You've got the lead, now what?

What Is Lead Nurturing?

Lead nurturing is the art (and science!) of commencing and maintaining a relationship with a lead through the sales funnel. Leading a prospect all the way from visiting your website (top of funnel) to handing them the keys to their new home (payday!) can mean months, if not years, of careful nurturing.

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The goal of lead nurturing is to be the agent who your lead calls when they’re ready to sign an agreement. Your careful stewardship of your relationship has led to that moment. It has taken patience, communication, consistency, and—most importantly—the ability to remain relevant and helpful.

The idea of nurturing every contact in your database might feel overwhelming. But understanding where your leads are in the funnel will help you go about this vital task in an efficient way.

Leads who are in the “awareness” stage, at the tip top of the funnel, need a lot less attention than leads in the conversion stage. Prioritising your focus will make your nurturing more effective and leave you plenty of time for your other real estate duties.

Let’s take a look at the tools and strategies you’ll need to master the art of real estate lead nurturing and reach the closing table.

Nurture Like an Expert

How do you stay out of the junk folder and top of mind for any real estate needs? You follow these three key tenets of touchpoints:

Personalise: Sprinkle in some personalised emails, texts, calls, social media messages, and letters. Send one to celebrate a birthday or congratulate the lead on their favourite sports team’s win.

Show your creativity: Originality drives engagement. Content that is interesting and unexpected makes people want to open, read, and follow your calls to action. This might not come easily, but taking the extra time to think outside of the box will pay off down the line in your nurturing journey.

Be authentic: Staying true to yourself (and true to your brand) makes nurturing all the easier. People are going to be drawn to you and engage with you if they feel like they’re getting to know the real you and not just a sales pitch.

Lead Nurturing Begins & Ends With Your CRM

Not everyone has a love affair with their customer relationship manager (CRM), but honestly, it’s your greatest partner in this mission to nurture and convert leads. Every tool we discuss below will be better optimised if you have a CRM that can track your communication and prompt your activities.

CRMs will enable you to collect relevant information on your leads, beyond their contact information. You should be able to add birthdays, anniversaries, kids’ names, social media accounts, even favourite sports teams. This type of meta information will help you as you establish long-term relationships.

CRMs can also help you organise and segment your contacts. Categorising your contacts into different types ensures that you’re sending the right content to the right recipients. Separate your contacts into smaller subgroups based on where they are in the funnel and the types of clients they are. This means you can send shorter, more targeted messages, more often.

Many CRMs will allow you to execute the bulk of your touchpoints directly from your dashboard. You can send email drip campaigns, text helpful listings, and even interact with a lead’s social media right from your CRM.

A solid CRM is also crucial to monitoring and evaluating your activities. Is what you’re doing converting leads to clients? Agents who can track their successes will save time and money capitalising on what works.

So before we talk about any nurturing strategies, the very first—and most important—step is to fall in love with your CRM.

Organising & Segmenting Your Contacts

Your CRM is full of dozens, if not hundreds, of potential leads. With your best-friend CRM, you can organise your contacts so you’re sending them the most targeted content, reaching out in the most effective way, and staying on schedule with your touchpoint cadence.

Here’s how we would recommend you segment your contacts, along with typical strategies for how often to reach out and the types of outreach that work best.

Lead Funnel	Stage	Touch Point	Activity
Want to buy/sell right now	Conversion	Daily	Call, SMS, Email
Actively considering buying or selling	Consideration	Twice a week	Call, SMS, Email
Passively considering buying/selling	Interest/ Consideration	Twice a month	Email, social media, direct mail, event invites
Undecided (on the fence)	Interest	Once a month	Email, social media, direct mail, event invites, phone call
Cold leads	Awareness	Once a quarter	Email, social media, direct mail, event invites

Automated & Personalised Lead Nurturing Tools

Nurturing is all about touchpoints, or the number of times you initiate contact with your leads. There are lots of different ways to reach out to your contacts, including email, SMS, social media, event invitations, and the good old-fashioned phone call.

Email Lead Nurturing

Everyone knows that email is a powerful tool for lead nurturing and conversion, but it’s surprising how many people get it wrong.

Agents often take a set-it-and-forget-it approach, creating automated email campaigns and blasting would-be clients with too much or the wrong type of information and then no personal follow-up. But with the right approach, email is still king.

Your emails should be a mix of content so your recipients don’t get bored. Campaigns should consist of anywhere from four to 10 different targeted emails.

You’ll want to space your emails out so there are several days or even a week in between, depending on your audience. You want that sweet spot between staying top of mind and driving people to the unsubscribe button.

The key to a solid drip campaign is to remember your goal: to create a lasting relationship that nurtures your leads over time. Your emails should lead to a call to action (CTA), such as an in-person meeting.

What to Send

You’ll need several different types of campaigns for your segmented buyers and sellers. Your automated campaigns should have a mix of appropriate, interesting, relevant, and helpful content. Here are some of our favourite email examples:

• Hot new listings

• Market data

• Community news

• Homes you’ve successfully sold

• Homebuyer resources

• Seller or homeowner tips

• Testimonials

• Why people love living in your community

• Blog posts from your site

• Newsletter featuring a combination of content

• Upcoming local events or business spotlights

Here’s an example of an email drip campaign cadence targeting passively looking homebuyers:

Email #1: Welcome, introduce yourself, provide a few new listings

Email #2: Light and carefree check-in, offer a home buying resource

Email #3: Email with a video (maybe a listing tour)

Email #4: Check in with a CTA to get coffee and chat about potential properties and next steps in the process

Automated & Personal Text Messages (SMS)

Your SMS strategy should be similar to the one you use for email, so make sure your audience is segmented and correctly targeted.

Be creative, consistent, and above all, brief.

Remember, text is a slightly more personal form of communication and it’s easier to overstep with recipients. That’s why we encourage you to get permission from your leads to text them. You can do this in a lot of different ways, but it goes a long way in setting the stage for a lasting relationship.

Here’s a great text script that tacitly asks permission:

Hi [lead’s first name], this is [your first name]. I haven’t heard from you in a while and was wondering if you’re still in the market to buy a home in [your area]. I’d love to chat with you if you are. Let me know.

What to Send

There are endless possibilities, but be sure to pick one that corresponds with where your lead is in the funnel.

For example, SMS is a fantastic way to send a relevant listing that just went live. Check out our best text message scripts to send or this six-day text campaign for new leads.

Here’s one of our favourites for reaching out to a cold lead. It’s short, friendly, and eager to offer help without being pushy:

Hi [lead’s first name], this is [your first name]. I hope you’re doing well! I was wondering if you were still interested in purchasing a home. Please let me know if you are, but if not, feel free to reach out to me when you are ready. Wishing you all the best.

Social Media Lead Nurturing

We often think of social media as a way to market ourselves. But consider this: Your leads use social media to reveal themselves.

Often, their accounts tell you exactly who they are and what they value in life.

While email and text messaging are traditional (and proven) ways of staying top of mind, engaging through social media is just as important.

It can be as easy as commenting on prospects’ posts, sending a relevant article, or tagging someone in a post about a new restaurant you think they’d like.

Keep the conversation going and we bet you won’t just be friends on social media, but maybe also friends in real life.

Phone Calls

In terms of touchpoints, there are few better ways to reach out than by calling. Calm your nerves and dial that phone.

Set yourself up for success by making your call quick, courteous, and respectful of their time. The goal should be a casual reminder that you’re there and ready to help with any real estate needs.

The farther the lead is down the funnel, the more specific your CTA can be. Maybe turn a quick check-in into a cup of coffee on Thursday. And a listing appointment on Friday.

Direct Mail Lead Nurturing

Before there were phone calls, there were—you guessed it—letters in the mail.

Direct mail shouldn’t be overlooked as a tool in lead nurturing. Consider this the easiest touchpoint in your arsenal. Send out postcards, flyers, even a quarterly recipe.

Take it a step further and send out handwritten notes to warm leads further down the funnel.

Events

One of the key steps in lead nurturing is to get face time. Leads are far more likely to enlist your services when they’ve met you in person.

Give them that opportunity by hosting an event.

Of course, events can be expensive, so don’t go too crazy, but maybe host a class on the homebuying process or an annual holiday party. Even inviting leads to a local open house can be a great way to meet in person and show off your real estate expertise.

Bringing Everything Together

Within your database, there may already be a wealth of leads waiting to be utilised. However, bombarding a new lead's inbox with irrelevant content will only leave them cold and disinterested.

Instead, consider crafting a considerate nurturing campaign, leveraging the power of your reliable CRM. This approach will help foster a warm and enduring relationship, ultimately transforming a recent website visitor into a satisfied client.

Lastly, it is crucial to recognise that authentic lead nurturing is the most effective. Trust your instincts when designing your lead nurturing campaigns. Now, go ahead and embark on the journey of nurturing those leads!