How Real Estate Agents Can Get Leads From Instagram

For many real estate agents, social media still feels like one more marketing task: post a just-sold graphic, share a market update, hope someone notices. Haley Ingram sees it differently.

As the founder and CEO of Coffee & Contracts, Ingram has built a business around helping agents use Instagram to attract clients in a way that feels more aligned than cold calling or door-knocking. Her approach centers on local content, lifestyle-driven listing posts, daily Stories, and a simple framework: attract, nurture, convert.

In this interview with The Close, Ingram explains what agents get wrong about Instagram, what a realistic posting schedule looks like, and what she would do in her first 90 days if she were starting over as a brand-new agent today.

What was your driving motivation to start Coffee & Contracts, and how has this changed and/or stayed the same over the years?

I started Coffee & Contracts just for fun, honestly. I was a real estate agent, and my brokerage told me to door-knock and cold-call. That felt so unnatural to me. So instead, I took to Instagram to grow my business, and it actually worked. I was attracting clients, and those clients turned into friends. It felt completely different from paying for leads or cold calling, which never worked for me because it just wasn’t aligned with how I wanted to show up.

Falling in love with marketing led me to start managing social media for other real estate agents, and that eventually turned into a side hustle called Coffee & Contracts in September 2019. Within a few months, it completely took off, and I’ve been growing and pouring into it ever since.

The mission has stayed the same: help agents attract clients on Instagram so they don’t have to door knock or cold-call. What’s changed is the scope of how we do that. We’ve adapted as platforms have evolved and as our members’ needs have grown. My goal now is to turn Coffee & Contracts into the go-to marketing platform for real estate agents — beyond just content, beyond just Instagram.

You’re able to generate consistent leads from Instagram when many agents struggle. What is different about your approach, and what do you attribute to your success despite an ever-changing market?

The thing most agents are missing is that they’re treating Instagram like a billboard. They’re posting market updates, just-sold graphics, just-listed graphics, and spending a lot of energy trying to educate. What they’re not doing is posting what locals and relocators actually care about. That’s the gap.

The content that builds an audience is local content and listing content that doesn’t feel like an advertisement — it feels like a lifestyle. When someone scrolling Instagram stops on your post because it feels relevant to their life, their neighborhood, or a move they’re dreaming about, that’s when you start to build a real following. And then once you have that audience, your stories become where you convert them by showcasing listings, sharing how to work with you, starting conversations.

Everything I do comes back to a framework: attract, nurture, convert. You need to attract a following first, because you can’t nurture or convert people who don’t know you exist. Then you need to nurture: build trust over time through content that’s genuinely useful or relatable. And then you need to convert: you have to actually put out content that tells people how to take the next step with you.

Most agents skip straight to conversion content without doing the attraction work first, and then wonder why nobody’s responding. If nobody’s in the audience, there’s nobody to convert.

As Coffee & Contracts has grown and impacted thousands of agents, how has that growth influenced your vision and goals for the business in 2026 and beyond?

It’s absolutely grown and changed. Coffee & Contracts started as just templates — that was it. And it’s evolved into something much bigger: a solution for agents who are overwhelmed and frustrated with marketing. Because that’s really what we’re solving. It’s not just “here’s a pretty graphic.” It’s “here’s how you show up, here’s what actually works, and here’s how to do it without it taking over your life.”

Our goal now is to become the go-to marketing platform for real estate agents. Not just for Instagram, not just for content: we want to be their full marketing operating system. The place they go to save time, stay consistent, and show up confidently with strategies that are actually working. That’s what we’re building toward, and that’s what gets me excited about where this is headed.

Based on your success and the current state of the market, what skills or traits do you think a successful real estate agent needs?

Two things come to mind immediately: adaptability and discipline.

Technology is changing this industry quickly, and the agents who are leaning into that — using it to save time, to scale, to show up better for their clients, and are going to have a real advantage. That’s true in any industry. You don’t have to be a tech expert, but being open to learning and willing to evolve is really non-negotiable right now.

And then discipline — I think this one is underrated. The agents who are finding consistent success are the ones who show up, do the work, and are willing to put themselves out there even when it feels uncomfortable. Whether that’s posting on social media, investing time in learning how to market themselves, or just sticking to the plan they set for themselves. It requires setting your ego aside sometimes and focusing on what actually moves the needle.

The shift I see in the agents who break through is that they ask, “What do I need to change to make this work?” instead of getting stuck on why something isn’t working. That mindset makes all the difference.

What does a realistic and effective posting schedule actually look like for an agent balancing client work?

If you want social media to be a lead source, you have to treat it like one. That means showing up consistently — not just when you have something to sell.

My recommendation is to aim for at least one feed post every weekday. I know that sounds like a lot, but here’s why it matters: posting more frequently helps you grow faster, reach more people, get more engagement, and — maybe most importantly — it helps you learn what actually resonates with your audience. You find your rhythm faster when you’re in it regularly.

That said, I would never tell someone to post every day if it means they’re going to burn out after one week and go completely dark for the next month. Consistency beats perfection every time. It’s genuinely better to post every couple of days reliably than to go all-in for a week and then disappear. Find the cadence that you can actually sustain, and stick to it.

On top of your feed posts, I’d also recommend showing up in Stories every single day. Stories don’t have to be polished: they’re your behind-the-scenes, your real-time moments, your “I just saw this listing and had to share it.” They’re what keep you top of mind between posts.

And practically speaking: time block it. Set aside one hour a week to batch and schedule your content for the week ahead. Track how long it actually takes you so it doesn’t feel like this vague, endless task. Once you know it’s one hour a week, it becomes something you can plan for and protect.

With so much distraction and competition on social media, what types of posts lead to DMs, conversions, and clients—not just engagement—in 2026?

Here’s something I want to say first: the content that leads to DMs and clients doesn’t exist without the content that builds your audience in the first place. You can’t skip straight to conversion. It’s a blend, and it maps back to attract, nurture, convert.

Your attract content is what grows your local following. Think local guides, neighborhood Reels, the kind of content that locals actually want to share with their friends. This content reaches the right people’s algorithms and gets you in front of buyers and sellers who live in or want to move to your market. It may not directly start conversations, but it’s building the audience that everything else depends on.

Your nurture content is what gets people into your DMs and starts to build real trust. This is your authority-building posts, your educational content that establishes you as the expert people want to work with. It helps your audience get to know you, your personality, and your approach. It won’t always get the most engagement — and that’s okay. It’s doing important work.

Then there’s convert content, and a lot of this happens in Stories. Showing behind-the-scenes moments: “I’m putting together a CMA for a client, anyone want one for their neighborhood?” or sharing a showing and using a question sticker to invite people to learn more. This is where real conversations start. You’re showing people what you do and making it easy for them to raise their hand.

And honestly, the number one type of content that gets people sliding into your DMs? Listings — but not the boring just-listed graphic. I’m talking about showcasing a listing through its lifestyle benefits. The feeling of the home. What it’s like to live there. That’s the content that makes someone stop scrolling and say, “can you send me more info?”

If you were starting over today as a brand-new agent, what would you focus on in your first 90 days?

I love this question. Here’s exactly what I would do.

I would go all in on local content. Local Reels, listing Reels, and collaborations with local businesses. I would be showing up as the local guide and real estate expert in my city from day one. In terms of cadence, I’d aim for local content about three times a week, listing content at least twice a week, and then once a week, some kind of authority and branding content, the kind of posts that help people get to know me as a person and as an agent, so they can start to know, like, and trust me.

And every single day, I would show up in Stories. Not polished content, just the behind-the-scenes of what I’m actually doing for clients. Getting on a buyer consultation. Writing a CMA. Submitting an offer. Walking through a showing. I call this “dangling carrots” — you’re showing people what’s possible and making them want that experience for themselves. It’s one of the most powerful things a new agent can do, because it shows you’re busy and working even before your business is fully built.

I would also focus on growing my email list from the start by creating a local guide to my area and promoting it as a lead magnet. That becomes the call to action on my local content, something free and genuinely useful that gives people a reason to stay connected with me beyond Instagram.

And finally, I’d be actively engaging with local accounts — following them, commenting, and reaching out in the DMs with a warm, light-touch message. Not salesy at all. Just a genuine “hey, welcome — let me know if I can ever help with anything.” Relationships first, always.

If an agent can only focus on one or two platforms right now, where should they be and why?

Instagram, without question. It’s where I built my business, it’s where Coffee & Contracts was built, and it’s where I see agents getting real traction — not just followers, but actual leads and closed deals, consistently.

My second pick right now is TikTok. I’m seeing so many of our members find great success over there and close deals directly from the platform. The reach is real, and the barrier to entry is still relatively low compared to how saturated Instagram can feel in some markets. If you’re not on it yet, it’s worth taking seriously.

And as an honorable mention — for agents who have the time and capacity for a heavier lift: YouTube is excellent. Long-form video content lives on Google; it’s incredibly searchable, and it has a shelf life that short-form content just doesn’t. A video you create today can bring in leads a year or two from now. It’s not the right fit for everyone, but for the agents who go all in on it, the return is significant.

What’s the most common mistake you see agents making when trying to grow their social media presence?

Posting without a plan. They’re just guessing and throwing things at the wall, and it shows. It confuses the algorithm, it confuses their audience, and it exhausts the agent. When you don’t have a plan, you end up wasting so much energy constantly trying new things, switching directions, and never giving anything long enough to actually work. The key is to commit to a strategy, execute it consistently, and then adjust based on what the data tells you — not based on how you feel after one slow week.

The other piece of this is that without a plan, most agents’ feeds end up looking like a billboard. Advertisements. Just sold, just listed, market stats. And nobody wants to follow a business on social media. People are there to be entertained, inspired, and to discover things they’re genuinely interested in — not to be marketed to.

Here’s something important to remember: most people who follow you are not buying or selling a house right now. They want to see beautiful homes. They want to feel connected to a place or a lifestyle. They do not want to read a textbook on how to navigate the homebuying process. That’s your job. You are there to help them buy or sell the house — not to educate them on how to do it without you.

What’s one thing agents can do this week to turn more of their content into actual conversations?

Dangle more carrots in your Stories. Whatever you’re doing in your business this week: post it. Show the behind-the-scenes and make it easy for people to raise their hands.

If you’re checking what new listings just hit the market, share those on your Stories and use a poll sticker to ask if anyone wants more information. Super low lift for them, and it tells you exactly who’s in buying mode. If you’re putting together a CMA, show what you’re working on and use a poll sticker to ask if anyone would like one, no strings attached, just to see what their home might sell for right now. Scheduling showings? Talk about it. Writing an offer? Talk about it. The poll sticker is your best friend because it removes all friction. People don’t have to type anything; they just tap yes.

And the last thing I’ll leave you with: show more listings. That is the product you are selling. Listings are what make people stop and raise their hands. Don’t be shy about reaching out to listing agents and asking if you can feature their property, and most will say yes. You are a real estate agent. Show the real estate. The more you show it, the more conversations you’ll start.