StepsMLS BLog

Blogging Your Way Into The Neighborhood

Cody Sweet

Many times when an Agent gets a website it is way too vague. The Realtor may work the greater Sacramento area, but that doesn't mean they should target the greater Sacramento area with their online marketing. There is without a doubt thousands of other Agents targeting this same area. This might sound like bad news, but really it is great news. With so many Agents targeting such a large area it opens up huge gaps for you to target a few neighborhoods and really clean up in those areas.

If you can use Pay Per Click for a neighborhood that is great, but in smaller cities sometimes there is not enough traffic per month for Google to allow this. This isn't a problem because it is usually very easy to obtain a top ranking organically(free) with such a targeted area.

Here are a few tips to help you rise to the top ranking in Google for your target Neighborhood.

1. Use your Neighborhood as the domain name.

Now it might not always be possible to have FairOaksRealEstate.com or FairOaksHomesForSale.com. Sometimes they are available, but many times you will have to go a little deeper. For example, right now FairOaksCAHomesForSale.com is available and that specific keyword gets searched 4,400 times a month!

With such a specific keyword such as Fair Oaks CA Homes For Sale, and a matching domain, you are well on your way to making the first page of Google.

2. Start a blog on your new domain.

Blogs are one of the best ways to climb up the search engine rankings. Google loves them and they are also a great way to keep in contact with potential clients. Not only that, but if someone goes to your site and see you update it several times a week, they know you are serious about your business and working hard.

Be sure to use your keywords in your blog posts. Don't stuff them in there so it reads like a robot wrote it, but try to write your blog posts around them. For example, every week you could do a blog post titled "Fair Oaks CA Homes For Sale 10-2". You could then list some of the new listings for that week in your blog post. Not only does it give your potential clients useful information, it also helps you increase y our rankings.

3. Rinse and repeat.

Start with one Neighborhood and get some experience under your belt, but once you feel halfway comfortable with it go ahead and replicate the same process in one or two more neighborhoods. You can do this for as many areas as you feel comfortable with, although I do suggest starting out slowly. It can take a lot of time to build a dozen sites at once while maintaining your old ones.

Once you have your new sites up, it isn't too hard to come up with blog content. Write 3-5 posts a week per blog and you will start gaining traction in the search engines fairly quickly. Once you get to one of those top spots you can scale back the amount of blogs you write per week significantly. This will allow you to then start on a new Neighborhood specific website to gain even more clients.

4.5 Tips for a Successful Website

Danny Walcoff

Do you have an older, cluttered website? It may be time to make it more user-friendly for the potential customers that visit your site. The following tips can dramatically increase the effectiveness and appeal of your real estate website.

1) Visitors should know what your business does within the first few seconds.
2) Site navigation should be clear and consistent on every page.
3) Use high-quality, relevant images that convey professionalism and consider using stock photos.
4) Use a color palette to ensure the colors on your site work well together and look appealing.
4.5) To sum it all up, make your website look and feel as professional as the business customers visit.

Follow these simple tips and might just get a few more leads

Pay Per Click for Real Estate Agents

Cody Sweet

Many Agents have given Google Pay Per Click a chance but end up dropping it from their marketing campaign. This is usually because they spent a lot and didn't make a lot. I am going to give you three mistakes to avoid when using Pay Per Click for Real Estate.

1. "City Name Real Estate" is EXPENSIVE!

Very expensive! Not only is it expensive, but many of these searchers are people who are just browsing. They want to look at some houses, see what's out there but are probably not ready to buy a home. They are just window shopping.

When you pick your keywords, be much more specific. "Sacramento Real Estate" will cost you much more money and bring you far less real leads than "Fair Oaks Condos For Sale".

2. Don't fall victim to the numbers.

Just because there are 350,000 people searching for "San Francisco Homes" doesn't mean you should try to get "just 1%" of them. If you play that game you will go broke. There may be a ton of people searching for that keyword, but you will be paying a high amount per click and again, most of them are window shoppers.

Don't count out keywords such as "San Francisco Sunset Homes". Although it may get less than 100 searches a month, it will cost you pennies per click and the people searching for homes in such a specific area are probably much closer to being ready to buy a home.

3. Keep your daily budget LOW!

When you first start your campaign you are still learning and have probably made several mistakes. Because of this you should keep your daily budget to something you can afford to lose. This is a mistake many Agents make. They set their budget too high, lose a few hundred dollars very quickly, and never try PPC campaigns again.

When you first start your campaign, think of it as gambling at the casino. You know you are going to lose money and if you do happen to win, that's just an added bonus. Once you get a little more familiar with PPC campaigns you will be able to use them much more effectively and start spending enough money to see quite a good return on your investment.

How a Real Estate blog brings you leads

Cody Sweet

When I say "Blogging" what comes to mind? Some idiot spouting off at the mouth about his personal opinions that no one cares about? Yeah, that's what I figured.

Unfortunately this is what comes to many peoples minds, but a Real Estate blog can actually bring you a lot of clients and make you a ton of money.

How?

By using Blogging to gain traction in Google, Yahoo and other search engines. If you want people to find your Real Estate website, blogging is your new best friend. Think of each blog post you make as a whole new website with its own target audience and it gives you another chance to reach potential clients.

Wouldn't it be great if you could have 150 different websites and each website could be in its own Real Estate niche? Foreclosures, first time buyers, investment properties, you can cover it all.

If you had this many sites, how many people would find you every month? Probably a whole lot more than are finding you right now.

Now of course you would still really only have one website, but each time you make a post it gets put out there on Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. and after a while will dramatically increase your search engine ranking and the chances of clients finding you.

Here are a few tips to get you started blogging.

1. Get a blog.

Too obvious? I wouldn't suggest signing up for a free blogging account at Blogger or Wordpress. You want to have your Real Estate blog integrated into your website otherwise it won't do you much good increasing your page ranking. You also want the potential clients who find your blog posts to end up on your website, not on Bloggers website.

2. Pick your Keywords.

So for each post you make you want to have a specific niche you are targeting. For example, it could be "Miami FL Foreclosures". This would be the niche, or keyword, you are targeting for this post. You want to use the words "Miami FL Foreclosures" in both the title of the post as well as in the first paragraph. Be sure not to go overboard though, it still needs to read as if a human and not a computer wrote it.

Your main goal should be to obtain the top Google ranking for as many keywords as possible. This will be very difficult for a keyword such as "Sacramento Homes". But for a more specific keyword such as "Sacramento CA 2 Story Homes" it will take much less time. If you have top rankings for 50 keywords that maybe only get 20 searches a month, that is still 1000 potential clients each month that will be looking at your site.

There is a WHOLE lot more to picking keywords than this but that is a topic for a whole series of other articles.

3. Blog consistently.

This is very important. The more blog posts you make, the higher your chances of being found are. Try to blog 3 times a week for one year and before you know it you will be all over Google and Yahoo. You will eventually start to make first page rankings for some of your targeted keywords and the calls will start flowing in.

There is so much to blogging there are thousands of sites dedicated to just that one topic. It isn't a hard thing to do but there is always something new to learn when it comes to blogging and search engine optimization.

Be sure to keep checking back for more articles on Real Estate blogs.

Social Media for Realtors

Cody Sweet

For some reason many people seem to discount social media. They think it is only for kids and has no real business value to it. This is both untrue and great news for you! This means that many of your competitors do not use social media in their marketing mix.

The truth about Social Media is that yes, SOME of it is geared more towards the young. MySpace is generally used by a younger crowd than Facebook and LinkedIn. MySpace also tends to have a less affluent crowd than some other forms of social media. However, this doesn't mean you should discount ALL forms of social media.

Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are all very viable avenues for marketing and networking. Over 41% of all Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn users have a household income over $75,000. 38% of LinkedIn's users make over $100,000 a year. These are the people you want to reach. These are the people who are going to be buying homes.

Here are 3 steps to get you started on Social Media.

1. Ask your friends/family/clients/colleagues to add you.

Send out an email to everyone you know and ask them to follow you on Twitter, or to become your friend on Facebook. This will be the easiest way to get a network of Socail Media friends at the beginning. The best part is now that you are connect to them, you are also connected to their friends and followers.

2. Interact with local businesses and organizations.

Start conversations with local business owners, clubs, organizations, etc. on your Social Networks. Think of it as a networking event, except it is online. You are there to meet new people and to build business relationships. I have actually sold a personal online business of mine solely through Twitter. We were in the same niche, we started talking and become friends, a few weeks later he made me an offer that I couldn't refuse. We have never met in person or even talked on the phone. Everything was done online and Twitter is what got it all started.

3. Join other peoples conversations.

The great thing about Social Media is a lot of times you can join in a conversation without ever being invited. Now if you were at an event and just jumped into a random conversation with your opinion people might think you were weird. However online this is very normal. If you see an interesting conversation on Twitter, go ahead and tweet in your opinion. You can do the same thing with Facebook. Chances are they will respond to you and you can start building that relationship. Aside from that, now their Social Media friends will see the conversation and they might join in as well.

4. Keep in touch.

Just like in your personal life, if you do not keep in touch people will start to forget about you. If you have a few people or businesses you think would be a good match for your business, keep in touch with them. Every couple weeks just drop them a message asking how things are, telling them about something interesting, or just commenting on something they have written online. If you keep the conversation going they are much more likely to remember you, and even start to consider you a friend.

Social Media can be an extremely powerful networking tool when used correctly and consistently. Despite what you hear about MySpace, do not discount Social Media all together, it really can bring you in a lot of business.

3 Easy Tips to Promote your Real Estate Website

Cody Sweet

Do you sometimes think that your Real Estate website does nothing more than float around the internet being stuck in purgatory?

This is because websites are not magic. The same way no one will see your postcards if you do not mail them, no one will see your website if you do not promote it. Getting the top spot on Google is a luxury afforded to just one, and let's face it, with thousands of other Real Estate agents in your area the chances of you getting that money making spot are about as high as you finding a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

So then, how do you make your website work for you? I will show you a few simple techniques that you may be overlooking.

1. Is your web address in ALL of your print ads?

I go through nearly all of the local real estate publications on a regular basis and you know what? Every issue I find agents who pay for a whole page ad to display their listings and they do not advertise their website.

A website is a quick and easy way for a potential client to connect with you, learn more about you, see other properties available and ultimately make them choose you as their agent.

I also see brokerages that list their agents but do not list any of their agent's websites. This is both bad for the brokerage and bad for the agents. Giving potential clients more useful information can only help. Why not give it to them? If you do not, the agents on page three may be the ones with a large commission check

2. Do you give potential clients a reason to go to your website?

At the very least you should have your web address on your business card. However, this generally is not enough to get someone to visit your website. Many times the card just ends up in that stack of 57 other business cards in their desk drawer.

Luckily there are a few things you can do to save your card from business card purgatory.

If you have a great looking website you can always have its image printed on the back of your card. If people take a shine to it they are much more likely to visit it.

You could also list on it some of the valuable features. Maybe you have a unique MLS search. Or maybe you have tips and tricks to increase your home value. This could be that extra little bump to help them remember to go to your website.

And be sure to TELL THEM about these features when you hand them your card. Flip the card over when you hand it to them so they are sure to see them.

3. Do your clients feel like Ray Charles when they try to read your web address?

You are using your business card to help stand out from other agents and to give your potential client some more information about yourself. So make sure they can take full advantage of this by being able to READ YOUR WEB ADDRESS!

I cannot count the number of cards I have where the web address is so small you do not even realize it is there. That or it is the same front, color, and size as all of the other information on the card.

Is your fax number really more important than your web address? Sure, maybe if they are faxing over a purchase agreement. But in order for them to send you a purchase agreement they must first know who you are and utilize your skills. They will never know what sets you apart from agents #462 or #948 if you do not give them the opportunity to find out.

These are just a few tips that every agent should use to promote their website. Promoting your website is not a one and done type of scenario. If you put in the time and effort to effectively promote your site it will be one of the best things you could do for your business.