I/E Speaks

Blogging is time consuming there’s no doubt. As a small business owner, it’s often hard to fit in the tasks that are on the peripherie of active business. Yet it’s those passive tasks that often build the business as much as the active ones. On top of that, unless you truly enjoy writing it comes down to a basic idea that you are spending time at something that is essentially just giving away information – for free!

Saying that, there are good reasons to blog.

Blogging gives you a chance to show your audience that you are a trust-worthy expert who believes in communication - in other words, a chance for you to be seen as a trusted resource. But that’s not all, there are many other benefits. The Search Engine Optimization (SEO) value alone is reason enough to start a real estate blog. Blogging is also a great lead generator and a wide open opportunity. 

A blog is not only a great way to get good fresh content up online to attract google, but it’s a great venue to impart current information to your clients, that might not fit logically else where on your site. I think of a blog more as a newsletter or newspaper than web content.

Time Commitment of Blogging

Blogging can be time consuming. There are actually lots of ways to help offset that time commitment. Imagine someone called you and wanted you to speak about your business in front group of hundreds or even thousands of potential clients.  As a real estate agent, you would probably jump at the opportunity. The time it would take to write your speech would be well worth it. With all marketing, there is a cost, the return on investment for blogging can make it all worth it.

Questioning your Writing skills?

Blogging isn’t necessarily about being the world’s greatest writer. Instead, it’s about being able to communicate with your audience. It’s about finding your voice and using your own style to speak with your audience. If you don’t feel you have the skills or time, there are plenty of ideas to help offset the task of keeping your blog updated.

Ghost Writers:  Good copywriters can write to emulate your voice. They have the added benefit of being able to effectively work in the correct keyword density that help makes the Search Engines happy.

Imaginations Everything has a great blog writing service. For as little as $15/blog post, we can keep your content current easily, all the while writing about your market, with your voice.  Contact us and we can show you samples of our ghost writing work.

Vendor or Preferred Partners: Your preferred partners are a great resource to help add content to your blog. I am sure your mortgage broker or local handy man would love the opportunity to contribute to your blog in exchange for free advertising. Business Owners, elected officials, school board members, etc. are also great resources to pull from. But make it easy on them. Provide them with a list of questions that they can easily answer. 

Where Do I Start?

Avoid the temptation of simply going to WordPress.com or Blogger.com and creating your blog. This provides little SEO value and can get you started in the wrong direction. Instead, find a solution that gives you total control. For example, with our hosting plan, there is an easy way to add a wordpress blog to your domain. Wordpress is a great blogging platform, there are many free templates, widgets an other tools to help you grow your blog. The platform is also easy to use.

Check out our resources section for links to wordpress templates and plug in’s.

Real estate agents are always taught to offer value to their prospects and clients. When it comes to a real estate website, that value comes in the form of MLS search tools, reports, exclusive market data, compelling offers, and so on.

The value in offering those things, however is you must show value FIRST. Only then can you ask for a site visitor’s information. That is because the internet consumer of today has to first see the value before they will give up their personal information.

So many real estate agents force the user to provide personal information before the visitor obtains the valuable information or access to special tools. This  concept simply goes against the grain of a successful website and will not produce the interaction you are looking for in your website.

Don’t hold your site visitor hostage

Most website visitors operate with this understanding; The World Wide Web is seen as a vast free-access information portal offering site visitors many choices where to secure valuable information. From experience, we have all become reluctant to give away personal information - And rightly so.

After all, they can simply leave the website and find someone else who is willing to offer the information on another website without obligation or fear of harassment. So - don’t force your visitors to sign-in to access a search tool, holding them hostage in exchange for their contact information?

MLS Search

Imaginations Everythign recommends you show value first by giving the site visitor easy, access to the MLS search. You should clearly communicate how much more they can get out of searching if they signup to save listings, create favorite property searches and receive the latest “feed” of new listings the moment they hit the market via “instant” email updates.

Call to action

If it’s a request for a free report, offer the site visitor a taste of the information to show them how they will benefit by gaining access to the full report. This way they can tell that the information isn’t the same old stuff offered freely everywhere. Allow them to read the first page but then request the full report. Or offer them a reason to give their personal information away…. instant access to the report. We don’t often recommend reports be accessed by gaining user information. As those types of leads are not solid ones.

We focus more on call to action that brings in a much higher qualified lead. A solid buyer or seller looking for you to take action with them. The information you provide on your site for free, keeps visitors on your site and positions you as a trusted source, encouraging them to take action.

Here at Imaginations Everything we’ve had a busy year despite the slow down in the real estate market. We’ve balanced out some of the shortfall by creating a few smaller sites for other businesses. Here’s some of the highlighted sites we launched, or relaunched in 2008:

Jan Horn - Long time client Jan Horn was looking for a fresh new look for his website. After doing some brainstorming with him, we relaunced a site that was much more streamline, and more in line with his business of selling architecturally significant homes. (see this post for more details)

Gina Martino and Maureen McDermutt - Both these agents were looking for sites. They are sisters, and we came up with a creative way of keeping site design costs down. We came up with a common look and feel, content, and then developed a site for each of them. Since they are in different geographical areas, they still stand apart from their competition with a custom site design.

Ultra LA Homes - Los Angeles Real Estate Agent, Jonathan Shelton’s site was developed from one of our semi-custom designs.

Katie Moss - Kaite came to us wanting a site to show off her landscape garden business. She was looking for something simple, very minimalist, but with high impact visually.  After having an initial discussion, and sending her some pricing and direction ideas, we quickly settled on a flash presentation. Katie also wanted to be able to keep her portfolio up to date herself, so we installed our photo gallery tool, which she’s been using since February and loving it.

2 Flower Girls - This fresh and sassy site shows off the talents of flower girls Diana Carr and PJ Richardson.

Deb Gillespie - A semi custom offering re-purposed for a spiritual teacher and reiki master located in Montreal.

Over the past few years of working with Real Estate Agents all across the US and Canada, I’ve been part of many a discussion around target, or niche marketing. Most realtors are reluctant to limit themselves to a specific niche on their website… feeling that a larger net cast will produce more fish.

I have seen the opposite happen. When I’ve worked with an agent, who is willing to take the chance, focus down on a market, rather than cast the wide net, success follows.

Creating a site that speaks to a target market, helps identify you as the expert. Being the expert doesn’t mean you have to give up the occasional listing that falls outside of your typical sale… it’s just about reality. If 80% of your clients are from a particular niche, then acknowledge that in your marketing plan.

Your website is your best weapon for target marketing, as you can speak a lot louder, and with more words than any ad in a newspaper. So whether your market is a specific geographical one, new buyers, downsizing buyers, or condos, take a fresh look at your site and see how you can find tune things to speak more to your niche.

Including informative articles on your website is another great way to add content to your site. If your real estate firm has gotten positive press exposure, include those articles on your site.

These articles can be for contributions made in the community and if you haven’t made any, then start to do so. It doesn’t have to be huge, but should carry positive significance, such as buying the uniforms for a little league team or holding a fundraising barbeque for your local school district.

Articles also give you the chance to give users information that they may not find on other sites. The economy has impacted how much a person can afford to pay for a home so even if they have three children, they may be willing to make do with a two bedroom home.

One of their biggest questions is going to be if their furniture is going to fit. This gives you the chance to post articles about what will fit in rooms of a specific size.

So for example if you have listed a home that has a master bedroom that’s 10 X 15, you can make a note that this room will fit a queen sized bed, a dresser and two end tables.

It might sound a little silly but people really want to know these things and even better, they may not have thought about it and now you’ve done them a favor by bringing it to their attention.

Articles can also be used to further your reputation as an expert in your field. Read up on current trends in real estate and write your own articles on them.

Do a series on how to avoid foreclosure or why a house in jeopardy should be sold by the owner before the bank comes in and takes it. Make the articles compassionate and informative.

Many people who find themselves in this type of situation are so burdened by the emotional aspects of it that they may not realize that they have significant equity in their home.

If you are strictly a selling agent, you can post articles on how to get good deals by buying homes that are subject to foreclosure.

Articles can also contain information on mortgage interest rate trends and how to determine what a buyer’s closing costs are. The topics are endless and will allow you to keep fresh content on your website.

If you have a hard time forming written sentences, not to worry. You can find article writers on the Internet who will charge you a fee to write the articles for you.

To save money, you can look for existing articles on the Internet and have an agency rewrite them for you at a cost that’s lower than an original article.

by Kim Hadley

Quality content is key to having a user focused site but having quality, compelling content will hold your viewer’s attention. Most real estate websites will include the agencies information and offer an interior search engines designed to show that agencies listings and/or an outbound link to the local Multiple Listing Site, (MLS).

You want your site to offer your viewer more than what the average real estate sites offer, and do so in a way that they stay interested in your site long enough to examine it fully and leave feeling they learned something. This gives you a better chance at having them return to your site more than once, it’s a way of earning their trust. It’s also a way of establishing your credibility.

The more informative your site is, the better your chances of converting users to clients. Your content should establish you as an expert in your field, the person people go to when they need information about real estate in your area.

Posting current real estate industry news is another way to display your knowledge and make your website informative. Perhaps an area of your town used to be primarily vacant land is now being developed into new homes. A blog can be a great way to present this knowledge, as it’s more news based, than static content.

When builders begin to develop an area, they often offer great deals on prices or extras in an effort to get the first ones occupied. Let your viewer’s know about any new trends such as a shift in the market that may turn it from a seller’s market to a buyer’s market or vice versa.

No one needs to tell you that a good real estate website should contain pictures of the homes that are listed. Take advantage of the newest technologies that allow a user to have a 360 degree virtual tour of the property’s interior and exterior.

Your website should also be a vehicle used to gain the trust of your viewer’s. Real estate is probably the biggest investment that people make and those people who are willing to let you handle their real estate transactions need to feel that they can trust you.

Viewers want more than fluff and if they feel that you will treat them with honesty, they will be more inclined to come to you for more information.

Showing that you have a good reputation amounts to more than just detailing your past success. With all of the emphasis on Internet fraud, people are less likely to believe what you say without something to back it up.

Including quotes from people who have used your services and are willing to share their great experience with you can have a section of all its own on your site. What’s important is to make sure that those people that you are quoting are willing to be contacted to verify what they have said.

Your content should not just be informative; it should also be entertaining, so that you can hold the viewer’s attention and get them to visit it again and again. This can be done with articles, blogs and newsletters.

If you are building your site from scratch and you can’t quite figure out where to start then consider this: What is the real estate industry all about?

The obvious answer is buying and selling real estate. While that’s true, it’s not the real basis of the industry. Being a real estate professional is about service. It’s how well you service your clients that will lead to actual sales.

Viewers of your site are not just looking for homes; they are looking for a realtor that they feel will provide them with good service, support and advice. This is why its essential to build a user focused site based on those principles.

The typical marketing strategy in the past for realtors has been to market YOU. Your Ability, Your Prowess in sales Your Success… YOU. No longer is that the case.

With the wealth of information at hand, and the ability for someone to actually “shop” for a realtor online. All people want to know about you is what it is that you can do for them now or in the future and they want to be able to determine that by the content on your website.

So the first step in building a site is to ask yourself, what kind of content, tools and services can I put on my site that will answer the question for them?

Long time client Jan Horn (www.janhorn.com) was looking for new look for the site we had designed for him back in 2003. Initially we had come up with a site for him that had a fair amount of content. With most realtor sites, we want the content to feed the search engines need for words they can scan to rank the sites.

Since Los Angeles is a very competitive market in terms of getting ranked high in the search engines, and since the client’s is working a niche market of architecturally significant homes, we decided to create a new site for hi that spoke more to that market, than play the search engine game.

We don’t often take this approach, but in Jan’s case it made sense. We work very hard at working with our clients to come up with individual solutions for their business, and for www.janhorn.com we came up with a site that’s as stunning as the homes he represents.

We’ve begun blogging over at MotherHood Incorporated, so check us out. Motherhood Incorporated is a great new resource for women who wish to raise a family, but still keep their hand in the work force. Imaginations Everything will bring the perspective of a small business owner, and all the tips and tricks that have come with being in business for 10 years.

As a small business owner, Imaginations Everything relies on a virtual work force, and what better one than women who have skill, expertise and experience as that work force.

www.motherhoodincorporated.com
www.motherhoodincorporated.ca
www.motherhoodincorporated.com/wordpressgeneral 

The best way to make your website user focused is to find out what your potential clients really want to know. You might think that as a professional, you already know this information but don’t be so sure about that.

Times change and so do the questions that people have. Also, everyone is different so they have different real estate needs.

It might seem natural to assume that most families want the white house with the picket fence and a big back yard. This may not as true as it used to be.

There are a lot of single parents out there, many holding more than one job and they don’t want the hassle of having to take care of a big piece of property.

One of the best ways to determine how to make your site informative is to query your past clients. Send them a survey and ask them to list what their top ten considerations were when buying or selling their homes. This way you will start off with great ideas on how to build your user focused site.

Don’t forget your friends and family. Even if they don’t yet own a home, it’s another way to get an objective point of view and they may give you fresh insight into what your site needs to make it more user focused.

You can also ask them to view your website and determine if it would hold their attention and give them the information they felt they needed if they were considering buying or selling a home.