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Money With Your Web Site: I'm a national real estate technology speaker, and I'm one of the lucky ones: I have a terrific group of market-leading agents from around the U.S., Canada and Australia, the Allen F. Hainge CyberStars®, to study. By studying them, I learn what really works and what doesn't work when it comes to marketing in today's world of real estate. The main thing that these top agents taught me is this: for the past 4 years, their personal Web site has formed the heart and soul of their business! Want proof? Agents who realize this fact have taken over the marketplace. In every market I've studied, 10% of the agents now do 90% of the business, an incredible statistic. These "Top 10" agents have, almost without fail, superb Web sites. When it comes to the CyberStars® themselves, when I last surveyed them, I found that they earned from $35,000 to over $400,000 from their Web sites alone in the past 12 months: 22% of them had earned in excess of $100,000 in closed gross commissions from their sites alone. A large majority of agents now have a Web site, yet when I poll them in my seminars, only 1%, if that, have earned any money from them! What's the difference between the majority of the agents and the CyberStars® when it comes to Web site success? I believe it's the fact that sites of the CyberStars® and other top agents have three essential ingredients, whereas the "also rans" don't. Successful Sites Are Consumer Oriented, Everything about the site is geared towards the consumer, not the agent. If all you have on your site is a bunch of listings and information on you (i.e. your basic Realtor.com site), you're not making much money, if any. The consumer will click off your site and go find one that's geared towards his or her needs. They want information that's of importance to them. Remember: radio station WIFM ("What's In It For Me?) comes in loud and clear! Successful Sites Have A Wealth Of
Information Look at your Web site as a consumer would. What would you want to know about your area? What would you want to know about buying/selling a home? What would you want to know about selecting and working with an agent? What would you want to know about hiring an agent, i.e., buyer's agency? What would make you "feel good" about that agent? If you analyze what your site should contain from this perspective and build one that fulfills your criteria, you'll make a lot of money from your site! The easiest and least expensive way to get a lot of consumer-oriented information on your site, of course, is to get a good template site such as Advanced Access, which has over 900 pages of it. No sweat, no expense…it's just done for you. Successful Sites Let You Add Your Own
Content… With your Advanced Access website, you're off to a good start, but don't stop there. Add "stuff" to your site on a regular basis, things that would appeal to the consumer who visits your site. Fortunately this is easy with an Advanced Access site, since you can do so in "plain English." What type of content should you add? Here are a few ideas used by the CyberStars® and other successful agents: local school information, photo pages of local events such as youth league games, photos from your client party, something on your hobby, virtual tours from VisualTour.com for every listing, local tax data, sample forms used for buying or selling, any information that would be of interest to someone visiting your area, real estate statistics, , links to your "business partners" (an attorney, a title company, a lawn service, a carpet cleaning company, a moving company, etc.), testimonials from satisfied clients and customers (consider using photos and audio files for them), etc. In short, then, deep sites geared to the consumer's needs work; shallow, egocentric sites that focus on listings don't. Now that you have a website, get started promoting it and adding to it, and you, too, will join those who are making a tremendous amount of money from their Web sites! Allen F. Hainge is real estate's #1 "Let's Make Money With Technology" national speaker and author. He is the founder of the Allen F. Hainge CyberStars(r) a group of top agents from the U.S., Canada and Australia who dominate their market using today's technology. Link Popularity Update The GoldenWebAwards is given out by the Association of Webmasters and Designers. As a FREE service of the Association, this award is presented to those sites whose web design, originality and content have achieved levels of excellence deserving of recognition. Make sure your website has NO empty pages and is personalized to YOUR taste. Here's how to get started: Visit the link below: Fill out the form completely on their front page. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact your Account Executive. Read the following from real estate professionals who are using Advanced Access' Marketing Tips to their advantage: "Just wanted to let you know what a terrific member of you company you have! Jeff Menendez goes above and beyond in his help and patience when I call in with a problem. His big problem is dealing with someone who is not computer literate. But Jeff walks me through it and thanks again to his patience we get it done! Thanks Jeff!" Peg Braxton "I enjoy the tips... keep them coming." Terre Steinbeck "I really appreciate the upgrades and the e-mails!" Carl Henger Advanced Access |
