So now that you have a Web site and it’s been submitted to the search engines, think your work is done? Not if you want serious online success, it’s not.

To market your site on the World Wide Web, you need to think beyond the bounds of having your site show up on search engines. Yes, it’s great to be found on page one of Google in a search for Podunk, Ohio real estate. But as more and more Realtors develop personal Web sites, the competition to appear on page one of Google – or any search engine – for any keyword search is going to become very stiff.

And since Google has only 10 spots on page one for any search result – 12 if you count the two Sponsored Link sites at the top, the competition to appear on page one is going to become so fierce that agents and brokers will need to supplement their search engine submissions with other forms of online marketing. After all, with only 10 spots per page on Google’s search results, how many Realtor sites can possibly show up for the keywords you hold dear?

The answer, of course, is 10 – which means that if your Webmaster has 11 clients in your town and promised that each would be on page one of Google for podunk ohio real estate, well…someone in Podunk ain’t gonna be a happy camper. Are you willing to risk your online success on whether your site is one of those top 10 for every precious keyword combination?

No, I didn’t think so. But what to do?

For one thing, you might want to consider Pay Per Click advertising. PPC is what it’s called when you go to a Pay for Placement search engine like Overture and bid on keywords. Overture then submits your site to several of the big search engines, including Yahoo, where your site competes with others for the keywords you’ve bid on. In smaller markets, this technique can be quite inexpensive and highly rewarding. But in larger markets with more competition, you may end up in a bidding war that will cost far more than you bargained for.

An alternative is Search Engine Optimization (SEO), which simply means either that your site designer optimizes your site for the search engines while it’s being built – assuming your designer knows how to do this, or that you pay a site optimization company big bucks to optimize your site after the fact. High quality SEO – which pushes your Web site onto the top, or near the top, of major search engines – is an extremely complex, time-consuming task. Good SEO strategists are always trying to refine their techniques to stay one step ahead of the search engines. Building SEO into a site at the time of construction can be less expensive – just as building upgrades into a house normally is cheaper than adding on later.

Realtors often confuse SEO with basic search engine submissions, thinking they’re essentially the same thing. They’re not. A submission is like going to the Department of Motor Vehicles and filling out a form. The form just has to be filled out and submitted correctly. Everyone does it the same way, whether they own a brand new Mercedes or a 1962 VW bug. The submission doesn't matter, except that it gets accomplished. The site itself is what matters to the search engines, and that’s where site optimization comes into play. It’s the optimization that typically makes one site more appealing to the search engines than another.

In addition to having your site optimized for the search engines, you’ll want it to appear on a handful of real estate directories. Perhaps even a few dozen – depending on your budget and your level of patience. One reason to be on various directories is simply because the better directories are found all over the search engines. So if a buyer is searching for homes on Google or MSN, and they search for podunk ohio homes, they may find a directory that appeals to them. And if you’re listed on that directory, they may click on you. Ideally, you want that directory link to take that buyer directly into your primary Web site.

Another, and more significant, reason is that creating links into your site from various directories adds to your site’s popularity. The more links into your site, the higher it measures on the popularity scale, and the more likely that search engines will give it better position.

Also, by creating directory links, you’re creating a funnel effect. You’re funneling Internet surfers from numerous directories into your primary site – which is exactly where you want them. And if your site has a few good lead capture tools, you’ll get enough names and email addresses to make the whole process worthwhile.

But the question now becomes, how much to budget for directories, and which directories are worth your time, effort and money to be on and possibly link to your primary site?

The budget question is easy: allocate at least $50 a month for directories. Most charge an annual fee, so add your site to 2 or 3 directories each month until you’re showing up everywhere. Knowing which directories work best is a little more challenging.

Obviously, the Yahoo Directory is the single most important directory on which your site can be listed, simply because Yahoo is the most heavily trafficked site on the Web and its directory attracts more eyeballs than any other. But many agents don't understand the difference between Yahoo's directory, its Sponsor Results and its Web Results, and they mistakenly believe that once their site is appearing on Yahoo under Web Results, their job is done. A Sponsor Result, as previously mentioned, is Pay Per Click advertising. A Web Result actually is Yahoo’s version of the Google database. Yahoo isn’t really a search engine, but if offers search engine results – Google’s search results actually, although the order of these results is likely to vary slightly from those on Google itself.

The Yahoo Directory is simply a list of sites selected by human editors. Business sites, including real estate sites, if they were lucky enough to be selected, were permitted to appear in the directory free of charge until about two years ago. Now, if you want your site to appear there, it will cost you $299 a year. And by paying your $299, you aren’t even guaranteed that your site will appear – just that it will be reviewed. How can Yahoo do this? When you’re a 900-pound gorilla, you can do anything you want.

Still, the Yahoo Directory is an excellent place to be – probably the very best directory for real estate agents and brokers on the Web. Plus, because other search engines use the directory to help build their own databases, your site benefits in the long run from being there.

Of course, dozens of other directories exist in real estate. So how do you find them?

First, go to Yahoo – www.Yahoo.com. Type the words: real estate directories. Then click on Real Estate > Web Directories, look through the Most Popular and Alphabetical lists, and you'll find almost too many of them. So which directories should you bother to click on? There's no simple answer, although you can run a test to figure out which directories probably are the best. (More about this below.) Some directories are worthwhile, others are junk. Go with your gut feeling – or ask an agent who's listed there if it's been worth the money and effort. Here are a few of my favorites:

www.Reals.com – This directory has been around for several years and shows up very well in the search engines. It's well organized, making it easy for consumers to find an agent or broker. To create a link directly to your site, click on Submit A Site (bottom left). A basic listing is just $20 – this may be the best $20 you'll ever spend; an enhanced listing is $100.

www.RealEstateABC.com – Also known as The ABCs of Real Estate, this excellent site offers free links to Realtor web sites. Click on Agent Pages, then click on Add Your Site to get listed. An added bonus of RealEstateABC is its Top 100 list – featuring the most popular Realtor sites in each section of the United States. Click on Top 100 and look for your site – but if you or your site designer hasn’t bothered to submit it, you won’t see it there.

www.RealEstatePros.org – Another directory that tends to show up well in the search engines, this one charges a small monthly fee – depending on the level you want – for a listing and link directly to your personal site.

www.IRED.com – One of the Web’s oldest real estate directories, IRED (International Real Estate Digest) always seems to be worth a few extra visitors each week to your site. It isn’t marketed on the search engines as aggressively as some others, but it’s a well respected source of independent real estate information.

Once you've exhausted the Yahoo list of directories – some time next year perhaps, you can repeat this process at The Open Directory Project (http://dmoz.org). This is the largest human edited site on the Internet. Once there, click on Business, and then click on Real Estate. Next, click on Directories, then on United States. You'll find several dozen more directories where you can create links into your site. (Note: You'll see The Open Directory link to Real Estate Directories right on that Yahoo page after you typed real estate directories. Right now, it's #2 under Web Results.)

If you’re having an anxiety attack over which directories actually generate excellent search engine results, try this test. Go to the nearest major search engine. Let’s use Google (www.Google.com), for example, and we’ll search for real estate in a particular market, as though you were a consumer looking for an agent. Go there now. I’ll wait till you’re there to get started…

Now, in the Google Search box, type: blue bell pennsylvania real estate. (This is a real town, by the way. Podunk is too, it’s just not in Ohio.) First, you’ll see two Sponsored Link results – these are directories that have paid to be there. Next, you’ll see Google’s top 10 results for the keywords you’ve typed. Of these top 10 – at least on the day and time I searched – four are the sites of individual agents: Mickey Allem (www.PhiladelphiaSuburbs.com), Diane Sarkisian (www.DianeSarkisian.com), Mark Cohen (www.MarkCohen.com), and Sue Adler (www.SueAdler.com). All four happen to have sites designed and marketed my company, Best Image Marketing (www.bestimage.com) – so they either got very lucky or else we happen to be very good at search engine optimization.

Then you’ll see a few directories among the top 10, including: Online Highways (www.ohwy.com), PhilaNet (www.membrane.com) – a regional directory in Southeastern PA, and Number1Expert (www.Number1Expert.com) – my company’s directory. Each of these directories provides links to agent and broker sites.

Finally, if you click the Next button at the bottom of the Google screen, you’ll see the next 10 results, and so on. Most surfers rarely go beyond 3 or 4 pages of results, so it’s imperative that your site is among the top 30 to 60 matches. Several more directories appear on the second page of this search, including www.Reals.com and www.RealEstatePros.org, while still others appear on the third page of results.

You should beware that some of these directories may be what’s known as spam directories or, even worse, generic directories. That is, unscrupulous people often buy domain names with built-in traffic, then stick a directory onto the domain and solicit ads by claiming their directory generates many impressions. One such generic directory is www.real-estate.com. You’ll note that it shows up on search engines randomly, but its pages are always “under construction.”

To get a real feel for finding directories, your homework assignment is to conduct a few searches yourself. Yes, it’s nonproductive work, because it pulls you away from selling homes. But it’s highly educational and will give you a firmer grasp of what actually appears on search engines. No matter what market you’re in, you’re bound to discover interesting results. Try: plano texas real estate. Or how about: thousand oaks california real estate. Or: dublin ohio real estate. Or: west windsor new jersey homes. Or: fairhope alabama real estate. Or your own town state real estate.

As you conduct several of these searches on Google, Yahoo, MSN or the search engine of your choice, your guideline should be that the more often a particular directory is found – assuming it’s not a spam or generic directory, the greater the chances that if you’re on it, you’ll be found too. That’s the acid test to determine whether a directory is worth the time, effort and money to get your site listed there.

Published: July 9, 2003

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Barry Kushner is National Sales Manager, Best Image Marketing ( www.bestimage.com ), which promotes top producing real estate agents and brokers via its highly visible NUMBER1EXPERT.com ( www.NUMBER1EXPERT.com ) Web site development and marketing system. Barry also has functioned as a Best Image sales representative and as the company's public relations director for nearly a decade. In addition to Internet marketing & sales, he has worked in print communications as a daily newspaper reporter, magazine editor and advertising agency executive, where he produced annual reports for some of the nation's major builders. Email Barry at: barryk@bestimage.com