Real Estate Marketing Blog

Its Raining Realty Agents!

I feel like I just recently posted that there was one agent for every 75 people in California. I even put it into my presentations.

"At one time there was an agent on every corner with a website, now there is an agent on every other driveway with three websites or more!".

Well, time to pull out the metaphor book again.

It seems that there is now 495,000 licensed agents in Cali. The state now boasts a licensed agent for every 52 adults, the California Department of Real Estate reported.

"The level of interest in real estate licensure is unprecedented," said Jeff Davi, the department's commissioner, in a statement.

Blogging the Right Way

Do you want to know the right way to blog for real estate?

Realtors need to:

1.Stay focused and remember why you are blogging. You are not a journalist. You are a marketer/salesperson. Therefore what you say has no value towards your business unless it yields (preferably) a measurable benefit towards your business. Like a registered lead or phone call. Even so, at least it should paint you as an authority on your local market.

2. Blog Locally, you can't possibly be an expert on an entire region. You won't be able to post enough meaning into your blogs unless you focus into sublocalities.

3. Take a stand. Be an authority. People are Sheople and want to be led. So start leading.

4. Know why you are blogging. Hopefully, it is not because someone told you it is the next big thing.

You can find out a little more at a recorded interview I did at the Real Estate Cyber Society. It is pretty cool with notes attached and everything.We are always available for consulting and/or development of your realty blog web site for SEO/  Lead purposes only. Consulting AT spiderjuicetechnologies.com or Blogdev AT spiderjuicetechnologies.com  (replace AT with @)

Hands Down:The Best Real Estate Marketing

What is everyone else doing? Do the Opposite!

We as people, and henceforth realtors and agents tend to be sheep. I think I have even coined us as sheople in an earlier post.

What do I mean? Well we often will follow the "wisdom of crowds" without thought of consequence. Instead of finding and then doing what the very best online marketers do. Often times we make judgements based on what the majority is doing. Unfortunately, the majority does 6 home buying or listing sides a year. The full article

How Far is too Far?

Agents get realty websites & real estate blogs. But this agent is using tradional media with a twist.

They say sex sells. Well that's as far as I will go on this "family" website. Check it out.

Americas Most Expensive Homes

Forbes.com did their annual real estate listings survey to find America's most expensive houses.

Even the NAR predicts homes to rise in value by hald of last year: 5.7% compared to 12.7% increase in prices in 2005.

So where are the most expensive homes?

Florida property is at the top. The French Regency-style estate, carries a  $125 million price tag.

Other locations:

Bridgehampton, N.Y., Manhattan's Pierre Hotel , Lake Tahoe, Corona del Mar, San Francisco.

There are many exclusive areas with expensive homes. Manhattan Beach, Aspen, Boulder, Bradenton in the FLA  Keys, Fort Meyers, Colorado Springs.

If it Ain't Making Leads, Then its Just an Expensive Brochure

Blogging, Websites, lead capture vs open MLs.

I can't tell you how many times a day I hear an agent or an "expert" espouse the virtues of the empowered consumer and that it really is a benefit to leave the MLS open VS forcing them to opt-in.

The biggest excuse is that the consumer will just move-on to another website.

Hmm. Lots of responses come to mind for that one:

"Whose fault is that?"
The MLS has systematically been given away by NAR itself and boards since the beginning of the net.
"So what"
Serious people do not mind giving away some personal information for the data they want. Blogs are growing at a blistering pace where anyone with a thought can publish. Do you want to see the future? Just go to MySpace. What a mess of disjointed and frenetic text. Remember the line, "57 Channels and nothing on?" Yah. The net is Cable TV on Steroids.

The future of the internet is paid content. People, will not mind paying for content from sources they trust, because they want the information they can trust. When you have a medium where anyone with Frontpage and some time can start a business, it makes it more time consumptive to get what you want. Thus, people do not mind giving their information.

I have driven millions of consumers to my own and my client websites. They all get a phenomenal lead conversion rate.

Real Estate Control Freaks

At the end of the day, a forced opt-in is about control.

Control over your business, your website and your future. The money is in your list of prospects that come from your blog, your website and IDX VOW websites.

Control is from you communicating your message to an opt in list. It comes from knowing the point of your real estate blog, or your realty website. In my opinion that is to gather names. Lots and lots of names. So that can talk with those names on your terms.

Wheres the Bubble?

Is the Good News getting just a little too bubble gummy for you?

Well here is some more and then I think I gotta lay off as I am getting a sugar rush.

This out of recent economic news:

Builders boosted construction spending to an all-time highlast month while consumers opened their wallets wider.

That was the message coming from the latest batch of economic reports released Monday.

Commerce Department said total construction spending in March climbed to $1.199 trillion, on an annualized basis, surpassing the previous record high set in February. That marked a big 0.9 percent jump from February's level _ a performance that exceeded analysts' projections of a 0.3 percent gain.

Private builders ramped up spending on a wide variety of projects in March, including residential construction and factories. The government also spent more on big public works projects, including power plants.

Again,this only goes to show that the real estate cup is beyond half full.