The Ultimate Guide To Real Estate Branding
Image courtesy of Joe Fletcher
In order to distinguish themselves from competitors, real estate companies must establish their brand. Buyers are evolving, and traditional selling points like statistics, financial numbers, and drab professionalism don’t always cut it anymore. Instead, businesses must connect with buyers on a personal level — identifying their target audience, establishing a brand identity, and then bridging the gap between the two.
Real estate branding design isn’t easy. There are several aspects of effective branding, including but not limited to brand identity, core, story, tone of voice, visual approach, and promotional materials. All elements of branding must be clear, consistent, and cohesive across all mediums to be effective. Proven Partners can help companies tackle real estate branding and marketing. This article will highlight case studies of companies with unique, distinct, and successful property branding.
What Is Real Estate Branding?
Real estate branding is a marketing strategy that companies use to define their identity, connect with audiences, and stand out from competitors. Traditionally, real estate companies felt they didn’t need branding, preferring to stay identity-less and homogenous. But in recent times, the “hotelification” of real estate has begun.
Hotels have always needed effective branding: taking the user experience into account throughout the design process, selling a unique lifestyle, and finding ways to differentiate effectively from their competitors. Now, agencies across the entire spectrum of real estate are creating distinct brands, from Industrious in commercial real estate, to Summit NYC in the residential property sector.
By constructing a narrative that resonates with their target audience, businesses that were once overlooked in a saturated market become attention-capturing brands that connect with buyers on a personal level.
Case Studies: Real Estate Branding In Action
To learn from the best, it’s important to study the best real estate branding examples. The way to assess a real estate brand is to check out its website, review its brochure, and take a look at its social media marketing. Strong brands have a very clear and cohesive approach across all mediums. Each of the following brands has mastered successful property branding, resulting in phenomenal outcomes.
Serenbe
Image courtesy of Serenbe
There aren’t many real estate developments with as precise, focused, and deliberate messaging as Serenbe. Their brand identity is all about wellness, nature, and quality of life, appealing to people who have had enough of urban-living, and all the noise, stress, and problems that come with it. To understand how Serenbe drives their values home, it’s helpful to take a look at multiple aspects of their branding.
Brand name: Serenbe gets its name from “serenity”, the state of being calm, peaceful and untroubled.
Imagery: Clean backdrops, country aesthetics, and nature shots are used throughout their website design and other digital and social media platforms.
Rhetoric: Serenbe describes itself as a “biophilic community”, which is a design concept used to increase occupant connectivity to the natural environment.
Brand Story: Serenbe’s founder attests the community was born in an effort to protect rural land outside Atlanta from urbanisation.
Social Media: Serenbe’s instagram combines beautiful landscape/architecture shots with resident-generated lifestyle content promoting an intimate community.
As a result of Serenbe’s compelling branding, they’ve achieved large premiums, gained great PR, and impressed potential residents.
Taos Ski Valley
Image courtesy of Taos Ski Valley
Consumers want to support companies whose values align with their own. This is why a real estate brand’s mission statement is a vital part of their identity. Companies who exhibit the core values that customers cherish are more likely to win that customer’s business. A perfect example of a purpose-driven real estate company is Taos Ski Valley.
The Tao’s brand is all about adventure, while placing a strong emphasis on sustainability and protecting the environment. Tao knows its target audience: They’re not speaking to skiers who prefer lavish resorts in the Alps. Instead, they’re focusing on down-to-Earth folks, men and women who love to be outside, and see adventuring as an extension of their soul. Tao advertises their facilities as “more retreat than resort”, and highlights their accessibility to all.
Tao’s mission-driven brand has attracted national attention, and according to their CEO, increased sales rates and prices. They are the first ski resort to become a certified B Corp, meeting the highest standard of verified social and environmental performance, sustainability, public transparency, and legal accountability. Sometimes good guy’s finish first.
Common
Image courtesy of Common Living
As rental prices rise in cities around the country, intelligent companies have created a brand for themselves by making shared spaces appealing to young professionals. In the commercial real estate market, a great example of this distinct brand identity is WeWork. In residential real estate, a company that stands out is Common Living.
Common has engaged young professionals by making shared living cool. There are a few selling points that make Common a popular brand among young people, namely: Community, flexibility, and simplicity. Using taglines like “you’re always invited and never obligated” conveys a sense of belonging, and promises a place where young people in a new city are sure to make friends. By highlighting “common” activities like potlucks and movie nights at every location instead of focusing on more mundane amenities, Common is sure to reach its target audience.
Flexibility and simplicity are also emphasised at Common through simple rental applications, easy move-ins, and short term leases. With remote work on the rise, twenty-and-thirty somethings have more freedom to relocate, and they covet an option that relieves them of all the usual stresses of moving. Tenants are able to move between various Common locations easily, which suits a young professional’s modern lifestyle.
Discovery Land Co.
Image courtesy of Discovery Land & Co.
When tapping into the second home market, real estate branding and marketing plays a core role. A purchase in this market is less about necessity and more about desire. Companies must find a way to build their brand in order to build awareness, induce demand, and keep audiences engaged. With the rise of branded residencies, the lines are blurred between regular consumer brands, and real estate brands. Discovery Land Co. is a perfect example of a company creating a strong, unique, and compelling identity that sells not only a piece of property, but an experience that resonates with buyers.
Discovery Land Co uses its brand identity to target a specific audience: wealthy baby boomers. To appeal to the elite, Discovery Land Co embraces its exclusivity, touting its luxurious homes, world class service, and remote locations. To target the older generation, the brand places a large emphasis on family. By invoking emotion-inducing rhetoric centred around spending quality time with loved ones, Discovery urges financially successful older people to rethink life’s priorities, and create memories that will last for generations. Older audiences are also enticed through the brand’s golf-centric amenities and classical values.
Proven Partners Can Help You With Real Estate Branding
These examples of successful branding are inspiring, but top-tier property branding and marketing doesn’t happen overnight. Companies must commit to crafting a thoughtful brand concept, and executing it across all mediums to reach the target audience. Proven Partners brand design helps real estate businesses with analysis, strategy, and development, bringing your brand to life in a way that ensures your business stands out from the crowd.
