Everyone has a different opinion about Realtor advertising strategies and how you should market your real estate services. Most experts tell you to make yourself (your brand) unique and different compared to your competition. But what they don’t tell you is that you should never, ever compete on “price” alone if you want to be a top producing Realtor. It’ll put you out of business faster than you got into it!

Some real estate agents think that if they brand themselves as the “discount Realtor”, in their Realtor advertising, that they’ll get more and more business and increase their income. False; don’t get caught up in this myth.

You can give cash back to buyers and discounts to listing clients until the cows come home but guess what? There will always be another Realtor out there who will undercut you on price, always! Even when it comes down to a client deciding between two great “discount Realtors”, the client’s final decision is based on everything but price, 99% of the time.

When it comes to Realtor advertising, think about this…….

If a client has a choice between two “discount Realtors” who are within a couple of dollars of each other, unless that client is super sensitive to price, they’re going to base their decision on the relationship they have with each Realtor; how they “feel” about them. How they “feel” comes down to the brand and how well that brand has been marketed to them.

You don’t believe me that price is a stupid point to compete on in your Realtor advertising? How about this…..

What is one of the most plentiful, free resources we have in the USA? Water.

How many different bottled water companies are there? About a “bazillion”, right? Just look in the grocery store aisle and see all the different shapes, styles, colors and names of these bottles of water. Consumers choose to buy something that’s otherwise free just because a company throws it in a bottle and puts a story behind it.

People are buying that bottled water’s “brand”, not the water itself. They believe the story, the brand, which the company is selling the bottled water with. People could get this stuff for free but they choose to spend their hard earned income on it because of how it makes them “feel”.

And to top it off, just about all the bottled water companies are selling their water for the same price. They’re not making sales because it’s cheap; it’s stinkin’ expensive to buy bottled water! They’re making sales because of the story, the brand, which they’re marketing it with.

That’s exactly what you need to do in your Realtor advertising! Realtors like us are a dime a dozen. Sure, some of us are more experienced than others but consumers don’t buy that unless we sell it to them as our brand in our Realtor advertising and marketing.

Even the real estate start-up superstar, Redfin.com, markets their brand as “highest in customer satisfaction”, even though their entire business model is based on giving buyers a rebate of 50% of their commission on every deal. Redfin’s business model is about price, yet they are purposely not branding themselves as that. This is exactly how intentional you need to be with your Realtor advertising.

BuySideRealty.com is a perfect example of the competition trying to out-price Redfin. Instead of giving only 50% of a rebate to buyers, they decided to give a 75% rebate.

So how did they do? Terrible.

They couldn’t get any traction and ended up merging with another company. They were able to out-price the competition but couldn’t last for any length of time. Redfin’s “brand” was too strong!

Hopefully you understand how competing on price in your Realtor advertising is a recipe for disaster. At best, you’ll earn a living for a little while before you’re beat out by your competition. Instead, define your brand, what you stand for, and market that in all your Realtor advertising. That’s what will make you a top producing Realtor earning the big bucks!

Josh F. Sanders is a Real Estate Broker and the Founder of Shiloh Street University in Seattle, WA, an online marketing school designed specifically for Realtors and agents.

SSU’s purpose is to “Create Wealthy Agents through World-Class Marketing” by providing step-by-step video marketing tutorials, lead-generation lessons, tips, articles, recommended marketing vendors and much more.

Get your FREE 5-DAY SNEAK PEEK of SSU’s “The Marketing Toolbox” at http://www.ShilohStreetUniversity.com