Conversations surrounding social media communities typically cover how to get attention, traffic and build satellite relationships. But what about harnessing social media and placing yourself as the hub... to become the central focus which the members gather round. I'm talking about creating the Church of You. Let's take a step back from looking at how to leverage these social media channels to attract business and instead look at how to create and nurture a following of raving fans to build repeat business, marketplace authority and a viral marketing engine. Currently, smart agents are building blogs and social sites for their farm neighborhoods, at least one broker is looking at how to build a social site for his clients. For sure, this should be a goal for any business... to create a community of raving fans around your products and services. "Like who?" do you say? Glad you asked because there's some big "churches" out there... Apple. These fans are freaks for the Apple brand and happily line up to shell out large gobs of money then tell the world that "it's so worth it." Harley-Davidson. The image that this brand supports appeals to the rebel in all of us and you can find product plecement ...

Whether we admit it or not, we do tend to judge people by the cleanliness of their environment. "The cleanliness of a person's home/car/clothing is a good sign of how together they are as a person." Online, your environment includes your website and it's "cleanliness" affects people's willingness to do business with you... Lacking in website conversions or stickiness? Chances are your website is too cluttered. Follow these simple guidelines to a clutter-free website and watch your visitors move into action. Get rid of the useless clutter Things like Flash animations, distracting graphics, unnecessary photos and pictures, "beautiful" design and layouts that are there only for the sake of looking beautiful and polished. All of these things usually do very little to advance the sale. All bling and no ka-ching. Not only do the above elements visually distract from the call-to-action but page load times can try a visitor's attention span when it's bogged down with flashing banners and graphics. However (caveat time!), things like video testimonials and Flash or Camtasia video that demo a product can do wonders to advance the sale. Text should be text Despite the occasional headline or sub-head, the text that is on your page should be text, not an image. Turn text it into an ...

Editor’s Note: We’re delighted that testing and tracking specialist Alasdair Morgan has submitted this guest article on uncovering prospect motivations through tracking. I recently started working with a new client who sells property in the Dominican Republic. He wants me to help him get more visitors to his site and convert as many of them as possible to prospects... and then clients. In terms of conversion, our basic strategy is to get as many site visitors on his mailing list as possible so we have a chance to move them from prospects to clients. Let me tell you about something that happened the other day that reminded me (for the thousandth time!) just how powerful it can be to track visitors on your website and in your newsletter, etc... My client sent out a newsletter with exactly 4 links in it: The 1st was to an audio podcast of him being interviewed about buying property and living in the Dominican Republic; the 2nd was info on a special deal he had on a beautiful property; the 3rd was to a local guide on the Dominican Republic in PDF format; and the 4th was to the home page of the website. For some reason, I ...

Last winter I took a trip to New York City. It was absolutely freakin' cold (remember, I'm from Phoenix where a 120F day is not uncommon) but I'm ready to go again (warmer months, please). There were some great sites to be seen for sure, but I distinctly remember this one fella. He was standing in the middle of the sidewalk, foot traffic swarming around him, and he was just screaming. Not sure what about, but he was definitely screaming. And no one paid him any mind (I'm told this isn't uncommon for New York). Odd, eh? Unfortunately, this screaming fella and many Realtors are more similar then you may think. When Realtors are asked about their target market they may be able to tell you about a neighborhood, income level, perhaps income or industry. They may be able to even tell you about the psychographics of values, motivations and goals. Each of these descriptors outline an ideal client but none, however, a target market. So, while the crowds of New York within earshot, they weren't interested in the screaming man's message. They weren't a target market for his message. So what's a Target Market? It's a Foundation piece for effective marketing: A group of people large ...

Not all prospects (or clients) are created equal. Ideally we all want those that are hyper-responsive, hang on your every word, preach your good name, and are an overall pleasure to work with. Not too much to ask, is it? The real question is, "How the heck do I attract these folks?" At Bloodhound's Unchained Social Media Conference, Brian Brady gave a session covering some of the aspects of how to go about "infiltrating" your online marketplace using social media guerrilla marketing tactics. In this video I give a quick walk-through of his presentation and elaborate on some of the finer details of how to not just attract clients... but attract hyper-responsive clients. You'll also learn how to: Become the leader of your market community using the "attractive character" Use community conversations to build your own authority Leverage the strategy of "graduating levels of intimacy" and it's role in your online marketing Click play and watch the 26 minute video (might wanna throw it into full-screen mode): Grab the mindmaps from the Unchained conference What are some ways you engage with your market online?

There's so much talk in the REnet about web2.0 this and social media that, one wonders how deeply the internet has impacted and evolved the traditional sales model let alone business model (Redfin, anyone?) Now, I'm a relative newcomer to the REnet. It was several years ago you would have heard me preaching the good word about the power of marketing real estate online. Heck, I even created and led a "Guerrilla Real Estate Marketing Online" intensive workshop but life events steered me into the more corporate sector. But still the phone rang... friends and past Realtor clients asked for my input and advice on marketing real estate online. Needless to say, my heart and passion lie with the entrepreneur who has put his balls and livelihood on the line to make a go of it. These folks have more fight and gumption than a roomful of corporate stooges combined. As you may have guessed, I'm not a big fan of the corporate method of doing things. That's why online marketing is so freakin awesome... the tools, communities, and immediacy of the medium level the playing field and really lend themselves to folks like you and I who can turn on a dime ...

If you want to instantly create authority status and compel your prospects to act then it's time to go live and offline. For building trust and authority there's nothing quite as powerful as getting in front of a group of people and teaching them something beneficial. Guess what, professor? That's why folks subscribe and stay subscribed to your email list... so they can learn something they can use when buying or selling their home. Give 'em what they want and further cement your super-duper real estate authority status by inviting them to a live class or workshop. This strategy works like a beauty. In fact, when you stand in front of a group of people that have come together to listen to you, you have instant credibility. Picture this from the mind of an audience member... they look around and see an audience sitting there, just like they are, hanging on your words. Cool! Your audience now views you as their trusted advisor, their teacher, guide and subject expert. Your workshop also turns your marketing into an event. Events, by their very nature, create buzz and attention. They also give you a reason to communicate with your mailing list more often because you ...

Without a doubt, email marketing is a top method for following up with your prospects and nurturing them towards a sale. The challenge arises when you've put together a really cool email that will educate and inspire your prospect to action... but you can't come up with a subject line that's compelling enough to get your email opened. In a previous article you learned several tips and tricks to brand your emails so they stand out in your prospect's inbox. You also learned the key to getting your emails opened is a subject line that is persuasive and compelling. Rest easy, you don’t have to be a pro-copywriter to craft seductive subject lines. Just follow a template... Templates are powerful tools in writing good copy quickly (fortune favors the swift!) Here's several templates you can start using today to pull more profits from your email campaigns by increasing the pulling power of your subject lines. Now, this first template gets folks to open the email for one reason and one reason only: it promises to reveal something that delivers a result they want to achieve. “For [blank], this works like crazy” For getting out of debt, this works like crazy For mass curb appeal, this works ...

In this video I take a few minutes to highlight how you may have been misled by the SEO enthusiasts and service providers. Heck, you may have even been misled by your fellow Realtors or, dare I say it, even yourself. Let me be clear, I'm not here to trash talk SEO because it is important in online real estate marketing. However, SEO and other traffic generation methods areonly a half of the key to highly effective website...

You may or may not know what a blog is but by the time you finish reading this article, you're going to want one. Short and simple, a blog os a type of website composed of individual entries ("posts") and commentaries. The newest sits at the top of the page and the previous posts are arranged in reverse chronological order. HomeStomper is a blog, best illustrated by this page. Here's some stats on how blogs are becoming the publishing/marketing tool online: Technorati tracks about 70 million weblogs with 120,000 new ones springing up each day and filling the internet at a rate of 15 posts per second. Umm, yeah, that's a hell of a lot of action. So why should you, a real estate professional, adopt a blog as a tool for marketing real estate online? 1. Keep things easy-peasy Forget the $197 setup fee and $29 a month to have a website, all you need is your domain name and an inexpensive hosting provider. Installing your blog is super simple and can be done in less than 5 minutes using Wordpress (the same platform that powers HomeStomper.) There's a number of real estate blog themes out there for Wordpress, too. Getting a professional look and feel ...