Guest blog post by Nathaniel Broughton

For the last 2 years, Google and Bing (the only search engines that matter) have become more aggressive in “suggesting” what keywords a user should search.

Picture this scenario.  You’re sitting with the cursor in your favorite search engine’s search bar.  You begin to type . . . and within a few characters, up pops a short list of suggested, bolded keywords to complete your query.  That’s Google or Bing guessing what it is they think you’re likely searching.

What are these suggest terms based on?  What does it mean for your business?

Google’s suggest terms are influenced by the popularity of keyword search phrases.  They aggregate this data and deliver the most common terms used.  For example, if you start typing “r-e-a” into the search bar, there are a few keywords that most people tend to complete their search phrase with.

“realtor.com” is a top suggest keyword in Bing.  “real estate” is a top suggest keyword in Google.

For businesses, brands, and even individual people, it gets more interesting.  It’s important to first be aware of the suggested keywords that searchers are seeing.  Search suggest is creating a new search environment for any business or professional online.

If you ignore it, you’re missing out on opportunities to drive new traffic, position yourself as an authority, and ultimately make more money.

Search Suggest Changes What People Search

First, consider how it can drastically change what people search.  When this was introduced in 2009, my mortgage bank saw some keyword searches explode.  Others completely fell off.  This happened for both generic searches around our services, and for searches on our company name specifically.

With all agents and brokers generating business from the web these days, you understand the value of both types of searches.  Say you are an agent in Newport Beach.  With search suggest, “Newport beach hom” typed into the search bar brings up the following suggest terms in Google.

Notice “Newport beach home tour” listed there.  Certainly, this keyword saw a spike in the number of times it was searched once it made the suggest list.

This is an immediate opportunity for an agent in that area to begin proactively marketing for that keyword.  Whereas in the past, hosting a page and ranking for “Newport beach home tour” might drive marginal traffic, with it as a suggested keyword it might now be worth thousands more visitors each month.

Marketing Your Brand in New Ways
Let’s look at another example.  This time one centered on an individual agent’s name.  I recently worked with an agent in La Jolla to find my home.  Her name is Meg Lebastchi.  When I go to Google and type in her name, here’s what I get in suggest:

Notice the 3rd keyword on the list: “meg lebastchi la jolla”.

If I’ve just heard about Meg from a friend, I’m going to look her up.  Since I know I’m looking to live in La Jolla, when I see that keyword suggested as I start typing her name I’m likely to click on it.  (If nothing else, I’m much more likely to use that as my search phrase than I was previously).

While Meg has a decent set of results when you search this exact phrase, as a marketer I see this as a ripe opportunity for her to do something even more.  She could register meglebastchilajolla.com for $8, and put up a simple website with her brand, picture, and her listings.

“meg lebastchi la jolla” is not a competitive keyword.  Many agents are out there competing on very hard keywords like “san diego homes for sale”.  This is low hanging fruit!  Hosting a website on meglebastchilajolla.com and doing some simple SEO will earn her a top ranking in a short time.  

Doing so would allow Meg to have more control over what a user sees when they go searching for her name.  Instead of a profile page on a national or company website, imagine what she could have an entire site dedicated to her.  It’s a chance to show a potential client like me how she’s the best agent in La Jolla.  Testimonials, pictures of her listings, and maybe some blog posts she’s written lately.

I think there are an unlimited number of opportunities like this for agents across the country.  Google and Bing are changing what people search for around your name, and your service area.  If you pay attention to it, you’ll find cheap, uncompetitive marketing opportunities to grab more business.

How Search Suggest Defines Your “Internet Reputation”
Another interesting aspect that has arisen from the introduction of search suggest relates to reputation management.  You should monitor this not only for opportunities to promote yourself, but also to recognize what customers might see about your reputation.

Truly, what are the suggest terms for your company name?  What are they for your individual name?  Do you know?

You might be surprised to learn that some common suggested terms are “reviews” and “complaints”.  As in, “yourcompany.com complaints”.  Hmm, as a business owner I’m not too excited about that.  But I also understand that you can’t please every customer.  If you’re in business, someone’s probably got a complaint right?
What you can do is be proactive about it.  Just the likelihood of someone searching “yourcompany.com complaint” jumps exponentially when that term gets suggested.

Imagine you’ve heard about a company from a friend.  Or you’ve seen an ad on them.  Or you’ve already started doing business with them, and the next time you go to find their site, you start typing the company name into the Google search bar.

On the list of suggested keywords is “company complaints”.  Wait, what?  People have had complaints?  I want to read them.  I want to see if working with them is still a good idea.  Whereas 10 seconds ago this would not have been my search, now it is.  This is why it matters so much.

Step one is to do these searches on your own and see what’s ranking in the results.  Usually it is a mashup of your own website, some third party review sites like a Yelp.com or the BBB, and maybe a blog or two.

Are you happy with what comes up?  There certainly are a lot of things you can do to proactively manage these search results.

For your own website, you might start incorporating these keywords into new or existing pages.  I’m sure you have a testimonials page.  But a complaint page?  By housing a page on your site about complaints – that has “complaints” in the URL and in the title tag – you’ll likely rank highly for a search on “yourcompany.com complaint”.

It’s better to participate in the conversation than be outside it.  On your own site, you can have a comment box that allows visitors or customers to leave a complaint.  And you can be right there to respond to them to see how it can be rectified.  The whole conversation is published right there for future visitors to see.

While no one likes complaints on their business, most people understand that they do happen.  Seeing a company honestly responding to, and trying to rectify, complaints, is a good sign in my book.

Another easy action to take is to try and monitor the 3rd party sites and be active on them.  If someone is bashing you on Yelp, get on there and have a voice.  Deflate the situation.  Let them know you care.

You might also reach back to the Meg example, and register domain names that match the search suggest terms.  We did that with our mortgage bank.  After seeing ‘vamortgagecenter reviews’ added to the search suggest box (and the # of searches for it going up 14x), we registered vamortgagecenterreviews.com.  We built a simple website that allowed people to leave reviews of our services.  It’s worked out great – and ranks #5 for that search.

There’s no question that search suggest is a powerful determinant of what users search each time they head to Google or Bing.  As a professional, you are well-served to be aware of these terms as they change over time.  The steps required to both take advantage of new marketing opportunities and to monitor your reputation in the search results are not difficult.  Just stay aware, and stay ahead of the game.  You’ll find ongoing opportunities to better your business from search engines that others will miss.

About the author: Nathaniel Broughton @natebro is a veteran internet marketer who’s helped produce three Inc 500 winning companies.  He is the owner of Growth Partner Capital, a venture fund with services in SEO consulting, online reputation management, and premium link building.

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Guest post by: Matthew Smith, Public Online Marketing, Dell

Go ahead and open Google and search for “your city” real estate agent. You should see an image like this:

These results you are seeing are called Google local results. They are local businesses in the area Google thinks matches whatever term you just searched for. As you look over these results think to yourself, do you see your real estate company or your competitors? If you don’t see your company, you are missing out on a free opportunity to attract leads. To give you an example of what you are missing out on the word “Austin real estate agent” is searched 210 times in Google every month!

In this article we will teach you how you can rank for your local terms to and attract those potential customers over your competitors. We will first cover how to get listed in Google local and then how to rank above your competitors.

Firstly you need to go to Google Local. To register your business you will need a Google account so create a free one if you have not already. Once your account is created, you will be taken to a screen that asks for your country and telephone number. Make sure to put the phone number you would like listed in Google maps. Google may actually call this number to verify the business listing and this number will be shown in the Google local map. Once you have inputted your phone number, Google will check to make sure that number isn’t already associated with another account; if it is not you will be taken to this screen to create your business listing.

Company – Simply add your business name.

Street Address – Here you want to add the address of your business. If you do not have a physical address you can actually just put your home address and set Google local not show your address on the maps.

Main Phone – This is the phone number you want your customers to call when they see your listing.

Website – Just put your normal website.

Description – In this space you want to add a description of your business that includes the city you are targeting. So for my example I am targeting Austin real estate agents. Therefore in my description I said we provide the best Austin real estate agents in the area. This inclusion of “Austin” tells Google that my listing is specifically related to that search. Think of it like this if you searched online for Austin Texas Pizza you wouldn’t want to be shown pizza places in Dallas. Saying your local area in the description helps show users and Google what your businesses focus is.

Category – Here you want to add the 5 best related categories. So for the first category you would most likely put Real Estate Agency.

Service Ares and Location Settings – Here is where you will set what geographic areas you serve. I mentioned in address that you could turn off your location, and this can be done by checking that do not show my business listing box.

However, only set that if you do not have a physical location. You should always set your areas served or distance from one location. If you type your zip code in the distance you can actually pin point a geographic area you work in. That way you can ensure your listing is only being shown to people that live in the general area as you.

Hours of Operation – You do not need to put your hours of operation unless you want to. However, if you do have specific hours and a physical location people can visit I would add it.

Photos – Here is one of the tricks to ranking well in Google local. You need to add business photos. This can be as simple as your logo, the geographic area you serve, or anything real estate related. If you look at the first image in this article you will see a few of the listing show fancy buildings. You want this image to pop and make your listing stand out. Google also likes listing a lot more that have pictures versus those who don’t. I would recommend adding at least 3 pictures to your page.

Videos – Another trick to help you rank in Google local is to add videos to your business listing. A great video would be to quickly film your building and your interior space and then upload it to YouTube. You need to understand that Google wants to show local listings that actually appeal to customers. They do not want to show a local listing that has no profile flare or information people will find interesting.

Additional Details – Here you will add a few additional details about your business. These little additional details actually help you rank in Google local so it is important to complete. For my real estate example I added “Real Estate Areas Served” and then added “Austin” you could then add it additional area you serve.

Once you have added all these details you can click submit at the bottom of the screen. This will then bring up a few verification methods. Google will sometimes offer a verify by phone method. This method is the easiest and involves Google calling your phone and giving you a code that you input into the verification box. However, the other method is to verify by postcard. In this method they will send a postcard to your physical address that you will need to input. Once you verify your listing by one of these two methods you are ready to go.

So now you have your listing created let me quickly cover once method you can now quickly implement to get ranking in Google. If you look at a local result you will see reviews next to most listings. Your goal is to get just as many if not more reviews then your competitors. What you can do is contact any customer you worked with in the past that you had a rapport with and ask them to review your business. I would recommend emailing them and following up with purchase, also add in how much you enjoyed working with them. At the end of that email you will add your business listing link so that they can easily go and review your business. The goal is to make the review process as easy as possible. You do not want to burden your web reviewer but you want to encourage them to give you honest reviews. Once you start getting the reviews your rankings will increase along with customer trust.

This is just the beginning of what it takes to outrank your competitors and drive leads. If you would like more information or have any questions please feel free to email me at matt@theseovoice.com . You can also visit me online for free seo tips and more.

About the author: Matthew Smith has been working professionally in the SEO industry for over five years – working for both small and large SEO firms and now work at Dell doing what he loves. Matthew can be contacted on Twitter @smith_matthew or on LinkedIn.

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For today’s Tip Tuesday post, I want to introduce a tool to you that some of you may be familiar with, but you may not have visited for sometime: Google Browser Size.

Do you know that some people do not see your site as you see it?

Maybe they have to scroll back and forth, maybe the whole site does not show up in one frame – these are all things that a lot of real estate agents don’t think about. They see their site and think that’s how it always looks – but many times sites look different in Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, etc.

Google has a fabulously free tool called Google Browser Size. This is a great tool where you can plug in any URL (your website, your blog, etc) and it will show you the percentage of people that are able to view parts of your site.

According to Google:

“Google Browser Size is a visualization of browser window sizes for people who visit Google. For example, the “90%” contour means that 90% of people visiting Google have their browser window open to at least this size or larger.”

Here is an example:

Here’s a closer view of their example:

Imagine if only 60 or 80% of the people who view your site can actually view your entire site? I know from talking to many of you that this year is the year you will be revamping your site and taking a hard look at what you want on your site or your blog. I recommend that you use this tool to help you build a better site!

Have you used this tool before? I’d love your feedback – leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Senior Marketing Manager, Inman News, @katielance

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Neil Schwartz has been in the real estate industry for over 30 years. He is the broker of Century 21 Masters, the #2 Century 21 office in the Nation. He blogs on neilschwartz.net, providing valuable information to agents regarding sales training, real estate marketing, social media, and technology.

Google Alerts is a monitoring service that alerts you when there are new articles, blogs, discussions or videos on any subject that you choose to be alerted about. It is a great tool for real estate agents and brokers.

In life, and especially in real estate, reputation is critical. A great review by someone on a blog can increase your sales while a negative review could be disastrous. That’s why I urge each and everyone of you to place yourself on Google Alert to keep track of what comes up. Brokers should monitor what is on the web concerning their agents, themselves and their company; Google Alerts makes this simple. It may prove to be time consuming to check on all of your agents, but it is worth your while.

It is critical in any business to keep current and to know what is going on in your market. Agents should stay up to date on various topics, including: real estate trends, mortgage rates, events in your market, and school rankings for the areas you service. With a few keystrokes, you can receive automatic updates on all of these topics and more.

We are always looking for things to talk about with our clients.  Often, we know what our clients are interested in but don’t know much about the subject.  Google Alerts is a great tool for you to keep up on your clients’ interests. Through Google Alerts, you can get free updates on sports teams, specific athletes, political issues, school teams, vacation spots or anything else your clients are interested in.  When you come across something that you think your client might enjoy, call them and/or email them the article you found.

Google Alerts is an agents free research assistant; it gives agents information which is critical to their business. I highly recommend that you start using it today, you will be glad you did. Let me know how Google Alerts works for you.

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Bill Risser is an Assistant Vice President and Branch Manager for Chicago Title in Phoenix Arizona.  When he is not conducting workshops or closing escrows, he can be found at the movies with his wife or golfing with his son.  Follow Bill on Twitter @billrisser or friend him on Facebook.

I’m sure most of us have attended online meetings or webinars.  The most popular product I’ve seen is GoToMeetings.  I’ve never had the joy of setting up an online meeting, but I know from personal experience that joining them can be a royal pain.

The other day, I saw a blurb from Reggie Nicolay about an online meeting site called Join.me.  Being the curious type, I instantly downloaded and installed the software, and tested it with a couple agents.  It worked flawlessly.  Most important was the ease of joining the meeting for the people I invited.  No software to load, no ID numbers to copy and paste, just a simple link to click.  Once they joined the meeting, they had the ability to enter their name, participate in a chat, conference call on a provided number, and even be given control of the presenters screen.  Another great feature is the Join.me blog with great tips and tricks for the product.  They even hold a “Coffee Break” contest on their Facebook Page for more engagement.  In a word, Join.me is awesome!

The LogMeIn people are responsible for Join.me.  LogMeIn allows users to remotely access their home or work computers.  It is the bread and butter product of the company.  Quite a few agents I know use LogMeIn from their laptops when they need to access a file on their home computer.  Join.me is just a couple months old, and I love the attitude of the company regarding Join.me.  Here’s what CTO Marton Anka said about Join.me this past October.

“It’s a super-simple yet super-reliable & secure tool that lets your peers take a look at your screen no matter where they are. For now, that’s it.”

I love the simplicity of the application.  Oh yeah, before I forget, it works on Mac’s too!  I now have a desktop shortcut that instantly starts up Join.me so all I need to do is invite guests.  In the real estate space, Join.me can be an invaluable tool for agents that can’t physically get together with their clients.  An agent could invite a client to their screen and then search the MLS.  This way, the clients could participate in the search.  If an agent was preparing a contract, the buyers could join in via Join.me while the agent explained the purchase contract.

From the brokerage point of view, why not hold Join.me meetings when introducing changes in the company website, new required documents, or the latest market data?  There are many ways real estate companies could implement an online meeting strategy to save time and streamline business.

I will be using Join.me when agents that have attended my workshops have questions about Facebook, HootSuite, Google or anything else we’ve covered.   Now, instead of finding a common time and place to meet, I simply have them download Join.me, invite me to their screen, and request control of their mouse remotely.  I can now answer their questions as I show them on their screen.  Many IT professionals are using Join.me this way too, as a tool for remote access when they do not have other options in place.

What are some other ways Join.me can be used in the real estate world?  I’d love to hear from you.  Leave a comment below with your idea for using this simple yet sophisticated screen sharing tool.

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Matthew Shadbolt is the Director of Internet Marketing for The Corcoran Group, Manhattan’s largest real estate brokerage.

Follow Matthew on Twitter at @corcoran_group

The web is really good at connecting people. Really good. It’s also incredibly efficient at holding people at a distance. As connected as we are, our attention spans are collectively being pulled in ever increasing directions all day. Attempts to own more aspects of our digital day is becoming the key competitive strategic play of Apple, Google and Facebook.

All week here I’ve advocated problem solving, connecting and helping people as the key driver behind everything that’s done online, and I believe the main way to do this is to have fun. When I think of the things I enjoy about the internet, they are very rarely because they made me think about a business model in a new way, or that I loved the way they worked or even what they looked like. What I love about them, and why I’d repeatedly go back, is because they were fun.

This is where many online marketing strategies struggle. Facebook is fun. Facebook for business is inherently not fun. YouTube is really fun. YouTube for real estate, is very, very rarely fun.

The process of purchasing a home is one of the most terrifying, life-changing and thrilling things you could ever do in your life, especially if you’re a first time buyer. That feeling of opening the door to your new home, taking a deep breath and saying “this is mine” is one of the most incredible things you’ll ever feel. How is this experience being translated online? Is it fun? No. It is checkboxes, drop-downs, and pages and pages of ‘matching listings’.

‘Browsing listings’ is a far cry from ‘finding homes’. It’s like asking someone ‘how’s the market?’ and being presented with an Excel spreadsheet. Sure, there’s been some primitive attempts at ‘lifestyle search’, or ‘visual search’, but nothing that resonates with the real-world process of home buying. One of the main reasons home-purchasing or selling is so intimidating is that it’s essentially NOT fun. How different would it be if it was? This is one of the big lessons the real estate industry can learn from working online. Why do millions of people use social media every day? Because it’s FUN. Why are people NOT visiting your website or your Facebook page, or watching your home tour videos – because they’re NOT fun.

Many of us in the real estate marketing world equate confusion, anxiety and frustration with the technology inherent in using these services. Thankfully, this is a short-term problem. As technology gets smarter, it starts to disappear and become invisible to the user. The iPhone or Facebook’s new messaging service are great examples of this. I can only imagine the intense complexity behind these services, yet it’s not there when I’m looking up restaurants nearby or chatting with friends on the other side of the world. I just don’t care how it works.

This is one of the big challenges for our industry. ‘Browsing listings’ needs to transition into ‘finding homes’, and we’ll hear less and less about the ‘conversion funnel’ and more and more about long term customer advocacy across many different types of platforms. As a truly impatient New Yorker, I can’t wait to see what comes next.

And speaking of truly fun ways of connecting people, here’s an old one, but a great one (32 million views anyone?):

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Matthew Shadbolt is the Director of Internet Marketing for The Corcoran Group, Manhattan’s largest real estate brokerage.

Follow Matthew on Twitter at @corcoran_group

Over the past few years there’s been an explosive growth in the number of things marketers can do, especially online. Even the trusty banner ad seems to be in rapid decline. As the internet becomes more pervasive in our lives, to the point where the ‘internet enabled device’ (often called ‘the internet of things’) is ubiquitous, the implications for real estate professionals are potentially seismic. How will people look for homes in the future? By what’s around them? Through recommendations from their friends? Through ‘curated’ search results assembled for them by experts?

The simple answer is, of course, that nobody really knows. A lot of these technologies are still in their infancy. Five years ago most of us had never heard of checking-in or status updates, and tweeting was something for the birds (many maintain that it still is). The idea of a multi-touch device we’d have in our pockets that knew where we were all the time still seemed like science fiction. Yet we don’t think like that any more. Many of us have embraced this new technology as it becomes more user-friendly and a lot less about the nuts and bolts of ‘how it works’.

Here’s 3 emerging ways we’ll interact with the internet in the coming years.

1. Moving between devices will become easier and more a part of how we move around the real world.

Imagine you’re a train commuter who has a long commute each day. To pass the time you watch movies and TV shows on your iPad, streamed directly through Netflix. You arrive at your stop but you haven’t finished watching that oh-so-climactic episode of Lost. When you get home, your internet-enabled plasma screen will remember at what point you left the episode, and automatically pick up from where you left off, allowing you to finish watching the show seamlessly. This technology is here today.

What does this look like for real estate? Imagine you were in a certain area, browsing around a neighborhood you’re thinking of potentially moving to. Your smartphone could record places you were interested in, then allow you to download relevant local video and information based on where you were via your desktop or television when you got home. It’s an increasingly common phenomenon that people are watching the television and also online at the same time. The idea of these screens combining is something we’ll see a lot more of soon.

2. The internet will be built-in as a standard feature into the things around us

The idea of more devices that would be able to handle transactions, especially smartphones, is one that’s right around the corner. Square are already doing it, Google are talking a lot about it, and the concept of your phone replacing your credit card is here. An electronic device with a built in reader that would automatically recognize your location and offer you loyalty rewards for coming back to the store is something we see in the Foursquare and Facebook Places models as they attempt to redefine customer loyalty. Imagine a scenario where you’ve created an electronic version of your grocery list on your iPhone before you go to the store. Upon arrival, the store will recognize you as a return customer, optimize your route through the aisles, and show you featured products you might be interested in based on your interests and related purchases.

3. When we’re moving

The un-tethering of the internet from the big box that sits on your desk is increasing with rapid pace. Not just GPS directions, but using the internet to build out and enhance the driving or flying experience. The idea of ‘what’s around me now’ is already here for smartphone users who are walking around (its adoption rate in urban areas is much higher than in more rural parts of the country), but it hasn’t made it to the car yet. Of course, there are obvious safety concerns with anything that might cause distractions, but the idea of remote diagnostics, local information, or using your car essentially as a large smartphone with wheels is here today. What does this mean for real estate? Think guided open house tours, saved locations, voice-activated notes, and even record imagery (think Google Street View) of the surrounding area. Then once you got home you’d be able to transfer that information from ‘outside’ to any device.

In an uncertain future, what is certain is that the pace at which the technology formerly known as the web will continue to evolve and grow at an increasingly aggressive rate. Cutting through the noise and being able to deliver information that’s timely and valuable to users will be where many businesses will need to focus, especially real estate. Outside of sharing property information, what services could you potentially provide for these platforms?

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Written by Nick Lovegrove of limeyboy.com.

limeyboy.com has spent over a decade helping real estate agents get more from the web, whilst trying to insulate them from the really geeky parts. We help agents define their online brand through building real estate websites, integrated blogs and social networking strategies around them. We are dedicated to helping you find the web approachable and fun, and yet have no desire to turn you into a geek.

Website: http://www.limeyboy.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/limeyboy
Twitter: @limeyboyweb

Ask any real estate agent what they want their real estate website to be about and they will tell you that it has to reflect their track record, their successes, communicating their area knowledge, their expertise and that certain “je ne sais quoi” that just makes them special.

Ask buyers & sellers what they are looking for, and they will tell you that it really boils down to two things: the actives and the solds.

Now, ask any real estate agent what they want their real estate website to do and it really boils down to one thing: get them leads.

There lies the fundamental problem with many real estate websites and it’s this discrepancy which is why many of them aren’t generating leads.

You see, if the content of your real estate website is predominantly concerned with information about you, it’s highly unlikely to show up at search engines when people are looking very specifically for actives and solds. Which, incidentally, is where you get the leads from!

Most agents say that they know that people are not searching for real estate agents, however many agent’s websites makes me doubt they really believe it.

“Were you looking for me? I’ve been waiting for you….”

Many agents will tell you that they show up for their name. However this really should be the bare minimum, as many names are fairly unique keyword phrases. If people are searching to find you by name, they already know you on some level. What a good real estate website can do is to help you be found by people who don’t know you, which is how you grow your business.

However showing up for real estate terms is a different matter altogether. Furthermore, if your website’s content isn’t aligned with what people are searching for it isn’t going to stand a chance of showing up online.

So What Are People Searching For?

If you decide the leave the safe harbor of your ‘about me’ online resume, I mean website, for the uncharted territory of aligning your website’s content with what people are searching for, there is a great tool to help you plot your course.

google offers something called their Keyword Tool to help you figure out what people are specifically searching for in your area. Once logged in, (you may have to sign in with a gmail account) you can experiment typing in various keyword terms and see the amount of search volume for each term or phrase.

For many agents this is both humbling and insightful. It’s insightful in that it gives you the simple facts of what people are searching for in your market area. Where it’s humbling is that it always reveals that hardly anyone is searching specifically for you! Often times the only person searching for you is…well, you! This is precisely why your website’s content should not be about yours truly.

By using this tool at the beginning of a project, you can ensure that your site’s content is aligned with what people are searching for. I think that a lot agent websites are still being created with little consideration of aligning with what people are searching for. That’s a rather large consideration to ignore.

An effective website should not be a 10 page online resume. What’s the first rule of resume writing? It has to fit on one page. So dedicate the other 9 pages to providing the information that people are searching for that’s been defined for you using the keyword tool.

“Is this what you think buyers and sellers are doing at google?”

Remember, search engines essentially only have the content within your site to make a determination of its relevance against what keywords people are typing into search boxes (inbound links aside). If your site is full of keywords such as ‘integrity’, ‘experience’, ‘trustworthiness’ and people are searching for ‘condo’ or ‘apartment’ you can kind of see the problem.

If you are serious about showing up online, you have to be serious about crafting content that is aligned with the demand for it.

FOREM reader’s: How are you making sure your website’s content fits with what people are looking for?

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MIKE BOWLER, SR. has been in the real estate business (Lansing, MI) for the past 32 years. During that time he’s educated and consulted hundreds of REALTORS. Mike is a former owner/broker of Coldwell Banker Bowler Real Estate and is currently an Associate Broker for Coldwell Banker Hubbell Briarwood in Lansing Michigan, who bought his company in 2001. He also owns his own company PRETEC (Professional Resources, E-Business, Technology, Education, & Consulting) and is also an avid fan of social media in the workplace. Mike was named in 2009’s Top 25 Most Connected Real Estate Professionals by PROXIOand selected by Inman News as one of the 50 Most Influential Online.

OK, that might sound a little crude for a title, however it’s “Fun Friday” and I was told to make this post fun.  With all the amazing changes, challenges, and innovations coming at us real estate agents in this industry, it’s difficult to find much fun in the fact that we need to be thinking about and doing something about the following everyday:

• Websites
• IDX
• Blogs
• Social media
• Having a profile on various portals
• Syndication of our listings

Let alone…

• Bank foreclosures
• Mitigation
• Short sales
• Price reductions

Most of the items above didn’t even exist a few years back, however that’s what makes this business so much fun and yet challenging.  We have an opportunity every day to learn something new.  So, if you take offense to the list above or the video below and think I’m full of it, you can “Just Go Google Yourself” and see what you find.  Happy Fun Friday!

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Guest Blogger Stephen Pacinelli has delivered presentations to thousands of REALTORS® on the benefits of sales automation, social media, blogging and online marketing. Stephen’s strategies come first hand from some of the best Realtors around the country. Steve co-founded Tech Savvy Agent and helped build it from the ground up to provide the best technology and marketing information to REALTORS® seeking the latest strategies and tools.

Let’s face it, Google pretty much runs the Internet.  It dictates where we go and what we see.  So if I want to play nice with anybody, guess who it’s going to be….Google.

There are 4 indispensable tools that I feel everyone should be implementing in their current business.   These tools are easy to get, and free, simply by going to google.com and signing up for an account on the upper right hand side of the page.  We’re going to start with the most basic, being your profile and touch upon some more advanced tools like, the Keyword Tool, Google Alerts and Analytics.

1. Google Profile

We can’t control what appears on the first page of Google, right?  Wouldn’t it be great to at least know that a hand-typed profile and a nice looking bio created by you, would be guaranteed to appear on the first page?  Well, guess what?  We can do that by simply filling out your Google profile.

After getting your Google account, go to Google.com and click on Google Account Settings.  You will see an empty profile screen on the upper left hand side.  This is where you want to add some information, such as a short bio or other variations of your name.  The information entered onto this screen is guaranteed to show up on the first page of Google (on the bottom) when someone searches for your name.

2. Google Alerts

The next important tool I would recommend is Google Alerts.  The Internet is a wide open space for anyone to say anything.  Do you know what people are saying about you?  You spend a lot of time making sure your reputation is secure off-line.  How about on-line?   Under the Google Account Settings screen, look for the small yellow bell and click on the Alerts link.  Key in your name here but be sure to put it in quotes as shown below, to lock your first name in with your last.  Otherwise, in my case I would get notified of all “Steve’s” or all “Pacinelli’s”.  Answer the next few questions and Google is now set up to send you an alert the second it finds any reference to your name on the Internet.

3. Google Analytics

Everyone has a website these days.  But it seems as if only a small amount of agents are truly harnessing the power of their on-line presence.  To do this, you need to have an understanding of your consumer and know what they liked most as well as what they didn’t like or did not find beneficial from your website.  Google Analytics to the rescue!  This tool will compile and save data about your visitors on your site including location, time spent, pages visited, their entry page and exit page as well as a myriad of other statistics that will give you better insight to cater towards their needs.  Google Analytics will work on almost any website and most reputable website providers will have a custom box to enter in the code that Google supplies.  Simply find the Google Analytics button under the same Google Account Settings screen I referenced earlier.

4. Google Keyword Tool

In this blog post, we definitely saved the best for last.  Knowing what your target audience is searching for on the internet can give you a competitive advantage in trying to meet the needs of this fickle group.  Since Google knows where everyone is going, it keeps detailed information about what people are searching for on the Internet.  This fantastic feature is the Google Keyword Tool.  Any tech savvy agent that is looking for a good domain name, has a website or enjoys blogging will find this tool invaluable.  The easiest way to take advantage of this free tool, is to Google “Google Keyword Tool”.  The first entry to pop up is what you are looking for.  Type a phrase into the space and instantly see the amount of searches completed for that phrase.   This is a component that has limitless use, since knowledge is power in understanding consumer behavior in the real estate industry.

I hope you find these four tools as useful as we all do at Tech Savvy Agent. What are some other free tools are you using in your business?

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