We already determined traditional methods for directional signs are a thing of the past. 

So, how do you drive traffic to your model home without this traditional, outdated marketing strategy?

By targeting the right audience by providing digital directions (aka Facebook ads or boosted posts) to your model home during model home hours.

Instead of placing a sign on every corner, the traditional “directional sign placement strategy” has evolved into digital signs directing your potential buyers back to your model home. Start by targeting people in the market for a home, at a much lower cost than traditional signage, and don't waste your money by casting too wide of a net. 

How do you do this? Start investing in online ads. That's right, Google and social media are your new directional advertisers. 

And for the skeptics out there, let me paint the picture for you. If your buyers are already online, searching Google and scrolling through social media, why would you bank on them driving by a particular, “popular” intersection? With targeted ads, you can get directly in front of your audience while they’re online in their normal routine. 

The name of this game is the right person at the right time with the right information. 

Target Your Audience

Talk about getting granular in your targeting—popular online advertising platforms contain detail targeting that lets you refine your audience and qualify the person before delivering the ad to them. With the use of pixels and audiences, you are also able to target and retarget people that have already show an interest in your company. It makes sense to keep showing interested people your model home ad. 

Who knows, maybe this is the day they’re driving around looking at neighborhoods. Since you are able to get really specific, it means the walk-in traffic should be very qualified and interested. 

Run the Ad During Model Home Hours

It doesn't help to run ads about your model home when the model isn't open. By not running your ad continuously, you save money and can put more of your digital marketing dollars towards the right type of ad at a relevant time. No more putting a sign on a corner and hoping the magic works with the ideal buyer. 

With this strategy, you can have confidence your ads are only being shown to people looking for a home and are in the area at the time the model is open. It’d be like going to your mapped out corner to place your directional sign at the exact moment your target buyer drives up—timing is everything!

Give Them Directions & a Teaser of the Home

The entire point of providing both directions and a home teaser is to make it easy and convenient for people to locate your model home. You want to qualify the walk-in lead with enough info. without having them disqualifying themselves. Give details about the area and the home to entice the potential buyer, but leave much to be desired—that way they have an incentive to come to the model home.

It's not old news that everything is going digital these days. In the homebuilding industry, we have a hard time making the transition to the ever-changing online marketing and sales world. Why not make the change? 

With online ads, you can see exactly how many people have viewed your “digital directional”, how many people clicked the ad, and you can even retarget these interested buyers. Why stick to print signage when you’re unable to track and target this method?

Let’s say it cost you $500 to place all of your directional signs around one community. You have an employee coordinating these signs, working with the sign company, mapping out the locations, and making the deals to lease the location of the signs. The time and energy put toward this project is a significant investment. Now, you could track how many people walk into your model and say they saw your signs, but you aren’t really able to get too specific. It’s hard to know if it is really working. Did people come into the model because of the sign or was that just the last piece of marketing they have seen?

Enter: Online Ads

With a cost per click around 40 cents, Facebook is a great way to get traffic to the model home. Think about it, it costs you under $1 to get someone to click on the directions to the model home or to click over to your website. Sure, you have set up costs for the ad, but the bang for your buck is much larger. 

The same is true for Google: Pick up potential buyers while they are searching on the Internet at only 31 cents per click. It doesn’t become a guessing game, as you’re already qualifying buyers before you even show them the directionals! 

Plus, when you put up an ad online, you can view every last metric—views, clicks, cost per click, leads, etc. All the information is at your fingertips and now you have the ability to capture that person’s digital footprint and retarget to them. 

So, what’re you waiting for? Transform your directional signage into the digital, handheld form for your potential buyers. Kick the competition to the curb by getting ahead of the game and driving optimal traffic to the model home—all from their phones.