The Perfect Real Estate Craigslist Ad? by Josh Schoenly

63,216,431 people used Craigslist in the month of September. Based on this information, do you think there may be a slight possibility that you could generate additional leads and sales using Craigslist real estate marketing strategies for your business?

Although the answer to this question should be a resounding "yes", there is certainly a right and wrong way to use this platform. Unfortunately, with our years of experience working with agents, investors and brokers around the country, we have found that many professionals are not initially implementing this technique correctly.

Here's the major issue we have found. Since Craigslist closely resembles a form of traditional classifieds based advertising, a majority of users choose to utilize this real estate marketing tactic by simply running basic ads with no or a very poor call to action. We cannot expect visitors to contact us directly. Instead, online marketing strategies require us to be proactive instead.


A Craigslist Case Study
For instance, if you were to spend 15 minutes scanning over local postings on Craigslist, you would typically find a lot of listings that rattle off a bunch of features and benefits of a particular home, with perhaps a link to a website or property search tool.

However, the problem with this approach is that 95% of the population is doing the same exact thing! Unless that prospect is ready to buy or sell on the spot, your ad could quickly be glimpsed over with no action being taken. The difference with using Craigslist real estate marketing strategies is that you must focus on lead capture instead of simply advertising your goods and services to a huge marketplace.

True, this is a super simple concept to grasp, yet too many real estate professionals are still following outdated methodologies to build their lists. Consequently, this calls for a complete mindset shift in order to fully take advantage of all that Craigslist has to offer.


Introducing the Craigslist Ad Sandwich
I decided to cover this exact topic in a recent video training video that I published. I am going to keep the text portion of this part short and sweet. Here is a basic Craigslist real estate marketing outline that you can refer to to get the real nuts and bolts of everything that is involved with this process:

Gripping Headline: What makes your listing or offer unique? Focus on features, benefits, and pain points that will grasp your audience�s attention. This has to be compelling to get people to first click on your ad.

Image/Banner Ad: Once a person opens your ad, the very first thing that should draw their attention is an image or banner ad with a very strong call to action. The offer should be something that will speak to your audience and cause them to click over to your opt in page.

Property Info With Link: This portion of the Craigslist real estate marketing ad should be very short and to the point. The property information can be followed by an HTML link that directs to a property specific landing page with lead capture for future follow up.

Final Call to Action: You can finish off your sandwich with an image or text link call to action. Create a twist on your top offer leading to the same landing page, or perhaps target buyers on your first image ad and sellers for the bottom portion.