Technology For Agents

After doing some research today, it looks like Trulia is on the rise in the search engine rankings in the Houston real estate market. Houston is the 4th largest city in the United States, and the largest in Texas; it’s a gorilla of real estate markets in my opinion.

Trulia ranking well doesn’t surprise me. Their site is well optimized to rank well in search engines, and their site is truly innovative in the tools it provides to real estate consumers.

However, what does surprise me is that real estate agents in Houston are actually helping Trulia rank better than them. Why? It could be a for a couple of reasons:

• They don’t really care about rankings, and are perfectly fine with intentionally doing this.
• They are uninformed.

I seem to feel that it’s more a matter of the agents being uninformed than them not really caring.

It Gets Worse

What I find in common with many of these agent sites is that they are all from one provider. Number1Expert is a firm that builds real estate sites for agents, and for a fee, the agents can use them to procure business in the form of real estate leads.

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Do you like helping your competition when it comes to search engine optimization? I personally don’t like to.

However, it seems that many uninformed agents looking to increase the nifty features of their website are inherently harming their chances of doing well in search engine rankings.

How is this so? Eric Bramlett, Austin Real Estate Broker has brought it to my attention that the widgets that Trulia offers also include a keyword targeted link back to their site, which intentionally helps improve their search engine rankings.

Why do many agents still use the widgets? I believe that it’s simply them being uninformed about the real intentions of the widget feature. That is why I’ve decided to increase awareness by posting about this here at TechForAgents.com.

Trulia is truly kicking butt in the SERPs (for big time terms, and for long tails) because they’ve cooked up some solid linkbait in the form of widgets.

If you are currently using their widgets on your site, I would either:

• Discontinue the use of the widgets all-together.
• Take Eric’s advice, and modify the script to use the widgets without hurting your search engine rankings. You can see an example of this modification by following the source link below.

Source

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Take the internet lead: this type of consumer is quick to browse websites, makes decisions to stay or go in the matter of seconds, and many times is more educated about the real estate process than the average consumer.

If one of your sources to tap is in the realm of online lead generation, mastering the lead conversion process is one of the best “art forms” you can choose to focus in on.

I say “art form” because I truly feel that converting online leads takes talent. This talent could be found in you, or if your business is at a higher level, someone that you hire.

You should not only possess natural rapport building skills, but should also have the motivation to master your scripts when in dialogue with all of your online leads. You should also be someone that can take a phone conversation with someone and naturally convey the sincere desire to help without sounding cheesy. It’s not easy, but then again it’s not impossible to learn what it takes to convert more online leads.

Three Factors

Quick: A lead has contacted you online requesting more help about the real estate process. What do you do? Your ability to convert an online lead will be in direct proportion to your level of mastery with the following three areas.

• Timing
• Scripts
• Follow Up

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Don’t take offense; the consumers that you are working hard to attract don’t want to learn about who you are, what you’ve done, or what you’ve sold; Initially. Choosing to make your real estate website more consumer focused than agent focused is a decision you surely won’t regret.

Nearly 85% (TAR) of consumers browsing your real estate website use it for one thing only: to search and view properties for sale in your market. Take a look at your website now. At first glance, now that we know this vital statistic, is your site conducive to giving them what they want?

It’s all about adopting the right mind-set. When you’re working on new marketing materials, take a step back and assume the role of a skeptical customer. Ask yourself: Why should she care about your product? How will it make her life better or easier? What are the damn benefits? - Dan O’Sullivan

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Once your very first site is on the world wide web, you’ll most likely begin to ponder how your visitors are making it to your site. A proactive online lead generator will be sure to track keywords that they rank well for in the search engines; that’s how they get visitors. Hittail is a free online tool that I use for all my sites for this very purpose.

HitTail reveals in real-time the least utilized, most promising keywords hidden in the Long Tail of your natural search results. We present these terms to you as suggestions that when acted on can boost the natural search results of your site. It’s that simple. - Hittail.com

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