The Mistakes: 

• They lack a strategy to gain traffic.
• They lack high impact messaging.
• They offer nothing unique as a call to action.
• They have weak content.

1. They lack a strategy to gain traffic.

Websites don’t gain traffic on their own. It is earned.
You can pay for it and you can generate it on your own.
But without a strategy to gain it, your site will fail to produce leads.

The Soluton: The best ways to drive an audience to your site.

• Compelling content. Write (or talk) about what your audience wants to learn about, and they will come. It’s like magic, but if you’re answering the questions that you know your target audience is looking for answers to, they will find you.
• YEO (You Engaging Others). Show honest interest, awareness, and interaction with your target audience. Instead of talking about you, you engage with others to learn about them. This participation is contagious and incredibly welcoming. People will notice, and want to engage more.
• Build a Tribe. Use social media to target and attract like-minded people with your content and YEO efforts. In addition to regular participation, staying on message, and on brand is key.
• SEO (Search Engine Optimization). A managed SEO strategy with a company that cares and understands your business is guaranteed to bring targeted traffic.
• Paid Ads. The data shows that the traffic is there. You can jump right in front of it when you work with a Google Ad company that cares and understands your business
• Employ a Copywriter. Content is king. Work closely with a skilled content creator that cares and understands your business to build your own SEO.

2. They lack high impact messaging.

You have just an instant to communicate a message with your visitor. Don’t blow it.

Use words and imagery that makes them understand that you can help them with their quest.
They want to know: Who are you? Can you help me? How do we begin?

The Soluton: The best ways to to create high impact messaging: 

• Use a Hero image/video that your visitor relates with.
• Use a Logo that is recognizable and memorable.
• Use a Slogan that isn’t made of Styrofoam
• Use a Call-To-Action that they actually want

3. They offer nothing unique as a call to action.

If every other real estate website out there is offering a property search, a home value request, listing alerts, or the like, then that’s your cue to offer something different. You can still have these options on your website, but don’t trot them out like you’re offering something that your visitor is looking for. They’re not.

The Solution: Offer actions that your visitor will truly appreciate. 

A few ideas:

• Get a personal tour from Greenville’s Relocation Expert.
• Take the survey. Which Greenville neighborhood is best for your family?
• “Coming Soon Listings” are your secret weapon for buying in Greenville.
• Skillful Negotiation wins home buying contracts. Learn how we do it.

4. They have weak content. Weak content repels an audience.

Examples of Weak content:

• There is very little content
• It’s outdated content
• It’s canned, and it’s being fed by a 3rd party (like keepingcurrentmatters.com)
• It’s copy/pasted from a 3rd party (like wikipedia)
• It’s not relevant to your visitors’ needs
• It’s a blog that was abandoned

Strong Content is how you attract an audience.
Strong Content is how you build understanding and trust with your audience.
Strong Content makes you look like the expert.

The Solution: Create content that satisfies the following:

Your audience is looking for answers to their questions. Anticipate and answer them.

They are looking for guidance in their real estate journey. They are the HERO, you are the GUIDE.

They are looking for someone they can trust. Educating them builds trust.

They are looking for someone who empathizes with their challenges.

If you can’t make the content happen because you don’t have the time, or interest, or language skills, then you need to seek someone who does. Having strong content on your website is crucial for connecting with your visitor and that is the first step in “generating leads.”

Don’t just hire whomever to help with your website’s content. Hire someone who cares and understands your business. Hire someone that you are willing and able to spend time with to train to write on your behalf. This relationship needs to be healthy and maintained in order for you to get the results you want.

With an incredible track record of our clients’ websites being a healthly lead source for their business, you can trust that we’ll make you a success as well.

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding how to generate leads with your real estate website just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to book a call at any time.

The post Your Website Fails to Generate Leads Because of These 4 Mistakes appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

The Goal:
Find language that better connects the dots to what you really need to say/communicate.

Examples of Styrofoam Words: 

Phrases such as, “Helping you acheive your dreams” or “Real Estate Specialist” or “Service is our Hallmark” or “Premier Real Estate Team” carry litte value.
These words sound like they have impact, but they are just stand in’s.

People want to find someone that they connect with, someone they feel offers what they need, who empathizes with their challenges.

To acheive this we need to tell them with words that connect.

“We Take The Suck Out of Relocation”
“We Sell It Faster, and We Sell It For More”

The Slogan, The Bio, Testimonials, Calls To Action… these are all the opportunities to make an impactful impression with your audience.

A swing and a miss here is on you.

Take the time to boil down what you offer to a real claim. Why choose you?

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding how to leverage impactful language just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.

The post We Gotta Stop Feeding The Audience Styrofoam Slogans On The Homepage appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

Without a clear understanding of what needs to be accomplished with the homepage we’re bound to miss the mark.

Let’s look at how one might use particular text and images to tell The Story.

1. Recognize Our Visitor’s Challenges

We recognize that you have an issue/ a challenge /a pain. We know you, we understand you, we understand this situation.

Identify our target audience’s main concerns and acknowledge them. 

• For example: Our target audience wants to move out of a dense urban area and into a more rural area with a high quality of life. Our main hero image could be a serene landscape, a lake perhaps, with a smattering of homes dotted on the shore. Overlaying this beautiful, calming image is a bold statement such as, “Leave The Noise Behind.” Include a few more words below in smaller text to support that claim, “Life is just better in Greenville, NC*.” Finish it off with a clear call to action button/link: “Make your move.” This links to the ways to initiate a conversation with us (email, phone, text).

2. Provide Resolutions To Their Challenges.

We have what you need to overcome your challenge. Our skills, our knowledge, our product, and our experience will guide you to resolution.

• Continuing with the example above we need to round out our certain understanding of their concerns, and offer solutions.
  Choose only local images (not stock) and couple them with simple claims and offers build on their trust that we understand their hurdles.
  A few ideas:
  – Why We All Love Greenville (links to a page full of reasons and calls to action).
  – Get A Personal Tour From Greenville’s Relocation Expert (call to action).
  – Let’s Go See Homes You’ll Love Before They Hit The Market (call to action).
  – Is Greenville a Perfect Match for Your Family? (call to action).

The reason the above are so effective is because we are not just offering what everyone else is offering. We’re telling The Story that we are the guide to help them resolve their concerns. We are not just stating that we have been doing this a long time, and here are the tools everyone else offers (property search, featured listings, home values, etc). We are considering their specific needs and acknowledging them and offering resolution.

Pro Tip for Step 2. (If you can stick with it) Blogging with The Story in mind allows us to show a dedication to our target audience’s education all the while resolving their concerns. I can see the headlines now: How To Best Get To Know Greenville, NC In One Weekend. What Made Us Fall In Love With Greenville, NC. What Locals Do For Fun In Greenville, NC. What Locals Do When Their Family Comes To Visit Greenville, NC. The Top 10 Questions We Hear From People Moving To Greenville, NC. Feel free to steal any of these as primers for your blog.

3. Showcase The Trust of Others

We want to illustrate that others have taken this path before and we successfully guided them to overcome their challenge. This is done with testimonials (and images/video of past clients when possible) that directly express that we have helped them with the same challenges and concerns of our visitor.

Avoid lengthy client quotes – trim them if necessary. Keep it direct and to the point. A few perfect ones are better than long, fluffy ones that never get read.

4. The Introduction

Now that they trust that we understand them, and are capable of helping them, we introduce ourselves, our approachability, our willingness to help and connect immediately, our level of relevant experience, and the like.

If we introduce ourselves too strongly, too soon in The Story, then it can come off that we want the visitor to become part of our story, rather than us helping guide them through theirs.

Note: The above isn’t as much a rule as it is a suggestion. If your face, look, and name are a big part of your brand – then I can see the draw towards introducing yourself earlier on in The Story.

5. Call To Action

All throughout The Story above we should sprinkle in specific calls to action, but it is imperative that we close the homepage Story with specific requests for action. Just as a sales appointment should end with an action item (close a deal, schedule a next appointment, initiate paperwork, etc.) the homepage story needs to end with a strong call to action.

Reiterate and encourage that they communicate with us that they are ready to share in the solving of their challenge.

• Come for the weekend. Let me show you why we moved to Greenville, NC.
  (call to action links to contact)

*I’ve never been to Greenville, NC. I’ve heard it’s a very nice place to live, and therefore made for a fine example in this exercise.

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding how to tell the Homepage Story is just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.

The post What Is The Story We Are Telling On The Homepage, And How Do We Tell It? appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

If the story being told on the homepage is that there is a challenge to be solved by using your services, then who should we make as the Hero?

There is only one Hero in the homepage story we are telling.

Who is it?
Is it you, and all your strengths?
Or is it the visitor and their need to overcome their challenge?

The more compelling story is when the audience can truly relate to being the Hero.
The audience relates with Luke, not Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars (A New Hope).
The audience relates with Charlie, not Willy Wonka, with Neo, not Morpheus, with Frodo, not Gandalf, with Dorothy, not Glinda.

The visitor is the Hero.

The visitor wants you to be part of their story of success. The motivation is not to become part of your story, but to have you help them in their journey of overcoming their challenge.

The How: The audience needs to find parallels to their challenges in your story. Use images that reflect your target audience. Present their questions and challenges head on. Illustrate that you understand their plight, and what a successful resolution looks and feels like. What’s happened to others that you have helped, is happening to them. Assume the role of guide, mentor, or sage in your hero’s journey.

The Why: They want to solve their challenges with trustworthy guidance and for that they will exchange their time (and money).

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding who the hero of the homepage is just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.

The post Who is the Hero of the Homepage Story? appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

The Decisions: We focus on getting the following affirmatives:

• Visitor decides that they need what you have.
• Visitor decides that you’re the best option to solve their problem
• Visitor decides to exchange their time and money for your offer/service

This doesn’t all have to be done in the millisecond that they first come to the page, but they need to stay on the page long enough to decide that they need what you offer. To get them to stay, they have to feel understood.

The What: Your audience must immediately recognize that you understand them.

• You understand the challenge they have come looking to solve.
• You understand how they feel now
• You understand what it feels like to resolve the challenge

Your audience wants to feel that you understand their challenges and that you can support their journey to solve them. They want empathy.

The How: Show your audience that you understand and empathize with them:

• Use language that they recognize and connect with.
• Consider a brand/character archetype that matches the personality of your target audience.
• Use imagery that mirrors their emotional state (before and after overcoming their challenge)
• Present the questions they ask, and the challenges they suffer and offer solutions to them.
• Showcase testimonials of others you’ve helped with similar challenges.

Your audience wants to solve their challenges with trustworthy guidance.
They want to be the hero by making the correct decision in solving their challenges.
They feel this when it was their idea to take your guidance.

The Nuance: It should be that they decided to work with you, and not that you convinced them.

If you would like to take a deeper dive on understanding the goal of a website’s homepage just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.

The post What Is The Goal Of Your Website Homepage? appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

How it works: These are ways we look to leverage the Hero Image

• Tell A Story To Connect Emotionally With Your Target Audience
• Highlight Your Brand
• Answer Your Target Audience’s Questions
• Showcase Your Value Proposition/Call-To-Action
• Make a Claim/Announcement

How we bring it all together:

Select a Compelling Image. Choose an image that your target audience recognizes as being part of their life, or the life they want. This familiarity assures them that the site is for them. Avoid obvious stock photos. Be authentic. Don’t use images you don’t have a license to use.

Make a Compelling Claim. Your hero image coupled with this claim is your first impression. This statement is the reason they will stay longer. Workshop this statement until it is pithy, and powerful. 

Offer a Compelling Call To Action. Be upfront about what you want your audience to do. This site is your opportunity to compel them to connect. Put it put there.

Hero image pro-tips:

• Choose an image where there is energy focused on the Claim/CTA
  • Someone pointing, looking, moving towards your CTA.
• Choose an image with depth that draws you in to a vanishing point
  • Horizontal lines, angles, structures, paths… draw your attention.
• Use dark and light shading to create contrast for your Claim/CTA
  • Vignette, fogging, semi-transparent shade… make for easy-to-read text.
• Choose an image with some empty space to place Claims/CTA.
  • Alternatively, this can be added with solid color overlays
• Apply the above to your interior page subheader image selections. Avoid using a default subheader when each page has its own story to tell.

Should I use a Slideshow for my Hero Image?

• Do more images tell the story better?
• Will our audience pay attention long enough to warrant it?

Should I use a Video for my Hero Image?

• Does video tell the story better?
• Will our audience pay attention long enough to warrant it?
• Can we get the right video clips to tell the story we want to tell? Cost?

If you would like to take a deeper dive into how to choose an effective hero image just let us know. At no charge to you, we’d be happy to discuss this important topic. We’re available by email, text, phone, chat, or feel free to schedule an appointment at any time.

The post How To Choose An Effective Homepage Hero Image appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

If you work in real estate, you have probably experienced the satisfaction of helping clients navigate the various challenges of finding a new home or putting one up for sale. To be successful, it is critical to not only build relationships of trust and understanding with clients, but also assure your clients that you have the expertise to fulfill their needs. It is likely the case that you did not expect privacy compliance to be a major concern for your business. Nevertheless, this is a reality for not just those working in the real estate industry, but for businesses of all kinds.

If you have a website for your real estate agent business, U.S. privacy laws may require your website to contain an up-to-date Privacy Policy. Noncompliance with these laws may cause a negative impact on your business, such as incurring fines and even lawsuits under certain circumstances. Because of the broad reach of privacy laws, it is critical that your business is prepared. This article seeks to provide you with some critical information so that you may comply with the law while continuing to achieve success for your real estate agent business and your clients.

This article will discuss the following four topics:

• How real estate agent websites collect personally identifiable information;
• What laws require real estate agent websites to contain a Privacy Policy;
• Fines that may result from non-compliance with privacy laws; and
• Where your real estate agent business can get an affordable Privacy Policy solution.

How real estate agent websites collect personally identifiable information

When websites collect personally identifiable information (“PII”), privacy laws govern how that PII is used and disclosed to others. PII can be defined as any piece of information that directly identifies, or may reasonably identity, a specific person. PII may include the following:

• The first and last name of an individual
• Addresses, including zip codes
• Telephone numbers
• Email addresses
• Username/Password for property portal/IDX

In some cases (though rare) real estate agent websites might ask to collect credit report info, bank account information, and social security numbers in order to get pre-qualified to purchase a home.

Real estate agent websites may collect PII via the following:

• Contact forms and appointment forms containing an individual’s PII, such as telephone numbers and home addresses
• Inquiries from across state lines from potential clients desiring to move to a different state
• Portals containing images of users’ houses, along with information such as zip codes and addresses that may be viewed by others

If your website collects PII via any of the above methods, then your website may be required by law to contain a Privacy Policy. 

What laws require real estate agent websites to contain a Privacy Policy?

Privacy laws are broad in scope. If your business’s website is accessed by users protected under an applicable privacy law, such as California, there is a good chance your website must comply with it. Depending on where current and potential clients may access your website, this means that your business must be aware of major privacy laws governing the collection and use of PII. More likely than not, these laws require your website to contain an up-to-date Privacy Policy. These laws include the following:

• California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA);
• California Online Privacy Protection Act (CalOPPA);
• Nevada Revised Statutes Chapter 603A;
• Delaware Online Privacy and Protection Act (DOPPA);
• Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The above laws require websites to contain Privacy Policies. These policies must make a variety of disclosures pertaining to what information is collected from the individual, how that information is used, and who has access to that information. Check out our article on laws requiring Privacy Policies for more guidance on what privacy laws may apply to your real estate agent website.

A new development that is creating significant compliance challenges for businesses is the expansion of consumer control over how PII is collected and transferred. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act allows consumers to “opt-out” of certain disclosures and transfers of PII to third parties. Moreover, this particular law requires businesses to make specific disclosures pertaining to their information collection and sharing practices within their online Privacy Policies.

With privacy laws in the United States and abroad continuing to evolve, it is critical to determine what privacy laws apply to your website so you can effectively respond. As these laws continue to change, the risk of incurring heavy fines and lawsuits only increases.

Fines that may result from non-compliance with privacy laws

Noncompliance with applicable privacy laws can potentially result in significant fines and penalties. These fines may range from $2,500 per violation to €20,000,000 or more in total under European law. This “per violation” calculation is significant. It means that, even if your website only receives a handful of visitors on a weekly basis, the total fines incurred from violating the law can still be significant depending how often you collect PII from individuals.

Where can a real estate agent get an affordable Privacy Policy solution?

When faced with the compliance challenges posed by the numerous privacy laws on the books, businesses must often incur substantial costs just to hire attorneys to write a compliant Privacy Policy. We’ve partnered with Termageddon, a Privacy Policy generator that will create a customized Privacy Policy for your website and keep it updated whenever privacy laws change. For more information check out our Dynamic Privacy Policy info page.

The post Why Real Estate Agent Websites Need A Privacy Policy appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

Here are the passed Privacy  Laws that you may be violating:

The California Online Privacy Protection Act of 2003 
The General Data Protection Regulation 
Nevada Senate Bill 220 (goes into effect on October 1st, 2019)
California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) (goes into effect on January 1st, 2020)
As you see above, two new laws go into effect over the next six months (Nevada/California). The California one is a big deal, because it enables Californians to sue businesses anywhere in the US for not having a Privacy Policy. The fees per violation of the CA law are up to $7,500. Nevada fees are $5,000 per infringement.

The fees per violation of the CA law are up to $7,500

Furthermore, there are over a dozen states that are drawing up new bills requiring websites to have Privacy Policies, which are sure to have different requirements for each.
But the real kicker is that what passes today as a compliant policy will likely not pass as compliant in the future.
You will be required to maintain your policy pages as new laws are passed/amended.
This is not a hoax. These new Privacy Laws are real, and website owners that do not comply with can face very real, very large fines.

But the real kicker is that what passes today as a compliant policy will likely not pass as compliant in the future.

Sensitivity to privacy protection is the new normal and you’ll want to take it seriously. Stay tuned as we keep an eye on this, and work to keep you informed.
***If you have questions on this matter please contact us directly, and we will help ensure your compliance and protection.***

The post If You Have A Contact Form On Your Site, You Could Face Huge Privacy Law Fines appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

What Benefit Are Google Sitelinks?

1. It improves your “Click Thru Rate”
– Your most popular pages are typically the ones that are shown in the sitelinks. Offering these popular links right away ensures your audience is clicking through to the content you want them to experience.
2. Sitelinks establish credibility
– The amount of space that your site with sitelinks below takes up in the search results is impressive. It shows a sort of endorsement from Google. You won;t be overlooked.
3. Increased the awareness of your services and offerings.
– Having your best pages appear in the sitelinks instantly reveals what you have to offer to your audience. Your brand, your reputation, your content… all of it is suddenly more visible than other results on the page.
4. Effective Pages get more visibility
– Instead of hoping that your homepage successfully directs your audience to the most effective pages on your site, sitelinks presents them right in the search results.
5. Having Sitelinks is a clear indicator of a website with healthy SEO
– This does not mean however that if you don’t have sitelinks that your site is poorly SEO’d.

How Do I Get Google Sitelinks?

There are no guidelines from Google as to how to get sitelinks.
What we do know is that sitelinks are associated with sites that use what Google would consider “best practices.”
Here are a several things we recommend to give yourself the best chance at getting sitelinks:
(Note – many of you will need to work with your website support to address these)

• Submit your site to Google Search Console (AKA Google Webmasters)
• Sign up for Google Analytics and add their tracking code to your website (you might need your website support you help you here).
• Make sure you have a unique and descriptive Site Title. This is ours: Real Estate Tomato | Custom Real Estate Website Design | WordPress
• Make sure you have a unique and descriptive Meta Description.
• Your main navigation menu needs to be clearly organized. This means ONLY the most important pages are the main menu items and their related pages are in dropdowns below. It is also a good idea to use Parent Page >> Child Page structure where you have deep content.
  For example:
  If you have a Community page that showcases all your featured Communities is might have the URL like this: awesomerealestate.com/communities/.
  Now a “Child” of that page would have a URL that looked like this: awesomerealestate.com/communities/alexandria/
  That is a proper hierarchy organization of your pages.
• Add and submit a sitemap.xml to your Google Search Console. If you are using WordPress you just need the Google XML Sitemap Plugin.
• Cross link to and from your websites most important pages. Continuing with the community page example, you should make sure that each page has links to the other important community pages, as well as to search pages, contact pages, and other site defining pages.
• Similar to the homepage Title above, make sure your pages all have SEO friendly titles that relate to the content within. This is important because it’s what appears in the sitelink.
• Similar to the homepage Description above, make sure your pages all have SEO friendly descriptions. This is important because it’s what appears in the sitelink.

Reasons Google might NOT show sitelinks for your site:

• Your site is poorly optimized (For ex: Pages have the same or similar title and meta description. Or you have thin content on pages)
• Your site doesn’t allow for the algorithm to find pages “good enough” for site links
• Sitelinks wouldn’t be relevant to a particular search query (not all searches produce results of site with sitelinks)
• You are missing a sitemap
• You have not submitted your site to the Search Console

Can I Change My Google Sitelinks?

There are no settings to control your sitelinks. Google’s algorithm selects which links it determines “when we think they’ll be useful to the user.”

Can I Demote a Google Sitelink?

Sadly Google stopped allowing this option in Oct of 2016.
Some important notes:
Current maximum number of sitelinks is 6.
Current maximum number of characters in the sitelink title is 31
Current maximum number of characters in the sitelink descriptions is 65
If you found the above tips helpful, you should really subscribe to future updates.
Or if you are a little embarrassed by your current website, drop us a line and we will make you look amazing with a website makeover!

The post What The Heck Are Google Sitelinks And Why Do I Need Them? appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.

In 2017 40% of the Visitors to Our Clients’ Websites Was Mobile.

This is a growing trend. We started noticing an uptick back in 2012, and it has been growing ever since.
2012: 9%
2013: 13%
2014: 19%
2015: 27%
2016: 33%
and now 2017: 40% Mobile.
At this rate, by next year nearly 50% of your website audience will be mobile.

At this rate, by next year nearly 50% of your website audience will be mobile.

Have you ever heard of Bounce Rate?

Bounce Rate is the percentage of users that come, look one page, and leave your site without taking any action.
Our own Bounce Rate for November is 1.59% 
This means that less than 2 out of 100 leave our site without clicking to see more.
**If your website is not mobile friendly, your Bounce Rate could, at best be around 50%.
Half the audience you attract to your site leaves right away.
All that time, money, effort, that goes into your site is flushed for half your audience because you don’t have a mobile friendly website.
Nearly 3 years ago, Google announced that they give preference to mobile friendly websites in their search results.
So if you want to start appearing competitively again, and want to keep half your audience from leaving your site before they even look around, we can help!
Drop us a line and we will make you look amazing with a website makeover that brings you into 2018!
 

The post What Kind Of First Impression Is Your Real Estate Website Making To Mobile Users? appeared first on WordPress Real Estate Website Design | Real Estate Tomato.