Google Ads are one of the top lead generation methods for real estate investors along with organic site visitor growth through SEO, Facebook ads, and other types of online marketing strategies. It’s a hot topic in real estate investing circles, and if your business goals are to dominate the market, chances are you are either already using Google Adwords, or you’re considering using Google Adwords to get more leads.
If you haven’t come across these terms before, we’ve shared a detailed guide on Google Ads in another article. In essence, it’s a way to put an ad for your business at the top of the search results when people type in a query in the Google search engine about selling houses. It was formerly known as Google Adwords, and it’s probably the most popular pay-per-click (PPC) campaign for real estate investors, although there are other types of PPC as well.
Google Ads bring results to businesses (more clicks = more visits = more leads = more deals), however, real estate investors have a number of concerns when it comes to doing an ad campaign for their business. There are three typical issues:
Also, some of the real estate investors out there have tried Google Ads in the past without noting an favorable ROI. This speaks more to the fact that it’s hard to do Adwords properly, and not that the method itself is invalid.
There is no way around it – before you reap the rewards of PPC, you have to tackle a number of challenges. We will share 12 tips that will help you improve the performance of your ad campaign.
It may seem obvious, but rational goal setting is often overlooked, especially when you do your first online marketing campaign as a real estate investor. We recommend to first take a look at your business goals (both your 1-year and 5-year plans), and then to take a look at your budget in order to come up with a realistic goal.
If your goal is to close 20 deals this year, you need approximately 400 leads (close rate in REI nationally is around 5%). And to get those 400 leads, you need 4,000 visits, because the average conversion rate for real estate investing websites is 1% (or 1 in 100 visits will result in filling out a form). Now, not all website visits are a result from a Google Ads campaign, but for the sake of the argument, let’s say Adwords are your only marketing channel.
To get 4,000 visits this year, what should your ad budget be? The short answer is: it depends how much you are willing to pay per each single lead.
Don’t worry, this is the only part of this article where numbers and math play an important role – but you can’t make a good budget without it, so let’s dive in.
Different real estate investors bid for the same Google Ads (for example, the keyword phrase may be “sell my house fast Independence Village Columbus”). You need a bidding strategy, otherwise you are spending marketing money without getting a result. And at the same time, a higher marketing budget will put your Google Ads in front of more people and you’ll end up with a higher lead volume. You have to make sure there is a balance between the money that is invested and the volume of leads you are getting.
That’s what formulas are for. Determine the following parameters:
Then, you can use the following formula to find out your max CPC per Google Adword:
(Revenue per customer) x (conversion rate) x (1-profit margin) = Max CPC
Alternatively, you can use our name your price technique to come up with a bid adjustment formula.
Ideally, the goal of using Google Adwords for real estate investors is not to get just any lead, but to get hot leads – leads that are more likely to convert. Unfortunately, there is no foolproof method for attracting hot leads exclusively, however, you can tweak your Google Ad campaign to increase your chances of getting good leads for your marketing dollar.
If you have a small budget, you can target a specific neighborhood instead of going for a big real estate market like the whole city. The number of real estate investors aiming for “sell my house fast Independence Village Columbus” is likely to be lower than the number of REIs who bid for “sell my house fast Columbus.”
You are bound to have lower max CPC with this approach.
If you are after more than one type of website visitors, then split up the campaign. For example, have one Google Ad campaign for motivated sellers and one for cash buyers if you are a wholesaler. This will allow you to choose different sets of keywords, time of the day when the ad is visible, geofence an area, etc. for each group. Ultimately, this will bring better results than if you are casting a wider net for multiple target audiences.
You are expected to do keyword research before you start bidding. Everyone has an idea about the search phrases motivated sellers type when they use Google. It goes along the following lines: “sell my house fast,” “sell my house without a realtor,” “how to stop foreclosure,” and such. Once the campaign is live, you will have data on keywords that are simply draining your budget without bringing new leads and you can exclude them. Of course, long-tail keywords (like “sell house fast in X”) perform better than short keywords (like “sell house”).
But excluding negative keywords from your keyword list before you start an Adwords campaign is even more important than including long-tail keywords. Negative keywords are words which are similar to the keywords you bid on, but the search intent of the people who use them has nothing to do with real estate markets. The typical example is “sell my house” – users can type in words like “furniture,” “books,” “video,” “in grand theft auto,” after the target keywords.
If you don’t exclude these keywords from your campaign, you will end up paying for marketing that is shown to people who have no intention of selling a house. We’ve shared a great list of negative keywords for real estate investors and you can make your Adwords campaign more efficient by tapping into this resource – it’s based on marketing dollars spent by Adwords Nerds and Carrot for many clients over the years.
Talking to people who closed deals with you is a great resource for learning how to make your Google Adwords campaign more effective. Of course, first you need to find out if the homeowner clicked on an ad to visit your website or find your phone number. With proper conversion tracking, you’d already have this information, but don’t limit your inquiry only to those motivated sellers who saw your ad.
Ask all homeowners who choose you: how did they find your business, and if that was through a search engine, which words they typed in and why? You can easily get the popular searches as data, but when you ask actual sellers, you’ll hear about the reasoning behind using specific phrases. This can be a great insight when you’re choosing keywords for your next Adwords campaign.
You can easily do a thought exercise – put yourself in the shoes of a motivated seller. What would you do if you needed to sell a house quickly? The reasons can vary (you know the full list of reasons), so what would you personally type into a search engine to find a reputable cash buyer?
You don’t have much “real estate” in a Google Ad (pun intended), so use it wisely. One typical mistake is to check out what your competitor’s Google Ads look like, and to try to copy them. It would be better if you find out your unique business proposition and include it in the ad.
Are you able to offer a price on a house within hours? Do you specialize in specific types of real estate deals? Do you have a long track record and experience? Are you a certified broker or boast some particular skill? These are all great ways to set yourself apart from other real estate investors. Also, a unique ad will bring in hotter leads – for instance, when you clearly state that you specialize in probate proceedings, chances are, the users that end up clicking on the ad need someone just like you.
The format of Google Adwords is standardized: you have three headlines (should you choose to use all three), two description fields, and a display url. There are many ways to tweak this format, but the one that stands out the most is adding an extension.
Real estate investors usually add an extension that is a phone number, or they add multiple site links (an about page, referrals, content, etc.). Now, motivated house sellers might prefer phone calls or they might want to visit a website first, and both are valid channels. Some want to establish a connection right away by talking to a real person, and some want to do their due diligence on you without being influenced by a talking head.
While you can have a whole discussion about phone calls vs. website conversions, all marketers would agree that adding an extension (regardless of whether it is a phone number or site link) will bring better results.
This is another crucial aspect of your Google Adwords campaign – where do you send these users when they click on the ad? You have to be strategic about the elements you include in your landing page if you want high conversion rates.
To begin with, make sure you divert users to a page that’s designed to convert visitors into leads, and not to your home page or any random page on the site. Then, you need to test out different conversion techniques. You can use a lead magnet, or you ask the visitors to fill out a form; you can test the placement of each element on the website to find out what works.
Plus, don’t underestimate the overall quality of your website. This includes website navigation, content, and especially the credibility of the information you present. If your about page inspires trust, and this is supported by testimonials, your conversion rates will increase, because, after all, you are in the business of selling and buying real estate, which is a big deal for the visitors who are filling out the forms.
Again, this is not strictly connected with Google Ads, although you can choose responsive Google Ads that will format based on the device used to access them. We are talking here about the website, and the importance of having a mobile-responsive design when visitors open your site.
Many motivated sellers access these ads from their mobile (like on their lunch break at work?), so if you make sure they can browse your website without any technical difficulties, you will get more leads.
In digital marketing, tracking every campaign is a no-brainer. Here in particular, you’ll need to include every piece of data in your analysis. Don’t overlook a channel in your funnel. You probably already use your CRM system to note the conversion rates on your website, but Google Adwords are not the only channel for inbound traffic. So, use tools that will allow you to track the effect of Google Ads to get a clear picture about the leads you acquired as a result of bidding on a keyword.
If you add a phone number in the Google Ad (as we advised above) then, you can do call tracking that will pinpoint the calls coming from the extension in the ad. If you want more data on call tracking, you’ll have to go for software that’s not part of Google, especially if you want a solution for detailed call metrics.
While you can’t use the trademarked name of another real estate investing business to attract motivated sellers, Google allows you to place a bid on their name. How does this work? Well, let’s say that your main competitor in the area is “Ugly Houses In Phoenix LLC.” If you bid on “ugly houses in phoenix llc” your ad will appear above the organic search results for the phrase.
People will end up clicking on your ad, however, it is up to you to decide whether this method is cost-effective and acceptable for your business.
This concludes our list of Google Adwords tips for real estate investors. Some of them feature basic advice for novices, and some contain more advanced tips. You can use them to set up your Google Ad campaign or to improve its performance.
Before you test them in your PPC marketing, keep an eye on the current trends in your real estate market as well. Bidding on keywords is not isolated from the general economy and you might want to adapt your marketing to the circumstances. For instance, if you are in a sellers’ market, do you want the top results on Google for your keywords at all costs?
Last but not least, pace your campaigns to get long-term results in your market. Slow and steady wins the race. Good luck!
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