Guide
Real estate marketing ideas: 12 that work, and what each costs
Updated
Here are 12 marketing ideas real estate agents use: six that cost nothing but your hours, four you pay for, plus open houses and a weekly video.
In short
- The six ideas that cost nothing are your contact list, a farm area, your Google profile, reviews, a monthly email and referrals.
- Bought leads, portal ads and boosted posts bring you leads this week and stop the week you stop paying.
- Open houses put you in a room with buyers who have no agent yet, and you can host another agent's listing.
- A weekly video keeps your face in front of your area. Filming on a phone is free, and Cutroom edits it for you from $19.99 a month.
- Marketing ideas on this page
- 12
- Of the 12 ideas cost nothing but your hours
- 6
- A month for Cutroom Lite, if you add the weekly video
- $19.99
Which ideas keep working after you stop paying?
Some ideas keep working for years after you build them. Others stop the week you stop paying for them.
- A portal ad leaves you nothing once you stop. The portal keeps the audience you paid to reach.
- Your contact list, your farm area and your Google reviews keep bringing you calls after you stop spending on them.
- Paid ads are faster. Most agents run a little paid marketing while the free ideas are still growing.
Paid ideas and ideas you build
Paid ideas stop when you stop paying. The ones you build keep working.
What it costs
- Paid ideas
- Money, every month
- Ideas you build
- Your hours
How fast it works
- Paid ideas
- Leads this week
- Ideas you build
- Calls a year or two from now
When you stop
- Paid ideas
- The leads stop too
- Ideas you build
- It keeps working
Who keeps the audience
- Paid ideas
- The portal or the app
- Ideas you build
- You
| Paid ideas | Ideas you build | |
|---|---|---|
| What it costs | Money, every month | Your hours |
| How fast it works | Leads this week | Calls a year or two from now |
| When you stop | The leads stop too | It keeps working |
| Who keeps the audience | The portal or the app | You |
6 ideas that cost nothing but your hours
Each of these costs hours instead of money, and each one still works in five years if you keep it up.
- Put one real number in your monthly email, like what the house on your own street sold for. People forward a sale price to their neighbors; they do not forward general advice.
- Ask for the review at the closing table, while people are still thanking you. A specific review beats a glowing one.
- Ask for referrals in plain words, right after you have done good work for someone.
The six ideas that keep working
| Idea | What you do | What it costs |
|---|---|---|
| Contact list | Put everyone you know in one list with notes, and contact them on a schedule | Nothing |
| Farm area | Pick a few hundred homes and send them real sale numbers for years | Printing and postage |
| Google Business Profile | Fill in your hours and service area, and add photos of you at work | Nothing |
| Reviews | Ask every client at closing, and quote what they say | Nothing |
| Monthly email | A short email with one number: what sold nearby and for how much | Nothing |
| Referrals | Ask who they know who is thinking about moving | Nothing |
Idea: Contact list
- What you do
- Put everyone you know in one list with notes, and contact them on a schedule
- What it costs
- Nothing
Idea: Farm area
- What you do
- Pick a few hundred homes and send them real sale numbers for years
- What it costs
- Printing and postage
Idea: Google Business Profile
- What you do
- Fill in your hours and service area, and add photos of you at work
- What it costs
- Nothing
Idea: Reviews
- What you do
- Ask every client at closing, and quote what they say
- What it costs
- Nothing
Idea: Monthly email
- What you do
- A short email with one number: what sold nearby and for how much
- What it costs
- Nothing
Idea: Referrals
- What you do
- Ask who they know who is thinking about moving
- What it costs
- Nothing
This is the whole editor
Highlight a phrase and a clip lands on those exact words. No timeline, no keyframes, no layers.
How to farm a neighborhood
Farming means sending one neighborhood real sale numbers for years, until you are the agent people there think of first.
- Pick an area small enough that you can send something to every home each month, for years.
- Send what listed, what it sold for, how long it took, and what that means for someone thinking of selling.
- A postcard with only your face on it gets thrown away. The sale numbers are the part people read.
- Hand-deliver a market report once a quarter, so people meet you and not only your mail.
- Expect this to take years, because only a handful of homes in one area sell each year.
4 paid ideas, and what to watch out for
Paid marketing is worth it when you need leads this month and the free ideas are still young. It is not what you build the business on.
- Write down how you will follow up before you buy a single lead. Bought leads punish slow follow-up more than anything else.
- Portals sell leads either as a monthly fee for a share of one zip code or as a cut of your commission when a lead closes. Ask which one you are signing before you sign.
The four paid ideas
| Idea | What you pay | Good for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bought internet leads | A monthly fee, or a share of your commission when one closes | A short bridge while the free ideas grow | Several agents often get the same lead, and you do all the calling |
| Portal placements | A monthly fee, set by how many agents want your zip code | Being the agent shown next to your own listing | Count the appointments you book, not the views |
| Boosted posts and local ads | Whatever daily budget you set, for as long as you run it | Pushing one open house to one zip code | They do little unless the post is worth watching on its own |
| Mail outside your farm area | Printing and postage for every home you send to | Almost nothing. Skip it | One postcard to 10,000 strangers costs more than it returns, because nobody there knows your name yet |
Idea: Bought internet leads
- What you pay
- A monthly fee, or a share of your commission when one closes
- Good for
- A short bridge while the free ideas grow
- Watch out for
- Several agents often get the same lead, and you do all the calling
Idea: Portal placements
- What you pay
- A monthly fee, set by how many agents want your zip code
- Good for
- Being the agent shown next to your own listing
- Watch out for
- Count the appointments you book, not the views
Idea: Boosted posts and local ads
- What you pay
- Whatever daily budget you set, for as long as you run it
- Good for
- Pushing one open house to one zip code
- Watch out for
- They do little unless the post is worth watching on its own
Idea: Mail outside your farm area
- What you pay
- Printing and postage for every home you send to
- Good for
- Almost nothing. Skip it
- Watch out for
- One postcard to 10,000 strangers costs more than it returns, because nobody there knows your name yet
Open houses
An open house is the one place where buyers who have not chosen an agent walk in and start talking to you.
- You do not need your own listing. Most listing agents are glad to hand a colleague a Saturday.
- Ask every visitor what they are really looking for, and write it down while they are in the room.
- Send each visitor something useful the same evening, like three comparable homes or an honest note on the price.
- The follow-up is the part that pays you. A sign-in sheet nobody calls is worth nothing.
Where video fits, and what it costs
A 60-second video that answers a question you get asked all the time keeps working for years. It also makes people recognize you.
- Film one a week on your phone, then post it, send it after calls and put it in your monthly email.
- People in your farm area can read your name for a year and still not know you. Your face and your voice fix that.
- The free way is a phone, a window and the captions built into Instagram or TikTok.
- Cutroom does the editing for you. You upload one clip of yourself talking, up to 3 minutes, and get a captioned 9:16 MP4 back in about a minute.
- You change the video by editing the transcript, not by dragging clips around a timeline.
What one video costs
| Option | Cost |
|---|---|
| Your phone and the app's own captions | Free |
| A Cutroom edit: cuts, captions, hook and clips | 100 credits |
| Export | 20 credits per minute of finished video |
| A 30-second video, all in | About 110 credits |
| Your first video | Free within 7 days: 600 credits, no card, Cutroom mark |
| Lite | $19.99 a month for 1,250 credits, about 11 of those videos, no mark |
Option: Your phone and the app's own captions
- Cost
- Free
Option: A Cutroom edit: cuts, captions, hook and clips
- Cost
- 100 credits
Option: Export
- Cost
- 20 credits per minute of finished video
Option: A 30-second video, all in
- Cost
- About 110 credits
Option: Your first video
- Cost
- Free within 7 days: 600 credits, no card, Cutroom mark
Option: Lite
- Cost
- $19.99 a month for 1,250 credits, about 11 of those videos, no mark
Questions people ask
- What is the most effective marketing for real estate agents?
- For this quarter, open houses and carefully bought leads, because they are the fastest. For a career, your contact list, a farm area and your reviews, because they keep working. Sellers usually call the agent they already know rather than comparing three strangers.
- How much should a real estate agent spend on marketing?
- Less than most new agents expect. Six of the 12 ideas here cost nothing but hours, so start with those. When you do pay, for leads or for mail, judge it on appointments you booked rather than views you got.
- What are cheap real estate marketing ideas?
- Your contact list, a Google Business Profile, asking for reviews and referrals, and hosting open houses. All of them cost hours, not money. A phone video posted with the app's own captions is free too.
- Do postcards still work for real estate farming?
- Yes, if they carry real sale numbers instead of slogans and you send them to the same area for years. A one-off mailing across a whole city costs more in printing and postage than it brings back.
- Are bought leads worth it?
- Sometimes, as a short bridge, if you have written down how you will follow up and you count appointments per dollar. You start every call as a stranger, and nothing you paid for stays with you once you stop.
- What does the video idea cost?
- Nothing if you post a raw phone video with the app's own captions. With Cutroom, a 30-second video is about 110 credits: 100 for the edit plus 20 per minute of export. Your first video is free. Lite is $19.99 a month for 1,250 credits.
Put your hours into the six ideas that cost nothing, and pay only where you need speed. Your first video is free.
Try for freeYour first video is free, no card, and you have 7 days to make it. It carries a Cutroom mark; Lite at $19.99/month removes it