realtor

Leads…. all agents want them and just about everyone pays for them. A lead is like gold and a solid lead is even more valuable than that. So, it makes sense that agents and brokers would pay for an actual, real lead. I mean, at the very least this is a few thousand dollars, and that’s nothing to sneeze at.

Where do leads come from?

When you start off in real estate a lot of the leads will come directly from your brokerage. Your managing broker may allow you to take a couple of the leads that are cold calls, or those that just simply call into the office looking for information about the property and are not currently working with an agent. However, this is not the most reliable source and because most of us are working from home anyway, no one’s going to be sitting at the desk in a vacant office anyway. This is where agents need to get a little bit more creative.

Friends and family.

New agents are likely to get some of their first listings from friends and family. Even if you, as a new agent, don’t have a lot of experience, these are the folks that are likely to give you your first shot at the business. But from here, you can build your book of business through referrals, friends of friends, and if you’re good enough, your reputation will proceed you and you’ll naturally get referrals.

I have one agent that doesn’t have a website and has never advertised online a day in her life, yet being in the business for nearly 30 years, she has a steady flow of referrals and leads that come in every month making her at least $250,000 each year.

Now, I don’t necessarily recommend that for everyone. Remember, she’s been doing this for three decades. For those that are either new in the business or have been in it for a few years, you may not have built out your book of business just yet and therefore are looking for leads wherever you can.

If you’ve been in the real estate industry for any amount of time, you’ve probably already received spam phone calls, emails, and cold calls telling you that they have leads to give you hand over fist. But, those necessarily aren’t that reliable either. Good leads, solid leads, ones from people that have actually given you legitimate name, phone number, and email, are like gold and this is why a lot of places like Realtor.com and Zillow.com choose to sell these to potential agents.

But, which is better? It can be a crapshoot throwing money at a potential lead funnel not knowing whether or not those leads are actually going to close. And of course, you need to buy the lead first and as you know in real estate, you may not be able to collect on that lead for at least a month or more.

How Leads Work

Zillow.com has a service called Premier Agent that agents and brokers can sign up for that allows them to have an ad placement on property listings in particular ZIP Codes that they choose, top placement on agent finders, exposure across other affiliated sites and highlight reviews on your agent profile.

All of this allows for clients and consumers to visually see you and your services more often and more prominent eventually inciting a lead. When an interested buyer clicks on a listing, they will see that agent’s name beside it regardless of who the actual listing agent is. The buyer would then reach out to that agent to see the property.

Zillow has a variety of payment options either month-to-month or within a certain month contract and the cost of each lead depends on the average price of homes in the ZIP Code and location the agent chooses. Most agents pay anywhere from $30-$75 per 1000 impressions, meaning the number of times their contact information is presented to a buyer or client.

They also recommend paying for at least 5000 impressions per month to get the most bang for your marketing bucks. Even if just 1% of folks that see your impression contact you, that could give you a return of about $100 per lead, clearly an effective and appropriate return.

Realtor.com has a program called Connections Plus and sends out a lead to all the agents in a specific area. Whichever agent contacts the lead first has the best chance of getting the deal. Those that sign up for this type of program get automated email and text responses to their potential lead, they are allowed to track data from up to 150 different lead sources in their CRM system, they can add agents from a team into the database and share the leads with the team, and there provided all information about the lead including contact information and their recent searches.

Both companies highly recommend each agent qualifies their own lead as they cannot guarantee that this will be an actual lead that will follow through to completion.

Realtors Connection Plus is slightly less expensive than Zillow but it will also depend on the location in which you are farming and whether you’re paying extra for additional leads or more surefire leads versus colder ones. Realtor.com sends all of these cooler leads or nonexclusive leads to all the agents in a particular ZIP Code based on a first-come, first-served situation. These nonexclusive leads are also less expensive but exclusive leads, allow agents to pay to be the only agent in a specific ZIP Code.

If you’re the only agent a client is reaching out to, chances are you’re the one that’s going to get the deal. Most of these nonexclusive leads start at about $200 a month while exclusive leads cost $1000 a month. (These fees can change so it’s important to check with current listings and fee structures.)

Which is better?

Naturally, Realtor.com has more monthly users than Zillow based on the fees. However, both websites receive a lot of traffic and can be a great source of leads regardless. Just about everybody under the sun knows about Zillow.com with Realtor.com being a close second and of course, the site that gets the most traffic will naturally get the most leads. However, Zillow.com also allows for sale by owner or FSBO listings and Realtor.com does not so you’re likely to have even more potential options for clients.

The key in real estate is to find what works for you. Not everything will work for everyone. It’s important to throw a whole bunch of rocks into the pond and see what works. Find a social media that works for you, a marketing outlet, and a lead generation tool. And of course, for the best service, support, and future in real estate, join eXp Realty. Regardless of whether you get your leads, the support and backup you need to be a successful agent really comes from a fantastic brokerage.