This New "How To" Book on Real Estate Internet Marketing 
Can Help You Get Started, or Get Even Better, on the Web.
By Kristina Morrison
Vice President, Advanced Access, Inc.

What the Real Estate Industry Needed:

For several years, real estate industry leaders and associations have said that the number one need today was for Realtors® to become more e-savvy. Learning to use computers and the Internet was deemed critical in order for Realtors® to continue being the first point-of-contact for e-savvy consumers who increasingly were turning to the Web to find homes.

A New Tool Helps Answer that Need:

In late spring of this year, the largest producer of textbooks in the world, Prentice Hall, published the work of two long-time marketing professionals-a book entitled Internet Marketing in Real Estate. Happily for Realtors®, the authors chose to write their book for all skill levels-from Realtors® brand new to e-marketing and without a clue about what to do next, (or even first) to Realtors® who got off to a fast Web start and now want to do even more.

San Clemente, California-based co-authors Barbara Cox, Ph.D, and William Koelzer, CBC, APR, researched and wrote for more than a year to produce the 256-page book of easy-to follow, plain language tactics and how-to directions that Realtors® can apply in their quest for more effective Web marketing.

The book's ten chapters take real estate professionals systematically toward a useful presence on the Internet that will serve them, their clients and their future clients. Clearly defined procedures help Realtors® move through the sometimes-scary process of learning to use the Internet for real estate marketing. The book even shows Realtors® how to use their current traditional marketing and promotional tactics in concert with their e-presence.

Internet Marketing in Real Estate shows Realtors® (and their Webmasters) how to make realty sites more "findable" by property buyers and sellers. It also describes proven ways to respond to consumers once they have found the Realtor®'s site. For example, the book walks readers through the "must-dos" of effective e-mail. More than merely describing how to e-mail effectively; this book actually gives numerous response samples, so that the Realtors® can feel confident in responding to most consumer e-mail that they might receive.

Straightforward plain language discussion answers Realtors'® questions, common and esoteric, about getting sites to show up high on search engines such as Excite and AltaVista as well as in the new and all-important, human-edited directories such as the Open Directory Project at Dmoz.org.

Getting found on the Web, however, entails far more than coming up well in search engines-and here is where the book excels. If a Realtor® secures both free and paid links on other Web sites that point consumers to his or her site, the result is virtually the same as getting found through high search engine placement. The book explains how to excel using both tactics.

With so many millions of sites on the Web today, which ones are the best on which to place those all-important links? The authors cover this aspect in great detail, citing not only the key realty sites to be listed in---such as MLS search sites and Realtor®-locator directories-but scores that most Realtors® might not discover on their own. For example, because Web users who are relocating to a given city frequent local city Web sites, such sites are perfect for placing a link or banner leading to a Realtor's® site. Costly? Not at all. Often a year's worth of city Web site banner ads that work on a powerful 24/7 basis can be bought for the price of a single newspaper ad. And what should the link or banner say? The book tells you.

What about the Realtor's® all-important Web site itself? Where do you get one? What does one cost? Should you pay for a custom site or get an inexpensive one made from a template? What should the site contain? How should it look? Who will be the primary audience? What is the best way for Realtors® to introduce themselves to visitors to the site? Is it better to emphasize a particular realty specialty? Should the site offer links to other sites? What content should be in most sites? What kind of picture(s) should sites contain? What about the all-important "Look-n-Feel?" Should an agent's site offer MLS searching? These questions are answered, along with hundreds more.

Reading Internet Marketing in Real Estate is made a more enriching experience by the many links the authors include to sources of additional related information on the Web. I have not counted all the links referenced in the main body of the book and in the voluminous appendix, but they must number well over a thousand. Each time you learn something new from the book, you can learn even more by going online and visiting the related links.

As an executive with a Web site design and hosting firm that has created sites for more than 5,000 agents across the country, let me say that this book covers each one of the most critical Web marketing topics in a way that works. I hear these questions daily from Realtors. Now I can point them to the answers.

There is no room here for me to cite every one of the scores of other Web marketing topics covered well in this new book. However, key ones include planning, budgeting, strategies, tactics, co-op alliances, alternative media, publicity, signage, farming, direct mail, and how to make your existing promotional activities drive consumers to your site. It is the kind of book you may well want to refer to daily, as you become more skilled in Web marketing.

How do you learn more about the book, or get a copy? You can learn more at http://www.BooksOnRealEstate.com where you can also purchase a copy through a link there to Amazon.com where the cost is only $19.33.

There is nothing like this book on the market today and likely will not be for a long time. It is the first to explain exactly how, when and where, to do what, in Realtor® Internet marketing.

I hope our weekly Marketing Tips have been helping you with your own marketing efforts.  Here is an inspiring email from Sally Atwood, a local REALTOR® in Fairbanks, Alaska.  

"I really like the weekly tips you send out. I am not able to implement all of them due to time constraints, but I did get my site on every sign I have on property. Thus far in July I have had 305 hits and it is still increasing."

Sally Atwood
Century 21 Gold Rush

Or, how local REALTOR® Wayne Del Bosque in Oklahoma City, OK will be using Marketing Tips to increase traffic to his website:

"Every idea you have sent so far is a great one!"

Wayne Del Bosque
Coldwell Banker Advantage