There are a lot of myths around selling your home, and one of those is that if you just get your home on the right website, with the right amount of online marketing, the home will practically sell itself.
That’s like a startup believing that if they create a website, the next step will be to stand aside and wait for the rush of customers.
And that’s just not how the world works for startups. The era where being online equated to legitimacy, which equated to investors and customers, is gone. Startups in today’s economy have to focus on developing a good product, leveraging effective content marketing to help get the product noticed, pricing the product correctly, and then investing in a sales staff who know how to close a deal.
And the same can be said for selling your home.
If you want to sell your home, here’s the reality, rather than the myth.
1. Present the best product possible.
It all starts with the product. In this case, the product you’re putting on the market is your home. Generally speaking, investing more in your product will lead to a greater return in the market. The same can be said for your home. Spending time and effort on making your home as appealing as possible will increase the likelihood that it will sell.
There is a myth that good online marketing will help mitigate the fact that you are putting a bad product on the market.
It won’t.
If you want the maximum return, you need to put the best possible version of your home on the market.
2. Create great visual content.
In today’s world, great visual content in the form of photographs and video can make all the difference in the world when it comes to selling any product—especially a home. Buyers simply have access to so many listings that a poorly photographed home is hugely disadvantaged. Great, real photos are best.
If you or your REALTOR don’t have a good camera, or are not comfortable taking pictures, hire a professional photographer. You can find a great photographer for as little as $80.
Trust me…it’ll be worth the investment.
3. Create great written content.
Along with visual content, written content is extremely important. Imagine visiting the website of a company that is selling a product that will involve one of the largest purchases you’ll ever make.
Now imagine that the website for that product contains typos, poor spelling, and statements written in ALL CAPS (see how awful that was?).
When it comes to writing the description of your home, stick to the basics. The description of your home should simply point out its features, and what sets it apart from the competition.
Proofread that description twice.
The point of the written description is to let the reader know what’s important about the property, and the way in which it’s written makes a big difference. Realtors, listen up. “This home will not last long” is not a property description and is useless to the buyer.
4. Go to market with the right price.
Imagine if McDonald’s invested the time and money to develop Chicken McNuggets—including whatever it is they do to find chickens that can produce boot-shaped pieces of chicken meat on a consistent basis—only to charge $19.99 for a box of McNuggets.
Or imagine if Morton’s Steakhouse charged $19.99 for a steak, rather than $75.
Both companies would suffer greatly.
When it comes to product, pricing is important—and that is especially true when pricing your home.
All of the great photos and descriptions in the world will not mask an asking price that is too high. Further, if your home is priced too high, it will show up in search results with homes that are priced correctly—and are far better properties.
Keep in mind, people search online using price parameters (for example, homes below $250,000). Make sure your home is priced correctly, so that it competes with similar homes.
Or, in other words, there is a healthy market for Chicken McNuggets and a healthy market for Morton’s steaks. But if one ended up trying to compete with the other for the same buyer, it would be a disaster.
Getting an opinion from a real market expert is highly worth it. Want to know what your home’s value is? Find out here.
5. Invest in a sales staff.
You have your home ready. You’ve taken great photos and written a great description. You’ve priced it accurately. What’s next?
Just like if you were running a startup, you would invest in an experienced sales staff who knew how to sell your specific product, and knew that successful sales often occur because of the details.
In the case of selling a home, that means following up with potential buyers, showing up at every appointment, and (often most important) maintaining lines of communication during the inspection.
In other words, you need a customer-focused, transparent brokerage like Worth Clark Realty.
Because selling your home is a lot like getting your product to market as a startup. You need the best possible product, content that helps sell the product, the right price, and a professional sales team to tie it all together.
