How to Create a Real Estate Newsletter

A real estate newsletter is a kind of service that you can offer to your network of prospective clients and contacts, sharing important information and reminding them of your expertise and value in the industry. It’s also a great way to reach out while keeping the focus off of yourself — because we all know that unnecessary contact is a surefire way to inadvertently burn up all your hard-earned goodwill. 

Unlike social media, a real estate email (or print) newsletter allows you to directly contact people that are waiting to hear from you, and they don’t even have to be online to see it when you push send. Even if they don’t read it immediately, newsletters with valuable information are often kept or printed out for reference, which gives you even more opportunities to get yourself in front of your growing audience.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Define Your Goals and Pick a Platform

While you could create each real estate email newsletter from scratch, meticulously designing a layout and plugging in information until everything’s just right, you’re better off going with a trusted real estate newsletter service. They’ll have templates and designs ready to go, as well as additional functionality that allows you to track open and interaction rates. 

 

Depending on what your goals are — such as ease of use, automation or lead generation — the platform you choose should reinforce your brand and how you typically engage with your audience. For example, if your audience is full of families in suburban areas, you probably don’t want a real estate newsletter that’s focused on luxury apartments and urban living.

That said, if your network consists of tons of street addresses, you might want to consider a print and mail newsletter service. Emails might be quick and easy, but nothing quite matches the staying power and attention of regular mail. The best newsletter providers do both, giving you templates for email and mailing, so be sure to check out your options before you move forward.

2. Gather Your Content

If you’re sending out a real estate newsletter, you need to have something to say. While a template makes presentation a snap, you’ll lose readers as quickly as you add them if you don’t have anything interesting or valuable to say. First and foremost, that means matching your content to your audience, but it’s also about introducing your audience to unique and compelling information.

Here are some popular content ideas that we incorporate into our content for our clients if you’re not sure where to start with your real estate newsletter:

  • Expert advice
  • Recipes and homeownership tips
  • How-tos and educational content
  • Seasonal and holiday information

Other content that helps make a newsletter pop are:

  • Community calendars and local events
  • Local neighborhood market analysis and information
  • Property videos

3. Choose a Template and Add Your Content

Once you have your content and your preferred platform decided, browse your template options, keeping in mind your audience and the type of content you’ll be sharing. Since your newsletter will be sent monthly or on a similar schedule, you’ll want to be consistent in your branding and look so that your audience can build that trust with you even if you’re not actively engaged with them.

In general, real estate newsletter templates have three primary callouts: the header (also referred to as a banner sometimes), headlines and the content. The header acts as sort of a unifying umbrella, setting the stage for future iterations of your newsletter, whether printed or emailed, while the headlines introduce each informational section and the body content reaffirms the claims of each heading.

By gathering your content up front, you’ll be able to better arrange your real estate newsletter with a natural and interesting flow that encourages an active look.

4. Personalize the Template

After adding your content, you’ll want to personalize your newsletter template for better engagement with your audience and email list. Most platforms make this easy as long as you have names and associated emails and addresses, but the idea is to populate specific fields such as a “Hi Jack,” or “Hi Jill,” introduction at the beginning of the newsletter when possible.

It might seem corny or cheesy, but admit it — you’re more likely to read something that specifically calls out your name on it than something addressed to everyone and no one.

The Better Way

If all of that sounds hard, it’s because it is. Creating a real estate newsletter from zero is a lot of work and it involves building an audience, working with templates and creating valuable content on a regular basis. For most of us, there’s hardly enough time to get through the day as is — where are you ever going to find the time to not only learn the skills, but engage in newsletter creation month after month?

The good news is that we’ve got you covered. At Ready-to-Go Newsletters, we’ll help you create and send your newsletters so you’re getting them out the door. Our real estate newsletter subscription service puts interesting and engaging newsletters that are ready to be sent right in your hands. Customize your newsletters as much or as little as you’d like, and we’ll take care of the rest. 

Click here to request a sample or join the many other real estate agents that leverage real estate marketing newsletters to help expand their real estate business.