Customized and fully SEO optimized real estate agent’s web design.

Google map is integrated to show new listings, sold listings and all listings on different listing search result pages. Users can also compare up to 5 listings at a time on search listing result pages. All of them above greatly improve user’s search experience and largely increase average visit duration, which in turn will help in website’s organic ranking in search engines.

I was inspired by new real estate ads campaign which RE/MAX announced Jan 24 to roll out nationally focusing on “all the things that move you.”

As what they released to the press, All the Things That Move You(SM) includes a full schedule of TV, radio, Internet, print and outdoor ads that will run throughout 2012. Designed to identify with the personal moments that drive decisions by homebuyers and sellers – having a baby, getting married, landing a new job or downsizing – the campaign reinforces the notion that experienced RE/MAX agents know how to help.

I thought, Hmm that really is a good marketing approach. Real estate agent is there to help potential home buyers and sellers to fulfil their dreams, not just sell or buy some properties. Because otherwise it would make no difference to hire anyone to do the job.

I think Re/Max’s new ads campaign is trying to let people connect Re/Max the brand with some personal feelings, so it might be helpful in building its brand. Here is why, if those ads could really touch people’s feelings, it could “plant a seed” into people’s subconscious mind. Therefore Re/Max the name could easily be triggered when those feelings come to the surface or when such moments come.

Well, would their campaigns help individual Re/Max real estate agent’s business directly?

Not too much I think. Like I always talk to my local real estate agent friends, your success depends on how successfully you could build your own brand as an individual real estate agent. It doesn’t matter what agency you are with today, what matters is what makes your potential clients believe you can help them to fulfil their dream.

But how? Since you don’t have so big amount of money to run your own ads campaigns on TV or radio as Re/Max did, you can still have some real estate marketing company to design a marketing plan to fit your budget. I am not talking about having property virtual tours posted to YouTube, because really those virtual tours won’t trigger any emotion and won’t help in building your own brand. Let’s do something differently amazing and make people remember you and like you.

Do you know that potential home buyers and people who are looking for rental homes use Craigslist more often than using MLS real estate listings?

How do I know that? Let’s look at the following stats:

This is what Google tells me what the hot searches are among BC online visits during the past 30 days in real estate niche:

As you can see, keyword terms “craigslist” and “craigslist vancouver” are #2 and #3 top searches. Their search volume is 3 and 4 times higher than “mls” or “real estate” in search volume.

Alexa shows that Craigslist is the #22 top sites in Canada. Craigslist and Kijiji are the two most popular classified ad sites in Canada. There are hundreds and thousands of listings in lower mainland posted to Craigslist everyday. In Vancouver area alone, there are about 500 listings in low season and above 1000 listings in peak season posted to Craigslist everyday. Not to mention there are another a few hundreds of posts in other areas like tri-cities (Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam and Maple Ridge), Fraser Valley, Victoria and so on.

Check out what I found what a Realtor said about his experience:

“I am a Realtor with Keller Williams Realty in Franklin TN. OF COURSE I use the MLS to list all homes for my sellers. The Nashville MLS is a GREAT tool and a no-brainer when it comes to giving a listing exposure. This exposure naturally targets other Realtors with buyers. In addition, buyers are learning more and more how to use the public MLS system for their particular area.

On the flip side, many buyers and renters are turning to Craigslist more and more. In fact, the last 2 rentals I had on the MLS were ALSO posted on Craigslist and BOTH rentals got their renters from Craigslist…NOT the MLS. To make it even sweet, I got ALL my calls from Craigslist. Not one of them came from another Realtor on the MLS.

I have also found similar success with listing a home. I have gotten extra traffic and calls from Craigslist. This is a FREE service and that extra call or email could just be the one.”

Of courses there are always different voices because different people have different approaches and experience. Check what I found in Yahoo Answer about “How much has craigslist taken from the real estate listings vs MLS?”

My advice is no matter its about listing on MLS, Craigslist or somewhere else, you want to catch up with as many marketing channels as you can, as long as your time or budget allows, because you will never know who the potential buyer come from where. And real estate marketing is all about exposing yourself to the maximum! To your success!

to you and your whole family!

Recent states show that only 12% of local small to medium businesses in North America catch up with mobile marketing trend since 2010. Most of them never aware that mobile marketing is so close to them everyday. At least mobile device already becomes one of the most important things to carry everyday just like wallet to everyone.

What sets local mobile marketing apart from any other local marketing ways?

Instant marketing

The traditional tools of marketing have become outdated just because they can not be in touch with the target customers day in and day out. They may come out with new offers and schemes but the customers are not aware of them. It is not always possible for all to stick glued to the television to catch the latest development of every product that they are using.

So, it is the responsibility of the company to make the customers know about all the recent developments of their products and services. There is no better way than local mobile marketing.

Life span

Mobile marketing service is more effective than any other marketing because the life span is longer. If you send a message to your customer, it will be there in the inbox, whereas the other tools of marketing are ephemeral and short lived. But the customer can always take a look on the message whenever he wants later on. So, the life span and effect of local mobile marketing is far reaching.

Existing and new customers

This marketing tool helps to maintain the existing customers. At the same time, it is easier to gain new customers as well. The service will send message to the existing customers. It will also set some target of the new customers as well.

Small and medium scale businesses thrive on local mobile marketing primarily. There are a number of local marketing services that will claim make your product popular. But you have to consider a few things before you take recourse to a local mobile marketing service.

• Who are your target customers? Before deciding your marketing strategy, you must identify your target customers.
• Identify their mobile using habits.
• It is important to know when they are using their mobiles and to what extent, whether they delete the messages or take a look again when free.

Local mobile marketing service is not only about messages. There are interactive voice calls, picture messages and so on. Whatever it may be, the main aim is to extend the reach of a company. Marketing strategies can not be predefined and static. It has to evolve itself according to the requirements. Local mobile marketing strategies too can change itself from time to time according to the need of the business.

Online real estate listing promotion is hot. It gets more eyeballs. It is the preferred source of information for most home buyers surpassing old sources like the print ads, yard signs, magazines, billboards and television.

What makes online real estate marketing so popular? There are several reasons that make web promotion of listings effective and popular. Here we list five of them.

Cost Effective

Millions of internet users are using the internet for browsing through listings. The crowd can only grow bigger with increasing use of the Internet day by day. The costs compared to reaching a huge audience and visibility is quite low giving a fillip to internet listings. The affordability combined with convenience makes web promotion a killer. Emails and online chats are means of low cost fast interaction tool for the marketer to stay in touch with clients.

Time Saving

Internet searches effectively shorten home search for homebuyers. How? Well the homebuyer can sift through the information and zero in on the most suitable listings of their preference, in the process saving on physical searches. In turn they are more likely to close deals sooner than can be achieved through traditional methods.

Average Home Buyer is getting Younger

The average age of the homebuyer is reducing with better employment and available loans. What does it mean? You would agree that the young generation is more tech savvy. They spend more and more time tweeting, social networking and of course searching. The latest generation is virtually growing up on the Internet. Would not anyone promoting real estate want to get their attention constantly?

It is also observed that internet clients of real estate are wealthier and more knowledgeable. Why would not someone selling a property want  to miss fat pocket clients?

Blogging

With the popularity of blogging sites like Twitter the space for online promotion of real estate has got a new dimension. MicroBlogging sites like Twittter, social networking sites Facebook are the latest tools in the hands of web marketers for real estate listing promotion.

Visual Impact

A virtual tour, Realtor’s real estate video channel, photos – all go a long way to make a deep impact on the homebuyer. All these tools are being used more and more on web portals. The best of brochures would fail to make an impression when compared to these new age tools.

However it is important to adhere to certain real estate marketing tips while promoting real estate listings on portals.

• Use a professional domain with a good name
• Creating dedicated accounts in blogging sites
• Maintain a good database of the leads coming from internet promotion
• Use the right keywords with matching headlines on the web pages
• Have pictures, videos or downloadable brochures in the website
• Technical tools for promoting web ranking of the site including SEO
• Most importantly have professionals follow up the leads

The Internet is getting bigger and so is the real estate listing promotions on it. If you are not online then you are ‘offline’ in real estate promotion!

Not surprising to me though, Google has recently stated that 20% of all searches are related to location. That translates to approximately 2.6 billion searches a month, and that number is increasing by about 50% per year.

But how you can take advantage of this local search trend to generate more qualified leads to your website? There are three steps you can do about it.

First of all, find out the geo modified keyword phrases for your business. What is Geo-modified keyword? Simple, it is the best word to describe your business or professionalism plus the city, town or even postal code of your area. For example, if you are a real estate agent who specializes in selling West Vancouver properties. The best Geo-modified keywords for your business are “West Vancouver real estate agent”, “Realtor in West Van”, “selling properties in West Vancouver” and so on.

Secondly, you will want to optimize those geo-modified keywords in your website (if you have one), which I call it “on page SEO“. How to do the optimization job? Easy but could take relatively long time. Technically, you will want to mention the keywords almost everywhere and as often as possible. (But don’t overdo it, otherwise Google could think it spam.) What I mean by “everywhere” – In the site meta keyword, site description, site title, blog title, blog content, footer, deep linkings and so on.

Thirdly, you will need to hire local marketing company or professional to do all kinds of search engine marketing, which I call it “off page SEO“, to push your website to rank for those Geo-modified keywords. Although nobody (including Google itself) could guarantee the rankings of your site for any keyword, meaning you will find your website’s ranking will be up and down for any keyword, the overall ranking of your website can be improved in the long term if that marketing company or professional use the correct and most efficient marketing strategies.