Build a Great Real Estate Website with a WordPress Premium Theme

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Building a real estate website with a WordPress premium theme is something that every real estate professional should consider two great reasons:

• You get a great looking website for your real estate business that is extremely easy to customize and that offers you tens of thousands of free add-ons ( plugins, in the parlance of WordPress) that enable you to extend your website’s functionality

Click on the link for more information or to check out a demo of AgentPress.

• You get a built-in blog that allows you to interact with your audience, establish yourself as an authority in your market, and multiply your opportunities for ranking in the search engines (every post you create becomes another page for search engines to add to their index, which is what they build their search results from)

And you get both – a great-looking website with tons of functionality and a built-in blog that can help you capture top search engine rankings – for a fraction of what you might expect to pay, as premium WordPress themes do not really come at a premium price. In fact, most premium themes won’t set you back more than $100.

AgentPress Theme for Real Estate Websites

And while there are many premium WordPress themes for real estate websites on the market, there is one that stands head and shoulder above the crowd: AgentPress by StudioPress.

Not only does AgentPress enable you to showcase your listings, it also enables you to build your brand by giving you the opportunity to showcase what you know about your business, your profession, and your markets. And an AgentPress real estate website with an integrated WordPress blog allows you to go beyond a static, one-dimensional presence on the Web that does little or nothing to differentiate you from the competition by establishing a dynamic, interactive, three-dimensional presence that takes your competition out of the picture altogether.

Because when you set yourself apart from the competition – in way that establishes your credibility and adds a highly personal touch to your presence on the Web that encourages people to get to know you, like you, and, ultimately, trust you – you really have no competition.

Key Features of AgentPress WordPress Theme for Real Estate Websites

Some of the key features of the AgentPress WordPress theme for real estate websites include:

• Search engine optimization – the AgentPress theme features SEO Settings and Options pages that makes it easy for you to take care of the SEO basics
  

  SEO Settings for AgentPress

• Custom property templates – the AgentPress theme was designed to make it easy for real estate agents to create listings for all of their properties with a custom template that allows you to input all key listing information, photos, videos, and so forth
• Custom sidebar “widgets” – WordPress “widgets” enable drag-and-drop customization so that you can easily and instantly create the look and functionality they want with their real estate website/blog
• Support – the AgentPress support forum is populated by people who are experienced WordPress users as well as experienced users of the AgentPress theme for real estate websites, which makes it a great place to learn about how to optimize your website and to get better results from your overall online real estate marketing efforts

Ultimately, building a real estate website with a WordPress premium theme is one of the best things you can do to market your business on the Internet. And the AgentPress theme for WordPress makes it quick, easy, and extremely affordable to do.

Find out more about the AgentPress theme for real estate websites by clicking on the link and checking out the online demo.

If you want to kick your real estate marketing efforts up a notch by adding some flashy video to your website, make sure you click on this link to learn all about what Animoto can do for you.

Double Up on Your Google Rankings for Your Local Business

Local businesses are in an enviable position when it comes to gaining visibility in Google’s search results because they have the opportunity to capture top positions on the first page through two different methods:

• Organic web search results – organic web search results are those that you are probably most familiar with because they are what Google serves up in response to a search query on the Google.com homepage and can include a combination of news, videos, images, and so forth
• Local business search results – local business search results are the listings that appear on page one as a 3-pack, 7-pack, or 10-pack either, most commonly, above the organic search results or, occasionally, part way down the first page and are served up in response to search queries that contain a “geographic modifier” (such as a city name) or when Google’s algorithm detects a local intent (they also appear in Google Maps search results)

It’s important to distinguish between the two types of search results because the ranking algorithms for web search results and local business search results are completely different so the pathway to the top of web search results is paved with different factors than the pathway to the top of the local business search results.

Moreover, according to  Google, about 20% of all Google searches have a local intent behind them (that number goes up to about 33% for Google searches via the mobile web) so there is a lot of interest in local content. And many of those people who are looking for local content follow up their online research and comparisons with an offline purchase. In fact, according to a Google-sponsored, comScore.com study on the influence of online search on offline buying behaviour, 63% of people who make a purchase after online search activity do so offline.

Finally, while it generally takes a website to get to the top of Google’s organic web search results (you can also rank for alternative content such as YouTube videos, PR Web news releases, images hosted on Flickr, and so forth), the only way you can get to the top of Google’s local search results is by creating (or claiming an existing) Google Places listing.

Click on the link to contact me for a free and painless – relatively speaking  – consultation.

Five Reasons Why Every Local Business Needs a Blog

A blog can be a great addition to any business’ existing website or it can serve as a business’ presence on the Web. And considering that nearly 50% of small businesses do not have a website – and small businesses make up about 99.9% of all businesses – establishing a presence on the Web in the form of a blog can do wonders for your business.

It doesn’t matter if you do business primarily or entirely offline or not, today’s consumers use the Internet to find businesses to do business with. And that’s especially true when it comes to local business, as Google recently reported that 20% of all Google searches have a local “flavour” to them (that number goes up to about 33% when you look at Google searches via the mobile Web).

And those numbers are only going to increase as Google and other search engines continue to improve local search capabilities and consumers continue to turn to the Internet in general and search engines in particular – and away from traditional tools – to find local businesses to do business with.

Establish and Build Your Reputation

People generally prefer doing business with companies and people that they know or, at least, feel like they know. You may have framed mission and value statements hanging on a wall in your office, but do your customers really understand what your business is all about and what it is trying to achieve? Do they know what’s important to you as a company? Do your customers understand the values and goals that are important to your business? A blog makes it possible for you to highlight achievements and contributions you’re proud of – such as charities you’re involved with and community activities you sponsor – showcase customer problems your business’ solutions have addressed – all with the intention of building your brand and solidifying your reputation.

Grow Customer Relationships

You might have some demographic/psychographic data on the people who are buying your business’ products and services, but what do you really know about them? People who are interested in what you have to say on your blog are probably your best customers and the more you know about your best customers, the better you equip yourself to find more of them. The comment portion of every blog post creates opportunities for you to engage in dialogues with your customers in a unique way. While the majority of your marketing efforts are limited to one-way messages, blog posts open up two-way communications.}

Build Customer Loyalty

Your customers want to get to know who they’re doing business with. And the more they know you – and know about you – the more loyal they become. As you showcase some of the different services and solutions your business offers, your customers and prospective customers are exposed to new and different ways in which you can help them, and they end up doing more business with you. Creating content around customer success stories is a great way to solidify your relationships with those customers and also  to position different services and solutions in a way that helps to sell them without selling. And by offering the ability to subscribe to your blog – via email or RSS – you can keep your customer base up-to-date on your latest posts on auto-pilot.

Establish Yourself as an Authority

Without a blog, your website is simply a flashy online brochure filled with marketing messages. And, if you’re like many business owners, your website probably doesn’t generate a lot of business. By adding a blog you will be able to establish yourself as an authority on your niche through the content you post and the dialogues you engage in with customers. And you’ll start to see that your blog will become a source of business. Letting customers and potential customers get to know you, what you’re all about and all about the problems you’ve solved for other people will go a long way towards cementing you as an authority in your field.

Drive Traffic

Blogs are search engine magnets because search engines – like the people who use them – love fresh content. And while a static website offers up nothing fresh for search engines to consume, regularly updated blogs – whose posts are rich with high-value keywords – keep search engine spiders coming back for more. Every post creates an opportunity for you to capture new rankings in the search results and, with them, more targeted traffic.

Over the course of the next couple of weeks, we’ll spotlight some local businesses in different markets that have been enjoying success in their markets as a result of their blogs (if you’ve got a local business blogging success story and you’d like grab the spotlight, send me an email and we’ll see what we can do).

Interested in adding a blog to an existing website; or, perhaps, establishing your presence on the web with a standalone blog? Click on the link to contact me for a free and painless – relatively speaking  – consultation.

Two Simple Keys to SEO Success: Take Care of the Basics and Forget about Algorithm-Chasing

Search engine optimization (SEO) is critical to the success of any website because it helps to improve a website’s visibility in the natural search results – the end result of which should be that the optimized website experiences a sustainable boost in search referral traffic.

And yet in spite of the obvious importance of SEO, the realtiy is that the vast majority of websites have never been exposed to even a bare-minimum level of SEO effort, meaning that they are potentially forfeiting top rankings – and the traffic that top rankings virtually guarantee – to their competitors

Why do so few people bother with SEO when it is so essential to a website’s success? Here are three possible reasons:

• Search engines employ extremely complex ranking algorithms

A ranking algorithm is basically a mathematical formula that comprises many different variables that evaluates and ranks web pages in order of relevance to a keyword query. Google’s algorithm is reputed to comprise around 200 different variables, which means, in a sense, that every time you create a website you’ve got to do about 200 things “right” (or at least “more right” than all of the other websites that are competing against you for the same keywords).

• Search engine ranking algorithms are fiercely guarded secrets

As if it’s not bad enough having to do about 200 things right every time you create a website, search engines do not tell you what those 200 things are. In fact, not only are their ranking algorithms locked up tighter than Fort Knox, there is speculation that they release misinformation about their ranking algorithms in an effort to throw off people who try to manipulate the system to achieve better rankings.

• Search engine ranking algorithms are constantly changing

Even if you knew what all of Google’s 200+ ranking factors were and if you were able to do all of them “right” every time you built a website, you’d still be behind the eight-ball because search engines are constantly trying to improve the experience for the end user so they are constantly tweaking their algorithms. In fact, it’s been reported that Google plans to introduce about 550 or so improvements to its ranking algorithm in 2010.

In spite of some seemingly significant hurdles, SEO is eminently “doable” if you follow two simple pieces of advice:

First, take care of the basics.

Find out where your website stands today vis-a-vis your top-ranking competitors for your target keywords. Hire a SEO consultant or, if you really want to be in control of your website’s destiny, invest a few hundred dollars in some SEO software. And then take action to close the obvious gaps.

Second, forget about chasing search engine ranking algorithms.

Think about end-users. That’s what the search engine algorithms are designed to do, so don’t you think you should too?

By taking care of the basics and focusing on the end user, SEO “happens” naturally; so, too, will better visibility in the natural search results.

Keyword Research – Four Criteria for Selecting “Money” Keywords

Keyword research is absolutely essential to the success of any website because keywords are what people use to find websites and are what search engines use as the basis for their rankings. Good keyword research increases the probability that search engines will rank the pages on your website high for your target keyword; and bad keyword research (which often means no keyword research) will doom your website to the search engine cellars.

Since search engine visibility is a key factor in attracting targeted search referral traffic, the higher you rank, the more traffic your website will receive. Clearly, keyword research pays off.

In order to ensure you get the most out of your keyword research – and, in so doing, increase the volume of targeted traffic to your website – make sure that the keywords your research identifies meet the following four key criteria (work through them in the order in which they appear):

1. Relevance

Your keyword research time and effort must focus on identifying keywords that are relevant to your niche because relevance is critical to both search engine rankings and to the satisfaction of your end users (which, in turn, is obviously good for conversions).

If the overall theme of your website or blog focused on golf, you won’t be doing yourself any favours if you target keywords that are not related to golf.

2. Probability to Convert

Your keyword research time and effort needs to ensure that the keywords you target are used by people who are highly motivated to take some form of action:

• Click on a link
• Download a report
• Subscribe to a list or a fee
• Request more information
• Call or visit your business
• Buy something online

As a rule, research has found that “long-tail” keywords – keyword phrases that consist of two, three or more keywords – tend to lead to higher conversion rates. The reason is simple: long-tail keywords are more specific than single-word keywords and often reveal a “probability to convert.”

For example, a long-tail keyword phrase such as “download free keyword research software” is obviously more likely to lead to a conversion than a shorter keyword phrase such as “keyword research.”

So even though search volume for long-tail keywords/phrases is lower than for more general keywords/phrases, people using them in their search queries are generally motivated to take action.

3. Search Volume

Unless, for some reason, you don’t want or need an audience for your website or blog, your keyword research time and effort must focus on identifying keywords that have a satisfactory number of people using them in their search queries every month (what constitutes “a satisfactory number of people” is, of course, up to the individual and depends on his/her objectives).

To determine raw monthly search volumes for the keywords you’re researching, head on over to Google’s Keyword Selection Tool and do the following:

• Specify the country or territory you’re targeting
• Select a language
• Enter the keywords you’re researching
• Enter the Captcha
• Click on the “get keyword ideas” button

After Google serves up the initial results, you’ll want to narrow the keyword ideas by specifying “phrase match” for match type because it will produce a much more useful number – for our purposes – than the default “broad match.”

Eliminate any keywords whose “phrase match” search volume falls well below the “satisfactory number of people” your keyword research says you need.

4. “Rankability”

The final criterion your keyword research must focus on is whether or not there is a reasonable probability that you can achieve a high ranking for the keywords you’re planning to target because the only way you’ll attract search referral traffic is if you rank at or near the top of the search results. Period.

While there are some fairly advanced ways to determine the “rankability” of the keywords you’re researching, in the interest of simplicity we’re going to go with a quick-and-dirty method that many people commonly rely upon: the number of other web pages that are “competing” for the same keywords that you’re researching. To do this,

• Navigate your browser to Google’s homepage
• Enter one of the keywords you’re researching into the query bar (make sure you do a “phrase match” search by enclosing the keyword in quotes)
• Click on the search button

If the total number of “competing” web pages – which will be displayed just below the query bar on the search results page – is less than 30,000, you’ve got a good chance of being able to capture a top ranking for the keyword for which you ran the search (it goes without saying that the lower the number of competing web pages, the better your chances are of achieving a top ranking for a particular keyword).

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