Pretty much every adult with a smartphone in America is on Facebook or Instagram.
Consider this: Your competitors? They're on Facebook. You? Absolutely there. And let's not forget your entire Sphere of Influence (SOI).
People are spending hours per month scrolling these apps. Heck, they're addicted to them!
Needless to say, Facebook isn't just another platform; it's THE platform. So when you run Facebook and Instagram ads, you're not just targeting some niche source. You're literally reaching almost every potential homebuyer and seller in the country.
A colossal user base, unmatched targeting precision, and a plethora of ad formats make it the go-to place to connect with eager home buyers and sellers.
With Facebook ads, you're not just advertising; you're:
Zeroing in on your ideal audience with impeccable accuracy
Funneling traffic straight to your listings, website, and events
Generating leads without burning a hole in your pocket
Amplifying your brand's voice and credibility
Keeping a close eye on results and fine-tuning your strategies
And your job is to target the right people so you can reach those high-intent folks in a place where you control the messaging, and in a much more cost-effective way.
But here's the catch: Facebook is a bustling marketplace. With a staggering 10 million advertisers, standing out is no walk in the park.
To truly make a mark with Facebook ads in 2024, you need campaigns that are not just strategic, but downright irresistible.
Ready to dive deep on how to use Facebook for real estate advertising?
Let's go!
Top Takeaway:
Utilizing Facebook ads for real estate can be a powerful tool to reach potential clients. By targeting specific demographics and showcasing listings, agents can increase visibility and generate leads in a cost-effective manner.
Meet rAIya:
The pioneering 24/7 AI real estate assistant that actively converts leads 365 days a year.
Chapter 1: Key Benefits of Facebook Ads for Real Estate
There are several unique advantages that Facebook advertising offers compared to other digital marketing channels:
Massive Audience Reach
With nearly 3 billion monthly active users, Facebook provides instant access to a huge audience.
This includes your ideal real estate leads - millennials looking to buy their first home, families needing more space, seniors looking to downsize, and investors seeking cash flow properties.You can display your ads to narrow segments of this audience with Facebook's detailed targeting options.
Target by location, demographics, interests, behaviors, and more to only reach the most likely buyers and sellers.
Highly Visual Ad Formats
Facebook offers several visually compelling ad formats that work exceptionally well for real estate.
From image ads featuring beautiful listings, to video ads showcasing walkthrough tours, to carousel ads highlighting multiple properties - visual content stands out in the crowded newsfeed and grabs user attention.
Cost-Effective Impressions
The average cost per click (CPC) on Facebook is under $1, generally cheaper than Google Ads.
And you only pay when users actively engage with your ads, not just for impressions.This allows you to test different audiences and creatives affordably to gauge interest before scaled spending.
Start small to validate your campaigns before increasing budgets to drive more traffic and leads.
Advanced Targeting Options
Facebook's detailed targeting settings allow you to hone in on your perfect real estate leads.
You can target by location, demographics, interests, behaviors, and even connections to friends of your page fans.
Combining these options gives you laser-focused hypertargeting to get your ads in front of the most motivated buyers ready to take action.
Retargeting Past Leads
Create custom audiences in Facebook Ads Manager based on your email lists and past website visitors.
Then serve ads specifically to these audiences to re-engage them.
For example, target visitors who searched listings on your site but didn't contact you.
Retargeting past leads is one of the highest converting tactics.
Flexible Budgets
Facebook ads allow flexible daily budgets as low as $1 per day up to hundreds per day.
Set budgets based on your business goals, test results, and seasonal fluctuations.
Modifying budgets and bids is simple within Ads Manager, giving you the agility to increase spending during peak seasons and scale back during slower months.
With these powerful advantages in mind, let's explore some proven real estate Facebook ad strategies.
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Chapter 2: Tips for Running Successful Real Estate Ads on Facebook
With 2.3 million monthly advertisers competing for attention on Facebook, your ads need to stand out.
Apply these best practices to create effective real estate ads on Facebook that convert:
Lead With Your Listings
Source: LocalIQ
The most direct and effective ads showcase your actual property listings.
This immediately shows users you have inventory to match their search.
Create image or video ads for your newest or most high-demand listings, including eye-catching visuals, property details, and a clear call-to-action like "Learn More."
You can even auto-generate these ads from your MLS listings using Facebook's Catalog Ads feature.
Retarget Engaged Users
Create new ad sets targeting anyone who clicked your previous ads.
Use fresh creative and offers to re-engage this already interested audience.
You can even create lookalike audiences off the custom audience of engagers to find more users like them.
Drive Traffic to Listings
For cold audiences, send traffic to your listings pages, open houses, or lead capture landing pages.
Warm audiences can go directly to lead forms.
Use website tracking pixels to create custom audiences for future retargeting and track conversions to see which ads and audiences perform best.
Automated Outreach:
rAIya Voice tirelessly calls and nurtures your leads to drive qualified appointments right into your calendar.
Chapter 3: Optimizing Campaigns & Targeting for Results
Rather than just analyzing performance data, have a true conversation with it.
Ask questions like:
"Which ads are really resonating with my audience?" and
"Where am I seeing the highest engagement levels?"
Use those insights to guide your optimization efforts.When refining your targeting, think deeply about who you're truly trying to reach.
Test getting more specific, but also explore expanding your parameters if you need a wider net.
Facebook's suggestions for similar audiences can reveal new opportunities too.
For budgets and bids, let the results help you find the right amounts.
If your daily budget is getting used up too fast or too slow, make adjustments.
Bid strategies can help, and aim to have your budget last around 12-24 hours.
Get strategic with your ad scheduling.
Figure out when your audience is most likely to be on Facebook and engage with your content - mornings and evenings for videos, weekends or weekdays?
You can schedule ads to align with those usage patterns.
Installing the Conversions API enhances your understanding of what's working.
See which ads actually drive actions on your site, not just clicks.
Then optimize for real value, not just vanity metrics.
And don't forget to regularly review insights and look for trends over time.
See what resonates with your audience and use those learnings to guide where you spend your ad dollars.
The key is to have an ongoing, two-way dialogue with your data.
Let it guide your efforts, but also ask it questions and explore.
This collaborative approach will reveal what works best for your unique audience and goals.
Ylopo Webinars:
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Chapter 4: Ad Format Options for Real Estate
Beyond standard photo and video ads, Facebook offers several specialized formats that work extremely well for real estate marketers:
Carousel Ads
Carousel ads allow you to showcase multiple properties in a single ad unit.
You can feature up to 15 images or videos that users can swipe through horizontally.
This is ideal for promoting several listings matching a specific audience.
Each carousel card can have different visuals, captions, links, and calls-to-action.
Stories Ads
Over 500 million users engage with Facebook Stories daily.
These disappearing slideshows help showcase your brand personality.
Post behind-the-scenes phz`otos of you staging homes, industry events, testimonials, or listing teasers.Add text overlays, music, interactive elements, links, and calls-to-action.
Capitalize on newer features like stickers, polls, and swipe-up links to grab attention.
Dynamic / Catalog Ads
As mentioned, Dynamic Ads for Real Estate (now known as Advantage+ catalog ads) automatically generate ads from your MLS listings.
These ads allow you to showcase up to 50 properties in a single ad unit, with each property having its own image, headline, description, and CTA.
When targeting people who previously visited listings on your site, Dynamic Ads display relevant available properties. Great for lead nurturing.
Lead Ads
Lead ads add an instant "Get More Info" form right within the ad unit so users can inquire without leaving Facebook.
Once submitted, you receive their contact and questions instantly, allowing you to follow up and convert them into clients.
Local Awareness Ads / Reach Ads
Target people nearby new listings by creating a 1-3 mile radius audience.
Raise local awareness of open houses with ads that only show to users within that set radius, driving foot traffic.
You can also take advantage of map cards, store visits optimization, and offline conversions tracking to measure the true impact on your ROI.
Messenger Ads
Run ads driving users to click and message your Facebook business page, allowing you to immediately connect via chat.
You can also use sponsored messages, click-to-Messenger ads, and Messenger home placements to nurture leads, increase CTR, and improve reach and frequency.
The wide range of ad formats on Facebook allows you to diversify your campaigns and continually test new approaches.
Experiment and track results to double down on what works best.
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End the vicious cycle of wasted time and money on dead-end leads.
Chapter 5: Why Ylopo is Set to Take Over the Real Estate Facebook Ads Scene in 2024
In the early days, real estate teams tended to treat Facebook lead gen ads in a rather simplistic way. And because of that, so did we.
All we cared about was cost per lead (CPL).
"Hey, look at us! We generated a lead for just $2.50! We can give you way more leads for your budget!"
But the truth is, most of those cheap leads were junk.We made it so easy for people to convert that we ended up with lots of bogus, low-quality leads.
Now we take a more sophisticated approach.
It's okay to put some gates in front of consumers, even if it means a higher CPL.
We want to intentionally filter for serious, high-intent leads.
Because Facebook and Instagram ads are so affordable, we can generate fewer but higher-quality leads.
I'll take 8 solid leads over 25 bogus ones any day!
Over the years, we've built up a database of over 30 million leads.
And we can track what happens to those leads - which ones become qualified prospects, which convert to closings, etc.
That rich first-party data is like rocket fuel for our Facebook and Instagram campaigns.
We use it to refine our targeting and improve performance.
The more leads we generate, the more data we have, and the better our future campaigns will be.
It's a beautiful flywheel effect.
Watch our CMO Juefeng Ge break down what we’re doing to generate high-quality Facebook and Instagram in 2024:
See How We Help Agents Crush Facebook Ads and Dominate Their Market
Executing an effective Facebook ad strategy takes specialized technology and marketing expertise.
That's where we come in.
Unlock the full potential of Facebook advertising for real estate with Ylopo’s proprietary AI-powered platform.
We integrate directly with Facebook to deliver predictive, personalized ads showcasing YOUR listings to hyper-targeted home buyers in their feeds. Our dynamic recommendation engine continually refines ads in real-time based on user engagement.
This approach converts at up to 7.6X higher than typical real estate Facebook ads.
We handle the entire complicated setup and optimization for you, seamlessly importing listings and leveraging custom audiences. You get more leads from warmer traffic without extra work.
See for yourself how our technology can revolutionize your Facebook ads:
Laser target likely buyers based on interests and behaviors
Retarget and nurture past leads to close more sales
Let our AI optimize ads to improve performance
Capture more leads directly from Facebook vs your site
Track real ROI based on website conversions
Our platform and Facebook expertise can take your ads from basic brand building to a core sales driver.
Book a demo now to discover how our unique solution can help you absolutely crush it on Facebook this year. Our team is standing by to show you our targeting and optimization technology in action.
Claim your demo and unlock the immense potential of Facebook advertising for real estate in 2024. Let's strategize!
About the Author
Aaron “Kiwi” Franklin
Head of Growth
Aaron "Kiwi" Franklin is the Head of Growth at Ylopo and an innovative technologist and serial entrepreneur who has over 25 years of experience creating digital solutions for major brands and pioneering companies at the intersection of technology and real estate. His depth of expertise stems from leading development of the first website for Apple to founding a global community of over 1,000 elite athletes. Connect with me