex’s MarketEdge puts company approved-branding right into our financial analysis solution, ensuring that all marketing materials are consistent (and beautiful). New templates coming September 5th!
5. Auditing Agents
With style guides, templates and training in place, ultimately it is your agents who carry your brand. They are the face of your brokerage and on the front lines with your clients. Auditing your agents in relation to your brand during regular review sessions can help to ensure consistency. You might also consider instituting a reward and recognition program to encourage brand adoption and proliferation.
[To do: How To Reinforce Your Company’s Brand Through Employee Recognition and Reward Programs]
