By Heather Sittig Jackson, Relola CEO

What matters most?
Your annual transactions. Your website. Your Facebook followers. Your testimonials.

It’s a trick question, really. All these things are important to showcase as you build your personal real estate brand. But, they aren’t the most important things to buyers and sellers.

Buyers and sellers put one other factor above all of those: your local expertise.

In the Zillow Group’s Report on Consumer Trends, 82 percent of homeowners said local expertise matters most of all. That means your prospects want to know what you know. They want your understanding of market data, yes, but they really want broader context about your local area.

How has the community changed?
What does business look like in your area?
How have the demographics shifted?
What new plans are in place for residential construction?
What kind of changes are people making to their homes?

Write about the listings you visit, whether they’re yours or not.

Whether you took a buyer through the property or visited as part of a caravan, you’ve probably seen anywhere from one to ten homes this week alone. And, if you did have a buyer with you, you were probably explaining all about the area, how the house was upgraded or maybe what opportunities you envisioned for the home or the area.

Everything you said was hyper-local and it was pure gold. So now imagine that you can capture that content in order to share it with other buyers!
It sounds magical, but it’s actually very practical. Buyers rely on your expertise as they look at listings. Sellers want to know you know the area and the marketplace inside and out.

That’s where Relola comes in.

After you preview a property, take a moment and open the Relola app to create an Insight-- our version of a mini-blog post. Use our simple prompts to capture your thoughts on the listing. You can type them or even use your talk-to-text feature. Then you publish and the platform broadcasts your Insight to your social channels. Your Insight is then also added to your interactive map, creating a comprehensive snapshot of your local expertise.

You know who else cares about local? Google.

I hear this from so many agents: How do I enhance my site? How do I get found by Google? And Google has the answer: create the right content for the right people. Give them something to find when they search for your area. And, even better, give them content to engage with when they find you!

But that might be easier said than done. Creating hyper-local content isn’t just about your state, or even your city. It’s about what’s outside your front door. It’s about what you see and do everyday. And it’s about your unique, one-of-a-kind, truly authentic experience as a real estate professional.

Write about neighborhood features that make your community unique.

Where do you like to go for coffee? When is that new gallery opening? Why did that one bank become a restaurant? How hot is that playground in the summer sun? Which deli delivers on Fridays?

You know the details that make a community come alive, whether or not your prospect already lives there.

Here’s how Relola can help. With the Relola app, you can put those neighborhood features into context, adding pins to your interactive map that you share on your Facebook business page and website.

Connect with your trusted service providers.

So much of your local expertise is tied to what you know, but also who you know. And you know the people your clients and prospects need to know: The painter who does meticulous work, the lender that makes house calls, the dog walker who has the magic touch.

Those references are another way you’re valuable to your local community, and Relola helps you capture your network with the Reloladex. This tool lets you add the trusted service providers you recommend already-- only with a simple-to-use tool that you can embed in your Facebook business page and website.

Hyper-local content is the mandate of local real estate professionals. But, you’re busy in the business of real estate. Our goal is to help make creating that content as painless as possible, helping you create, share and celebrate your expertise in a beautiful way.

For more information, visit homesmart.relola.com.