Tag archive for "online" | Blog.PropertiesOnline.com

Why Blogging is Good for Your Business

Twenty years ago, a solid marketing strategy for real estate involved putting ads in the newspaper and leaving signature FOR SALE posts on properties. Now, with the digital age among us, this type of marketing is just simply not enough. In order to stay on top, real estate businesses, as well as all types of businesses, have to learn how to get noticed online. One of the greatest tools for receiving online attention is blogging. And I’m going to spend the next few paragraphs telling you exactly why blogging is good for your business.

What is a Blog?

A blog is like an online, interactive journal. While they can be used for personal or public use, their function can often vary. Blogs are similar to articles, and can be found on designated websites to inform or entertain readers, who are often allowed to rate or comment on the material. For businesses, blogging is a great way to share knowledge, attract readers (or potential clients), gain credibility, advertise, and improve search engine page rank through better search engine optimization (SEO).

Making the Most Out of Blogs

In terms of improving business, blogs are an easy way to improve online popularity. When someone is searching for real estate agents online, you want your service to be the first to pop up on Google. Blogs have the power to make this happen and here’s how:

Search engines, like Google or Bing, rely on an intense algorithm to find websites when you search using a series of words. Websites that are frequently updated, well respected, contain large amounts of data, and are linked to other sites are typically the first websites to show up in a search. By posting blogs on your own site and by publishing more information, you are expanding the website and increasing its chance of hitting a lucky component in the search engine’s algorithm. When posting blogs on other sites, known as off-site optimization, it is important to include inbound links to your site and to write quality blogs. These components of blogging are targeted ingredients that a search engine look for and will make your site stand out from the rest.

Blog and Get Noticed

For real estate blogging, businesses tend to inform audiences on the housing market, quarterly reports, and events going on locally. This is an easy way to outreach readers (potential clients) and keep content current, all while improving your marketing strategy. When it comes down to it, a solid use of blogging not only makes your website look better, it can also improve your business’s SEO performance and land your website among the first pages in a search engine’s results.

How Facebook is Cornering the Property Market

Facebook has more than 1.31 billion active users. According to NAR (the National Association of Realtors), 90.5% of real estate agents and brokers use social media to some extent. In a study of traffic sources conducted by Properties Online, using Google Analytics, single property websites received the most referrals (50%!) from Facebook.

Changes to Craigslist in late 2013 mean that referral traffic from the site can no longer be measured. This gives Facebook a boost in ratings, so to speak. And the social networking giant is doing all it can to maintain its place at the top.

Twitter has been growing, but hasn’t had the impact on real estate professionals that Facebook has. Still, at more than 645 million users, the social media site is a significant force, with a lot of potential. One problem for real estate listings is that Twitter is home to A LOT of information. Tweets can easily get lost and end up unseen. But there is something to the platform – something that has had Facebook on alert for a long time.

You may have noticed the subtle integration of some of Twitter’s features into Facebook this year. Actually, just before the New Year, Facebook began by renaming its ‘subscribe’ and ‘hide all’ options with ‘follow’ and ‘unfollow.’ Facebook is using an algorithm—based on your usage—that then controls the content that appears in your newsfeed.

Another Twitter-ish update was the move to ranking link posts from publishers higher in the newsfeed. This seemingly small change led to big things for Facebook, with publisher content referral traffic from Facebook rising 50%, to account for over 15% of all social referrals. At the same time, mind you, Twitter referrals decreased four percent.

Now, as we know, Facebook is great for sharing photos and videos (and this is great for real estate professionals). But Facebook saw Twitter’s edge when it came to user-generated content and changed its algorithm to rank text-only status updates from users higher in the newsfeed. Their research showed them that users respond positively to these types of updates, and that they prompt more of the same. So, that that and run with it – share your thoughts about a listing, the market, anything of interest, with your Facebook followers.

Facebook may never replace Twitter when it comes to real-time news, but it doesn’t need to. And while a full-blown social media presence is great, if you can pull it off, you don’t need that, either. Facebook is a fantastic option for busy real estate professionals, and it’s gotten even better in 2014.

Boomerang Buyers Need Extra Help in the Home Buying Process - What to Know

Home buyers are Online – But are you Meeting their Needs?

If you aren’t already aware of this NAR statistic, prepare yourself: 87% of consumers begin their home search online. Yep, 87%, well over two-thirds of Home buyers start their search online.

This is great news for agents and brokers marketing their properties online. But here’s the clincher: the NAR also tells us that a whopping 48% of internet leads go unanswered and unattended. Forgive me, but that is just madness!

In today’s real estate market, the opportunity is ripe to build your business by providing exceptional, attentive customer service. With the proliferation of online apps, social media, and smartphone usage, your potential to reach and respond to clients grows every day. But you have to be in those places too, and you need to make sure you’re set up to not let quality online leads slip through the cracks.

Customers are online in droves. But it’s up to you to attract them, engage them and retain them. Utilize inbound marketing tools to help customers find you, not your competition. Make use of products and services designed to empower you to efficiently expand your business while generating more traffic and better leads.

If I was to contact you today via your website, would I receive a professional response within 15 minutes? If not, you may have already lost my business. It’s not enough for your site to look pretty – it needs to be functional, automated and effective, too.

Be known for delivering an experience beyond what you project online or in your other marketing materials. Follow up, follow through, stay connected, and maintain a high level of service even after you’ve closed a sale. Because here’s another NAR statistic worth noting: 41% of real estate customers still rely on personal referrals when hiring an agent or broker.