Google recently began running an hour long video ad to promote itself between YouTube videos. That’s pretty extreme, when most ads in this space are likely 15 to 120 seconds, and are designed to get the message across in 5 seconds or less.

So, what can we learn about this extreme dose of ad info which Google no doubt spent an enormous amount of money to shoot, edit and publish?

What does it mean for real estate investors and professionals in this space?

You Need To Keep Marketing, No Matter How Successful You Are

You don’t just get to a point where you can stop marketing or slack off on it. There is a reason the biggest brands like Nike, McDonalds, Microsoft, Apple and Uber keep marketing. They have to. Creating an ad like this one from Google might cost most companies six or seven figures to produce. Just one ad. Your budget may not be that big yet, but keep on growing your marketing spend every month.

Trust Is Hard To Earn, Easy To Lose

Especially today, with so many companies moving online, it is hard to earn trust. It doesn’t take much to lose it. If you have to run an hour long ad to try and convince people to still trust you, you’ve already lost that trust. If you have billions of dollars to run propaganda to restore your brand after a hiccup, you can do it. Most can’t afford it. Avoid losing trust in the first place.

The Right Way To Approach SEO

In this ad, Google not only revealed that it changes its SEO rules and rankings 6x per day, but those changes are the results of over 200,000 test runs and tweaks. Most real estate companies don’t have the budget and flexibility to keep up with that.

Many of Google’s SEO rules and guidelines for quality content are public. They will take a lot of time to read, and of course they are always changing to stay ahead of those trying to game the engine.

SEO and ranking well on Google does have a lot of value for real estate companies and professionals. Though resources may be better spent simply focusing on creating quality content, with authority, and interesting content people will want to share. That is evergreen content that will keep working for you later today, tomorrow and in 10 years, despite all of the algorithm changes in between.

40% Of Websites Are Spam

Google says they consider around 40% of all websites they crawl to be spam. Is yours one of them?

If it looks cheap and salesy, or you are trying to cram in keywords, expect them to keep decreasing your rankings or ban you.

Focus on better design and more value.

 

Are you about to make one of these deadly marketing mistakes?

This is looking like a fantastic year for real estate wholesalers. There are millions of motivated sellers. There is plenty of money for deals. Landlords and rehabbers are still looking for inventory. However, to connect all the dots requires marketing. As a new company just a year or two old you might be spending just $10,000 a month on this. If you’re moving fast you might have over a billion dollars to grow your business through marketing this year. No matter what your budget, the key is getting the most out of it. Fail to do that for a couple of months and you could be facing bankruptcy.

Here are the five top mistakes not to fall into now…

1. Copying Tactics That Don’t Work

The number one mistake real estate investors are making is copying tactics they see others using, but don’t really work. Or at least don’t work well. Just because someone looks successful, doesn’t mean their marketing is really working. At least it may not be working on anyone but you. They might have just put their last dollar in marketing to you, and are a week away from going broke.

If you don’t know the returns they are getting you really don’t know. This can apply to investment strategy, websites, videos, ads, the length of your content and podcasting.

Test and watch your data before you go all in.

2. Cheap & Flawed SEO

Trying to get noticed by the search engines and to rank high on Google can have great advantages. Yet, most get it horribly wrong and waste lots of money on these efforts. Most actually do more harm than good to their rankings and visibility.

The most common reasons for failure here, include:

• Hiring cheap SEO companies

• Keyword research by people who don’t really understand the real estate industry

• Copying outdated online suggestions over putting yourself in your customers’ shoes

• Ignoring common sense when picking keywords

• Not reviewing and updating keyword research and SEO on a monthly or quarterly basis

3. Taking Bigger Competitors Head On

You wouldn’t try to take a semi head on if you were driving a Prius on the road, right? Yet, many investors do this every day with their marketing. You can’t directly take on competitors who are spending $30,000 on blog content a month, or who are happy to throw away 4 billion dollars on online ads this year just to drive you out of business. Not if you are only investing $10k a month in your own marketing. You have to be creative and find a competitive edge and unique way to stand out.

4. Not Providing The Communication Options Your Ideal Customers Want

You might really want to get motivated sellers on the phone for a live pitch call. For all the same reasons they really don’t want to do it. You can spend $1M on ads to drive traffic to your website. Yet, if your only option is to call or use Facebook Messenger, you might only convert 1 in 1,000 hot leads. The rest are onto your competitors’ websites looking for other options. Like emailing, texting for help and live chat features. Remember, it’s not about you. It’s about them. Recognize that the last thing distressed sellers want is yet another person on the phone reminding them of how desperate their situation is and pressuring them.

5. Not Getting A Marketing Coach

Even if you don’t have other types of coaches and advisers yet, you already know that the best in every field has one. Given that 90% of your business relies on marketing, this is the most important part of your business to get help in. You don’t have to spend $40,000 on a cheesy coaching program full of fluff, but it pays to have an expert adviser to help you leap pitfalls and get right to winning in this area.