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Just skimmed through the thread. Holmes is wrong about one thing regarding the internet and it's driving the business via web advertising. Having a webpage is great and all, but it shouldn't be the primary source of business. No reason to spend big bucks trying to convert those internet leads. People don't shop agents, they shop homes. He with the most listings gets the most buyer leads.
Agents do the worst job of advertising to the best people to get business from. The best sources of business are your SoI. There is already a level trust there and you typically aren't battling 50 other agents for the business. They are also the most cost effective to market to.
I'd guess for my production level I spend relatively little advertising dollars trying to get a strangers business. I do spend a money marketing properties but not on other stuff like billboards, prints ads, etc. I have 1 personal website, enhanced Realtor.com, a flat rate multimedia advertising site that includes virtual tours and a call capture #, and fliers. Advertise the listings on a lot of free websites including craigslist. Then there's topproducer, talk fusion, and my newsletter that are all flat monthly rates.
When I figure up what it costs me each month whether I sell 1 property or 5, I love utilizing the free stuff like facebook and a telephone.
The problem with Facebook business pages is the FB language. It isn't rich and easy to work with. I'm happy with my business page for what it is. I'd share the link to mine but I can't, but if you type in my company name on Facebook you can see it there.
Facebook isn't Wordpress. You can't search for articles or find other content. All you get is some scrolling stuff in a status update. It doesn't function the way that a business needs it to.
Think of the relocation buyer. They type in Chicago real estate or something into Facebook and get a business page. They have to scroll through wall status updates to try and search for information that might be relevant to them. This is a completely inefficient way to get the information you need. Facebook isn't popular for business use, yet, because the current interface isn't business friendly. When they change that...I'd expect to see more people hop on board.
Yeah right, I do agree with your thought and its new interface is more irritating. I have seen many people working on FB that are running their online business and they are even gaining popularity but, still it is not that fast.
I know one thing that creating FBML pages can get more traffic and a way of getting business.
Just skimmed through the thread. Holmes is wrong about one thing regarding the internet and it's driving the business via web advertising. Having a webpage is great and all, but it shouldn't be the primary source of business. No reason to spend big bucks trying to convert those internet leads. People don't shop agents, they shop homes. He with the most listings gets the most buyer leads.
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I agree, people shop for homes online absolutely. I don't think it would hurt your business if you showed up on the first page of Google multiple times for "yourtown realtor" or "yourtown real estate agent" though, essentially giving the internet searchers little to no option but to click on a website that you own. If you own various website properties you can essentially take over the front page for these "mytown homes" search terms. On each of your websites you display your mls idx etc.
So if people do a Google search for "mytown homes" they get a list of results back, usually this is TEN distinct websites that fit on the first page of the results. Most internet searchers will not go past page 1, especially in a competitive industry like real estate where every agent and their mother has a mls idx feed that searchers can browse upon registering.
So, You cut off registration on your idx feed and make people sign up with their information and they'll acknowledge that they are giving you permission to contact them in the future. If they aren't truly ready to buy or sell, you can set them up with a drip feed email campaign and followup by phone over the course of a few months, asking if they need any professional assistance buying or selling, any specific questions they may have about a specific property, etc. At the very least you could end up getting a referral commission out of these contacts down the road if they choose not to work with you directly, location issues, etc.
It costs you nothing but time and maybe an email autoresponder program monthly fee to keep all of these fresh internet leads in communication with you. If you are getting hundreds of signups a month, basic math will tell you that SOME of those people will turn into a client and/or become a part of your sphere of influence (figure 2%-4% internet lead conversion).
My point is, a lot of people do not have and will not have a huge "SOI" going into the real estate industry. The Internet is the most logical place to communicate with people that that have a need that YOU can fill. Maybe they don't want your help now, but why ignore people that don't need your help RIGHT NOW, would you do that to people offline? What if all you had to do to keep some of these leads in your SOI was to send an occasional e-mail or make a quick phone call once a month? Offline and online are quickly becoming one in the same for a HUGE demographic of people, and to put it bluntly...you are certainly leaving money on the table if you are not working on your local internet presence. There is a reason why the major players in ANY competitive industry are pumping thousands of dollars a month into Internet advertising....ROI. The average transaction value for a real estate agent is fairly large, so even though you are spending thousands a month on Internet adsvertising...how many houses do you need to sell to make a hefty profit? Of course I understand new agents will not have thousands to spend on Google advertising right away....BUT they should consider saving for the Internet advertising before forking out tons of money for other media in my opinion.
The nice thing about Facebook is that is is still relatively unsaturated (you get clicks for cheaper in general) compared to Google advertising, and they have the BEST targeting I have ever seen. For instance, say your niche is "luxury homes". Well you can drill down to advertise ONLY to people that you feel are your target market. Some 20 year old clicking on your facebook ad will cost you money that you are not likely to ever see again...as a 20 year old is PROBABLY not going to qualify and eventually work with you this year in buying a luxury home. BUT, I bet if you targeted those 40-50 yr old adults that live in the "higher-end" towns surrounding your area...you'd have a great chance at eventually snagging a client and at the very least increasing your SOI for a few dollars a click. So the goal would be increase your SOI, while focusing on your marketing ROI. I like that.
Also, I know someone mentioned that I said you HAD to pay money. You do not have to pay a dime for the PRESENCE on facebook...your business page, personal page, fan page, etc. And I agree that there is a lot of integration tools out there that will allow you to connect your facebook presence to your other internet marketing efforts. BUT, as far as actually generating targeted leads, like I mentioned...their targeted advertising is really amazing. Having said this though, social media browsers in general are NOT buyers...that is why a Google presence (multiple website properties on the first page of the search results, paid ads, etc for multiple real estate-related terms) still reigns supreme. If you don't think so, do some Google searches for real estate terms in your town. ie: "mytown homes for sale"
Every agent seems to have a website. I hear them often complain that it does nothing for them. I then ask them how much traffic they're getting to their website and they look at me with a blank stare. Well if you are not IN FRONT of the internet searcher, meaning your site does not show up for real estate related Google search terms in your target market, well then I would agree that a website is just a "great thing to have" and should not be a primary source of your business. Take that same "its just great to have" website and put it in the top of the local search results for your town's real estate search terms. I guarantee that many Agents would be absolutely SHOCKED at the potential business they are missing out on if they were able to take a look at the amount of targeted traffic visiting and registering on the websites at the top of the search results.
The people/Brokers/Agents showing up consistently in the top 5 of the regular search results are PROBABLY ahead of the pack in your area in terms of overall revenue generated. Don't take my word for it though, ask them how they are doing.
Last edited by holmes1985; 01-16-2011 at 07:47 PM..
The people/Brokers/Agents showing up consistently in the top 5 of the regular search results are PROBABLY ahead of the pack in your area in terms of overall revenue generated. Don't take my word for it though, ask them how they are doing.
On the first 2 pages of google there are 3 agents that show up and the other 17 are companies or lead generation sites. 2 are above average but not the top agents in the market. The other I'd never heard so I looked up and he does a handful of deals a year and has been around a while. I'd say he was below average.
I checked on 6 of the top resale agents in our market. 3 don't even have a website. 1 has a blog. 1 has a plain generic site with very little info. 1 has a good website.
Now don't get me wrong. If you can get the placement and turn the numbers you can do good business but there are cheaper, easier ways to get higher quality leads. That's all I'm saying.
I can't argue that there are certainly cheaper and easier ways to get some high quality leads for most new real estate agents. I guess I am really looking at the longterm and the effort needed to increase your SOI in a dramatic fashion....people only have so many relatives and friends etc. The Internet would be the next logical step in my opinion.
When you say "17 are companies", do you mean actual Agencies? If they are Agencies that are actively collecting registration information, than an Agent ends up with those leads down the line. So, in my opinion, individual Agents would be better suited to do their OWN marketing outside of their Agency/company so that they can have first GRABS on these incoming Internet leads. I'm sure that most of the top ranking websites in any major metro area in the U.S. are occupied by the larger Agencies in the area, and this is because they are getting a great ROI. The problem is what exactly is going on with these incoming leads? How many people from within that specific Agency contact them? How many people do they go through? Does the broker just send the leads out to whatever Agent wants them? Does he send them out to a new Agent each week?
I would imagine that many of those 17 companies you mentioned are actual real estate Agencies? If so, then that is my point...they are there to collect registration information from the internet browsers looking to buy a home. (are they forcing registration/collecting user info regardless?) If an individual Agent ranked above these huge Agency websites and forced registration in order to view local properties...they would know instantly WHY these Agencies spend the money that they do for top Google rankings.
The incoming leads are not all going to be as good as if you talked to a friend or relative, but I bet some of them are. Internet lead generation makes up for quality with quantity. This quantity of leads is very difficult to achieve on a passive basis OFFLINE. If it is achieved, it is usually because someone has been an Agent in a specific area for 20 years, and they're successful from their constant networking over the years, etc.
I can't argue that there are certainly cheaper and easier ways to get some high quality leads for most new real estate agents. I guess I am really looking at the longterm and the effort needed to increase your SOI in a dramatic fashion....people only have so many relatives and friends etc. The Internet would be the next logical step in my opinion.
When you say "17 are companies", do you mean actual Agencies? If they are Agencies that are actively collecting registration information, than an Agent ends up with those leads down the line. So, in my opinion, individual Agents would be better suited to do their OWN marketing outside of their Agency/company so that they can have first GRABS on these incoming Internet leads. I'm sure that most of the top ranking websites in any major metro area in the U.S. are occupied by the larger Agencies in the area, and this is because they are getting a great ROI. The problem is what exactly is going on with these incoming leads? How many people from within that specific Agency contact them? How many people do they go through? Does the broker just send the leads out to whatever Agent wants them? Does he send them out to a new Agent each week?
I would imagine that many of those 17 companies you mentioned are actual real estate Agencies? If so, then that is my point...they are there to collect registration information from the internet browsers looking to buy a home. (are they forcing registration/collecting user info regardless?) If an individual Agent ranked above these huge Agency websites and forced registration in order to view local properties...they would know instantly WHY these Agencies spend the money that they do for top Google rankings.
The incoming leads are not all going to be as good as if you talked to a friend or relative, but I bet some of them are. Internet lead generation makes up for quality with quantity. This quantity of leads is very difficult to achieve on a passive basis OFFLINE. If it is achieved, it is usually because someone has been an Agent in a specific area for 20 years, and they're successful from their constant networking over the years, etc.
I like the thought and this is quite good update to know and understand. Internet lead generation at first attempt will not give you much benefit but, after a long time it will be very essential.
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