Public Relations emphasis
In August of 2022, I decided to enroll in a real estate course and take the Idaho Commission Real Estate exam to earn my salesperson license. Since then, I’ve been working under Idaho Agents Real Estate while finishing up my last few semesters of school. Because I work as a 1099 employee, I realized that working as a salesperson in real estate is very much a business and as such, requires a brand image and marketing strategy.
I plan on continuing my work in real estate as I prepare for graduate studies. And so I dedicated this last semester to build a business that could continue to expand and I could sustain myself through. My goal was to establish a digital presence through a website, blog, and social media, build a consistent and trustworthy brand image, and connect with potential prospects in SE Idaho.
The first step was to design a branding guide. I met with my broker to review my plans and to discuss any ethics and guidelines that I needed to follow. The criteria I were given were to continue using my brokerage logo and color schemes. I documented the logos color schemes and chose 2 new fonts. I used this branding guide as my source to establish consistency across my designs and digital presence.
I designed new business cards following my branding guide. The goal that I have with all of my designs is to translate a minimalist and down-to-earth personality. With this in mind, I used my brokerage colors for accent on a white background. The time that I allocated to the designing portion of my project (branding guide and business cards) and meeting with my broker for resources, updates, and revisions was about 6 hours.
When I began my project, I didn’t have any digital presence for my business. I signed up for the Pro Premier plan through WIX and built a website, Emma Smith Real Estate. Because I hang my license under my brokerage, I needed to ensure that its’ logo was on the header of every page. I established this website as my personal business page and included my brokerage information.
I connected with my clients and gathered reviews for a testimonials page, wrote a short bio for my home page, and a more detailed bio for my about page. I also spent a large portion of time designing my site specifically for mobile view. The total allotment of time that I spent in building and designing my website, taking new professional photos, and writing content, made up about 20 hours.
Website (desktop view)
The majority of work on my project went into a blog that I had started in early February. My niche is real estate investment and as a means to market my business and generate leads, I decided to share tips and resources on how to begin investing.
I created a blog, Real Estate Investment for Beginners, through Substack and posted 6 weekly articles on the fundamentals and how-to’s of investing in real estate. I created a section on my website with featured articles and a link to my blog. The time I spent in researching weekly topics and keyword trends, writing, and editing amounted to about 4 hours a week/24 hours total.
Blog page on my website:
I designed a handout which highlighted 3 articles I had written for my blog and distributed them during my presentation at the Communication Senior Showcase. I included my contact information and a QR code that linked directly to my blog where they could continue reading the posts included on the handout.
I created two QR codes to share in my presentation. One was linked directly to my website and one was linked to my blog and was included on my newsletter handout.
During the course of this project and through establishing a digital presence, I’ve connected with 2 new clients. Creating a digital presence with a consistent brand and image has been advantageous to me connecting with people who are interested in real estate. Through my business, I’ve been able to share my passion for investment and passion for helping people reach their real estate goals.
As I continue to market myself through updates on my blog and sharing accomplishments with clients, I plan to continue establishing a trustworthy business here in SE Idaho and build my clientele.