November 2, 2026 · 7 min read
How to Audit Your Brokerage's Marketing in Five Minutes
Twenty-four yes or no questions, eight areas, one score. A walk through what a yes means in brand, social, listings, email, Google, website, recruiting, and systems, and what to do in the five minutes after.
A brokerage marketing audit in five minutes is 24 yes or no questions, three in each of eight areas: brand, social, listings, email, Google, website, recruiting, and systems. Answer each one honestly, and the share of yes answers is the score. The score lands in one of four levels and points to the area that needs attention first.
Most broker-owners have never scored their own marketing. They have a feeling about it, usually formed the last time a recruit asked a hard question or a seller chose the other agent. A feeling is not a baseline. The free Brokerage Marketing Audit turns it into one, and the walk-through below explains what a yes means in each area so you can answer without guessing.
Five minutes is not a stretch. There are no essay answers, nothing to upload, and no account to create.
Why yes or no beats a rating scale
Rating scales flatter everyone. Ask a broker to rate their email marketing from one to ten and the answer is a seven. Ask whether a newsletter went to the database last month and the answer is yes or it is no.
Three questions per area keeps every area at equal weight, so a strong Instagram account cannot hide an empty careers page. With 24 questions, each yes is worth a little over four points, which makes the math easy to follow: eighteen yes answers is a 75.
The rule for answering is simple. If you have to think about whether the thing exists, or whether it happened in the last 30 days, the answer is no. A no is not a judgment. It is a task.
First, say which office you are
Before the 24 questions, the audit asks one more: which describes the office. The choices are one agent, a boutique brokerage of 2 to 15, a team or office of 15 or more, and a luxury version of each. This question does not change the score. It changes the plan the result points to at the end, so answer it as the office is today, not as it hopes to be by spring.
The eight areas, and what a yes means in each
Brand. A yes means there is a written guide agents have seen, the logo and templates live in one library, and a stranger scrolling three agents' feeds could tell they belong to one office.
Social. A yes means the office account posts on a fixed schedule, uses the formats that carry reach now (Reels, carousels, Stories), and somebody approves each piece before it goes out.
Listings. A yes means every listing gets the same launch set from coming soon to just sold, the set is built from templates rather than a blank canvas, and the seller sees it.
Email. A yes means the database lives in one place, hears from the office every month, and grows when a new agent joins and brings a sphere.
Google. A yes means the office profile is claimed and current, reviews are requested on a script, and the profile gets posts and photos, not just a phone number.
Website. A yes means every agent has a page, the site changes monthly, and it publishes new pages that answer the questions buyers and sellers type.
Recruiting. A yes means a careers page exists, a recruiting post goes out on a rhythm, and the 90-day offer to a new agent is written down.
Systems. A yes means agents have one place to request marketing, one person approves, and leadership sees a plain-language report every month.
Notice the pattern. Almost none of the yes answers depend on talent or budget. They depend on whether something is written down, scheduled, and owned by a person.
Reading the score
The score is the share of yes answers, and it lands in one of four levels.
Running, 85 and above. The pieces exist and the systems run them. Work here is refinement.
Building, 65 to 84. Most pieces exist. The gaps are usually rhythm and ownership, not missing channels.
Starting, 40 to 64. Some areas are solid and others are empty. The empty ones are usually the ones nobody was assigned.
Not yet, under 40. The office runs on the agents' personal marketing. The brand has not started yet, which is at least a clear place to begin.
The free result shows the score and the level. Entering an email opens the rest: a bar for each of the eight areas, the first three fixes in order, each linked to the page on the site that explains it, and the plan that fits the office type you picked. Casey reads every result and replies himself. There is no automated sequence waiting behind the form.
By the numbers
NAR's 2025 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers found 66% of sellers chose their agent through a referral or a past relationship, and 43% of buyers found their agent through a referral. The email and Google areas of the audit exist to keep that audience warm.
Whitespark's 2026 Local Search Ranking Factors put Google Business Profile signals at about 32% of local pack ranking, and 46% of Google searches carry local intent. Three questions on Google are not too many.
Recruiting Insight's Q1 2026 Agent Migration report projects about 300,000 agents changing brokerages in 2026. The recruiting area scores whether an office is visible when one of them looks.
Metricool's 2026 Social Media Study found only 21% of accounts under 10,000 followers are growing. The social questions ask about schedule and format because that is what separates the 21%.
What to do in the five minutes after
Take an office of eight agents that scores 58. That is Starting. The bars show brand and listings near full, social and website in the middle, and Google, email, recruiting, and systems close to empty. The total is discouraging. The bars are not, because four strong areas mean the office knows how to finish things. It just never assigned the other four.
Screenshot the score and the bars. In 90 days you will want the comparison.
Ignore the total and read the lowest bar. That is where the first fix lives.
Take the first fix only. Claiming and completing the Google profile is an afternoon. Doing all three fixes at once is how nothing gets done.
Put the retake on the calendar for the same day next quarter.
The audit does not tell you to hire anyone. It tells you which of eight areas is empty, and empty areas are the cheapest to fill.
How Urban Marketing Edge handles this
Every strategy call starts with the same eight areas, because they are the same eight areas we run for clients. A plan begins with the missing pieces from the audit: a written brand guide in month one, monthly content themes so social has a schedule, a listing launch set built from templates, a monthly email to the database, and a Google profile that gets posts and review requests. The dashboard gives agents one place to request marketing and gives one person the approval step, which turns the systems area from zero to three yes answers in the first month. Plain-language monthly reporting keeps leadership looking at the same bars. Plans are month to month, billed in advance, no setup fees. If you want the baseline before the call, run the Brokerage Marketing Audit first and bring the score; it makes the thirty minutes more useful for both sides.
Questions brokers ask
How long does a brokerage marketing audit take?
About five minutes. There are 24 yes or no questions plus one about the size and type of office. Nothing to upload and no account to create. The slow part is being honest, which is why the rule is that anything you have to think about is a no.
Do I need to enter my email to see the score?
No. The score and the level show without an email. The email opens the bars by area, the first three fixes with links to the pages that explain them, and the plan that fits. Casey reads each result and replies personally rather than dropping you into a sequence.
What score should a brokerage aim for?
Aim for the next level, not for 100. An office at 58 that reaches 70 in a quarter has fixed three areas. Running, 85 and above, means the systems carry the work without the broker pushing. Most offices we meet score in the Starting or Building bands the first time.
Can a single agent take the audit?
Yes. The first question includes one agent as an office type, and the result points to a plan sized for one person. The eight areas still apply; a solo agent has a brand, a database, a Google profile, and a website page, and needs a system for listing launches.
Why are there recruiting questions in a marketing audit?
Because candidates research an office the way sellers research an agent: the feed, the website, the newest agent's page. Recruiting is marketing with a different reader. An office with strong listing marketing and no careers page is invisible to the roughly 300,000 agents projected to change brokerages this year.
Is the audit different for a luxury office?
The 24 questions are the same. The office-type question has luxury versions of each size, and the result points to the luxury plan track, where creative, property emails, and strategy meetings are built for higher price points.
Book a 30-minute strategy call
Run the audit, take a screenshot, and bring the bars to a call. Thirty minutes is enough to read the lowest three and agree on the order. On the call we map the simplest plan for your content, themes, and monthly cadence, and we will say plainly if the first fix is something you can do yourself this week. No pitch deck, no pressure. Book a 30-minute strategy call, or see what each plan covers on the plans page first.
