Online real estate marketing made simple

Brian first published this blog on October 1, 2007. Every word of it rings true today some 14 months later. 

A while back I gave a speech at a real estate franchise convention on the topic of online marketing. 200 weary brokers filled the room. They expected to hear about new technologies and cutting edge tactics.

I let them down. I decided, instead, to tell them this:

The first thing to do when thinking about online marketing is to forget about technology completely. A carnival of blinking tools and barking vendors has clouded your thinking. I want you to go back 15 years to a time when your marketing was guided by an understanding of business fundamentals.

Now -- in 1992 -- where do you start in thinking about how to market your business?

Right here: Understand your customer.

Then what? Meet their wants and needs.

It is then reasonable to say that your marketing effort should be about telling and showing prospective customers you have what they want.

Let's fast forward back to today and apply this formula to your business and the Internet.

What are your customers' wants and needs? There are some things unique to your market, but a decade of research from NAR, CAR and others has pretty well established what consumers want and need most when they go online for real estate:

#1 Listings
#2 Home value information
#3 Community information

Now, let's meet their wants and needs.

First off, put a full IDX feed directly on your home page, front and center. No "featured homes", just quick access to a full feed of listings for your market and prominent promotion of the "homes by email" feature that comes with your IDX system.

Next, dedicate a full section of the site to detailed, up-to-the-minute information on home values in your market: Recent sales, list to sales price ratios, days on market and your own analysis of what it all means. Put this on a blog, email it in a newsletter and make it easily printable. Get it out there!

Lastly, leverage the local knowledge within your company by placing detailed neighborhood information on the site. Focus on the small stuff no one else covers. This may be done via a blog or blogs, or, if you don't have skilled writers in your company, at least hire a local freelancer to craft some core neighborhood guides.

You can forget about everything else about until you master these things.

How, then, do you tell and show prospective customers you have what they want?

First, eliminate almost everything that does not make a connection between what you know your prospective customers want and what you now have to offer them. Employ the electronic marketing platform you've been using to send e-cards and cookie recipes to distribute all that neighborhood and market knowledge you know have on your site. Switch out all those newspaper and bus bench ads touting your brand to simple calls to action along the lines of "Search every home for sale in _________ at www.___________.com" or "Sign up for weekly home sales prices in your neighborhood at www.__________.com".

If you look at online marketing through this lens, things will become much clearer. You'll also have a framework for judging what online applications are important for your business and which are not. You'll find a new focus that will move you beyond the clamor of the carnival.

--- Brian Boero

A couple of things, a few ideas and well wishes

As 2008 winds down, the news continues to distill fear, confusion, and sepulchral predictions for 2009. 

No doubt, there will be challenges in the coming year. But so what? When aren't there challenges? Since I've been working inside this industry (1998), I've seen it face off with plenty. For the most part, minus a few scars, a few bumps, grinds and stammers, it has remained intact.

Recap

The 1990's. The birth of online real estate moved the industry through the three stages of Schopenhauer's truth. First it ridiculed the Web. Mocked it as folly. Then it violently opposed it, buckling at times over fear of disintermediation. But then, self-evidence took hold. Acceptance.

In 1999, only 20% of real estate agents had websites. By early 2001 that number quadrupled.

The 21st century. First half of this decade. The stock market dove. Dot-coms tanked. This presented the industry with a golden opportunity -- and plenty of challenges -- as a real estate gold rush brought hundreds of thousands of new Realtor miners to its banks armed with pans, picks, cradles, hydraulic hoses and a lust for commission riches. Once again, real estate endured. The best invested in their businesses amid the craziness. Enhanced their brands. Made every effort to secure market share before the river would, inevitably, run dry.  

The 21st century. The latter half of this decade. Today. A weak economy. A confused consumer. The pending death of traditional marketing. Bloated brokerages engorged with needless operating expenses burdened by agent overpopulation and ridiculous splits. And no clue how to end them. Yikes!

Challenges galore.

The most nimble among you shift. Adapt. Discover, as this 39-year veteran has, that new opportunities are not hidden in some dimly-lit corner. They abound. Evidently clear. And ripe for the picking.

Real estate's greatest folly is the truth Schopenhauer spoke of. And the time it wastes dabbling in doubt and opposition to new ideas and processes. Some, such as David Schubb, the veteran agent above, proved how adapting early is the key to success during down times. He is busier and more successful than ever. Brokers like Benn and Lani Rosales proved that embracing Web 2.0 early could help build a new age brokerage and launch a successful new media enterprise. 

Older firms like Windermere uprooted themselves from the depths of tradition, bonsaied their online presence, and forged a nimble approach to tomorrow.

New companies like Sawbuck proved the viability of the virtual brokerage.

Some tips

I decided not to make a top 10 list of ideas or predictions because there are so many other writers who have beat me to the punch. Maybe I'll just publish a top 10 list of the best top 10 lists in real estate.

I also have no interest in making predictions this time around. I'd rather offer a few simple things I think will get help you find your way through next year. 

1. Sharpen your efforts to communicate your value. Dispense with the old cliches and try speaking with a real voice that tells truths. Discard slogans like "I deliver dreams" unless you can actually enter your clients' sleep and choreograph them each and every night. Seth Godin published this gem not too long ago. It's one of those posts that should be printed and taped to your computer. Question every bit of copy you write. "Now is the right time to buy" may be a truth but if you don't back it up with compelling reasons, it will fall on deaf ears. Back up what you say with a showcase of your knowledge. Denny does that one way here. Noah does it a completely different way here. Both work. How are you doing it?
2. Get critical on your website's ass. Ask yourself one question: "Does my website address the needs, the fears, the concerns of my users and correspond directly to what is happening in the marketplace?" We've seen too many sites with happy go lucky images that feel, look, and read in a way completely disconnected from the world outside. Why appear oblivious, insensitive and out of touch if you don't have too? Real estate is our economic ground zero. Do not be afraid to confront it. You can do truth without being negative. I continue to love how PMZ posts real market trends on their home page. Creating content and copy that resonates with the times, tells the truth and builds trust is the best move you can make in '09.
3. Perform a full vendor audit. Big brokers: You could be overspending hundreds of thousands of dollars needlessly with legacy vendors providing expensive and dated applications, content, data, advertising and services that can and should be negotiated down and/or replaced with newer, and better, options. Long-time vendor partners who have failed to lift the hood on their product, overhaul it and provide you a better price with better service are basically telling you they don't care much about their own business. How much could they care about yours? There are some great vendors out there. And APIs that can replace expensive components on your site. And tactics you can easily employ that can save you tens of thousands on needless SEO expenses and drive traffic and, dare I say - leads - to your firm. How deeply have you investigated these opportunities? 
4. Increase your use of social media. And more effectively manage your current efforts here. The agent posing with the dog of yesteryear who Twitters about their dog today is simply broadcasting the same shallow, meaningless message. There are some fabulous ways to use new media but this requires a re-education about how to broadcast your value and your brand. I continue to recommend what Tracey has done with video. Others outside the industry, such as Dan Hesse, CEO of Sprint, have used new media well. Be different. Get more creative. Talk with people rather than at them. Amid all the blogging and Twittering, how about offering one solid, comprehensive benefit to working with your firm that anchors your reason for being. Promoting your brand is one thing. Building it, expanding on its value, is quite another. Post less. Make every word you write worthy of quotation.

That's that for that.

As for 1000watt...

2009 is year two for our firm. In 2008 we worked with some smart folks who won Innovator Awards, released ground breaking products and altered real estate in positive ways. Some were start ups. Some were large, established media companies. Some were brokerage companies, MLSs or associations.

All of them have one thing in common: They are not standing still.

The reason I bring this up is too offer you an alternative to the depressing news and tunnel vision it can cause. These firms and others are aware of the times, but are surging forward nevertheless, committed to not shutting their lights, not closing their doors, not cowering in the corner and not giving up.

Our association with them fuels our optimism.

Recently, Brian and I participated in a "fireside chat" hosted by one of our clients. They regularly invite their agents and agents at competing firms to talk about things meaningful and inspirational. One participant questioned the notion of transparency and believed in guarding her knowledge so it would not be stolen by others in the business.

1000watt believes otherwise. Presenting your knowledge, wearing it out in the open is the way of the future. Today's consumer rely on it. The next generation of customers will demand it. We have been deeply committed to this ourselves. Give and you get. That works for us.

Currently, we are working on a new 1000watt site. We're sticking with a simple, clean look, more white space and a few more features. We are planning to redo our newsletter and putting the final touches on a few new content offerings we hope you will like.

We're getting lots of invitations to speak at association events and know that many of our readers have been recommending us. Thank you for that. Maybe I'm old fashioned but spending an extra hour after a speech answering questions as I did at Triple Play two weeks ago in Atlantic City, or enjoying a meal with attendees as I did at a conference in Bermuda a few months back offers me privileges Twitter and Facebook will never grant me. I am grateful for that.

On behalf of Brian and I, have a peaceful, special holiday time. We are both shutting down as of tomorrow and getting back to the things most precious in our lives: Our families and our well being.  

After New Years, we are off to Connect in NYC where 1000+ people from all walks of this industry gather in one place to learn, to give, to meet, and to partner with one another.

Finally, we have triggered a few vintage posts to auto publish while we're gone. They are some of our faves from the early days, when we had few readers.

We look forward to coming back refreshed, rekindled and ready to help you kick ass.

Marc Davison
Twitter: 1000wattmarc

How to write good copy and win customers

Dale Carnegie shared a secret to writing great copy in his book How to Win Friends and Influence People that goes as follows:  How to _____ and _____. All one needs to do to launch a powerful ad is fill in the blanks.

Applying this method to the Site X advertisement I wrote about here last week looks like this:

HOW TO INCREASE YOUR REVENUE AND BUILD BETTER RELATIONSHIPS WITH YOUR CUSTOMERS

How many of you would respond to such a headline?

Site X could then have distilled their offering down to one simple statement as follows:

Site X provides tax roll data, integrated maps, and local neighborhood information that can be easily integrated into your website.

And then followed that up with simple bullet points that drive home the benefits:

• Help clients make smarter property decisions.
  

• Add value to your service proposition.

• Differentiate yourself from your competition

Writing a great copy is not exclusively, or even predominantly, about talent (though it certainly helps). It's mostly about following a set of basic accepted guidelines. Below I've listed those to which I adhere.

Simplicity is good. Create clear, concise copy that is easy to read and understand. The quicker you propel your customer to the decision point the better.

Edit. Boil statements down to 1 and 2 syllable words. Stick to shorter sentences. Short paragraphs.

Define your message immediately. Start before you write. Nail the most important aspect of the message. Then lose anything that detracts or distracts from it.

Identify your audience. And identify their needs. Make sure your copy connects with those needs. Make sure your audience isn't everybody. Maybe everyone can use your product or service but you will be more successful if you can isolate exactly who you are writing for. Know them. Target them.

Be believable. Stay away from grand statements. Write like you speak. Imagine you are talking one-on -one with the reader.

Speak to the reader's needs, not yours. Prospects don't care about you, your product or your company, but they may care about how they could benefit by using what you have.

Reach inside their heart as well as their head. People respond to emotion. Great copy will dramatize a feeling the user will reap from using your product or service. Buzz words, hyperbole and jargon can't do that.

Compel. Make them an offer -- a strong call to action -- they can't refuse. Make the offer strong. Clear. Make sure it has real value. The most you can afford to give away.

Get a second (and third and fourth) read. This seems really obvious, but all I can point to are the hundreds of miles of real estate convention aisles we have all walked gazing at vendor booths and not knowing what in the world they are selling.

Look at your ads. Look at your websites. I know you are proud of them but pride doesn't bring in the Benjamins. Today, especially in the Web 2.0 world of transparency, offering a clear, definitive message that reflects the needs of your reader is more important than ever.   

- Davison

Ad copy that attempts to say everything - sometimes says nothing

It's ads like this one for Site X Data that may explain why real estate people are often so confused by vendors.

Maybe I'm dense. Maybe this copy works for Fidelity. So this is only my opinion but as an advertiser and as someone who came to this page looking to learn about the product, I came away feeling as if the very basics of good copy writing were avoided. I was left misinformed and confused - a state I think many real estate people find themselves in when viewing vendor collateral. Let's analyze. 

What they're offering is the SAME POWERFUL DATA as they always have. What does that mean to a potential first time viewer? In my case, it rendered me helpless. Made me feel like I was late to their party and expected to catch up with the conversation on my own.

The copy informs me about the product's ENHANCED INTERFACE AND FUNCTIONALITY but never told me exactly how. If you're selling me a saw, I want to know how fast it can cut. If you're selling me enhancement, I want to see what it once was and what it now is. 

The copy sternly advises that INFORMATION IS POWER. AND YOUR BUSINESS NOT ONLY THRIVES ON IT. IT WILL STARVE WITHOUT IT. I agree. Hence the emptiness in my belly wondering what it is they are selling.

Further down, the copy informs me that the product has been completely updated and refreshed. I know. The headline made that crystal clear. If there's nothing new to say, white space always works.

I'm eager to learn more about this elusive "enhanced, powerful" data, but all I keep reading is jargon and ad speak. You know, the ponderous verbs that are the hallmark of forgettable copy: streamline, utilize, enhance, maximize, facilitate, empower, interface, tools, power, 24/7 - terms that say everything, yet says nothing.

Here, to quote verbatim:

You’ll find 24/7 online access to a full array of tools that will help you in your day-to-day tasks—ultimately increasing your revenue, enhancing efficiency, reducing risk and providing your customers with a better overall experience.

Seems to me that could describe every product sold to real estate over the past twelve years. 

The ad also attempts to connect every single entity in real estate with every single issue all these entities ever encountered by assuring the reader that the "enhanced and streamlined data reduces risk and increases revenue for just about everyone as well as providing fingertip access to leads that will serve to help build strong relationships with customers."

Can it cure ED too?

Why can't vendors distill their message down to simple, easy to understand language? If your can't pitch a product or service clearly using one simple sentence and drive the offer home with a second simple sentence, then perhaps the product has issues and the copy writer is doing their best to cover it up. In this case, I cannot honestly say because I can't figure out what the product is.

Regardless, in my opinion, this is a persistent problem that not only originates from vendor copy to potential real estate customers, but is ongoing for consumers who face agent and broker messaging where their entire consumer proposition is also hidden - wrapped like jiffy pop inside a self serving, elusive real estate centric message.

I subscribe to a different discipline. One that gets to the point. Tells it exactly as it is. Simple. At a glance. Easy to understanding. Honest. No hyperbole. No hidden anything. Transparent.

I believe that if your ad copy leaves the reader wondering what the product or service is, despite all those words used, the ad creates less leads, more unqualified leads and more work for the sales people. Seems to me that is not any advertisers ultimate intention.

Next, I will post the ten disciplines of copy writing we subscribe to at 1000Watt.

- Davison   

72 hours later... I am abandoned

The saga continues

Part 1
Part 2
Part 4

It's Thursday. 5:17

72 hours ago I became a lead. Today, I feel ignored. Unimportant. I feel that maybe I failed to clearly express my needs to the agent on whose website I was captured. Maybe I wrote something that rubbed her the wrong way. Maybe she's sick. Or lying in the hospital victim to a crime. Or illness. If that were the case, I would feel horrible for even thinking that maybe she doesn't care. Or worse, can't do her job.

I want to believe that real estate agents are good people who wake up every morning hell bent on doing right by their customer. I know they want to sell their listings. I know they want to get their buyers into new homes. I know they want to build their new client base. I know they want to build deep seeded loyalties with past clients. I know they want to make as much money as they possibly can and live wonderful lives.

Then why aren't they?
I think they have no idea how.
And I wonder... who's to blame?

I believe we are all responsible for our own actions.
I believe that our success or failure rests upon our own shoulders.
I believe that if you take your life in your own hands, you can't blame anyone for your failures.

Yet I cannot bring myself to blame this agent.

A few months back Brian and I were in a cab in NYC and saw a huge ad posted on the side of building. It was a call to action for would be agents. He blogged about it the following week and it's worth reading. It pertains to this.

Is real estate a career for just anyone?
Has it performed a disservice by importing people into it as easily as songs into iTunes?
What happens when an agent graduates and is awarded their license?
Are they ready?

Did they learn bedside manner? Marketing? Technology?
Have then been taught how to analyze cycles? How to analyze data? How to cope with bubbles or even what bubbles are?

Have they written a thesis or given projects to work on to help broaden their awareness or skill set?

Are they briefed on many online communities, forums and destinations that can help them grow, aspire and connect?

Do they know how to discern between the hundreds of vendors that will promise the earth and deliver them soil?

Are they taught how to properly price homes?
Are they taught how to negotiate through the home inspection?
Are they taught how to respond to an email inquiry?

I don't know how long it takes for an agent to master their craft but however long that is, today in 2008, given everything from huge commissions to complex market trends, is it fair that agents are allowed to woodshed these critical skills on the consumer?

I don't have all the answers. But I know this -- the system is corroded if what I've been experiencing this week happens more than once in a blue moon. And if it is... the industry must consider its responsibility. Its stake in changing it. I refuse to believe there is an epidemic of agents in that don't care about the consumer. And if that is the case, all the more reason to mend it.

But I actually believe most agents care.
I believe they love their job.
I am convinced they just don't know how to represent.

The industry as a whole owes something to the agents it recruits. It owes them a more comprehensive education at the onset. Better training and internship once hired. And stricter standards along the way.

The industry owes something to sellers like the owner of the home I inquired about and never heard back on. The industry owes something to buyers -- the ones who get sucked up into the vortex.

And the industry owes something to the professional agents who who kill for their clients but get lumped under the big tent of stereotype.

And the industry owes it to itself to live up to its self portrait.

...to be continued

- Davison

25 things to web 2.0 your company

Following the keynote on opening day at Connect 2008, Brad Inman chatted with Sherry Chris, Charley Young, Don Lawby, Kevin Boer and I on the subject of how to web 2.0 your company. We were to discuss the 25 things you need to do to web 2.0 yourself but never quite got there. Still, it was a good conversation.

I'm not a lead

The task at hand

Let's get to work in '08!

-- Davison and Boero

After the harvest, a time to give thanks

A turkey with stuffing.
Cranberry sauce.
A vegetable casserole.
Wine.
Old friends.
Family.

As social structures dissolve, as family members spread further and further away from each other, as our lives get more chaotic, we hunger for the simple traditions that act as an anchor point for our lives.

This past weekend, we all took time to savor a tradition that dates back to 1621 when Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast. This harvest meal has become a symbol of cooperation and interaction between two distinct cultures and people.

Well after dinner, stealing a few moments away from family and friends, I composed a simple text message and sent to close friends in business. It read, “You know, we really have a lot to be thankful for.”

Collectively, as an industry, we hardly celebrate the cooperation and interaction of the many distinct cultures and people within our rank and file. If we did, I believe we would find we have so much to be thankful for. Perhaps during this time of harvest and low yield, we could reflect on the past feasts and all the participants that made those harvests plentiful. Maybe in doing so, we can find and perhaps create a more positive outlook on the future. 

Let us give thanks for …

The past. One hundred years ago there were only 8,000 cars and 144 miles of paved roads.  Alabama was more populated than California. Fourteen percent of homes in the U.S had a bathtub. Seventy-five percent of urban Americans lived in rented apartments. Real estate was a lawless practice. There was no testing for agents, no MLS, no ethics training, nothing but anarchy. It has come a long way since then, and despite the assumption of many that real estate and Realtors don’t like change, leafing through its history one marvels at the amount of change and reform within the industry.   

The Internet. In the time it took to dial an agent on a rotary phone 20 years ago, today we can access listing and neighborhood information about any neighborhood and any home for sale in America. In the time it took for that agent to call back, we can now browse through dozens of sites, view videos of homes, save listings and target them on area maps. The Web has not replaced anything other than wasted time and has added a dimension to real estate that might be the single biggest contributor to the boom in housing that recently ended.

Low interest rates. Before taking credit for any sales, we must first give thanks for the  incredible loan interest rates that feed the dream of home ownership. While there has been a measure of irresponsibility in this regard, many Americans have realized the dream of home ownership many times over because money was, and remains, incredibly cheap.

Technology vendors. Despite all the bickering, slander and overzealous indictments of vendors, can anyone imagine where real estate would be without the thousands of vendors that keep the industry moving forward? From the earliest of IDX vendors to today’s blog providers, Web site hosts, language translators, social networks and electronic marketing tools, if it weren’t for the men and women who've taken their inspiration to the mat and put hundreds of millions of dollars on the table to advance this industry, odds are you probably wouldn’t be reading this article now.

The media. Say what you want about the media but, historically, publishers have been friends of real estate. TV, radio and newspapers have dedicated more airtime and ink to agent advertorial, home listing advertising and positive coverage than the industry would care to remember. Even “negative” coverage, now in hindsight seems more like a friendly warning rather than an evil blow. Today, the media is targeted as the scapegoat for real estate’s woes and undeservedly so. It’s sad to see this age-long ally to this industry cast aside, especially in light of some of the great things I see going on with media.

Inman News. Without the Real Estate Connect conference, without the exploration of new ideas and challenging of old ones that takes place on Inman.com, our industry would be far poorer. Carp all you want about phantom biases and imaginary agendas. It's the truth.

Zillow. Rich Barton and company are beacons for this industry. They showed real estate how to shake it up and reinvent itself for modern times. Some 3 million eyeballs come to Zillow each month and a vast amount of them proceed onward and out to other real estate destinations. View this company as a competitor or as anything you like, but appreciate it for opening our eyes to the possibilities and learn from what its founders have done.

Customers. Without them, there is nothing. From touchy buyers and unrealistic sellers to the tens of millions of random voyeurs who visit Web sites each month, they are the ones to whom we should offer the most thanks. Six percent of tens of trillions of dollars over the past decade has provided so many people with a way of life few people experience.

Each other. Few industries contain as diverse a collection of people as those who drink from this well we call real estate. Men, women, young, old, formally educated and street smart -- the multitude of experiences and array of talents is awe inspiring. I marvel at the things we can all learn from each other.   

Apple Pie

My wife bakes the best apple pie I’ve ever eaten. By Sunday night, it, along with all the turkey, had been devoured. Our Thanksgiving celebration ended. The fridge was bare.

Symbolically, we have harvested the fields of real estate and eaten from the yield of the past 10 years. And like the farmers of the past, we need to now get back to work and sow the seeds of our future, collectively and interactively. We’ll need to dig a bit deeper, think a bit wider and work a bit harder. We have tools and technologies like never before. We have an industry filled with amazing people and ideas. The possibilities and partnerships are endless.

- Davison

A map of Real Estate's Web 2.0 universe

We thought it would be useful to list and categorize all the Web 2.0 companies and applications in real estate. Something that would serve as a map or crib sheet for our clients and readers.

This is what we have so far.

Please note a few things about how we put this together:

• We only included companies focused exclusively on real estate (e.g., Trulia) or larger companies that actively play in the category (e.g., Google). Going beyond that is another project entirely.
• We included only companies focused on the U.S. housing market. There are plenty of great property sites in Europe, but, again, we wanted to present something that lists the most relevant companies, not the most.
• It is possible, even likely, that we left some companies out. Comment here or give us a shout if you have additions. This is going to be a dynamic page. Along these same lines, let us know if you think we've placed a company in the wrong category. There were lots of judgment calls here and these placements make sense to us. But we're not always right.
• Our "blog" category is the most subjective. We only wanted to include blogs that covered web 2.0 and online real estate regularly. And those that are, in our opinion, the best.

Enjoy!