What is the most common mistake that real estate professionals including Realtors and investors make when running Google ads? As a digital marketing agency specializing in real estate PPC ads, we know the answer for sure. The most common mistake they make is to promote a completely ineffective landing page.
Using a high-converting landing page is one of the most important aspects of a successful Google Ads campaign for real estate, or any other industry for that matter. Most real estate agents and investors focus on targeting the right keywords and optimizing their bidding strategy, but only a few of them pay attention to the landing page they are promoting.
The reasons are obvious. While keyword and bidding settings can be controlled and adjusted from within the Google Ads dashboard itself (with just a few clicks), you have to go the extra mile to create a high-converting landing page. I have seen that most real estate agents use their brokerage’s real estate website and don’t have the permission to add fully customized pages. And those who have full control over the design and development of their website don’t have enough technical knowledge and experience to design and build landing page.
Whatever the reason is, it’s extremely important to understand that you will end up wasting money if you don’t promote a landing page that immediately captures the attention of your prospective clients and compels them to take the action you want them to take (which includes sharing their contact information).
In this guide, I am going to discuss some of the most important aspects of a real estate landing page and how to make it effective for your PPC campaigns:
Table of Contents
What is a real estate landing page?
You are probably already aware what a landing page is. Here is a brief explanation:
When you promote an offer or your service with Google Ads, you can drive traffic to any page on your website. The users click on your ad and are directed to the page where they can sign up for the offer or service in exchange for sharing their contact information including email address and phone number. This page where the users sign up is called a landing page.
Cut down Google PPC cost with landing page optimization
You can substantially cut down on your PPC cost by optimizing your landing pages:
Read Also: Definitive Guide to Lowering Real Estate PPC Cost in 2022
Here is how Google puts it:
What it basically means is that the kind of experience the users have after arriving at your landing page after clicking an ad will directly/indirectly impact the following things:
- The position of your ad: For the same amount of ad spend, your ad will get displayed more prominently if your landing page provides a better user experience than other advertisers.
- More value for money: Since your will get displayed at a better position, you will get more clicks and conversions for the same amount of money.
- A better conversion rate: A good user experience directly relates to the conversion rate. It goes without saying that if your landing page compels your users to take the desired action, you will have a good conversion rate.
Now that you know what a landing page is and why it is important, let’s discuss some of the most important things you need to keep in mind when building one for your Google Ads PPC campaigns:
Message matching
If your ad headline and ad copy say you are offering a free property valuation, the landing page that the users arrive at after clicking on your ads should be focused on that offer only. Don’t confuse your visitors with other offers such as newest listing, closing cost calculator, a free eBook on how to sell your home fast and for top dollar etc.
Create a different ad group and a landing page for each offer or service you are promoting.
If you want your users to sign up to get a free eBook, this is what your landing page should promote, not free property valuation.
This is what called ‘Message Matching’ in the PPC world.
You might believe that by offering different things on the landing page, you will increase the conversion rate as the user would opt for at least one of the offers or services. For this reason, many real estate professionals promote the home page of their website where they have everything – new listings, featured listings, FSBOs, free EMI calculator, free property evaluation, neighborhood guides etc.
But believe me, this strategy is going to hurt your Ad Rank. You will end up paying more money to Google than you should.
In essence, your ad copy and the landing page copy should complement each-other, instead of confusing the users.
5 types of landing pages to have for real estate Google Ads
If you are in the process of building your real estate website, it makes sense to create a few landing pages so that you can use them any time you want in the future for all types of PPC platforms including Google Ads, Facebook and Instagram Ads, and LinkedIn Ads.
If you already have a website, you can hire a designer and/or developer to create these landing pages for you. Alternatively, you can sign up for a drag-and-drop landing page builder which allows you to create a landing page on your own even if you have no technical knowledge.
Here are a few different types of landing pages to crate for Google Ads:
Real estate landing page for buyers
- Free neighborhood guides (including best school districts)
- Latest listings
- Listings in a specific budget (for examples, homes/condos under $150,000)
- Home search
- Featured listings
- Pocket Listings
- Listing Alerts sign up
- Relocation guide
- Real estate market trends
- Mortgage guide + EMI calculator (with a disclaimer)
Real estate landing page for sellers
- Home value landing pages
- Complimentary staging
- Free home selling guide
- Real estate market reports
- Downsizing and upsizing
Real estate landing page for investors
- Sell home for cash
- Find the best real estate investment deals in your area
- Real estate investment guides
- Distressed seller guides
Important elements of a real estate landing page
A landing page consists of many different elements. While which elements you should focus on depend on the offer you are promoting with Google Ads, one of the most common landing pages used for real estate PPC is property listings page. Let’s discuss some of the most important elements on a property listing landing page:
Don’t promote your home page
Most real estate agents have property listing widget on the top of their home page. For this reason, they promote the home page to capture home buyer leads. Well, I am not saying it’s a completely wrong strategy, but you can boost conversion rate by promoting a customized landing page depending on what type of property/home buyers you are targeting. A customized landing page will help you create a headline, sub-headline and text throughout the landing page that speaks to your target audience.
For example, you can create a listing page that targets people looking for starter homes. Now you can write a customized headline, sub-headline and text that speaks to your target audience. You can also have search options that are relevant to your audience already selected. You can have all the most important things listed to generate search results that are relevant.
In the text, you can promote yourself as a real estate agent specializing in helping people looking for starter homes. This will not be possible if you promote your home page, unless you have an entire website dedicated to buyers from this market segment.
Images are the most important aspect of your landing page
You are selling real estate which is a very expensive acquisition for most people. For this reason, your landing page should have stunning visuals that help your target audience envision the kind of lifestyle after becoming a homeowner.
Plush greenery, views of the ocean, and beautiful homes with stunning curb appeal and interiors evoke emotions that can help you generate more leads for the same PPC budget.
Relevant headline, sub-headline, and text
The headline and sub-headline that you use for your landing page should closely match your ad’s headline and sub-headline. The same goes true for the landing page copy.
When users see your ad and click on it, they expect to get more information on the landing page about the offer or service that you are promoting. The landing page copy should not confuse the visitors. For example, if you are promoting starter homes and the users arrive at a landing page with generic listings, they will feel disappointed.
Your real estate landing page should build trust
There may be hundreds of other real estate agents in your target zip codes, so why should a home buyer or seller pick you over them?
Real estate is such an expensive acquisition that people want to work with someone who they can trust. You can build trust with testimonials and social proof.
Promote your specializations, skills and neighborhood expertise throughout the landing page, but if your claims are not backed by genuine testimonials and reviews, you will find it difficult to build trust with your target audience. Here are three things that may help you establish rapport with landing page visitors:
- A video in which you explain your expertise and offer
- Testimonials videos from past clients
- Reviews and testimonials from different websites and social media platforms such as Zillow, Trulia, and Facebook.
Focus on making CTA and contact form effective
Your call-to-action (button) and the lead capture form should be used not only for collecting contact information, but also for boosting conversions. Strategically placing CTAs and contact forms at multiple places on the landing page is very important.
Real estate landing page examples
Here are a few real estate landing page examples that I really like:
HomeLight
Below is the the Google Ad they are promoting.
In the ad copy, they promise an accurate free value calculator. What makes this offer really stand out is the fact that the visitors can get accurate valuation based on current market trends by answer 7 simple questions. The ad copy then tries to build trust by stating the staggering amount of market data the estimates are based and ratings.
Now visit the HomeLight landing page.
The landing page stays true to the promises made in the ad copy. There is a simple and easy-to-use calculate on the top and below that, a CTA which offers the visitors to get accurate value of their property by answer seven simple questions. The page then goes into a detailed explanation how the estimates are accurate. There is also an FAQ section and reviews and testimonials section. In a nutshell, the page has all the elements of a great real estate landing page.
Flyhomes
The Flyhomes landing page has a simple call-to-action (CTA) which makes collecting information about the leads extremely easy and intuitive.
Once the visitors click on the CTA buttons – strategically placed at several places on the landing page, Flyhomes uses a multi-step lead form strategy, asking leads to share the details of their home buying plan by selecting the area they are looking to buy in, budget, timeline, down payment etc.
This makes the landing page extremely engaging.
Looking for a customized real estate landing page?
If you are looking for a customized real estate landing page for your Google Ads PPC or Facebook Ads or fix the existing one, do get in touch with us.
Our real estate digital marketing experts will build a customized landing page, guaranteed to boost conversions, and help you get more leads for the same ad spend. No recurring monthly fee!
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