Although a number of communities have ordinances restricting the use of certain colors, sizes, text, and placement of real estate yard signs there are still a few tricks that savvy real estate agents use for attracting more interest and traffic to their listings.
Traditionally most of the signs have Realty logo, agent’s name, and contact information. Some also put “For Sale” rider on the sign and others even create custom real estate yard signs for each high-end property they manage to list.
So, what can agents do with their yard signs to stand out from the crowd?
- Your professional personal photo with your slogan will make your yard sign more memorable. Cut-out photos without rectangular backgrounds look much better than the square ones with the original studio background showing. Don’t make them too small or too large. Bottom left or right positions are the best to be captured by the eye of the viewer.
- Use at least 2 colors in addition to white. One of these colors should be the boldest and the brightest and secondary color more subdued and complimentary to the main color accent. Too many strong colors may clash and create an opposite effect distracting viewers from the message. Try not to use solid black or red backgrounds for the whole sign. These often are subconsciously associated with mourning and danger.
- Don’t clatter your sign with too much information. Your name, large phone number, and optional photo are the main components of your real estate yard sign. Website address and slogan should be much smaller. Some Realtors want everything to be bold, bright and jazzy in order to stand out, in their mind, not realizing that in this case, nothing stands out because all the parts are equally important. Imagine yourself at the store and 5 sales people simultaneously talking to you about the product you are looking at. You don’t want your real estate yard signs to act like this. Make your phone number and your name the most important and visible parts of your sign. “For Sale” or “Just Sold” words are often printed on separate riders
- Use complementary riders not only for “For Sale” or “Just Sold” but also for additional information such as QR code and “instant SMS info”. A lot of people would prefer getting instant property information via QR code or instant SMS code instead of calling a real estate agent. Agents, of course, would have to create property pages on their websites and generate the codes pointing to these pages.
Not too many Realtors are that technology savvy or simply bother doing it thinking that just having website name, email and phone number will cover all communication possibilities. Often people drive by and don’t want to get out of their cars to get closer to the yard sign. The fastest and the most convenient way for them to get property information would be instant SMS code. - Reflective real estate signs. If you live in the Northern part of the US then these reflective signs may bring you additional leads during darker winter months. As already stated above, check with your local city officials if there are any restrictions on these types of signs.
- Lighted real estate signs may put you into a completely different category for the following reasons:
they convey a message to your future and current clients that you go one step further in order to sell their homes;
make easier for the potential buyers to notice your yard signs in the dark;
You may choose solar-powered configurations and batteries-powered ones that will work with your existing real estate yard signs.
Most of the batteries-powered models emit brighter light but they will last only for 100-150 hours (10-15 days).
Solar-powered lights need much less maintenance.