Why Builders and Realtors Need to Analyze Big Data

Big data has suddenly become big business. If you are a builder or a realtor, how can you benefit by gathering and analyzing big data? Will data help you sell more homes?

Yes. You might assume that only big organizations need to harness the power of big data. Far from it. Both small and large real estate companies can run their businesses better by analyzing customer data. However, a good understanding of how big data helps your business is essential to develop a suitable business strategy.

Data becomes valuable only when you analyze it. And proper data analysis helps you know your customer better.

Data analysis helps you gain an edge over your competitor

Several builders and agents still don't take the time or trouble to gather data about their target customers. By simply gathering and analyzing data, you can gain an edge over your competition.

By analyzing data, a real estate company can find out what kind of homes sell well in a particular locality. This knowledge will help the builder launch the right project in the right locality.

Data also helps builders and realtors find people who are more likely to buy or sell homes in the immediate future. This will help them create a marketing strategy that targets the right group of buyers.

Data gives you more comprehensive demographic information. It also shows you why certain category of homes sells well in certain localities.

Launch better marketing strategies

After analyzing big data about your customers and the real estate industry, you can use that information to expand your business. One advantage of using big data is that it helps you improve your marketing strategies.

If you run a website, by simply looking at who is visiting your site, you can create a marketing strategy tailor-made for them.

When you have access to data which shows you who your target customer is, you will have no difficulty launching a more personalized marketing strategy.

This kind of analytics is useful for several types of businesses. Data also helps you adapt your marketing strategies for future buyers.

Data helps you decide whether you should implement a marketing strategy or not

By simply analyzing the data gathered by your analytics software, you can decide whether or not you should implement a new marketing strategy. If you market your homes or services to people who are not interested in being a buyer or seller anytime soon, you are simply wasting your time and resources.

When you have real data about your customers and the real estate industry, you can find out whether you should expand your business to other markets.

Realtors sometimes make business decisions with no reason. However, when you work with data analytics, you can make sound business decisions with a reason. A well-thought out business strategy will only benefit you and your company.

How to gather data

It is not difficult for a real estate company to gather data. Most of them already run websites. By simply analyzing the key phrases that attract people to their website, a builder can find valuable information about their potential clients. Both free and paid data analytics software solutions are available.

Struggling to find buyers that qualify? RealTAG gives you the real estate content that drives consumers to your site, and gives you an inside look at their financial situation. Close more real estate deals and generate qualified leads by contacting RealTAG today!

Social Media and its Potential for Testing Creative Campaigns

Despite the massive popularity of social media, truly creative social media campaigns are hard to find. Many brands still nurture the wrong notion that a little semblance of social media in a campaign is more than enough to get consumer attention. Unfortunately, it isn’t quite so. Social media is evolving rapidly, so if you want your campaign to get the attention it deserves, you will need to evolve as well.

Gone are the days when your YouTube followers would watch every video you uploaded and your Twitter followers would click on every link you posted.  Now it is a battle to create engagement.

Consumers are now being bombarded with numerous social media campaigns. Unless you launch a truly creative campaign, you cannot expect the user to engage with your brand. Interestingly, this isn’t all that difficult. The very nature of social media allows advertisers to be creative.

Creating content for social media takes a great deal of time and effort. What’s more, social media doesn’t allow the marketer to launch a campaign and then take a sabbatical. In order to create engagement, the advertiser needs to work on the campaign constantly.

It is the next big thing in advertising

Social media has caught the attention of big names in advertising and marketing. Businesses too have started realizing the potential of social media. Needless to say, many brands now don’t mind spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on social media campaigns. All of these factors have led to the development of some killer campaigns.

Creative convergence and its potential

Nowadays, we access information through many channels, and interestingly this has led to the convergence of different media platforms. It is now possible to access the same content on multiple platforms, albeit in different forms. This allows advertisers to be creative. 

Social media allows you to be crazy

In spite of the popularity of social media, very few advertisers are spending huge amounts of money on their social media campaigns. Most marketers don’t even spend a dime. They somehow create a campaign and then launch it hoping that it would be noticed.

 

For most social media marketers, their only investment is their time. And because of this, marketers are betting on crazy ideas that have the potential to go viral. If it works, everybody behind the campaign attains iconic status. If it doesn’t, well, nobody is going to lose anything. After all, hardly any money had gone into the making of this campaign. This again allows an advertiser to be creative.

You get to try anything and everything

Unlike other advertising channels, social media allows marketers to explore interesting ways to engage customers. Of course, some of these can be crazy, still they are considered acceptable. The goal is to create engagement and this allows marketers to try every trick in the book to create amazingly smart campaigns that have the potential to reach millions of people.

Social media calls for innovation

Social media is an ever-changing dynamic landscape. Existing platforms are constantly being updated and new platforms are being launched almost on a regular basis. Consequently, the user behavior and expectations change constantly. A campaign that does amazingly well on Facebook may not be that popular on Twitter.

 

This dynamic nature of the media itself spurs creative professionals to try out new and interesting ways to engage audience. This also means that advertisers have to constantly test new ideas and campaigns.

Inspiring Customer Loyalty in the Service Arena

New customers are considered to be the lifeblood of a business. In recent times, along with efforts towards getting new customers, marketers have been paying a lot of attention to current customers. They have been revamping the concept of customer service. New investments are being made in customer relationship management systems and building of teams for improved communications with customers.

When it’s time for festivities and you’re planning your gift list, there are often some unexpected people who just jump into your mind. They’re not family and they’re not friends. They’re people who make a place in your heart because of the way they treated you.

This is what service is all about. Exceptional service is always appreciated and remembered. It can create long term customer loyalty. The same holds true in the contact center arena.

So what qualities of contact center agents build customer loyalty? We think it boils down to four basic things:

Handling of issues in a customer-friendly way

Such agents make it their business to know the customer base in-depth. They have updated information regarding the latest communication trends and the contact channels that people prefer to use. They are evolving entities who are ready to handle future generations of consumers across various channels.

They are happy to listen to what customers want using channels that customers want. Then they respond in the way customers want them to.

Trying to give a personal touch to all interactions

Agents who manage to add a personal touch without getting too personal always score with customers. They consistently deliver friendly and warm service.

Contact center managers keen to instill such qualities in their agents have distinct systems in place for evaluation. They organize special programs for development of these qualities. Measures are taken to train agents to add a personal touch through multiple-channel communications which include voice interactions, emails, SMS, and chats.

Being naturally gifted

Some contact centers regard new agents as less-skilled members of the corporate workforce. This is certainly not true in all cases – many contact centers require their agents to have a specific level of academic qualification, for example, when a center caters to the health care field.

Contact center managers with a focus on building customer loyalty do not assume that a certificate makes for a good contact center agent. They seek out and recruit superior advocates of customer interaction and take appropriate measures to retain them. They are clear regarding the qualities a “perfect” agent is required to have and look for natural talent during the hiring process.

Going all out to ensure you are satisfied with a product.

Great agents stand behind a company’s product, and do whatever is required to ensure a customer is happy. They want customers to enjoy their experience and keep coming back. Happy customers translate into more business. Instead of simply having the objective of getting a job done, they have the goal of ensuring a remarkable experience for each customer.

In such a setup, various incentives inspire agents to improve their services in a sustained manner.

How to Launch a Successful Career as an Affiliate Marketer

Affiliate marketing is one of the most effective ways of making money online. In fact, some highly successful affiliate marketers earn millions of dollars by promoting affiliate products on their websites. However, just like other online money making schemes, affiliate marketing too comes with a learning curve. You can't expect to earn loads of money as soon as you launch your affiliate program.

Getting started as an affiliate marketer is easy, but establishing yourself as a successful affiliate marketer takes time and patience. So, how can you make money as an affiliate? What are the traits that a successful affiliate marketer should have?

Here are 5 tips for launching a highly successful career in affiliate marketing:

1. Choose a niche and work on it

Before you start affiliate marketing, you need to decide what product(s) you want to promote. If you run a website about weight loss, you could consider promoting weight loss products. A blog in the health and fitness niche isn't exactly the right platform to promote electronic gadgets. Although you can promote different kinds of products, sticking with one product or products of the same kind will improve the chances of you landing that first paycheck.

Of course, promoting different products might seem like a safe idea, but as a beginner you are unlikely to have the time or resources to promote all of them. So, before you start choose products in one particular niche and then stick with them.

2. Be willing to experiment

Don't approach affiliate marketing hoping that you will make a lot of money overnight. Don't expect to be a millionaire overnight. Some lucky few might have achieved this. But generally speaking, successful affiliate marketers spend countless hours on their affiliate marketing ventures before they see any success. Remember that the most successful websites and email lists weren't created overnight.

Don't give up on a product just because you aren't making a lot of sales. Try tweaking your sales copy and landing page. Be willing to make lots of experiments and revisions.

3. Stay cordial with the affiliate manager

Build a nice relationship with the affiliate manager. They interact with lots of affiliate marketers on a regular basis, so they know which creative performs best. That said, don't expect the affiliate manager to be available round the clock. They work with numerous people so they may not have the time to answer every one of your queries.  Don't waste their time. Be courteous during your interactions with them. Your affiliate manager wants you to succeed because when you make money, they also make money.

4. Tap into your creativity

Some marketers use Facebook to promote their products but that doesn't necessarily mean that you have to do the same. While using popular marketing techniques is never a bad idea, you need to tap into your own creativity and experience as well.

Note that customers develop ad blindness when they are bombarded with the same kind of marketing tactics.

So stand out from the rest by using unique methods. The fact that you are a newbie doesn't necessarily mean that you can't develop marketing strategies that veterans haven't thought about.

5. Get started

Many people who are interested in affiliate marketing spend a lot of time reading all the marketing guides on the planet. While gaining knowledge is absolutely fine, you won't make any money until you start marketing a product. Remember that now is the time to begin. Start that website or ad campaign now itself and reap benefits. If you wait until you are perfectly ready, you will probably never launch your marketing campaign.

 

Online Marketing Trends in 2014

No one can deny the profound impact of the Internet on marketing due to the way it facilitates information sharing. We find that today, more businesses prefer publishing their own original content instead of embedding their ads within the content of others. This offers additional benefits like audience growth and product branding.

Looking at these trends, here’s what we think the online marketing scenario in 2014 will be.

1. Content Marketing Will Rule

 

Companies can establish authority and gain consumer trust by regularly creating useful, relevant content using various channels. This allows them to build rapport with demographics and develop a loyal following.

Businesses can use channels like social media, eNewletters and articles on company websites to build their reputations. This trend implies that traditional marketing techniques like radio and television ads are losing their efficacy. It appears more feasible to focus on inbound marketing by creating engaging and valuable content.

2. More Diversity for Social Media Marketing

Previously there weren’t too many social media platforms that businesses could use for marketing campaigns. Today, new sites are coming up all the time and some are quite popular. These offer a plethora of additional options for producing great content using a variety of media.

As a result, businesses are branching out and experimenting with multiple platforms in an attempt to reach out to more customers. Diversification often proves fruitful because it helps build brand equity.

3. Image-Rich Content Will Win

Since consumers almost drown in the deluge of advertisements, they will not look at stuff that’s difficult to digest. The common characteristic of successful blog posts is the strategic placement of pictures to emphasize points. We doubt conventional textual content will ever get completely replaced. But it’s quite clear that the incorporation of images can add value to a marketing campaign.

4. More Will Not Be Better

Today, consumer preference is shifting towards simple marketing messages instead of deeper ones. Users prefer an uncluttered, clean and aesthetically minimal style.

Now innovative marketers are moving away from ads that shout “look at me”. They know that consumers do not like to be overwhelmed by the hype and are toning down their campaigns.

Hyper-connectivity and highly-digitized lives offer too many flashy and complicated sensory inputs and consumers are tired of this. Because of this, the coming year is likely to see simpler marketing strategies do better. Successful strategies will be those that promote products that simplify consumer lives and even just improve customer experience.

5. Content for Mobiles Will Be Mandatory

With the growing usage of tablets and smartphones, companies must create mobile-friendly content. This might involve creating alternate mobile versions of websites or using responsive web designs to give mobile users a positive experience. Without this, customers may move towards competitors who offer this convenience and businesses can face dire consequences.

6. Others

We feel that the effectiveness of ad retargeting is likely to grow. Once users leave a site, the products they saw will be shown again in the ads on different websites. Psychological studies have shown that repeated exposure to brand logos and names creates trust and familiarity.

We also think that social signals and SEO will get further intertwined. Since search engines strive to provide relevant and high quality content, they would give importance to the number of times an article, blog post, or product page is shared.

 

How to Use Hashtags with Twitter for Marketing

Do you use hashtags in your social media marketing? If not, you should be! Hashtags are part of an effective marketing strategy for businesses, and they fairly simple to use and understand. When utilized correctly, hashtags can be worked into a normal tweet so that it sounds natural and conversational. They can create a buzz about a topic that pertains to your business and reach a community.

What exactly is a hashtag?

According to Twitter, the # symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages. They allow Twitter users to tag their tweets to provide context or designate them as being part of a particular conversation. As far as marketing goes, hashtags can be part of a campaign by creating a buzz or starting conversation around a certain topic. They can also become trending topics as well.

How do you use hashtags?

You tag things by placing # right in front of the keywords you are using. They can be placed in the beginning, middle, or end of a tweet. All you have to do is decide on the keyword you are targeting and type a pound sign in front of it. The # symbol is a message to others tweeting that you are discussing a certain topic, and if they want to talk about it, they can use the hashtag too. And this is how hashtags become hot topics of conversation!

You can create your own hashtag, but you must make sure that it is as short and understandable. You don’t want to hashtag common words because you won’t be able to get many people to follow them. Hashtags should have the power to get people talking.

Here are some other hashtag tips and suggestions for effective marketing:

·         Hashtags are great for centralizing conversations around live, in-person events or conferences, live webinars, or other marketing campaigns you're running.

·         A hashtag is only useful if people know about it. So to start generating conversations through your hashtag, start adding it your existing resources and channels.

·         If your hashtag is too long, hard to spell, or too complicated, it will defeat the purpose of a hashtag as many people may forget it or not be able to fit it into their tweets.

·         Try to use hashtags on multiple social media channels. You can organize your content and pictures while using hashtags on channels such as Facebook, Google+, and Pinterest.

·         Keep your hashtags short. This way, they will easy to remember. Also, keep in mind that Twitter users can only use a maximum of 140 characters each a tweet, so keep it short and sweet.

The tips above should help you choose memorable hashtags that are unique. Utilizing hashtags in the right way can prove to be part of a very effective social media marketing strategy.