Balanced real estate internet marketing - top 4 tips!

One of the most common questions we receive is "where do I start for marketing real estate online?". Besides the general learning curve associated with learning how to do online marketing, I think most real estate agents just don't know what is entailed creating an online presence and marketing it. I thought it would be helpful to point out some of what is entailed if you want a balanced attach to real estate internet marketing.

1. Real Estate Website - Sound obvious? Well over 30% of real estate professionals still don't have a website and of the other ~70% that do, most of them do nothing to maxmize traffic to their website. A website can help demonstrate your expertise in an area and you can get it jump started with paid ads. A great company that many of our clients have used is Diverse Solutions.
2. Paid Ads - Yes, pay to play! Paying for ads using Google Adwords or Yahoo Search is a great way to make people aware of your website.
3. Real Estate Blog - Having a Blog requires diligence in keeping it up to date, but it can provide huge dividends down the road. There are some great free Blog sites like Blogger, Wordpress and others.
4. Real Estate SEO - Knowing how to succeed in the search engines is very doable, it just takes a little bit of time and some good efforts towards creating good real estate website content. Learning how to write powerful content is relatively easy because you already have the expertise because you know your area!

Tackling just these 4 items of real estate internet marketing will have you go far beyond your competition. Take it in small steps by just starting one project at a time. Don't try to start a blog an a website at the same time because it can seem overwhelming. To your success online!

Focus on Real Estate Not Technology

This blog is about real estate technology but I find that many agents get caught up in diong technology for technology sake. They look for the next gadget or gizmo that will help them. Now I am the first to say you want to experiment and try new things to gain that competitive edge. Make sure though that what you are trying has legitimate merits for real estate. Some items you should consider prior to purchasing the latest technology piece.

• Will it generate leads - if it is meant to directly generate leads it very well could be worth a try.
• Does it have a low cost and a high return - this is always a good thing.
• Can you get out of your contract easily - If you have to commit for 3 years I would be wary

I found a great new product that generates leads affordably for those listings that are out there and you can cancel at anytime. Check out www.OnlineRealEstateSuccess/TextmyMLS . This is the future of lead generation for listings.

Generate Instant Real Estate Business with Google

Do you need or want more business? Do you want business that can close in the next 30 or 60 days? This business is out there and in fact they are searching on Google. We have a FREE call today on the subject of how to use Google to generate instant business. This will be an action packed 39 minute call that will give you the answers you need today in order to get business. The only thing you have to ask yourself is "Is 39 minutes of my time worth 1 real estate sale?"

You can find the details of this call at:
www.OnlineRealEstateSuccess.com/Teleseminar

Master Real Estate Pay Per Click

Real estate pay per click is the process of taking ads on the Google, Yahoo, or Microsoft(MSN) network. The great part about these ads is you do not pay for them until a user decides to click on your ad.

There are some great reasons that you would want to do real estate pay per click advertising.

• You want instant traffic to your website
• You want very targeted and serious traffic to your website
• You have a budget and you want to make sure that you always stick to it on a daily budget
• You like to judge your results easily and see how people are interacting with your website.

It is important to know that many say you need to higher a professional company to perform pay per click advertising for you. I would recommend that you do the work yourself as it only takes a few minutes a week once you get it set-up the first time. Google has some great tutorials and there are plenty of resources available that allow you to get up to speed on what you need to do quickly.

There are some great real estate pay per click resources at:

• http://www.onlinerealestatesuccess.com/resources.shtml - there are free resources and recommendation of books.
• Complete Guide to Google for Real Estate Professionals - this is a great kit that allows you to get up to speed on Google AdWords quickly and is geared for real estate professionals.

Are all real estate websites really the same?

I heard another agent mention that "it doesn't matter what you do for a website, because all of the websites can offer the MLS". I thought this was an interesting concept, but sadly misguided. The real difference in a real estate website is the content that it offers. The content that you provivde is what separates your website from the 1000's of other websites in your market.

Creating content doesn't have to be complicated. In fact, it's probably the easiest because it is based off of the information that you already know. I am always amazed at the fear that agents have about starting to create content because it really is just writing down the information that they already have in their heads!

Some items to write about when creating your real estate website content are:

• Neighborhood Boundaries - Not everyone knows what boundaries make up the neighborhoods. Define the neighborhood and what types of homes exist in the neighborhood.
• Architecture Styles - There may be a dominant type of architecture, like Craftsman homes, in a particular area. Write about these and put some great pictures up.
• Turnover - Discuss what the traditional turnover in the area is. This can create a sense of urgency if turnover is low. :)

Creating real estate website content that is informational and has calls to action will help you to turn visitors into contacts! Following a simple guide like the Complete Guide to Writing Successful Content will help you to dominate your market and create as many leads as you.

Real Estate Pay Per Click Works If....

you actually use it correctly!

I have found that many real estate professionals state that using pay per click advertising is not effective. Here are a few of the excuses that I have heard (and maybe you have to)

1. It's too expensive
2. My competitors will just click my ads
3. It won't help you get any "good" leads
4. I don't understand it
5. SEO is better anyway so why bother

Ok, so let's breakdown some of these misunderstandings. If you decide not to implement real estate pay per click after this post, then you might want to consider going back to cold-calling. :)

1. It's too expensive - Really? I have found that depending on your market you can drive focused traffic to your website for $50/mo or less! Now, it takes just a litte bit of understanding to find some value oriented keywords, but it's not difficult. Taking the time to choose the right words and then right good ads will have cheap traffic to your website in no time. Besides, who isn't willing to trade $50 for a $6,000 (or more) commission?
2. My Competitors will just click my ads - Ok, my first comment is this, if your competitors are that lame that they can click on ads then they probably aren't competition! That being said Google and Yahoo have complex algorithms that enable them to determine click fraud. Everything from determining that the same IP address is clicking to the time that "person" stays on the landing page is taken into consideration. So, don't worry!
3. It won't help you get any good leads - Ah, the "good" lead vs. "bad" lead debate. Leads, are leads, are leads! You might have 100 people through an open house and not 1 buy the house, but heaven forbid 100 visitors come to your website and none of them buy. Leads are as good as you envision them and with the right process to work them you will be closing deals in no time.
4. I don't understand it - Now this one I can sympathize with. Both Google and Yahoo have put in some excellent wizards to help get you started. In addition to our real estate internet coaching, we even put up a FREE report on real estate pay per click.
5. SEO is better so why bother - I am a firm believer in achieving organic results. Now, even the best SEO people in the country can't deliver traffic based off of a particular keyword in under an hour, but you can with pay per click! Furthermore statistics show a visitor is 30% more likely to click your organic link if they also see a paid ad with the same web address.

So, real estate pay per click really isn't that bad after all. It can help you to quickly achieve results and test new pages to see if they will achieve the conversion rates you envisioned. To your success online.

Make Money from your Real Estate Website

Creating real estate content for your website visitors is a sure way to increase your results in the search engines and turn visitors into contacts. But, how do we make money from our visitors if they don't contact us?

Don't worry, I am not encouraging you to go track down advertisers to support your website. Just as you can advertise through Google using pay per click advertising, you can also place their ads on your website! This product is called Google Adsense and will allow you to easily place ads throughout your website.

Here are just 3 of the highlights of using Google Adsense on your website:

1. It's FREE to sign up!
2. Only ads that are relevant to your content are displayed
3. You get paid each and every month!

Since you invest the time into creating and maintaining your real estate website you might as well get the benefits of extra revenue. Many of our coaching clients receive enough each month to pay for their website and more. It isn't uncommon to make $150-$300 a month!