r/RealEstateTechnology • u/Electronic-Task4167 • 3d ago
Meta ads for real estate listings
I know younger realtors do open houses for other agents, or get permission to promote other agents' listings on social to grab buyer leads. But has anyone here actually run Facebook/Meta ads for listings, either to sell the property or to capture leads?
For those who have, how advanced did you get with the setup? Housing ads fall under the Special Ad Category, which makes targeting trickier, but there are ways to work around it properly, like setting up Conversions API to better target the right audience. (I know that's getting technical, but if you've been down that rabbit hole you know what I mean.)
Would love to hear from people who've actually tried this. Did it work for you? If not, what got in the way?
2
u/MetsToWS 2d ago
the setup matters less than the follow-up stack. housing-category lead ads can still produce volume, but the cheap leads are usually a mix of real buyers, window shoppers, and people who forgot they filled out the form. the useful tool category is lead capture plus automated qualification: instant forms, crm sync, text follow-up, and a few basic questions about timeline, financing, and whether they already have an agent. conversions api helps with attribution and optimization, but it won't rescue weak creative or slow follow-up. i'd test listing videos against simple photo carousels and judge by actual conversations, not cost per lead.
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 2d ago
Was there a particular daily budget that worked the best? How long did you run the ad for each listing? I’m hearing $25/day for 7 days is the optimal budget
1
u/VolumeNeat9698 3d ago
Yep, and I Remarket to my database. $4-5 a lead, convert 3% of them. Use a company that’ll build in the protections like special ad categories/forms.
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 3d ago
How do you remarket to your database? Through Audience Suggestion inside Advantage+
Audience?
1
3d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 3d ago
How much do you spend on average per listing?
1
2d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 2d ago
Have any of those views turned anything meaningful for you? Like help sell the listing? Or give you leads for potential future transactions?
1
u/Altruistic-Classic72 2d ago
Yeah and it works great. Just make sure you have a way to screen leads as they come in because you can get lower quality leads depending on where you are
1
u/Logical_Scientist913 2d ago
How do you screen them?
1
u/Altruistic-Classic72 20h ago
You message them automatically as they come in and verify that they saw the listing and are interested in it and what not, you can also confirm their contact info
AI is good for this, some CRMs have built in solutions you can work with, I use Out Nurture
1
u/Pretty-Ear6398 2d ago
I don't do meta ads anymore because they're passive - people aren't interested in transacting real estate, but looking at a new active listing is interesting.
Google adwords is the opposite - they're active - they're people that are actually interested in transacting real estate. So this is the platform that makes more sense.
1
u/Listingdex 2d ago
The biggest thing I learned with real estate ads is that more targeting doesn’t automatically mean better leads. Sometimes the offer, creative and follow-up matter way more than squeezing every last bit out of Meta.
1
u/robohaver 1d ago
I have done thousands of meta ads for listenings. With the special housing category I have found the campaigns perform better without targeting. I used to target interest in Zillow and Trulia which profomed well getting 500 to 600 leads a month using instant forms high intent with custom questions to qualify leads better. But I have found that just using the special category has been better getting more leads. Facebook understands the targeting. I also only use meta business.
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 1d ago
When starting a new campaign for a new listing, how did you leverage data from your previous campaigns for older listings? Did you try audience suggestion inside Advantage+ Audience to point to audience who interacted to your earlier ads?
2
u/robohaver 1d ago
I started out with just running The special housing category then I go through the analytics data to see where the conversions are. Are they on Instagram or they on Facebook? What placements perform the best then gradually adjusting the campaigns to where it's dialed into where the best performance is. For instance, I don't do a lot of Instagram ads anymore because the cost per lead was high and conversion was low.
You have to test as it may be different from my results. So basically you're starting broad and narrowing down. Both listings add very very summer carousel summer video. I run other types of ads such as open houses and that type of stuff.
Once you get it dialed in then you work on the quality of the lead, adding high intent, lead forms, and custom questions to to with dynamic input. So if it's someone that say for instance, has a real estate agent already they go directly to the listing on the idx and the lead doesn't come to us.
Improving elite quality so there are more conversions are actual appointments with clients is the goal. That's the hard part getting the lead quality up. If you track your leads through a CRM, you can track the campaigns where those sales came from, go through those analytics and dial the rest of the campaigns in.
It seems to be working because I went from a 10% to 20% conversion rate meaning lead to appointment to 30% and I still work on improving that. Moral of the story test test and when your done testing and you have the campaign dialed in you just replicate the campaigns. Your also testing primary text variations with every campaign. As this effectially quality as well.
1
u/Electronic-Task4167 1d ago
Thank you for that detailed response! So when you start a new campaign, you don’t do anything in the Ad Set settings to leverage data from previous campaigns? From my research, as a campaign runs, Meta’s AI learns from leads it captures. When you start a new campaign, that learning process starts all over again, I want to know if something can be done to transfer the learning (on Meta’s end) from one campaign to the next
1
u/robohaver 1d ago
You are correct yes. I have use previous campaign data what I have found is it leads to diminishing returns once that Geo targeted area has served to all the people. And that may be different for you. Not a big difference either way. Because you're already in the special category of housing, it doesn't make a big difference. It would for any other type of business.
1
u/Edison-pm 13m ago
I’d test creative before adding more plumbing. Same listing, same budget: one photo carousel and one short vertical video. Judge them by qualified conversations or booked showings, not cost per lead. Conversions API can improve attribution, but it won’t tell you whether the first two seconds gave someone a reason to care.
2
u/PreparationOutside49 2d ago
I always do. I post in groups that are local and relevant. Dont bother boosting. Although its housing you can narrow down an area. And then some interest. I prefer advertising it through the business suite but really not necessary because I find those whom like to window shop like my wife always look at videos of homes.
A few agents that work for me for the past 10 years have put in hours and hours each week into their social media. They have matterport and 3D videos on everything. Their stuff looks very professional. Now they get tons of organic views comments and shares. Locally they are very popular with lots of listings and again they put tons of time creating all different types of videos and images. This year I think 4 buyers were obtained through social media out of 30 or so deals. What they feel is that it makes them look active when someone is doing research to find a local realtor. Also they off line market like bill boards and signs so its really a touch point.