Rbuy - Online Real Estate Auction


	The Internet Auction for Realtors®
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Promoting Your Auction

Marketing Your New Auction Service

Marketing Your Auctions

Definitions: Marketing is Advertising, Promotion, Publicity, Public Relations and Selling.

The following example may help to make the above five concepts more clear. “If the circus is coming to town and you paint a sign saying 'Circus Coming to the Fairground Saturday', that's advertising. If you put the sign on the back of an elephant and walk it into town, that's promotion. If the elephant walks through the mayor's flower bed, that's publicity. And if you get the mayor to laugh about it, that's public relations." If the town's citizens go the circus, you show them the many entertainment booths, explain how much fun they'll have spending money at the booths, answer their questions and ultimately, they spend a lot at the circus, that's sales.” - Promoting Issues and Ideas" by M. Booth and Associates, Inc.

Marketing
A successful auction depends on how well it is marketed. This assures your seller that all the potential buyers have a chance to bid. Another important reason for aggressively publicizing your auction to its broadest market is that the highest bidder can be someone not actively looking to buy. They are the curious, bargain hunters, neighbors, and friends. Many people treat a real estate auctions like a spectator sport, especially if it is in their neighborhood, making sure they know about it is important.

Make Your Auction a Local Marketplace
Your company's objective is to make your online auctions a local marketplace that buyers search first for property to buy. It is estimated that over 70% of the buyers will bid without an agent. Bidding online is not new to buyers who have used eBay or other consumer auctions. Buyers think that the online auction is a fairer and without pressure, a fun way to buy a home.

To keep buyers coming to your auctions requires continuous promotion and a continuous flow of new listings to establish it as a local marketplace. As a listing service that sellers value, the results of the advertising and promotion of your auctions will be more listings and sales.

Rbuy doesn't provide the buyers you need.
It is the listing agents responsibility for creating the competition required to sell a property at its fair market value. Real estate markets are local and buyer's won't know you are auctioning your listings unless you promote it. Make sure you promote your auctions to other agents so they show the listings to their buyers. With several bidders, the "Law of Increasing Returns" will work for you by attracting more buyers. Any bargain hunter can start the bidding. However, it is important that you aggressively publicize your auctions locally using the customary marketing methods, including signs, flyers, and newspaper ads, in addition to the MLS, and Web sites. That's money well spent. It will gets you more listing and buyers.

Agents have the Auction Advantage
Auctions work best when the agent has access to his target market. The reason agents get a better price than traditional auction companies is that when buyers want to buy they call an agent. The agents have access to their target market, the buyers. That makes agents serious competition for the over $100 billion traditional auction market.

Your Best Listing Service
A whole generation of homeowners has been brought up on eBay and take the online auction for granted. This makes Rbuy your best marketing services for getting listings. It also separates you from the other agent who are still wedded to the old ways of selling real estate. Although most sellers are familiar with the online auctions, they don't know that any agent can auction their home. So, let the homeowners in your market know you provide the online auction service, and that you recommend it because it will sell their home faster.

Marketing Your Auction

Law of Increasing Returns
The more bidders you have the
more bidders you will get.

Professors Utpal Dholakia and Kerry Soltysinski found that participants in online auctions tend to gravitate toward and bid for items with one or more existing bids, and ignore comparable (even more attractive) listings for the same item but with no bids. They found that bidders exhibited herd behavior by making multiple bids on some auctions (coveted comparables), and making no bids at auctions for comparable items (overlooked comparables).

The law of increasing returns says that auctions that have more bidders tend to attract more bidders. So, one way to start your auction is by lowering your recommended opening bid to encourage every potential buyer to bid something, and make sure every bargain hunter, friend, you know bids something.

"Don't write about the thing you're selling.
Write about the people to whom you're selling it." Nick Usborne

Press
When introducing a new service in your market, such as the Rbuy Online Real Estate Auction, it is an opportunity for your company and its agents to get free advertising from the press. Any Company that offers an innovative Internet service such as Rbuy Online Auction will find the local press interested. Press releases are the most effective and least expensive form of advertising and is one way to alert the media. Stories in the press, radio and TV are one of the most effective and inexpensive forms of advertising. It is well worth the cost of a professional to write success stories about your auctions.

Public Relations
Provide an Auction Workshops for Sellers. Explain how the auction works to sell their property faster, gets the true market value for their property and gives them more control over the selling time.

Also, provide Workshops for buyers on Bidding Strategies, or "How to buy your a home on Rbuy Online Auction."

MLS
Listings entered into the MLS and placed in Realtor.com should note that the "Property is Auctioned on www.Rbuy.com.” If your MLS does not have a form for auctions, let them know the need for it. Many MLS companies are aware of the need to provide for the auctioned listings.

Signs
Rbuy signs placed on the property with your company sign, is one of the most effective way of generating interest in you auction. Auction signs are the best source of buyers. In the "Sign" section a sample of Rbuy's sign is available for your sign company. The auction signs bring inquiries from curious neighbors who are potential buyers and sellers, and their friends that are potential buyers and sellers.

Pictures
The saying that "a picture speaks louder than words" is especially true in an online auction. Surveys show that buyers surfing the Internet for property think the picture is the most important part of a listing. The listing information on Rbuy provides only a brief description of the property, but up to five photographs. There is the option for using the IPIX, www.ipix.com tour service for 360-degree pictures. Photographs that display your property at its best are crucial for attracting buyers to inspect the property. A rendering of the house or, a picture of a similar home is better than no picture.

Auctions Create a Market
Auctions attract buyers who would not ordinarily show any interest in the property with just a for sale sign. It is sometimes curiosity and the lure of a bargain that attracts many of these buyers. In a slow market, the auction makes a market because it can attract buyers.

Ads
Rbuy provides its members with sample ads, card mailers, and a logo that can be downloaded for use in brochures, advertisements, and classified ads. These ads are intended as examples. Rbuy encourages agents to emphasize the benefits that are appropriate for their target audience.

Open House
Email a copy of your auction listing to the members of your Association of Realtors. Invite them to a special open house where you will have information on explaining how to register their buyer and get them approved to bid.

Advertising Fee (optional)
It is customary for the seller to pay an advertising fee for an auction. A 1% upfront advertising fee is customary. The seller must understand that this fee does not go to the agent or company. It is used to benefit the seller by attracting more bidders. For instance, five listings that average $500,000 each will give you $25,000 to advertise your auctions and attract buyers for all the auctions. One additional bidder can mean an increased in the price many times the cost of the advertising fee.