First of all, hold on. Don?t stop reading if you have nothing to do with real estate! Even though the following advice is kind of specific, you can still adapt it to any other market and have a great website too. Now, let?s get down to business.
Real estate is one of the more profitable markets ?offline? for people who have been in it for a number of years and have some veteran experience. However, the internet being quite a new thing creates some difficulties even for the most experienced agents.
That?s why I?m creating this guide. I want to show you a cheap and easy to grasp way of launching a great website without having to hire a professional developer.
Who are you?
Essentially, it doesn?t matter if you?re an agency, or a lone broker trying to make a living. The general traits of a great website remain the same ? although they may require small tweaks here and there depending on the scale of your business.
Step #1: Taking care of the technical stuff
There are three things I want to explain really quickly here: domain, hosting, and WordPress.
As a broker you?re surely doing your business in a specific area. When it comes to the domain name, it?s best if you choose something along the lines of: ?losangelesrealestate.com,? ?torontorealestate.com,? and so on. Of course, neither of these is currently available (they?re just examples), but I?m sure you get the point.
By indicating the area in which you do your business right in the domain name, you?re making it a lot easier for your prospective clients to find you on Google.
When it comes to hosting, there?s only one main rule. Please don?t sign up for a free hosting account. Such platforms are NEVER any good, and you?ll simply end up with a thousand ads displayed on your site without your permission. Hosting isn?t really expensive, you can get it for $5 a month. Try companies such as Host Gator, or Site5.
Finally, we?ve come to WordPress. This is the cheapest (actually it?s free) and the best website management platform available.
It?s very easy to use, so you don?t need any serious computer skills, and it provides all the features you would require. Also, you can extend its possibilities by installing some free plugins (thousands of them available).
(Your web host will most likely take care of installing WordPress on your domain for free.)
Step #2: Use a quality theme
When new visitors come to your site, you have no more than 4 seconds to make a lasting impression. At this point, they will already know if they want to do business with you or not.
I know this is unfair, but it?s just the way it is. Therefore, it?s your job to make the best first impression possible. That?s why a really nice theme for your WordPress site will come handy here.
Unfortunately, there isn?t that much quality stuff for the real estate market online. One theme I can recommend is HomeQuest (not an affiliate link) by ThemeFuse. You can get it for $99.
This might sound expensive, but it?s actually a real bargain comparing to the amount you?d have to pay a professional designer to create a custom theme for you from the ground up.
Step #3: Create quality content
?Quality content? sounds a bit vague, so let me explain it in a little more detail.
First of all, you have to know who you are talking to (know your audience). Depending on the type of the client you want to attract, you?ll have to share different content.
For instance, first time home buyers will search for specific advice, rather than some speculative thoughts and predictions. Also, if someone lives in Texas, they will probably be more interested in Fort Worth real estate than in Beverly Hills real estate.
This all sounds basic, but new website owners often overlook these details and end up catering to the wrong audience.
Once you have your target audience set you can start planning your content.
There?s a really big spectrum of things to share, but here are some ideas you can build upon:
- advice on how to find deals in the area,
- list of deals in the area,
- advice on what creates a good deal,
- differences between various types of real estate from a legal perspective,
- how to get effective financing,
- how to recognize a bad neighborhood, and more.
The main advice here is to make your site content-driven. Always focus on the reason why the visitors would want to come to your site, and not on what to sell them. If you figure this out, you?ll have a successful website in the real estate market.
Step #4: Make it personal
The main difference between quality websites and poor websites is that the former talk to the visitors directly and make their message personal.
A couple of guidelines you can follow when creating your content:
- Speak to the visitor directly. Use the word ?you? a lot.
- Don?t be anonymous, show your face and display your real name wherever possible.
- Don?t try to sound smart. Create your content to use a voice you?d use when speaking to your visitor in person.
- Don?t ever write about yourself using the word ?we.?
The idea here is to create a connection, not to a barrier separating you (your business) from your visitors/clients.
Step #5: Create an email newsletter
This is a method people don?t usually use when they first launch their sites, despite the fact that it does work brilliantly in every market.
The idea is to get people to revisit your site whenever something interesting is going on. So if you convince your audience to join your email newsletter you will be able to send them direct email messages containing some unique advice or deals whenever you want.
Later on, you can also use this method to promote your own offers.
The only difficulty is to get people on board and convince them to sign up. The internet-wide method of doing this is to offer some kind of a bonus.
You could, say, create a Word document titled ?X Things to Do Before Buying Your First House? (or something similar), save it as PDF and then offer it as a gift in exchange for signing up.
You can get all the technical stuff done in MailChimp, for example. This is a great and free (for small lists) email marketing tool.
Step #6: Getting your audience ready to buy
This can be tricky, so it?s important that you understand exactly what I mean here.
The point in this step is not to make big money, it?s just to get your audience accustomed to some kind of offers and spending just a little money.
That way, you?ll find it much more natural to offer bigger deals and market to people directly later on. If you?ve never offered anything and then right out of the blue you?re sharing big real estate deals, people will find it a bit surprising.
The easiest approach here is to go to Amazon, search for publications on the real estate market and offer it through the Amazon Associates program.
That?s it for my list. Feel free to comment and let me know what?s your experience with websites in the real estate market. Are you a real estate agent planning to launch a website?
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