Tips from the 4th new rule of online marketing:

Old Rule: Your Website is all about you.

New Rule: Your Website is all about the customer.

More than 68 percent of all real estate professionals in 2003 had a “Website” – either a personal site or a page on their company’s site – according to a National Association of REALTORS Center for REALTOR Technology (CRT) survey. Thus, the next step for the majority of REALTORS is a Website makeover, while about a third will be buying their first website.

Understand first the three basic types of websites available today:

• Template, which resembles a printed brochure (“brochureware”) and usually drives prospects to your competition. Remember, a Webpage or even a handful of Webpages doesn’t make a Website, just as a handful of pages doesn’t make a book.
• Personal, which you can purchase off the shelf from a Website provider to personalize and promote yourself or your company.
• Custom, which is developed from scratch just for you. Also called a “Destination Website,” these sites are the most expensive to design and maintain, but draw consumers like a magnet and keep them there.

Websites are about marketing, not about technology. And marketing is about your customer, not about you.

The formula is simple: A Website becomes a powerful marketing tool when it’s nearly one hundred percent focused on the consumer. A Website becomes an asset when it’s easily transferable to a buyer of your real estate practice.

Ultimately your goal for your Website is the same as it’s always been for your marketing tools – to capture as many face-to-face appointments as possible.

If you are planning a Website makeover – or buying your first Website – experience shows there are six questions to answer first so you can talk to your web designer to get what you want.

1. How much are you willing to spend? How much can you afford? First-year costs will include initial design, operating expenses (hosting), and site maintenance. There are four ballpark categories for budgeting:
   • Personal websites

     Under $1,000 for first year

     $1,000 to $2,500 for first year

   • Custom websites:

     $2,500 to $5,000 for first year

     $5,000 and over for first year

   By establishing your budget first you’ll avoid the eyes-too-big-for-your-wallet syndrome and get a website your can afford to live with.

2. How will you measure your website’s success? Here are a few ideas for the critical statistics you’ll want to track:
   • Prospect count – unique first time visitors
   • Return visits
   • Site areas of most interest (page popularity)
   • Referrer sources (strategic link popularity)
   • Response rates (form registrations)
   • Number of face-to-face appointments set
   • Customer feedback
3. What makes you best, better, or different?
   • How do you rate in the eye’s of your prospects?
   • Do you strive to be the best among your competition?
   • If you’re not the best, do you strive to be better than most?
   • If you’re not the best and not better than most, how do you try to be different?
   • Do you have a unique selling proposition or mission? When you’re trying to be different, the idea of making your website about you or your company (ego-centric) is very seductive. The most common error in real estate sites today is a focus on the agent instead of the customer (consumer-centric).

4. Who is your target customer? Do you have several?
   • Do you want to use sub-pages to capture buyers, sellers or other target prospects? Sub-pages avoid the appearance of one-size-fits-all and enable visitors to find the specific information they need in fewer clicks.
   • Think about creating specific sections of your website to match each type of consumer you want, i.e., first-time buyers, second homes, waterfront, luxury homes, investors, condos.
   • Remember different site visitors will use different entry points into your website (not everybody begins at the home page). For different target customers promote unique page URLs such as HotNewListings.com (buyers) or GetTopDollar.com (sellers).

5. What will you offer? The mind-set of consumers as they enter your website is, “What can you do for me?” Today’s time-short visitors have a purpose; they are searchers, not surfers. Will you offer information, testimonials, encouragement, convenience? Allay fears? Save time? Provide solutions, free reports, or special services? Be prepared to discuss response offers with your web designer that will “Wow!” visitors to your site.

6. What do you want viewers to do? Calls to action invite viewers to click on customer-centered offers and web forms. The ultimate goal for your website is to provide a steady flow of face-to-face appointments. To make this possible, your site must attract visitors and hold their interest long enough to harvest contact information for automated e-mail follow-up.

Answers to these six questions will give you and your web designer a set of realistic objectives for a makeover or new customer-centered website that a buyer of your practice some day can adopt with ease. In real estate, the catch phrase has long been location, location, location. Today the catch phrase for online marketing success is consumer, consumer, consumer.

Published: May 31, 2004

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