Real Estate and Beyond Blog

 INTERNET LEAD CONVERSION AND BEYOND

The real estate market is expected to pick up over the next six months since mortgage rates will be low, plenty of inventory from bank foreclosure, and tax credits available until first half of 2010. This is a perfect storm. However, I meet real estate agents that do not know how to generate their own leads. They continue to take educational courses because their broker tells them to attend as many classes as possible. Then, these agents are ready to do their first deal. Real estate is a contact sport which means we have to converse with people to generate real estate leads. Agree? I mentor agents to learn what to say in different situations such as listings, investors or just people who want to purchase a primary home. They can at least create the lead to have me with them during the meeting so I can control the outcome of the meeting. I am a resource for them.

The Shift by Gary Keller mentions the process for obtaining a lead. I have fully defined my process below for my team. I have had this process before his book came out. Please review the 4 Cs when it comes to Internet Lead Convervsion process for the Real Estate and Beyond Team.

1. CREATE-Gary Keller reminds us in both of his real estate books that Realtors are in the lead generation business. That means we have to create leads. There are too many real estate agents waiting for the phone to magically ring on a daily basis. I have learned to master this skill to create leads through multiple web sites for niche markets I represent, weekly radio show, monthly newsletters, market my listings to generate leads both local and Internet, sphere of influence, Craigslist, word of mouth, passing out my business cards to everyone I come in contact with on a daily basis, contact my database throughout the year, hold workshops for public to attend, loan officers, ActiveRain Blogging, and COFFEE.
2. CAPTURE-Here is another skill by itself. How do you capture the lead? It is very exciting when people call you from one of your call capturing skills. However, we must do something with this lead to make it happen. Personally, I keep my writing pad with me all the time to obtain the simple information such as Name, Contact Phones, Address, Email Address and purpose of the call. Then, I go for the direct close by asking them can we meet in the next couple of days. I have dedcued that the direct close is my best method since I am from New York.
3. CONVERT This is ones ability to ask for the business. The client must know that the real estate agent is confident enough to do the task in front of them. Steps 3 and 4 are quite easy for most agents since they know how to close business. I believe most real estate agents have a hard time with #1 and #2. Personally, I have developed this skill to a science.
4. CLOSE-I have a saying "Done Deal with Delia." I close my deals. Are there obstacles to overcome? Yes! One must listen to their client to deliver the goods. That means we have to listen to our clients needs and show them the product needed by the client. There are times we must use other means to find real estate deals other than the MLS. This is where I have differentiated myself from the wolf pack.

Did this come to me overnight? No, I have developed this system over the last seven years. I have learned that we are in the lead generation business. My goal this year is to fine tune #2 and #3 to close more deals. I have set up a system to track each call so I know where my marketing efforts are paying off or not when it comes to lead generation. I have developed a one page form to obtain the important information such as Name, Address, Cell Number and Email address. Then, I ask the person where they obtained our information from because I want to track where each lead came from to have metrics each month. Then, I ask them the nature of the call with the following categories:

• Rent To Own
• Seller
• Primary Purchase
• Investor Foreclsure,Trustee Sales, Auction, retirement or fix and flip
• Short Sale opportunity
• Other

Then, I have all the categories plus other to check when the inform me how they heard of us. Metrics is very important to me because it tells me where my marketing dollars work the most

The bottom of the form allows me to obtain basic information if it is a purchase so I can start sending them homes so they start touching the inventory and to assume the sale. Then, I refer them over to my mortgage partner to start the prequalification process. This works really well becasue we have responded to the lead within ten minutes of receiving his lead. It shows the customer that we mean business. First impressions mean a great deal in this business.

I have created the Real Estate and Beyond Team so I am able to service each lead. I am the ultimate "RainMaker" on my Team. I take this job very seriously. Again, I am always looking for new ways to generate leads. My grandfather told me, "Always ask it because if you do not ask then you do not get."That was his simple advice to his grandson. I have taken this advice into my adult life. I am teaching my children to do the same thing in life. Just Ask For It-Assume The Sale.

I have seen a steady increase of leads coming from ActiveRain based upon the topic areas of my blog. I spend the majority of my time writing about real estate investing. However, I have started writing about Phoenix overall to start attracting primary home buyers since 80% of my market right now are FHA buyers. We cannot ignore that business.

There are times when we have to touch the client more than five times to close a sale. The first call is just the warm up. We put each lead in our database to put the lead on a drop Email campaign that we have personally developed. Plus, they start receiving our monthly newsletter that contains real estate information along with meeting dates, workshop dates and hot real estate deals. People love information so I give it to them. The database works great becasue we are able to email blast the whole database or just parts of it. This is a vital part of the whole process. We collect information so we are always in front of our customers.

Yes, I do Google my clients to obtain more information on them. I want to learn as much as possible on them to create a bond between each other. Yes, I look them up on Facebook to connect with them on a social media realm. Agents have to start using all the tools available to them.

People are impressed when I inform them that I host a two hour weekly radio talk show on real estate. I have been doing this for four years. I have created a sub domain name "960RealEstate" to make it easier for my listeners to remember so they can visit my web site. Many times people are in their cars listening to me. That points back to my main web site. I encourage people to sign up for my BLOG. They love it. I have my podcasts of previous shows if they miss a week.

For other methods of converting Internet leads, be sure to check out giftofshift.com/activerainwhere you can purchase a limited edition hardcover of Gary Keller's book SHIFT, which comes with a free version of the eBook Soci@l: Attract Friends, Followers and Connections to Your Business, written by Ben Kinney and Jay Papasan (in which Ben shares his 'ten days of pain' lead conversion method) as well as free audio versions of Millionaire Real Estate Agent and Millionaire Real Estate Investor all for $19.99."

TOP 5 TIPS TO ARTICLE WRITING MARKETING

I have been hitting the Internet hard for the past eight months when it comes to marketing my real estate services. ActiveRain has been a major player in my overall Internet marketing plan. It gives me exposure that is much expected by my clients. They like the fact that I have my own blog so that they can keep up with local statistics and events in one place. I have disciplined myself to dedicate 90 minutes per day for social media. There are days when I am not motivated. However, I want to hit the mark.

I came a across an article describing the importance of posting articles on various sites to become a local expert. It was very interesting to me since I was writing blogs on a daily basis. I did more research on this type of marketing and found it to be very useful. So, I have included this strategy into my socail media game plan. Currently, I have published and posted 13 articles on various subjects on ezine. Feel free to visit www.DeliaTeam.com to view the articles.

TOP 5 TIPS TO ARTICLE WRITING MARKETING

1. INFORMATION-Write about information that people are search for such as foreclosures, real estate investing, private money and so on. Be the local expert on two to three niches of your choice and write about it so people see you as the expert.
2. TITLES THAT GRABS READERS ATTENTION-Be creative and have a title that grabs the readers attention such as "Phoenix Foreclosures Continue to Decrease"
3. POST ARTICLES ON MAIN WEB SITE-Builds credibility to people coming to your site along with original content added to your site for key word searches.
4. USE RSS FEED-Snydicate your articles for people who want to receive them.
5. CROSS REFERENCE ARTICLES FOR GOOGLE JUICE-All clicks point back to you.

The goal is to continue to write original content to post all over the Internet so you come up in key word searches so people have call to action to get in touch with you. It has been working great for me. This is not an overnight endeavor. One must be a farmer who plants the seeds to enjoy the harvest down the road. I would advise anyone to search through old blog posts to see if you can turn them into an article.

Here are my top web sites to post my articles:

http://www.ezinearticles.com
http://www.goarticles.com
http://www.web-source.net

GOOGLE LOCAL BUSINESS CENTER DIRECTIONS ON GETTING NOTICED

I just got off the phone with one of my network members. She was informing me about listing her business on Google Local. I asked her about the cost--FREE. One more time for everyone-FREE. She kindly sent me over the directions to make this happen today. I thought it was pretty neat and simple. Google is just amazing when it comes to all their little tools. So, I just wanted to pass the information to everyone on ActiveRain since we are all about sharing and making all of us more successful in our local markets.

 GET YOUR BUSINESS FOUND ON GOOGLE FOR FREE

1. Go to www.google.com/local/add
2. Click on "Create a new Google Account
3. Click on "Add new business" and fill out the entire form with complete description. Please include your web site address. This helps you obtain better rankings in the search engines.
4. Click on "Phone Call." You will receive automated phone call from Google asking for 4-digit code that is on your screen. The whole process takes about one entire business day.

Short and sweet but very powerful.

Make it happen.

Everyone is after the Google juice. What is Google juice? We are all concerned about SEO (Search Engine Optimization). How do we get there? Do we need to hire an expert to understand it? Google juice is the value Google gives to your site for having a great link to a very active site. The value adds up for each quality link and in return you obtain better search rankings.

There are people out there that will tell you that they have figured out Google's complicated algorithm process for ranking sites. The three main factors when it comes to the algorithm include:

1. Original content on the site
2. Age of web site
3. Number of links to the site

The term Google juice have been first used by Don Marti in 1998 or 1999.

Google juice allows unique visitors come to your website from search engines such as Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc. The more juice, the better for you and your business. Studies have shown us that nearly 80% of Internet users search by key words. So, it is critical to ensure your web site has the key words so people come to your site and stay a bit. One has to get to the first page of Google to make it in this world. Being on the second or third page will give one a chance to earn business. People want information within thirty seconds. So, that means people will not flip through more than three pages to find a match for their key word search.

I would highly encourage all of you to check your web site ranking at Page Rank by Google. The web sites at the top have more Google juice than others. This is a metric instrument used by Google to rank websites.  

Here are 5 tips to increase ones website rankings: Read entire article  

1. Join Forums
2. Submit to search engine directories
3. Establish ezine ads/newsletters
4. Creating and publishing articles
5. Links from related sites

Conclusion:

I dedicate ninety minutes per day to social media including blogging on ActiveRain, Facebook, Twitter and other sites throughout the week. I have decided to take the long term approach to the Social Media Game. The five tips listed above will always be an ongoing process for me. Yes, it takes longer to write your own original content. However, we all must pay a cost for freedom.  

YOU GOT MAIL!

How many E-mails do we write per day? How many E-mails do you read per day? E-mail has become part of our lives on a daily basis. I am sure I read and write over one hundred E-mails per day. It is important to me that that I effectively communicate with people via E-mail. So, here are my Top 5 tips on writing a more effective E-mail.

1. Subject line so people can decided to open it or not. Spam is huge on the Internet. I am constantly hitting my Delete button.
2. Short and Concise is appropriate when sending E-mails. Also, make sure it is readable for the receiver.
3. Think Before Click-Make sure you think before clicking to send a message. I have learned the hard way over my professional life by not thinking before sending. The receiver may take the E-mail differently than you intended.
4. Proofread and Spell-Check-People will check for mistakes while reading your message. You want to come across sound and professional at all times in this business.
5. Response Time-You want to make sure that you respond to E-mails in a timely manner. I check my E-mails frequently throughout the day so I get back to people within 24 hours or less.

Here are my Top 5 tips in building a better E-mail. Let me know which number you like best or feel free to add more tips that your personally do yourself so we can share with the AR Community.

The U.S. Marine Corps announced this past week that it will block its troops from logging onto social networking sites - Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, among others - from its computers. The news must have left a few Robins Air Force Base airmen wondering how their Marine counterparts got away with logging onto these sites until now. "Almost anything that is entertainment related is blocked," said John Birdsong, spokesman for the base. Robins Air Force Base airmen have long since been prohibited from logging onto social networking sites from their office computers. Most online radio stations and dating sites are also blocked from base computers. cited Marines No to Social Networking Sites

Robins Air Force Base is the first marine fort to say no to social networking sites due to security reasons. They are still permitted to log in on their own personal time. However, it is blocked from military base computers due to terrorist threats.

This is an example of how embedded Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites are now part of our lives such as the cell phone. What would you do if you could not access your Facebook or Twitter account? Twitter made national news last week because their whole system went down. I just wanted to share this article with you this morning.

I have decided to use article writing as part of my marketing plan. It does take focus and dedication to set time for this type of marketing. One must turn off all distractions to create a quiet environment to focus and write quality articles. Why article marketing? I have decided on this type of marketing for the following reasons

• Be the local expert in my local expert
• Minimal cost
• Create Internet exposure with many different articles on real estate articles

One can expect results over a three to five month period as one continues to submit 5-20 articles per month. The number of visitors to one's web site should increase as more and more people read the article. Then, click on the author's web site. This is a great strategy to increase the number of visitors to one's web site. One must use specific target keywords to generate more traffic and to be indexed on search engines. The goal is to write articles to get to the first page of searches. I have accomplished this many times when being very specific on writing my articles.

One will know that this type of marketing works by the following:

• Increased traffic to the web site
• Increase in page ranking by Google and other search engines. This does take time.
• Better rankings as one continues to use specific keywords for better placement
• More phone calls wanting to purchase and/or list real estate

I developed an overall social marketing plan for my business real estate. Yes, ActiveRain is part of my plan. However, I am writing articles to market my services at the same time. I have developed a list of areas to write articles on when it comes to real estate. Then, I submit the articles to different sites. My plan is to write two articles per week to submit. Then, I will have over 100 articles submitted over the course of a year on the Internet. Then, I will continue this strategy each year.

Here is a strategy that I am using to write articles at this time

1. Pick a subject and create bullet points as many as possible. This create an outline for you to create a simple outline. Then, write three to four sentences on each bullet point. Then, bring it all together to create an article. Edit and complete.
2. One must pick a strong title for the article to catch the eye of readers on the Internet. Key words are a must both in the title and throughout the article to ensure proper SEO rankings. One wants to be noticed for their expertise.
3. Quiet. Turn off all the distractions on one's life in order to focus on writing. It does take focus and dedication for this type of marketing strategy.

This is my strategy when writing articles on real estate. I will continue to share more successful techniques as I continue to perfect this marketing process. Please tell me some of your successful strategies so we can all continue to learn from one another.

There are well over one million plus agents in America. How does a buyer pick an agent? Do they take an online course on how to pick an agent? Agents have over 60% chance of being their agent on the first point of contact. I have found that buyers do not wish to tell their stories more than once to a Realtor? Has this been your experience? I assume the sale when I am on the phone. I give them several reasons to pick me as their Realtor.

TOP 10 WAYS TO STAND OUT FROM THE COMPETITION

1. Answer the phone
2. Dress professionally in public
3. Web site a must
4. E-mail address with your domain name
5. Host your own radio show
6. Access to great deals
7. Access to private money for real estate investors
8. Develop local network of professionals
9. Mortgage company that offers smooth process for financing
10. Close the deal while overcoming obstacles

Here is my list.

What are you doing right now to stand out from the competition?