Your 7-Day Open House Strategy for Instagram
This post originally aired as a podcast!
🎧 Listen to the show on Apple Podcasts | Spotify
In today's market, is it necessary to invest in listing marketing and open houses?
Yes! You worked hard to get that listing - let's use it to help you get more! That's why many top real estate agents, even in the hottest seller's markets, are still investing in their listing promotion.
So, in today's episode, I'll be sharing a 7-day strategy to promote your next open house using Instagram. Even if you've scaled back on your marketing for listings because they're selling so quickly, you definitely want to tune in as well.
Today's Fast Selling Market & Your Listing Promo
Even before today's market, people have always been interested in homes for sale. If you share a new listing on social, it's going to get attention from buyers, curious people, neighbors, your past customers, and the list continues.
In today's climate, we have an increased demand from buyers, but listing promotion doesn't have to be focused on buyer leads. Before we dive into marketing an open house on Instagram, I want to take a second to discuss the importance of leveraging your listings from a marketing perspective. An effective promo strategy is -
An example to the seller of the service you provide AND an example to potential sellers of what they can expect
A lead generation tool. How many buyers out there need an agent or have a home to sell first?
A branding platform. If you want to be the go-to agent in your market, there's no better way than actively selling in the area.
A source of traffic for your website. Stop paying for leads and generate them on your own site through your listings.
A content goldmine. If you've ever struggled with what to share on social or want to get creative with your marketing, you have so many opportunities with listings!
There are so many reasons to advertise your listing outside of attracting buyers for that home for sale. This concept alone could have been a whole podcast/blog, but I want to talk about marketing open houses on Instagram!
Creative Open House Posts on Instagram
Smart marketing is essentially taking something and making it work 10X over for you. This strategy frees you from the hamster wheel of marketing creation, and by promoting your next open house, you'll have more to share on social and more opportunities for connection.
Now, typically, if an agent is hosting an open house, they might share it once on social and be done with it. But today, I'm challenging you to do more and follow a one-week strategy of promotion. These ideas might even inspire you to step outside of your comfort zone and use more of the features Instagram offers!
Your 7-Day Instagram Open House Strategy
Let's begin with driving interest to your open house by sharing your new listing!
Monday’s Post
We want to make sure that we're starting off your open house promo strategy with a solid foundation, and this begins with sharing your new listing and the home's details on Instagram.
Where to post: Right on your feed, so this post shows up on your Instagram profile.
What to post: You'll want to share multiple photos or a listing video. Whichever you pick, make sure you are choosing the most eye-catching visuals. We want to stop people as their scrolling and learn more.
Caption Idea: This post aims to announce your new listing and generate buzz, so don't shy away from making this clear in your caption. Feel free to start the caption with "just listed in XYZ area" or "for sale," so people don't have to read your entire caption to understand it's a new listing. (If you're using a "just listed" graphic, this step isn't as necessary) In the caption, give details about the home like you would in a mini-listing description.
Lead Capture: Make sure you are maximizing this post's potential with a solid lead capture. An example could be directing people to get more info by clicking your "link in bio" which leads them to a landing page. Get more lead capture ideas here.
Open House Info: Don't forget to include your open house info in this post! It's not the primary goal of this share, but we're starting to promote your upcoming open house.
Hashtag Strategy: Implement a hashtag strategy to increase your post's exposure! Instead of using hashtags like #justlisted or #openhouse, get more specific to your market. Try hashtags like #orlandorealestate or #orlandohomes. Learn more about creating an Instagram hashtag strategy here.
Tuesday’s Post
Now that people know about your new listing, we want to engage them in new ways and further pique their interest!
Where to post: Instagram Stories
What to post: You don't have to share the same thing over and over to continue to promote your listing or open house. For today's post, choose a standout room or feature of the home you want to highlight, such as a gorgeous kitchen in this example.
Story Idea 1: Upload the prettiest photo of the kitchen (or video!) and add text that says "How stunning is this kitchen?!" and then add the Instagram Stories engagement sticker that allows viewers to engage with an emoji slider. The engagement sticker makes your Story interactive, and you can see who participated. Take it one step further and reach out to those people through DMs (direct messages) to keep the conversation going.
Next Story: Choose another photo or video but add text to it that highlights features of the room. For this kitchen example, you can add text that says, "quartz counters, a farmhouse sink, and upgraded appliances!"
Next Story: Now, we want to give the viewer more details about the home and highlight the open house by sharing yesterday's post. Simply click the paper airplane icon on Monday's post to share it to your Stories. From there, you can add text that says, "View this beautiful kitchen at my new listing" and point back to the original post. At this time, you can also add the open house info on this post or break it up into another Story.
Tune into this week’s podcast episode to learn the complete 7-day strategy - Listen to the show on Apple Podcasts | Spotify