Hyperlocal. It’s the real estate term du jour.

Are you writing blog posts about the local fireworks events or corn maizes or Christmas lights tours? That’s what some “experts” are calling “hyperlocal”.

The typical mentality about writing hyperlocal posts is to generate traffic. It is assumed that with the traffic (and let me tell you, agents BRAG about the traffic that XYZ hyperlocal post brings in), some how, some way, some one will remember that they found out some random specific piece of information about the area from your website.

Seriously?

Yes. I’m going to remember googling “Your City New Years Day Polar Bear Plunge” and finding YOUR REAL ESTATE site. Yup. Totally . . . NOT.

I often wonder if people actually have brains in their heads when they spout out this stuff. It’s VERY obvious they have zero understanding of marketing, of human behavior, of how things actually WORK.

Let’s get REAL. Let’s get back to reality.

If you are going to do hyperlocal “marketing”, do it right. Do it well. Do it so you get quality web traffic from leads who will actually have a need for your services!

Hyperlocal isn’t about your county or your city. It’s about a single neighborhood and if that neighborhood is huge, it’s about a single subset of that neighborhood. It’s THAT local.

It’s old school in a new school building. It’s neighborhood farming 2.0. It’s about getting real estate leads.

Getting traffic for traffic’s sake does nothing for you. Oh, it wastes your time, increases your web hosting expenses, possibly even crashes your website with too much traffic, but the traffic alone does nothing for you.

Focus on the right kind of traffic. Traffic that has a need for your services.

To do hyperlocal right, you must be focused on the hyperlocal AND you must be focused on the real estate needs of the hyperlocal. You must do both. At the same time.

See, while posting events and blather about local businesses is all well and good, it doesn’t give anyone an idea of what the homes are like or what their neighbors would be like. It doesn’t help them know how awesome the neighborhood looks during each season of the year. It’s just not enough about the foundation of the neighborhood, the homes and people.

So in that vein, here are 12 Steps to Awesome HyperLocal Real Estate Marketing

1. Keep your focus on your neighborhood and real estate, BOLD combined UNBOLD. Keep your efforts focused on this niche.
2. Share about builders in your neighborhood. Get floor plans, feature sheets, etc. This is especially awesome for neighborhoods that have been built out for years. Create a resources both in individual blog posts and on a page on your site.
3. Share each weeks homes that have sold. Take your own pictures so you aren’t in any violations and post the pictures along with the sold prices (unless you are in a non-disclosure area).
4. Tour each new home that comes on market, take pictures, pick a feature you especially like and share it in a blog post – include an IDX link of available properties for that week in the post.
5. Share each weeks homes that are new on the market. Take your own pictures so you can put pictures in your blog post – but share an IDX link to the available homes in that neighborhood so you are in compliance.
6. Share about all of the common areas in the neighborhood. Take a ton of pictures. Take video. Use lots of words.
7. Meet your neighbors. Video interview neighbors and ask them what they love about the neighborhood. Make sure to get their written release so you can share your video in blog posts about the neighborhood.
8. Create a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly “tour of homes”. Tour 4-5 available homes in the neighborhood and bring along your prospects. Make sure your neighborhood knows you have openings to join the home tour. Keep it on a regular schedule.
9. Have contests – neighborhood nominated – best landscaping, best holiday decorations, most inviting front porch, etc. Meet participants. Take pictures. Write blog posts.
10. Have a virtual tour of homes. Seek out residents who are willing to give you a tour of their home. Take lots of pictures. Share unique features. Profile the family and what they love.
11. Do a lot of video tours. Short ones. Drive up and down a single street and video the entire drive. Do it multiple times a year so people can see what the neighborhood looks like through the different seasons.
12. If you are focusing on a neighborhood that doesn’t cater exclusively to 55+, Profile aspects that would be important, walkability, wide streets, close to medical facilities, etc. Profile all of these things in videos, in pictures, in words.

Don’t waste your efforts! Get going on these awesome hyperlocal real estate marketing steps today! Dominate your neighborhood!