If you are planning to go FSBO on your property, marketing would be one of the most important and challenging activities. There are thousands of properties for sale every day. Each one competing for the buyer’s hard earned money. How do you plan to shift the buyer’s attention from other properties to yours?

FSBO or For Sale By Owner removes the real estate agent from the selling equation. By doing so, the owner will be able to maximize the return on his or her property by removing the need to pay commissions. But the pressure of marketing your property falls on the owner.

The objective of marketing is to generate leads in the form of buyer interest. The advantage of real estate agents is that they already have a large list of buyers whom they could qualify for your property. With FSBO, you have to work toward building your leads list.

Marketing requires time and effort but with right approach, you can gain traction with minimal expenses.

Here are a few tips, tricks and techniques you should consider to design your own FSBO marketing strategies:

1. It all starts with the home

Before anything else, get your home tidied and spruced up. Buyers do detailed inspection of potential homes before giving them serious consideration.

Have an engineer, architect or interior designer inspect your home and give their recommendations. You should not do extensive renovations. Buyers will bring their own professionals. Any major repairs will be potential point of negotiation.

But with FSBO, you have a 2% to 6% margin for negotiation because you no longer have to pay agent’s commissions and have more control over marketing. Your budget for repairs should be within your negotiation range.

2. Give your home a makeover

Once minor repairs and improvements have been undertaken, invite an interior designer or a stage production specialist to give you advice on how to give your home a makeover.

You will need images for your marketing collateral in print and online ads. Before even thinking of how the pictures should come out, you have to make sure your home projects well.

You will definitely need to open up spaces and remove clutter to allow viewers a better vantage point to re-imagine your home. The stage production specialist should be invited during principal photography to assist the photographer in conceptualising the images.

3. Get a reputable professional photographer

Even if your smart phone is equipped with a Carl Zeiss lens and the highest resolution, do not take chances with a Do- It- Yourself approach.

A professional photographer knows how to make your house come to life in pictures. Your images have to reach out and grab the viewers by the collar and make them want to buy your home. Professional photographers don’t just the skill; they have the eye to create a story out of pictures.

You will need images taken from different perspectives. A professional photographer will know exactly where to take these pictures and the best composition of light, color, lines and angles.

4. Have the marketing materials produced

Studies have shown that a combination of online and traditional marketing can increase the probability of a sale by 15%. For traditional marketing, you should consider the following strategies:

• Local ad placements in newspapers and high circulation publications.
• Flyer distributions.
• Strategic placement of posters.

Hire a graphics designer to prepare the marketing materials. If you want to save more money, outsource graphics design. You can find highly qualified graphics designers from the Philippines or India for less than half the cost of a local graphics designer.

You should also consider outsourcing marketing content to a freelance copywriter.

5. Identify the online marketing channels

80% of your marketing efforts should be online because it is more efficient in terms of cost and effective in terms of reach. Here are online marketing channels you should consider:

• FSBO sites – There are a number of reputable FSBO sites that have a large following. These sites are designed to provide the needs of a non-agent property sale. You can avail of free subscriptions but you have to constantly update text and images.
• Online listing sites – The Internet presents a good number of reputable online listing sites where you can post your property. The cost of listing will vary but will generally depend on your location. It could be quite expensive if it is in a prime area. But you should know a real estate will do the same thing without batting an eyelash.
• Social media- Social media networks are wonderful distribution channels. You can use a variety of social media sites to post or promote your property:
  • Twitter – Send out 4-6 tweets every day to real estate focus groups.
  • Facebook – Post it on your own Facebook wall or check if your neighborhood and city state have their own group pages. Try to join and if successful, post your property details there.
  • Instagram – This is a great network for images or videos.

With these social media networks, it is possible that a connection or community member will step up and help you move your home in the market. Of course, there has to be remuneration but the terms and amount would be more flexible.

Another way is to set up a website for your property. You don’t need a customized website for this. You can use a downloadable, free template from WordPress and create your own website. There are plug-ins available to make your website mobile accessible.

Always remember to link your social media accounts and website to your FSBO account.

6. Put it all together

In order to become more efficient, you have to be more mindful and strategic with your marketing approach especially with traditional marketing materials.

Place them in areas frequented by your targeted buyers. For example, the neighborhood grocery store, a large supermarket or at the information center at the closest mall would be ideal locations. People who are interested will just pick up a copy of your flyer or take note of your poster.

Have your print ads published on a Sunday which is the day of highest circulation for most dailies and glossies.

Update your content in the online listing sites, FSBO sites and social media once a month. Always try to give a different look on your property to keep interest fresh and new.

Marketing can be a difficult and challenging activity especially if you have not done it before. But with proper planning and a bit of help from the professionals, you will get it done and find success with your FSBO marketing strategies.