Slop or smart marketing? The Instagram trend costing agents their branding for quick clicks

Dayhouse director, Brent Day, made an Instagram post accusing “Jessica Thompson” of stealing items from various rooms in a property during an open home inspection, and included an AI-generated image of the supposed culprit.

Consumers were led to click through various images of the home before the final slide admitted it was only a ruse to gain traction, with the post gaining more than 500,000 views.

However, the post attracted criticism, with many social media users slamming the “terrible” marketing.

Day’s post was part of a broader online trend where companies and businesses pretend to accuse people of stealing from them or not paying their fees.

Long-term trust erosion

According to Macquarie University Business School’s head of department for marketing, Cynthia Webster, the tactic was borderline unethical despite the disclaimer at the end of the post.

Webster said that, whether the agent’s intention was to do something fun or shocking, it had the unintended consequence of sparking long-term distrust.

“Just because they got people to view the ad or at least, even engage in that post, it doesn’t really measure the long-term outcomes,” she told REB.

Cynthia said while the post may raise engagement temporarily, it could seriously diminish brand trust on an ongoing basis because the consumer’s emotions were being played with.

“They find out at the end, ‘Oh, you tricked me. Now you have manipulated me and kind of got me to do something that I probably wouldn’t have’.”

She said agents should consider the whole customer journey, and recognise that, by misleading their audience, they could lose the public’s faith in their brand.

“Not just in that particular agency, but the whole industry really suffers from customers being much more sceptical and thinking that they’re being manipulated all the time,” she said.

Webster also said the likely use of AI made the impact worse, given people were tired of effortless, “AI slop”, which was damaging for brands.

“When you just copy somebody and say, oh, it’s so easy to create these virtual influencers, it’s easy to create posts and content, you’re really not thinking, you’re not being a clever marketer.”

“Your brand is the one thing that will differentiate you as an organisation from your competitors; it is a strong brand.”

Where to draw the line

Webster said while some companies can get away with similar shock-value promotional tactics, agents had to carefully consider the image they wanted to convey to the public.

“I would think you’d be looking for long-term relationship building, which is what real estate’s all about.”

“Each brand just has to decide who they are and what their values are and how they want to be perceived in the market. You can see across any industry that they do differentiate themselves in certain ways.”

Webster said that in real estate, building a relationship with the consumer through marketing would put agencies at an advantage.

According to Webster, agents had many ways to come off as clever to their audience without lying, and the more creative they were, the more the audience would appreciate the content.

“Humour’s one way to gain traction, if that actually fits with a brand, and if they want to be seen that way versus just kind of surprising consumers in a pleasant way,” she said.

Webster also said sparking curiosity ethically was an effective way to gain traction and encourage consumers to remember the brand.

“You can offer something that’s unexpected, some kind of twist, which I think this is what they were trying to do at some level in this case, but you don’t have to lie to your consumers,” she said.

“Also, asking questions calls for action, or even generates mystery through images that don’t necessarily automatically align with either the industry or the brand.”