Hiring a marketer as a real estate agent: what to ask

Late January is when agents decide how they are going to win spring. The owners who will list in April are starting to interview, the calendar has room in it, and every marketing agency with a real estate package knows it. Some of those pitches will be good. Plenty will come from people who have run ads for dentists and roofers and assume a listing is just another product to promote.

It is not. Real estate is one of the few local businesses where the ad itself is regulated three ways at once: by federal fair housing law, by the ad platforms’ own housing policies and by your state’s license rules. An agency that does not know all three can put your name, and your broker’s, on something that draws a complaint. Here is what we would want an agent to ask any agency before signing, including us.

The rules an agency has to know before it touches your ads

Start by checking whether they can explain these without looking them up.

• Fair housing advertising. The federal regulation at 24 CFR 100.75 makes it unlawful to publish a housing ad that indicates a preference, limitation or discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status or national origin. It covers words, photographs and symbols, and it also covers selecting media or locations that deny parts of the market information about housing. Who sees the ad can be the violation, not just what it says.
• Google’s housing policy. Google’s personalized advertising policy states that ZIP code targeting cannot be used for housing ads here, and that age, gender, marital status and parental status may not be used to target them either.
• Meta’s Housing category. Listing ads on Facebook and Instagram have to run under Meta’s Housing special ad category. Age, gender, ZIP code, exclusion targeting, lookalike audiences and saved audiences are limited or unavailable, and city or pin-drop targeting is widened automatically.
• Your state’s disclosure rule. In Texas, 22 TAC 535.155 requires the broker’s name in at least half the size of the largest agent or team contact details, and counts social media and texts as advertising. California requires your name, eight-digit license number and responsible broker on first-contact material, including websites and electronic ads. Florida requires the licensed brokerage name on every ad, placed next to the contact information online.
• NAR’s Code of Ethics. For REALTOR members, Article 12 asks for a true picture in all advertising, and its standards extend that to images, URLs and domain names.

None of this is obscure to anyone who has worked with agents. All of it gets missed by agencies who treat a listing like a sale on patio furniture.

Questions to ask in the first meeting

Ask these early, before the proposal arrives.

• “Can you target homeowners in my farm area by ZIP code?” The right answer is no, followed by what they would do instead: city or radius targeting where allowed, content that attracts the right readers, and mail you control. An agency that says yes either does not know the policy or plans to work around it.
• “Where will my broker’s name and license number appear on social posts?” They should know your state’s rule and suggest putting it in bios and templates once. Texas allows the information on a profile page reachable by a direct link from the post.
• “How will you market me to buyers now that they sign before touring?” Since August 17, 2024, under the practice changes from NAR’s settlement, a buyer signs a written agreement with an agent before touring a home, in person or by live virtual tour. A buyer ad that promises a showing tomorrow sets up an awkward first call. A good agency will talk about consult pages and explaining what the agreement covers.
• “Will you ever write that buyer representation is free?” The agreement has to state your compensation and say that commissions are fully negotiable and not set by law. An ad that says otherwise contradicts paperwork the buyer signs before the first tour.
• “What claims will you put in my ads?” Texas treats a ranking without disclosed objective criteria as misleading, and also an ad implying you handled a sale you did not. Ask for sample copy. Listen for sides closed and streets sold on, with the basis stated, rather than “top producer” headlines.
• “What do you do with my past clients?” NAR’s 2025 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers found 91% of buyers would use their agent again or recommend them. If the plan is all strangers and no sphere, it skips the cheapest business you have.
• “Who owns the CRM, the ad accounts and the site if we part ways?” You should. Your past-client list is the most valuable thing in the building.

What the first 90 days should look like

A sensible plan for an agent runs roughly in this order.

• Weeks 1 to 2: your past clients and sphere imported into a CRM, tagged by closing date and home anniversary, with call and form tracking by source.
• Weeks 2 to 6: a past-client program running, with home-value updates, a review request to each recent closing and referral asks that name what you want.
• Weeks 4 to 8: Google Business Profile tidied, every bio and template checked against your state’s rule, a page explaining the buyer agreement, and sold history shown honestly.
• Weeks 6 to 13: paid work, timed to the season: seller-focused search ads, Housing-category Meta ads and Local Services Ads, where Google checks the license of each agent and approved ads carry the Google Verified badge.

If an agency wants to start with a big ad budget in week one, ask what it will do with the leads when nobody has built the follow-up.

What a good monthly report shows

Clicks and impressions mean little in a business that closes a handful of deals a quarter. A useful report shows:

• Leads by source, and how many became signed listing or buyer agreements.
• How fast each lead got a first reply. CallRail’s January 2025 benchmarks put real estate’s missed-call rate at 9%, the lowest of the industries it named, so agents already answer well; the report should prove you still do.
• Past-client touches sent and replies received.
• New reviews and their dates.
• Spend by channel against agreements signed, not against leads.

What to do this month

• List every place your name appears in an ad, bio or post, and check each one against your state’s disclosure rule.
• Pull your past-client list into one place, even a spreadsheet, with closing dates.
• Rewrite any buyer ad that promises a showing without mentioning the agreement conversation.
• Delete “number one” style claims you cannot back with stated criteria.
• Put the seven questions above to every agency you are talking to, and keep their answers in writing.
• Book seller-focused marketing for February and March, before the spring rush.

The agency that answers these well will have done real estate before. You can see how we approach the trade on our real estate agents page, and how we run Facebook and Instagram inside the Housing rules on our Meta ads page.