Real estate agents know that the goal of marketing your home for sale is exposing your home to the greatest number of people possible. Exposure creates demand and it just makes sense that the more people who are aware that your home is on the market, the greater chance you’ll get a response and the opportunity to sell your home by owner quickly and for the highest price possible.

As a seller and home marketer, you must be customer service oriented. Make it easy for buyers to find you and to see the home. Make sure there is someone available to answer the phone, retrieve and reply to your messages promptly and be ready to give qualified buyers a tour of your home as soon as possible. Here are some proven methods of letting the world know your home is for sale:

MLS Listing

If you’ve already made the choice to list your home in the REALTOR® Multiple Listing Service (MLS) you've accomplished one of the most important aspects of home market - EXPOSURE. Nationwide, 70%-85% of “arms length” (sales not involving direct transfers to relatives) home sales occur through the MLS system of cooperative sales involving thousands of real estate agents and brokers in your area. If you do nothing else to market your home, you’ve still got a great chance of selling your home simply due to it’s appearing in the MLS database of homes available for sale.

The vast majority of buyers use real estate agents and brokers to assist them with finding and purchasing a home since it doesn’t cost them anymore than working on their own. When real estate agents prepare to show properties, the first and only place they look is the MLS computer or MLS book. If your property is listed there, it’s priced properly and it meets their buyers’ criteria, your house will be shown and sold.

Internet Listing

If you want to find home buyers early on in their home shopping process, it has become increasingly imperative to have your home listed on the Internet. Recent studies show that as many as 70% of home buyer’s now do their preliminary home shopping on the Internet. Having your home listed on the top real estate portals ensures that your home will be seen early in the home shopping process. Through the Bloomkey^® HomeSeller Program, your home will be exposed to millions of buyers internationally through the top real estate web sites, such as Realtor.com, Google.com, MSN.com and Yahoo.com.

Yard Sign, Riders & Information Tube

After the REALTOR® MLS, a Professional "FOR SALE" Yard Sign is the most effective marketing tool available. Approximately 15% or more of home buyers find their next home through yard signs. Having a professional real estate sign in your yard puts the world on notice that your property is available for purchase. An additional 9% of home buyers find their homes through friends and neighbors, so yard signage is an important tool for getting the word out about your property to those who might come in contact with potential buyers.

An Information Tube or Box attaches to your sign. Make sure to keep plenty of Home Information Sheets in the tube for buyers to pick up. Keep in mind that these “Fact Sheets” are potential buyer’s first impression of the features of your home. Make sure they’re kept dry and that the info box is kept full.

NOTE:You’ll want to carefully consider what phone number you want on your sign rider. Remember that if you give out your home number to the public, you may be subject to prank, hang-up, late night phone calls. Especially if you have children, consider an alternative number or voice mail service to protect your privacy.

Newspaper & Print Advertising

Home Sellers often want to have their homes appear in the paper or other publications. From an outsiders viewpoint, newspaper advertising may seem to be an effective method for marketing a home. While many home buyers do use the paper when looking for a home, the odds of selling one home with a classified ad are extremely small. Print advertising accounts for less than 6% of home sales. And newspaper and print advertising can easily become your biggest marketing expense (just ask a real estate agent).

You may ask: “Why are so many homes advertised in the paper by real estate agents if it’s not that effective?” Real Estate agents and brokers advertise homes because they have many homes to sell. They know that advertising doesn’t sell homes - it “makes the phone ring”. Agents and broker’s aren’t necessarily trying to sell the particular home they advertise (otherwise why would so many include a picture of themselves rather than the home their selling?), they’re trying to 1) market themselves to other home sellers and 2) find more buyers to work with to show them not only the home advertised, but any others in the REALTOR® MLS that might meet the buyer’s criteria.

If you are interested in newspaper advertising, call the classified marketing representative for the publication of your choice. There's a link to placing newspaper classified advertising online in our Member's Only area. Your Bloomkey^® preferred customer relationship with the newspaper may save you money in advertising. Let us know when you would like to run an ad and we’ll help place the ad for you and include the Bloomkey^® logo in your ad at no cost to you to make your ad stand out and look more professional.

Open Houses

A small percentage of homes are sold through Open Houses. Holding an effective Open House requires good preparation and timing. Generally, Open Houses are held on Sunday afternoons, so stay with convention. Also, when making plans for an Open House date, consider other activities that may take place at the same time as your Open House. An Open House on “SuperBowl Sunday” or “Race Weekend” can be a lonely affair.

Although the odds of selling your home this way are small, if you decide to hold an Open House, you may want to consider asking a Mortgage Loan Officer to be with you, or at the very least, on call, to help qualify buyers if they show a strong interest in making an offer. Remember you are dealing with the public, so be cautious and remove any valuables from the home. Consider having someone with you at all times. Make sure you have plenty of Home Information Sheets to hand out. Lemonade and inexpensive snacks can make for an enjoyable experience for the buyers and perhaps make them want to stay longer. In winter, have a fire going if you have a fireplace. In summer, make sure the air conditioning is at a comfortable level. You want the home to invite people to linger, since the more people who are showing an interest in the home the better to make them feel like the property is desirable.

Excerpted from the RealtyThrift HomeSelling Guide E-BOOK available at: www.Bloomkey.com/store