Archive for April, 2009

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Real Estate 2.0 – The Upside to a Down Market

Posted by Brent on April 29th, 2009

As in all industries, real estate sellers and marketers are seeking more creative and cost effective ways to reach their target audience and make the sale.  The number of people who use the Internet to find their new home grows each year.  According to the Nationa Association of Realtors 2008 Internet Study, 87% of all home buyers now use the Internet in their search process.  But agents and Realtos should not fear this growing statistic…of that 87% who used the Internet, 85% used an real estate agent as opposed to going straight to a builder or home seller.  I don’t forsee the need for real estate agents ever changing significantly, at least not in the near future.

What we do see changing however is the way agents, Realtors, builders, home sellers and new home marketers take these properties to market.  The days of most traditional media outlets are over for now.  Print, radio, and TV are simply not cost effective nor are they measurable.  Builders and sellers out there need to use sales and marketing tactics that are cost effective, targeted, and measurable.  So how are they doing this?  Welcome to the world of Real Estate 2.0.

When we refer to Web 2.0, it essentially means the transformation of the web’s movement from a “read only” platform to a a fully interactive experience where consumers can interact, share information, and buy/sell products and services.  Traditionally, many industries have been reluctant to embrace online media regardless of its proven track record for more measurable ROI…simply because its a new medium.  Over the past two years we have seem a dramtic shift in not only the real estate industry’s understanding of Internet marketing and all its capabilities, but an actual action taken to implement these strategies.

More and more builders and agents are use Internet marketing to replace traditional media.  Everyone is working from a smaller budget and it is essential to track every penny.   The only true way to do this is with well-planned integrated online marketing solutions that are properly managed and backed by extensives testing and analytics.  Here are some of the marketing channels currently being used to more cost effectively to sell new homes:

Search engine optimization:  This is essentially the practice of increasing the quality and volume of traffic to a website through natural search engine rankings.  More agents and builders are realizing the long term importance of investing in SEO strategies to continually improve the quality of lead flow.  SEO is a true investment as it takes time to see tangible results, especially in an industry as competitive as real estate is online.

Paid Search (Pay Per Click Advertising):  PPC is a great tool to drive targeted traffic when organic rankings are not there.  PPC can be a quick way to waste money if it is not planned and managed properly.  The most effective PPC campaigns have a very targeted key word strategy, use effective landing pages to ensure conversions and leads, and are constantly monitored and adjusted.  PPC can also be geo-targetd as well as weekly/daily/hourly targetd to ensure you are hitting the most targeted audience at the highest converting times.

Social Media Marketing:  Here is where it gets interesting.  The real estate industry has slowly moved into the social media space through blogging and other web 2.0 platforms.  Now agents and Realtors as well as builders are actively using social media including blogging, video marketing, Facebook and Twitter strategies, viral contests, etc.  The measurable ROI will still come from the same outcome…website traffic growth, eventual leads, conversions, and sales.

Email marketing:  Email marketing still does often fall under the Internet marketing umbrella and is always an effective way to capture new business and retarget potential customers.  Email marketing has taken over for direct mail as a more powerful, more cost effective, and more GREEN method of reaching out to potential buyers.  Email marketing of course like the other elements being discussed must be executed thoughtfully and compliment the overall marketing message.  Email newsletters must be compelling and have a clear call to action.  Similarly, the landing page that the user is directed to should have the same message and prompt them to act.  In real estate, this usually involves capturing the visitor’s information.

The overall idea of an integrated Internet marketing strategy is to follow these basic steps to ensure true synergy between all offline and online marketing components:

  1. Review and define business goals
  2. Set aside a realistic budget (for Internet marketing to work, you must commit to it)
  3. Choose the most appropriate marketing channels to support your goals (i.e. SEO, PPC, Email, Social, etc.)
  4. Develop a comprehensive plan focused on conversions and meeting business goals
  5. Ensure all offline elements are complimentary to the online elements
  6. Launch campaign
  7. Monitor results
  8. Make continual adjustments to ensure optimal ROI

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Effective Email Newsletter Creation

Posted by Brent on April 29th, 2009

Email is a powerful Internet email marketing tool and a cost-effective approach to communicating with your target audience. It allows you to engage with your customers on a regular basis and to connect with prospective customers who are almost interested in your offerings. Here are a few pointers to increase the likelihood of your email being open, read, and simply avoiding the trash bin.

Before you start, ask yourself:
What is your goal?

What is the message you wish to convey?
•    Deliver only ONE message.
•    Make it clear and concise.
•    The purpose should be detailed in the first paragraph, which keeping sentences short and to the point.

What are you marketing?
•    Include call to action i.e. phone call, link to website.
•    Mention your value proposition over the competitors.

How are you going to connect with your audience to what you are marketing?
•    Personalize your email i.e. include the name of the subscriber in the greeting.
•    Make your content interesting to your reader.
•    Offer tips and advice i.e. ‘How Tos’.
•    Make it interactive i.e. include a relevant video or a poll.

The Subject Line
A subject line is your headliner. Therefore it needs to capture the attention of your audience. Your subject line should connect with your audience on an intimate level. Ensure that the subject line is useful, relevant and informative to the message you are conveying in your email. This will increase the likelihood of your email being read.

The Content
Establish a tone, write with a friendly voice and avoid sounding like a sales person. Your email content should be direct and informative containing pertinent information about your message. Be sure to include your full contact information.

The paragraphs should contain no more than 3 sentences. If you are trying to convey something in more detail, include a link to your website for more details.

If you have case studies or testimonials, share it in your email. Utilizing customer feedback and experiences can entice your audience to want to relate. Additionally, it is a trust factor and builds confidence in your brand as if a best friend told them so.

The Visuals
The graphics and images used in an email should be used sparingly but effectively. For quick download, all visuals should be optimized. They should be relevant and give an illustration about your message. If your company has earned trust logos, be sure to add to these trust logos to your newsletter footer.<–>


Internet Marketing Inc SEO Director Speaking At SMX Advanced

Posted by Mike Martin on April 29th, 2009

I’m speaking at SMX Advanced

I will be representing Internet Marketing Inc. at SMX Advanced in Seattle on June 2nd as a speaker on the Mobile Search panel.

SMX Advanced is a two day event taking place at the Bell Harbor International Conference Center from Tuesday, June 2 to Wednesday, June 3 in Seattle, Washington.

There will be a Meet & Greet party at the Odyssey Maritime Museum on Monday June 1st hosted by Microsoft who has timed the announcement of its new search engine KUMO later at the conference.

SMX Advanced in my opinion is the pinnacle of all major Internet marketing conferences as such if you could only attend one conference all year this should be the one, although PubCon would be a close second.

This conference has sold out each year and the last chance to get the early bird lowest pricing is on Friday May 1st by saving $200 at this SMX Advanced Registration page.

Please let me know if you will be attending the conference or in the Seattle area in early June by emailing me at mike AT internetmarketinginc DOT com

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Shopping Cart Technology Unveiled

Posted by Ceci on April 28th, 2009

So you are ready to take the next step expanding your business online and embrace your internet marketing efforts. You no longer have to have a physical storefront to do business anymore. Today some of the most profitable businesses are online and only have an online presence. There is such a wide range of shopping cart solutions how do you choose the right one for your online venture?  The most basic and important features of the shopping cart are 3:

-    The Shopping cart allows the user to interact with the store and add items to their bag. This should also calculate taxes and shipping and charge the user while staying on your website.

-    Shipping:  This is the only delivery method for online shopping carts. You need to be able to integrate the cart with your preferred shipping provider this will alleviate many hassles in the future and will streamline your processes from start to finish. This is very important because if your shipping methods are not efficient you will end up needing to charge higher shipping prices in the future.

-    Accepting online payment: No one likes to be limited. You need to be able to offer your clients several ways to paying. So make sure your shopping cart is able to integrate with various payment gateways and accepts several forms of payment. One of the easiest is over the phone and all you have to do is offer them a phone number to call.

shopping-cart
There are 2 main components in a shopping cart the front end which is what the user sees and interacts with and the backend or the administrator’s area. When choosing a shopping cart here are a few tips to keep in mind for uability:

Offer a Guest Checkout: not all people like to sign up for an account when shopping. Especially for first time users to the store, or people that are shopping for gifts.
Security symbols: Make sure that your website is secure and not susceptible to hackers. No one wants to put their credit card number onto a website that they do not think is safe. Make sure to have your SSL certificate correctly installed and it is also a good idea to include the SSL providers logo on checkout pages.
One page checkout process: this facilitates the user through the checkout process.
These are just a few quick tips to making your shopping cart more user friendly and what to look for when choosing which to use!


Not Just for 20 Somethings Anymore

Posted by Brent on April 27th, 2009

As the popularity of social media grows, more bsuiness owners are trying to understand what its all about.  One of the main factors deterring many businesses from using social media marketing is that they don’t understand it, nor do they think it will be targeted for their demographic (i.e. not online, not the right age range, etc.).  The biggest misconception is that people over 35 are not on sites like Facebook.com or Twitter.com.  That may have been true a few years ago but not anymore.

While just a few years ago the mediums were associated with the teenage and 20-something sets, that’s changed. Two-thirds of all online users visit social networks and blogs, according to data from Nielsen Online. And the largest growth in social media users last year came from the 35- to 49-year-old group.  There are a lot of business owners and potential customers in these groups!

The most important thing for business owners to understand is not WHAT social media is but HOW to most effectively use it for their specific brands.  It is different for every company and takes research and planning to set up a proper campaign.  The industry in general often referrs to social media as on of the most cost effective marketing channels but it is more time consuming than people think.  That is why many companies who do not have the bandwidth to tackle this effort in-house will hire a professional Internet marketing or social media marketing company.

Many firms will approach the way they offer the service differently.  Some only want to consult but not implement.  The problem with this approach is that is still doesn’t solve bandwidth and internal resource issues.  It is of course very important to have the client very involved so that the correct message is being communicated.  Experts will also advise clients who want to do some of the implementation (i.e. Tweeting, updating Facebook profiles, etc.) to make sure they understand the rules of online social communities.  The sales pitch should be subtle and only introduced once the trust has been established.  The key to social media is finding out who is talking about topics related to your business and getting involved with those discussions. 

From an online brand management scenario (an important aspect to a well rounded social media marketing effort), companies should keep open lines of communication with their customers.  If positive things are said online, say “Thank You”.  If negative comments arise, apologize and let them know you are looking for a solution.  The more that busineses can learn about social media and how they can effectivley use it the better.  That is where great Internet marketing companies can play a large role.


Twitter and AOL Community Leading the Charge in Social Media Site Growth

Posted by Steve on April 25th, 2009

Social Networks continue to grow at a rapid pace. Suprisingly, over the last year the fastest growing Social Networks
on the web are not Facebook or Myspace. The most rapidly growing networks over a one year span from February 2008 thru February 2009 are Twitter.com and AOL Community. The graph below shows the rapid advancement or decline of some of the most popular Social Media sites on the web.

Top Social Networking Sites by Unique Visitors, February 2009
Property February 2008 (000) February 2009 (000) Change (%)
Total Internet audience 185,017 192,187 4
Social networking audience N/A 122,290 N/A
MySpace.com 67,957 70,303 3
Facebook 32,436 57,375 77
Classmates Online 13,051 16,247 24
MyLife.com N/A 15,345 N/A
Buzznet 5,230 8,661 66
Yahoo Buzz 2,957 7,955 169
AOL Community 76 7,261 9,513
LinkedIn 3,316 6,948 110
AIM Profiles 7,960 6,928 -13
Digg 5,546 6,917 25
Bebo N/A 5,789 N/A
Tagged 1,704 5,396 217
DeviantART 3,710 4,770 29
Twitter 340 4,033 1,085
hi5 Networks 2,728 3,670 35
CaringBridge 1,713 2,483 45
BlackPlanet.com 2,030 2,381 17
Gaia Online 1,685 2,325 38
AddThis 407 2,020 396
SodaHead.com 777 1,801 132
Multiply 1,139 1,754 54
Friendster 2,496 1,689 -32
Xomba 967 1,591 65
Propeller 2,489 1,464 -41
MSN Groups 2,941 1,327 -55
Note: Audience is defined as all persons at U.S. home, work, college, and university locations.
Source: comScore, 2009


Bringing Social Networking to Iraq

Posted by Brent on April 23rd, 2009

As we gradually help rebuild Iraq, one key element to diagnose and fix is web access.  It is reported that only about 5% of Iraqis have web connections from home.  More can actually get online from Internet cafes and from their cell phones.  Recently, a State Department sponsored trip to Baghdad included Internet execs such as Jack Dorsey from Twitter, Jack Liebman from Howcast, and Raana Bar-Cohen of Automattic and Wordpress.  The goal of the trip was to assess the future of Iraq’s online culture and discuss ways to inspire new web entrepreneurs to emerge. (as stated in a recent Seattle Times article)

Iraq has begun a campaign to attract new foreign investment but needs to figure out the exact message and value proposition before true success will be reached.  The effort will no doubt take a long time but things are moving in the right direction.  One concern expressed by State Department and CIA officials is the possiblity that terrorists and militant groups might utilize the web and online social media to communicate.  This theory makes sense but terrorists can just as easily meet at a coffee shop.  Online meetings can just as easily happen offline.  Keep in mind that terrorists have already used email and web-based communication quite successfully.  We are making great stides to dilute these efforts.

Being a former Navy SEAL, and having spent much time in Iraq, I see great opportunity from making online infrastructure improvements.  Natually, the connectivity issues have to be addressed and infrastructure put in place before these discussions will become a reality.  However, we are including business owners, University professors, and investors in these discussions so that once the connection issues are fixed, new business can emerge.  One day, Internet marketing will become an option to help local businesses grow and thrive.


Using Your Brain on Twitter by Twinking

Posted by Mike Martin on April 22nd, 2009

The next evolution of has occurred this month as University of Wisconsin-Madison biomedical engineering doctoral student, Adam Wilson, posted a Twitter status update just by thinking about it.

twitter-brain

This application would be useful by those suffering ALS, spinal cord injuries, or brain-stem strokes who are unable to communicate verbally or by typing.

The interface as it stands now registers brain activity when viewing a keyboard displayed on the screen.

The process is similar to early phone texting as the system redundantly confirms via your brain signals which letter you absolutely want inputted on the screen, thus taking quite a while for a message to complete.

Adam told the Wisconsin Technology Network that he has seen people accomplish up to 8 characters a minute, thus a 140 character Twitter tweet by twinking would take over 15 minutes to complete.

Research scientist Gerwin Schalk states, “This is one of the first – and perhaps most useful – integrations of brain-computer interface techniques with Internet technologies to date.”

So now people can really know what you are tWinking.

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The Furture of Online Communication, and Marketing

Posted by Brent on April 21st, 2009

Is social network communication outpacing email as the leading form of direct online communication?  Not yet, but it could.  Email has long since been the primary form of regular commnication between individuals and businesses, but as the popularity of social networks like FaceBook, Twitter, Yammer, etc. grow people and companies are offered alternative online forms of communication. 

It is doubtful that social media will replace email as the lead form of communication any time soon because email has too many advantages for business related and personal purposes.  The downside to social communication is that it lacks privacy.  There are business related online social communication tools such as Yammer where companies can perform all internal communication.  Like email, this give the ability to track all communication.  The problem is that it is only internal.  Email has too many advantages to be replace by social communication, especially for business.

Where does this leave email marketing?  In the same way, businesses still prefer email as the best for of internal and external communication.  Email marketing is still one of the fastest growing forms of media and people are starting to use it more effectively with better templates and landing pages to increase conversions.  From a marketing perspective email is very powerful especially from a B2B marketing angle.

Social media marketing however, is growing like wildfire and has many different components.  Social media can leverage many different channels and platforms and has the advantage of complete creativity and scalability.  The one element that may begin to outpace both email and social media is mobile marketing.  Naturally, with the popularity of the iPhone and 3G/4G networks, Internet marketing can lebverage all aspects of mobile communication. 

We’ll see how all this develops!

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Small Budget SEO Strategies

Posted by Brent on April 20th, 2009

As the web grows, search engine optimization (SEO) strategies will get more competitive.  Its happening already.  As SEOs scramble to keep up with the latest and greatest with Google’s algorithms there are other looming issues to keep in mind.  The simple growth of the web and increasing competitive landscape make it more difficult to rank for competitive keywords.  The search engines are also delivering better results on the first page and fewer users feel compelled to look any further.  One query will get them great web page results, news results, local business results, video results, etc. all on the first page.  So what is a company to do?

More and more companies are seeking to get a better return from their smaller marketing budgets.  To accomplish this, they are turning to the most cost effective and measurable way to market…Internet marketing.  Natually one of the best long term investments in a company’s web growth is in organic search engine optimization (SEO).  But then the question remains, how long will it take to get to page one and will it be effective for you?

There are many key elements of course that go into estimating when “success” will be reached.  Noone can really predict how long it will take to achieve results but you can look at your online marketing competition to see what they have done right (i.e. how many pages does their site have, how many inbound links do they have, is their website user friendly and does it provide fresh valuable content, etc…).  The list goes on and on.  When companies make the decision that they do in fact need to make this investment and start down the SEO path, they will need to consider a few fundamental items that will shape their future:

  • How much budget is available to put towards SEO in the next 12 months
  • How competitive is the industry online (i.e. what is a realistic timeline and budget?)

The bottom line is that companies that decide to higher and SEO company will have to face these questions and make some decisions.  These days companies large and small have budget issues.  These decisions will be different for every company depending on how large that marketing budget is and how many other marketing channels are being pursued.  SEO takes time to show results so the tangible ROI may be 6 months out or more.  Therefore, most companies will be using organic SEO combined with Internet marketing strategies that will produce more immediate results.  This will leave only a certain amount of money to put towards SEO and companies that are new to SEO may be hesitant to put all their eggs in one basket.

Naturally, Internet marketing companies and SEO firms will make recommendations based on the competitive nature of their keywords.  Also, SEO can be a get what you pay for strategy.   It is not realistic for companies who only have $500 per month to spend on SEO to go after highly competitive terms but there are ways to get creative and work towards these goals anyway.  Before we break down the recommendations for small budget SEO campaigns lets identify the differences in keyword strategies.

Broad Keywords:  Broad terms are generally reffered to as the more generic (less specific) keywords and keyword phrases that drive more traffic.  An example term would be “shoes”.  This type of search is very high level and usually used by a person doing general reseach, surfing the web, etc.  But ranking for it will drive high volumes of traffic.

Long Tail Keywords:  Long tail terms are more specific keyword phrases that drive less traffic but can be more targeted and have better conversions.  An example long tail term would be “women’s Spring shoe sales” or “women’s running shoes Nike”.  These terms are very specific.  Often they will have a geographic focus as well for people looking for something specific in their area.

From a competitive aspect, broad terms are naturally more competitive and hence usually take more budget to put together and effective SEO campaign.  They also take longer to achieve first page results.  Long tail terms might be a bit easier to get and have decent conversions, but will that alone be enough?  Generally, the recommendation is to develop a keyword list that combines both broad and long tail terms.  This gives the company a chance to capture the lower hanging fruit first while tackling the tougher times over time. 

So what should you do if you have a very small budget but your terms are highly competitive?  Here are some creative recommendations:

  • Develop a long tail keyword list and go after the less competitive terms
  • Make sure your website has basic SEO coding and a sound strucutre from which to build this effort
  • Get involved:  set up a blog on your site and start writing content relevant to your users, your indsutry, and your keywords (link keywords to pages relevant to those terms)
  • Write on other relevant blogs and send links back to your website
  • Try social media as a support element to the SEO effort
  • Don’t expect results over night, or in three months for that matter

All companies need to get creative on how they spend money and achieve success.  A great online marketing strategy does not have to mean huge budgets.  But be careful about the “doing it in-house” route unless you have a qualified team experienced in all aspects of the campaign.

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