Real Estate Branding vs. Marketing: What's the Difference?

Promotion is a key factor in your success as a real estate professional, helping you to connect with potential customers and re-engage with members of your customer base. Marketing and branding are both part of that promotion process, but in order to apply them effectively, it’s important to understand their differences.

What Is Marketing in Real Estate?

In the simplest and broadest sense, marketing refers to every action you take in order to connect clients with the benefits that your business offers. This includes the four elements of what is called your “marketing mix,” which includes the products (or services) you provide, the pricing structure you employ, how and where you promote your services, and the place(s) where you do business. Real estate marketing also involves the processes and tools used for in-person, online, and print promotion.  

An effective marketing strategy that carefully considers and implements each of these areas can transform your real estate business in the following ways:

• Consistent marketing keeps you at the top of a potential client’s mind when they need your services
• Ongoing communication through marketing channels like email and social media help to build relationships
• A strategic marketing plan ensures that you are sending a consistent message with each client interaction

What Is Branding in Real Estate?

By contrast, real estate branding equals the cues that are used to show potential customers the values and priorities that represent your real estate practice. Most understand this to mean logos, colors, and even fonts -- but a complete branding system goes beyond this. It also includes elements like the kind of images and the writing style and terminology that you use. While marketing is purely based on your actions, branding includes customer perception of your practice based on every interaction you have with them.

Like marketing, a strategic branding system has very distinct advantages for your real estate practice:

• Quality brand elements create the best first impression with potential clients (made in just 50 milliseconds)
• With consistent use, quality branding promotes visibility and recognition of your business
• Branding can help you better connect with customers as they see your shared interests and values

To put it another way, branding is about what your business is, and it is expressed through promoting your practice. Marketing, then, is how you share your brand’s message with current and potential customers. It’s the tools, platforms, and policies you put into action and each customer touchpoint, from social media sites to your real estate website.  Marketing and branding are two different features, but both are essential to effectively promoting your real estate business.

Learn more about our integrated marketing packages for real estate agents.