I created a content calendar with 28 different and engaging content ideas to help realtors and brokerages create better content on their Instagram and TikTok moving forward!
As pictured below…
Now that you received your content calendar, you might be confused about what this means and how you can efficiently grow your business by creating content.
How to create engaging Instagram stories
Instagram stories are a fantastic way to get attract and maintain free engagement with your audience— as long as you keep it fun, light and invite your viewers in to share their opinions! Trust me, you’ll want them involved and engaged with your business, rather than a local competitor’s.
Apply these three tips next and I’ll show you with a quick example how you could recycle these content ideas all through your stories, posts, reels and TikToks without mentally exhausting yourself.
1. Tell us a story!
Most of us are watching and posting Instagram stories to either share an extraordinary experience, bring awareness to an important topic or keep tabs on somebody (that we were probably not supposed to keep tabs on).
2. Add auto-captions
When you’re creating an Instagram story that has any kind of voice audio, it’s in your best interest to take advantage of Instagram’s auto-caption feature. Chances are your viewer is watching your story (in conjunction with anybody else they’re following) with the sound off and occupied with another activity (watching TV, with friends etc.).
Getting anybody to fully commit their attention to you (even for a 15-second story) is now considered a long-gone luxury. Learn to adapt and overcome. Otherwise, your account will look like it was stuck in 2016, and we all know how fast momentum dies on social media.
3. Use Stickers
Validate your viewers’ opinions, ask questions, create polls, share your location and allow your audience to vote for what they want to see next. Instagram values activity and your ability to keep users on their platform. Instagram is a business, much like TikTok and Twitter… meaning that the algorithm favours creators with the capability to sell (whether it’s a service or product).
Ask yourself if you honestly believe posting a “Just Sold” story could ever be considered shareable to your viewer’s personal network, instead share tips that benefit first-time prospective homebuyers in your Province/State.
Using the “How to budget for your first down payment” example…
You see how this story is tailored towards grabbing your viewer’s attention rather than reminding them of your selling capabilities.
Position yourself as a real estate thought leader rather than a savvy salesperson. How can your audience stay captivated through a 15 second story? Is this content valuable enough to share with their friends and family, ultimately growing your sphere of influence?
If you’re already providing these tips for your clients during your consultations, you should be creating content that prospective clients actively search for. This will not only improve overall SEO performance, but it will cement in credibility with future clients as the “go-to” realtor whenever they’re ready to buy or sell.
How to create attention-worthy Instagram posts
Do you have an Instagram and TikTok in hopes of attracting more clients? Congrats, you’re a content creator.
So think like a content creator.
Apply these three tips when developing your posts to garner valuable attention and attract your ideal audience.
1. Narrow down your objectives
Why does your account matter on Instagram? Why did your followers choose to follow you? When we see accounts in our niche with tons of followers and engagement, we can’t help but wonder what makes them more valuable than (let’s be honest) our accounts struggling to even get a few pity likes.
I’ll tell you why…
They understand their metrics and study the best practices to grow their performance. Moving forward, understand that Instagram is not an appropriate outreach platform anymore.
Are you looking for more followers? Engagement? Story shares? Post saves? or for the algorithm to favour your account, so you could appear on the explore page?
When you narrow down your objectives, you establish what your ideal target market looks like. Make peace with the reality of BILLIONS of people in the world doing exactly what you’ve been doing while having the same dream.
Start your competitive analysis, what’s your value proposition? Casting a wide net in hopes of attracting the most views are counterproductive, you don’t have the bandwidth to service everybody and when you show social media time and time again, that you’re desperate for views from everybody and anybody the algorithm won’t know where to place you.
2. Identify your Ideal Audience
Securing the attention of a small group of people is productive and what’s highly recommended from leading Social Media Managers. However, pandering to a large group in hopes of converting them is an unrealistic waste of time.
Who’s your audience? What are their demographics and psychographics? You are your own brand; how do you speak to your clients?
A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well.
Jeff Bezos
From the trillionaire himself, understanding the importance of branding can set you apart. Separate yourself from the realtors who are cold calling their whole contacts’ list, to appearing in front of the right people at the right time.
Create a mood board using Canva or Pinterest. Does your Instagram show consistency? Pinpoint your specific brand colours, fonts and content pillars to appear as a professional with an ownable tone.
3. Sell without selling
Sell a lifestyle! Instagram is a visual platform engineered to inspire individuals to aspire to a particular type of lifestyle. Your viewers are likely on Instagram to unwind and relax after a hard day of work; trust me, they won’t appreciate an aggressive sales pitch.
When you post, tell us a story through a cohesive aesthetics.
Keep your content high quality, otherwise it’s an eyesore. Publishing low quality images and infographics won’t only destroy any chance of share or save-ability, you’re wasting valuable feed real estate by posting something nobody wants to look at.
3 things this post did right…
1. They know their audience
It’s easy to assume that this realtor is located in Maine and primarily works with solo buyers and couples looking to purchase their first home.
2. It’s shareable content
This creator knows their value, creating this kind of content in the form of “frequently asked questions” that her clients already asked her. When prospective clients scroll past this post on their explore page, they’re likely to share this with their personal network.
3. You’re keeping users on the platform
Instagram values content that can maintain the attention of their users, ultimately keeping your prospective clients on the app longer. The “swipe” feature on this post allows viewers to absorb content in a digestible manner.
How to create watchable reels
One of the fastest ways to grow on Instagram is to create a reel.
Catchy short-form video content trumps any other attempt at reaching more impressions, due to pandemic infused shorter attention spans and the rise of TikTok.
Nonetheless, Instagram reels and TikToks should be debuted differently. Although you can repurpose your TikToks as Reel content, it’s in your best interest to create Reels with trending Instagram sounds and applications.
1. Post frequently in your niche
As mentioned earlier, what’s the purpose of your account if you don’t have a niche or ideal audience you’re looking to serve? You’re the master of your craft, if you’re comfortable speaking to your clients over FaceTime and calls, then you should be just as comfortable educating your audience through a reel.
2. Optimize your timing
Whether you’re using a trending sound, creating an informational video in hopes of it becoming shareable, or slowing/speeding up your content, you need to pay attention to the length of your reel and the timing of your content.
After listening to the concerns of creators, Instagram allowed their users to now to post reels over 15 seconds long (30-60 seconds now). Allowing realtors to pack in the knowledge they acquired in their career into digestible short clips.
3. Add a personal touch
Even with a trending sound, it’s always beneficial to add your own personal touch to your Reels.
Similar to TikTok, you can click on sounds to see who else created a reel using that specific sound. Feel free to add your own voiceover or remix another account’s reel to display your personality. This is a parasocial interaction, your viewers will instantly feel closer to you from getting to know you through the screen which helps in producing those like and trust feelings which all realtors can benefit from.
Although it’s always recommended to avoid creating controversial and sensitive content like sharing your opinions on religion or politics.
What makes this reel, a good reel?
It’s relatable
Both realtors and clients can empathize with this scenario, as it’s likely that they’ve been in similar positions. Increasing likeability as well as shareability (e.g. other realtors posting this on their stories with a laughing emoji).
Trending sounds
John took advantage of this trending sound to create short-form video content that’s easy to understand while adhering to what the trend initially relayed. Despite that it’s posted as an “Original Sound”, the sound was trending on TikTok and Instagram before John’s usage.
He knows his audience
John assumed that the majority of his following and prospective viewers consisted of his past clients, future clients, and his industry peers (Realtors, Real Estate Assistants, etc.); resulting in his audience reacted positively, upping his engagement and collecting over 20,000 views.
How to create high quality TikTok content
TikTok measures success differently from Instagram, although many creators choose to repurpose their TikToks as reels, both platforms bring different experiences.
Why should realtors use TikTok at all?
TikTok has a much more favourable algorithm, as it’s much easier to go viral on TikTok versus Instagram and other social media platforms. TikTok prefers repeatedly watched high-value content, while offering much more customizability with their AI filters and exclusive in-app video editing tools.
If we’re being completely honest, Instagram only started offering the option of creating their own in-app short-form video content after following the success of TikTok. Dominating app stores in 2021 as the most downloaded app in the world, boasting more than 656 million downloads with over 1 billion active users.
Using your calendar, apply these three practices below to make better TikToks to attract valuable leads.
1. Find your niche
As repeated before, you get nowhere aiming everywhere. When you niche down your content to only serve a definitive group sharing a common interest, you will continue appearing on their FYP (For You Page), increasing brand visibility and awareness.
What are your real estate districts? Are you qualified to work State or Province-wide? If not, would you prefer to narrow it down to a specific area? Are you an expert listing agent who’s uninterested in acquiring buyer clients? Do you primarily work with couples looking to downsize and find their ultimate retirement home?
2. Post frequently
I’ve witnessed accounts grow from 0 to hundreds of thousands of followers, from consistently posting TikToks using trending sounds, hashtags and interacting with other creators via stitch or duet.
But remember, it’s essential to keep your content authentic and easy to watch (and replay).
But do not post for the sake of posting. There’s nothing more cringe than watching a creator’s non-sensical content using an outdated Snapchat filter or unclear audio.
3. Network and Collaborate
The beauty of TikTok, is that it’s content-focused. Their intuitive algorithm rewards accounts who create communities. Although it’s possible to go viral on TikTok using trending sounds, it’s recommended to publish purposeful content meant to teach and inspire rather than solely lip syncing to the latest addition to the Euphoria soundtrack.
Don’t be afraid to offer your (professional) opinion as a response to your own comments or to provide a second opinion to another realtor’s content. Whether you’re a mortgage agent, realtor or prospective client, authentic interactions increases the potential of higher visibility.
Become a pioneer in your niche; what kind of safe space could you build?
e.g. Are you passionate about helping young professionals and families build generational wealth through purchasing real estate? Could you provide them with actionable strategies, teaching them how to budget for their first down payment or how to acquire their own real estate license?
How did this TikTok get almost 300k views?
She collaborated with experts in her niche
@Tatlondono was independently TikTok famous prior to her duet with @vay.namae, however this interaction garnered almost 45 thousand likes and just under 270 comments from users recognizing them both on their FYP.
Easy to follow captions
Never treat this channel like a blog, save the long copy for your website and keep your captions short, easy to understand and clear.
She used a trending sound
She created original content using the popularity of the sound to bump her TikTok up and receive more views when others searched through that applicable sound.