2024 Home Builder Budget Must-Haves

With the new year just around the corner, home builders and real estate developers are starting to create 2024 budgets! From social media content and advertising efforts to search engine optimization and video, knowing what to invest in for 2024 can be challenging. The team at Milesbrand has curated a list of top 2024 home builder budget must-haves!

Strong Brand and Brand Consistency

A strong and consistent brand strategy is significant for home builders and real estate developers looking to build a successful business. From colors and imagery to messaging and experience, creating a memorable brand that differentiates the company from competitors while staying true to the brand promise boosts reputation, customer growth and lead generation. 

There are multiple ways to invest in curating a solid and consistent branding strategy, from a tagline that supports the community’s vision to the perfect logo and mark. Branding is carried out through all aspects of marketing, including professional photography and videography, unique digital design elements and more!

Discover how the Milesbrand team partnered with Shea Homes to build a powerful brand for the master-planned community of Stepping Stone!

Video Content

When budgeting for the year ahead, carving out space for creating top-quality video content is essential! According to HubSpot, video is the most popular and effective media format, and 50% of marketers leverage video within their marketing strategy, followed by 47% utilizing photos. 

Other interesting video marketing statistics presented by HubSpot are:

• On average, people watch 17 hours of video content per week.
• 91% of consumers want to see more online videos from brands.
• Long-from videos above 30 minutes, like webinars and live events, saw over an 11,000% increase over the past decade – making it the fastest-growing video segment.

Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn are the top three social media platforms for real estate developers and home builders and feature several ways to incorporate video content, including:

• Instagram Reels: A great way to share attention-grabbing videos on Instagram, reels allow businesses to record and edit short-form videos using special effects, unique audio and creative tools directly on the Instagram app. With 70% of Instagram users stating that they don’t mind seeing advertisements when watching reels, Instagram is a wonderful platform to spread brand awareness.

• Facebook & Instagram Stories: Stories provide home builders and real estate developers with a way to authentically connect with customers while simultaneously boosting engagement and website views. While Facebook and Instagram stories allow photos and videos, 35% of consumers say they often engage with short, narrative-style stories with photos, videos and texts! The best part about stories is that they take viewers directly to a website, blog or landing page through an easily showcased link.

• Vertical Video: Horizontal video is a thing of the past! Most popular social media sites, including YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok, display videos vertically. While home tours and community photos are shot horizontally, it is essential to ask the photographer and videographer to shoot vertically to help optimize brand exposure through quality vertical video content.

Digital Advertisement

The success of a real estate development and home-building business can hinge on its advertising efforts. Digital advertisements are a must-have for home builder marketing budgets. Below are some examples of advertising platforms to invest in and why!

• Over-The-Top (OTT): Delivered through an internet connection on a TV, over-the-top ads or connected TV ads are advertisements that are located over the top of other platforms, including Amazon Prime, Netflix, Roku, Xbox, Hulu and Apple TV. This ad option allows real estate developers and home builders to boost brand exposure through video streaming platforms. OTT ads are ideal for learning more about an audience and retargeting potential buyers with previous interest. Additionally, these ads allow for interactivity, which keeps viewers engaged.
  
  
• Streaming Audio: With 222.7 million people listening to digital audio once a week, it is a no-brainer to include streaming audio advertisements in the 2024 home builder budget. Streaming services such as Apple Music, Spotify and Pandora offer an exceptional platform to reach multiple generations with real estate and home-building advertising efforts.
  
  
• Pay-Per-Click (PPC): As an essential component of a successful digital marketing strategy for real estate developers and home builders, PPC advertising offers an easy way to gain qualified leads, boost website traffic and achieve a strong return on investment (ROI). PPC ad campaigns target specific keywords, reaching consumers unfamiliar with the business. For example, ABC Homes is advertising its new Atlanta townhome community – the keyword is “new townhomes in Atlanta,” not the company name. 

Website & SEO

From website content to search engine optimization (SEO), it is essential that home builders and real estate developers include investing in website tools within their 2024 budgeting plan. A few ways to optimize your website are:

• Call to Action (CTA): The sole mission of a real estate developer and home builder website is to provide viewers with valuable information that encourages them to click on a call to action (CTA) to take the next step in working with the company. CTAs are a great way to gain prospective buyers’ information, such as their name, phone number and email. Examples of CTAs are “Join our VIP List,” “Save Now” buttons or last-day promotions.
  
  
• Human-First Content: With Google’s Helpful Content update, home builders and real estate developers must create content with website viewers in mind. Writing content that provides helpful and relevant information will place higher in the Google algorithm.
  
  
• Keywords: While it is important to focus heavily on humans first when creating content, it is just as important to incorporate keywords throughout the website to attract search engines. Select keywords that resonate the most with the target audience and write content centered around those keywords for prospective buyers.
  
  
• News Page or Blog: Many home builders and real estate developer websites neglect to update their news or blog pages. Routinely posting on the site’s blog adds a page of content for viewers to read and search engines to index. Blogs also provide additional opportunities to optimize SEO through URLs, meta descriptions, alt tags, keywords and more!

Online Sales

With prospective buyers in today’s market typically taking to the internet for research and purchasing, real estate developers and home builders must invest in a quality online sales consultant (OSC). A well-trained OSC boosts a company's reputation through impactful growth and boosting sales and referrals. From reviving stale leads to ensuring customer satisfaction, OSC is an essential tool every real estate company needs to utilize!

Realtor Outreach

Realtor relations is one of the most important sectors to budget for in the new year! Whether an inexpensive gift or an extravagant luncheon, connecting with Realtors who can boost community sales is always a good idea! A few ways to reach out to Realtors in the area are:

• Monthly Office Outreach: Make an impression on local Realtor offices by sending over gifts, such as cookies, community merch and flyers, to encourage the team to reach out about community offerings.
  
  
• Realtor Luncheons or CE Credit Classes: An excellent way to get a group of Realtors to tour a community or explore model homes is to host a continuing education class or luncheon! These events boast valuable networking and relationship opportunities.
  
  
• Realtor Bonus Programs: Make it fun for Realtors by offering incentives for sales, such as bonus programs or commission prizes.

Optimize Homebuilder Budgeting with Milesbrand

At Milesbrand, our talented team of experts understands the importance of budgeting and what tools to invest in to help grow brand exposure, lead generation and customer satisfaction. Contact our team today to get started on your 2024 homebuilder budget!