Using the Internet to Market Real Estate in 2007

As more and more potential home buyers start their search for real estate on the internet - reassessing how you spend your marketing budget in 2007 is probably the wisest move you can take. Continuing to use traditional newspaper and magazine advertising has the following negative aspects: Newspaper and magazine advertising only lasts the life cycle of the magazine or newspaper - usually only 7 days To ensure you reach a potential buyer you need to advertise in all magazines and newspapers serving your area Theses magazines regularly sit side by side in diners, supermarkets and storesPotentail buyers do not see your adertising unless they visit your town, which is no longer how the home buying process starts85% of homebuyers NOW start their search for real estate on line and newspaper and magazine advertising fails to reach these potential buyers This form of advertising is extremely expensive and only allows you to display 1 small picture of your listing which is rarley enough to motivate a potential buyer to visit the propertySo whats the solution? To answer this it is best to look at how potential buyers search on the internet and then look at your options for reaching these potential buyers Potential buyers start their search in 1 of 2 ways:On realtor.com - the nations busiest real estate web siteBy using a search engine e.g. google and typing a search for "town name" real estate 1) On realtor.com - the nations busiest real estate web siteEnsuring your listing stands out on realtor.com is NOW essential - and there are 2 ways you can do thisBy becoming a showcase member - which allows you to add multiple pictures, a full description of your listing, links to your web site and email and displays your contact information . These listings are highlighted with a yellow box round them Negative - there is a monthly fee to be a showcase member and how many visitors to Realtor.com now choose to view listings with multiple pictures first is unclear By adding a real estate virtual home tour to your listing - "Featured Tour"- allowing multiple pictures, full contact information, links to your web site and email and creates the perfect open house 24hrs a day" Fact - 8/10 visitors to Realtor.com view listings with Featured Tours 1st, which if your listing is in a town with say 500 listings may move your listing from page 40 to page 1 On average listings with Featured Tours are seen 40% more than those without Featured tours continue to market your listings until sold unlike newspaper advertising which only lasts a week tatistics quoted are for 2005 - as more and more internet users have high speed internet access - this % will continue to increase 2) By using a search engine e.g. google and typing a search for "town name" real estate For example in 2006 - there were 80345 for Cape May NJ Real Estate and 17531 for Cape May Real Estate - total searches - 97876 on Google, Yahoo and MSNIf your web site does not appear on Page 1 of the search results you are missing out on all these potential customers The solution!There are 2 options to ensure your web site appears at the top of search engines - Search Engine Optimization - the process of overhauling your web site to target it for certain search engine terms* This is by far the best way as once achieved there is no cost per visitor to your web site * This can take time to achieve, particulalrly on Google which rates web sites on how many web sites link to your web site and the process of building incoming links is both time consuming and expensive if you choose to buy incoming links * When choosing a search engine optimization company ask to see examples of web sites that have Top 10 listings and not just for obscure search terms! Paid Advertising using a solution e.g. google adwords and overture for Yahoo The key advatnage with this form of advertising is you can see results within 24hrs or sooner The 2 major negative sare 1) The Cost per click is constantly rising - the average real estate click costs approximately $1.50 and 2) Click Freud is a mjaor issue - it is estimated that about 40% of clicks are freudulent Realizing the way people now start for real estate has changed and taking steps to adjust your marketing budget to reflect this should help you ensure 2007 is a successful year

Jon Hawes has been providing real estate virtual tours for over 2 years to help ensure properties are seen on some of the nations busiest web sites. By providing search engine optimization services to real estate web sites - he is able to promote both real estate and real estate agents on the inetrnet effectively