Don’t Be Left in the Dark

You’ve just won a listing for a commercial property — congratulations! Now, the real work of commercial real estate marketing begins. The task of selling or leasing a commercial property for the highest price can be challenging, to say the least. Even in a hot market, it’s essential to use the latest strategies and techniques to keep your client happy and to gain recognition in an often-saturated market.

The most obvious of these strategies is to publish listings on LoopNet, the most heavily trafficked, online, commercial real estate marketplace. Other digital listing services are also worthwhile, including CCIM, TotalCommercial, and CityFeet. Even the residential MLS has a specific section for listing commercial properties. When publishing any listing, you need to take ample time to create a highly-detailed description that highlights specific characteristics, as well as square footage, cap rate, and building class. Photos are also very important.

Beyond publishing online listings, there are many other ways to get your property out there for potential buyers to see. The following are 10 of the most promising ways now to get top dollar while establishing yourself as a top-performing broker.

A Marketing Package That Stands Out

It’s unlikely you’ll be able to garner the attention you want for a property without a high-quality marketing package that tell the listing’s story and engages qualified buyers. It’s well worth the investment to create a package that helps your listing stand out from the crowd. Carefully think about what makes your listing and your services unique. This is the story you should sell. Don’t scrimp on design or photos. It’s the visuals, as well as the clear content, that will propel leads to take the next step.

An Eye-Catching Property Website

With the development of easy-to-use templates, any commercial property agent or broker can launch a website that provides the details of the listing. This can be a landing page on an existing site or a single property website. Remember to use tools like Google Analytics to track how many people are viewing the site and where they are originating from. In some cases, it may make sense to “gate” details about the property by requiring registration to access them.

Email Marketing Campaign

Creating and nurturing a database of principals and other brokers is essential to your long-term success. If you have an extensive list of names, create an email blast to provide information to a targeted group of individuals who may be interested in the listing.

Targeted Direct Mail

Despite many technology gurus’ predictions, direct mail remains alive and well, helping many commercial real estate professionals make sales while building brand recognition. While sending out postcards and flyers can be more expensive than most digital marketing efforts, they also can be far more effective in targeting a specific group of qualified buyers. Don’t have an extensive internal database yet? You can obtain build targeted mailing lists to reach specific types of decision-makers who are in the market for commercial properties.

Display Advertising

You definitely don’t want to discount the effectiveness of a well-placed sign. In some cases, brokers report that nearly one-quarter of their inbound inquiries are the result of well-placed sales or lease signs. Along with signage, ad campaigns in local, regional, and even national publications can help increase exposure of your property while establishing your name as a service representative.
Online Ads Digital marketing strategies continue to gain popularity in commercial real estate. Once you’ve established a website, consider creating a Google AdWords campaign to drive online traffic to your page. Once you begin to understand the nuances of digital marketing on Google, try experimenting with alternative search engines, such as Bing and Yahoo!.

Social Media

Along with PPC campaigns, you can test the water with your commercial property marketing by building strong online communities on Facebook, Linkedin, and other social media sites. These interactive channels are a great place to showcase quality photos and descriptions or to engage directly with targeted audiences about listings.

Public Relations

Many businesses wonder why one company gets lots of exposure while plenty of others do not. One of the secrets of commercial real estate marketing is proactive public relations. While it can be beneficial to hire a public relations firm to help you in your quest to promote a listing, you can also generate exposure by connecting with local media yourself or by looking for media opportunities on sites such as Help a Reporter Out. By answering journalists’ queries, you’ll gain the opportunity to increase exposure for your business and your listings.

Blog Content

Once you’ve created a detailed property description for an online listing service, you can repurpose the content to create a blog post and provide additional details and status updates throughout the listing’s time on the market. By optimizing your blog for certain geo-centric keyword phrases, you can drive additional traffic to your site as a result.

Cold Calling

The best commercial real estate professionals spend considerable time nurturing their databases of potential buyers. When there’s a new listing, you can segment a more targeted group from this list who may be interested in your property and call them directly. Not only will you have the chance to contact someone who may be looking for what you’re selling, but you may also get insights into future business or obtain valuable new leads. Cold calling is typically not thought of as a particularly innovative marketing strategy, but it remains one of the most effective because, at the end of the day, commercial real estate is all about building relationships with others.

For anyone in the business of selling or leasing commercial properties, there are plenty of opportunities for marketing listings. Often, it takes a multi-pronged approach to garner the necessary attention to make a sale. Each listing is different and may require a slightly different strategy. However, with the mix of digital and offline tools that are now available to anyone in the business, even those who are just starting out can successfully get noticed in a continuously evolving marketplace. The key is to showcase
each listing in the best light, use a variety of marketing channels, and diligently follow up on each and every lead.