Working with a digital marketing agency can catapult your home builder brand, launch lead generation, and increase your bottom line. But hiring an agency isn’t a turnkey process. It takes coordination between the client and the agency. Each month at Power Marketing, we onboard clients. Our goal is to create a seamless process and take the pressure off, so our clients can go back to running their businesses. To have a successful campaign, digital marketing firms cannot operate under the “set it and forget it” structure. So, if you are planning on hiring a digital marketing agency, have these three elements in place once you get started:
1. Have an Accessible Point Person – The keyword is “accessible.” To have a successful project, you need an open line of communication. One of the biggest frustrations in the digital marketing world is creating a well-thought-out quarterly or annual campaign that doesn’t get approved. Typically business owners don’t fit the definition of “accessible.” Sure, there are business owners available to make decisions on a timely basis. But, most likely, business owners are consumed with P&Ls, payroll, assigning contractors, etc. The best positions are open communication are typically executive assistants and marketing coordinators. These positions have access to the decision-makers and are accessible.
2. Prepare The Sales Team – The goal of marketing is to increase revenue. Marketing isn’t a magic bullet. You suddenly aren’t bombarded with hundreds of leads. But there will be a steady growth of leads. Having your sales team prepared is paramount to converting these leads into sales. If you are using a CRM, set up a rotation for the salespeople. If you want a sales manager distributing leads, make sure those leads are assigned and responded to within ten minutes of inquiry. One of the biggest mistakes a homebuilder can make is waiting 24 hours to assign leads. Responding to a lead within five minutes will increase your chances 21x of turning them into a qualified lead as compared to waiting 30 minutes to reach out. If you think about it, when a potential customer submits a contact form, your product is top of mind. If you wait one hour, six hours, or 24 hours, your potential customer has drifted back to the world of power bills, kids, and grocery shopping. Or even worse, one of your competitors has beaten you to the punch.
3. Set KPIs and Be Realistic – A vital element of a successful business relationship is setting expectations. In digital marketing, these expectations can be challenging since you are dealing with SEO, PPC, email campaigns, display ads, and bounce rates, just to name a few integrated marketing strategies. Digital marketing is one of the best marketing tools because of the endless metrics available to evaluate performance. The trick is understanding what a good ROI is and what is a bad ROI. Some business owners expect instantaneous results. There are some programs providing instant leads. Typically these are short-term fixes and not long-term solutions. An excellent digital marketing program will have multiple elements such as content development, onsite SEO, social media marketing, email campaigns, and lead nurturing working together to drive your target audience to your website. Questions to ask:
- How long will it take to gain traction on SEO?
- What is a good number of qualified leads per month once we have SEO traction?
- What is a reasonable cost per lead if we decide to use Google Ads/PPC?
- What is a reasonable cost per lead for social media leads?
- What type of nurturing campaigns can you create to connect with potential customers that have shown interest in our product?
One Caveat, there is a direct correlation between the success of your campaign and your budget. I’ve worked with people spending $800 per month that wanted to rank #1 for every keyword associated with home builders in their city. This isn’t going to happen. Instead, we identified three long-tail keywords our home builder could rank for and started to process. When SEO is involved, it will take between 4 – 6 months to start ranking for your selected keywords. For home builders, SEO should be the focus of their long-term strategy.
Hiring a digital marketing firm should save you time, money and help you focus on your business. In addition, by correctly setting up the initial framework, you will save yourself headaches down the road.
Contact Power Marketing today to discuss your digital marketing plan for 2022.