The National Association of Realtors released their latest real estate marketing findings at the end of March. The recent surveys showed that the marketing shift continues towards Internet marketing and away from traditional newspaper marketing.

Using real estate websites to view listings of homes for sale increased 10% from the last NAR survey. Now only 10% of home buyers don’t use the Internet to do their home search. Newspaper advertising and magazine ads only attract 12% of the surveyed new home searchers.

What is interesting is that $5 billion was spent chasing 12% of the market and $3 billion was spent chasing 90% of the market. Hmmmmm. What is strange about that picture? One wonders if the newspaper advertising is done to please the seller that all marketing efforts are being made and the real estate website advertising is done to really find the active buyers. 17% of Realtors apparently had the same thought, according to a Classified  Intelligence survey, and don’t spend on newspaper advertising.

From an Inman survey 18% of the Realtors surveyed plan to invest over $10,000 over the year in real estate Internet marketing. On the other end of the spectrum, 20% plan to spend less than $1000. What would be interesting is if we could correlate these figures to the agents’ success ratio, full-time versus part-time real estate agent, and the volume of leads they get from agent websites. In short, which camp more describes the real estate agents and brokers that are deriving copious leads from their realty and agent websites?

As the advertising venue shifts from print to Internet, real estate websites, if they aren’t already, will become the prime avenue for home buying market leads. A foreseen benefit to web savvy real estate agents is that this continued marketing shift will lead to the creation of new technologies and gadgets to help Internet marketers.

Here is your nine step real estate blog checklist that has helped successful real estate agents maximize their blogging efforts. Print and use at least three times a week.

1. Title - Use keywords and attention grabber text.
2. First Sentence - Mirror the keywords in the title and jump right into the subject.
3. Length - Not iron clad, but 200 - 400 words. Let the entry’s subject matter dictate length. Some longer entries can be more effective is divided into several entries.
4. Keywords - each paragraph should have one of your specific target keywords or key phrases.
5. Visual relief. Keep paragraphs to two to four lines. Long paragraphs tend to create a mental block to reading. Think “visual bites”.
6. Re-read and edit. Check that verb tenses match and any run-on sentences get condensed.
7. Spell and Grammar Check. Use Word’s spell check. The grammar checker - not so much, since writing how you talk is more acceptable in blogs.
8. File name - try to use the keywords in the title in the file name as much as possible. Separate words with and underscore: like_this.
9. Graphics - Add a real estate image, if at all possible, that ties into the entry.

A benefit of custom real estate websites is that their navigation has been optimized for both the website visitor and the search engines. Custom real estate website designers constantly monitor the two facets of a website: is it attracting and retaining leads and it the search engine seeing the site as a visitor does. This is not as easy as it may seem.

Real estate website visitors see the navigation buttons and content that is presented by the browser. Since search engines are computer programs trying to assess that visual information from the coding done by the real estate website designer, it uses various algorithms to try and mimic what the eye sees. The website’s internal navigation is one of the critical features the search engine uses. A website visitor uses the navigation buttons and internal links to find where all your real estate news, homes for sale listings and blog entries are located. The search engine uses the links to create its own site map, but it also takes note of the quantity of internal links, their positioning on the page and how they are reflected in the headings and content to determine which are the most popular pages on your website.

A real estate agent may feel their index page is the most important page, but the search engines may find that the majority of web traffic, keyword usage and internal links point to the Feature Listing, guestbook page or About Us page.

Unseen on the web page is the code the real estate website developer uses to create the look, feel and interactivity features of the webpage. The most advanced website developers have changed the architecture of websites by moving the code that gives directions onto separate pages. The real estate webpage looks the same to visitors searching for a new home, but the slimmed down page makes it easier for the search engine to find and index the pages content - thus leading to better ranking.

This follows the maxim of “Follow the best industry standards in architecture and the website visitor’s taste in content and you will organically rank well in the search engines.” As a real estate agent, keeping up with the search engine changes and the continual evolution of HTML and CSS is not in the job description. Strange as it may seem, website developers thrive on learning new techniques for keeping your real estate website up in the rankings. Talking to people for extended periods of time? Selling houses? Sorry, not in a developer’s job description, which is good for the real estate industry.

Two quick IMC tips for maximizing your real estate blogging and neighborhood news efforts. Follow these tips and you will please both your real estate website visitors and the search engines.

1. Provide 2 to 3 internal links in your blog entries and real estate news articles. An internal link is one that connects back to a page on your real estate website. Typical pages to link to are the Contact Us, guestbook, bio page and homepage. These links tell the search engines that the pages you link to are popular and the website visitor has a better ability to contact and get to know you.

Remember to hyperlink phrases that relate to the page you are linking to, not just a “Click here” place in a sentence. For instance, to link to the home page or a guestbook page, use the “your city real estate” words in a sentence as the anchor point. This tells the search engine what you are linking to. This is versus a link to “homepage” which is too generic to convey any information to the search engine as to why your website visitor is following the link.

2. Use pictures in your entries. Yes, you can upload graphic images, usually JPEGs, with your blog entries and real estate articles. Check with your real estate website developer as to the best size. You will probably need to edit the graphic in Photoshop or a freeware like GIMP to size the graphic, but once you know how it is a fairly simple process. Having a dozen or so graphics that you can readily upload to your real estate website adds both “eye candy” for your website visitor. Added benefit: the image is given a title, which is another area to prominently place keywords or phrases.

In the evolving world of real estate Internet marketing, a new and successful real estate website strategy has evolved called “hyper local” marketing. This strategy has been driven by three elements: Google (the usual given), home buyers search techniques and real estate agents’ ability to build great website content base with neighborhood news tools and blogs.

Google decided to steer search terms “yourcity real estate” to larger real estate firms and directory style websites. Theoretically these websites are authoritative lists that give home buyers and sellers more options from which to choose. The algorithm will most likely get tweaked some more as time goes on. When Weather Underground shows up on the first page for real estate keywords, one has to wonder… What this means is that the Google front page competition shifts to the neighborhood, suburb and smaller real estate market areas’ keywords.

Home buyers’ search techniques are migrating to niche markets since A) the Internet can zoom in to any level of search granularity and B) using the broad search term “yourcity real estate” tends to turn up out of state, national websites. To find local Realtors and Realtors with specific areas of expertise, real estate searchers are using keywords that are becoming more market specific, such as “residential single family detached yoursuburb”.

With real estate agents able to research and add niche market specific blog entries to their websites, website visitors are able to find agents by their niche markets. Neighborhood news tools allow agents to post large articles that can encompass an areas history, scenic and cultural attractions, school data and general neighborhood descriptions.

The traffic that hyper marketing attracts is smaller in volume, but higher in quality. The real estate Internet marketplace is ripe for real estate agents to add their neighborhood or niche market content to their websites.

The nature of real estate marketing today is akin to the ocean before the storm clouds appear. To the tourist the water looks great, to the old salt, the wave patterns portend a big storm over the horizon. Much of real estate marketing has not changed, the post cards, the continual meeting people live and developing and expanding the referral network, and the newspaper and magazine advertising.

But as real estate agent Burke Smith said back in 2007, “Technology won’t replace agents; agents with technology will replace agents.” What is masking this real estate marketing sea change is real estate agents’ natural propensity to not fix something that does not appear to be broken. The most successful real estate agents of today are the ones with the least impetus to embrace real estate Internet marketing or to treat is as an auxiliary marketing tool.

The nature of a market’s change is that the new idea starts small and, even at 100% growth, does not significantly change the market’s dynamics. Then when the 10% market share doubles to 20% the major players in the market take notice, but they are too late to adapt. Detroit ignored the Japanese imports and the customers’ desire for small, trouble-free cars driving that market. Similarly real estate websites were once thought of as the small world of technology freaks selling to computer geeks. But consumer’s buying habits have changed tremendously from 1998 to 2008. The luxury of shopping from home at all hours of the day caused many computer-averse shoppers to master their computer’s Internet browser.

The National Association of Realtors figure on the percentage of buyers who search for houses online is almost 80%. Clouding the picture perhaps is the inability to draw a line from the Internet listings searches to the final sales. The agents with the technology, with their one, two, three or more real estate websites, are not waiting for the dust to clear. They have detected the number of real estate website leads that turn into sales increase dramatically year over year and know which way the home selling market is heading. Real estate brokerages that are hiring agents to handle their overflow of leads from their real estate websites are also aware of the marketing shift.

The Internet has turned shopping for homes for sale into a virtual journey. MLS listings are evolving online from static images to walk through slide shows or videos. Google Earth has made checking the neighborhood something anyone can do from satellite photos. While the shoppers are on virtual house shopping trips, it pays to have a virtual real estate storefront.

While the home buying market gets hammered with “national” real estate news, mortgage brokers and real estate agents are struck with the thought “It is not that bad here!” Then they notice the national news’ self-fulfilling prophecy affecting the local real estate markets. Solution: Become your own real estate news source.

Real estate blogs are the fastest way to reach your markets. Just as the national news feels compelled to beat their statistically misleading drums, real estate agents need to beat their own drum for the opportunities and real estate news in their local markets. Simple compare and contrast stories between the strength of local housing versus the deep price hits in markets like San Diego become wake-up calls to local investors and buyers.

Put on your “customer viewpoint” marketing hat and write blog entries that address the fears that new home buyers face. National news stories of new home owners suddenly getting faced with mortgages that are higher than their home’s current value puts a damper on buying. A blog entry that such a home buying scenario is highly unlikely in your market is necessary to counter the misleading national stories. Using your real estate blog as the “bully pulpit” can be just the beginning.

Once you have a series of articles on your website, contact your local newspaper and get them to work on an article and encourage them to quote your blog entries.

Real estate agents can also leverage their blogs by sending email newsletters with a short summary of the local real estate market and providing a link to the blog for more information. This step can achieve two items: educate your market and spur traffic to your real estate website. Of course, if they forward your email, so much the better.

As with marketing real estate on the Internet, providing news through your real estate blog rides the current wave of the public’s behavior. Just as more people are searching online for property, more people seek their news online. Interestingly more people believe a news blog more than the main stream media. Use the Force of the Blog!

Real estate websites exist to attract website visitors and convert them to warm home buying or selling leads. Real estate agents weighing the options in real estate website designs first need to decide whether to go with a custom website or a template website. This is an important decision since it affects your website’s ranking, brand reinforcement, visitor retention and ease of use.

Last time this topic was visited we looked at the dynamically populated templates. This time we’ll consider real estate website templates that are not dynamically populated. While a notch better for allowing search engine indexing, there are still pitfalls to using templates and expecting a miracle. Some common pitfalls agents make when using templates are:

The same meta tag descriptions and keywords are applied across almost every web page on the site. Or in the other direction, the metatags are only applied to the index or homepage. Meta tags are to help the search engines index the pages correctly. Website visitors never see these tags. Not using them correctly defeats their purpose. Real estate website developers of custom sites know the positive effect keywords have and painstakingly choose the keywords, craft the descriptions and match the meta tags to the page.

Search engine optimization is always a custom editorial work. Templates can allow for a certain amount of optimization, but the optimization that goes into a custom real estate website design is based on a designer’s ongoing education to stay current on the best optimization techniques.

Finally, adding content. Many templates come with pages of content that is the same that is sold to other sites with the caveat to edit it and make it your own. From the look of the Internet, that caveat is more often than not ignored. The problem with repetition of content is that search engines index pages on the site, compare them to other pages and penalize a website for having redundant content. The larger problem with not making the content your own is that your website is boring to your visitor. Personalizing the site, reinforcing your brand or image, makes your site a tremendous marketing asset.

Custom sites have a hybridized content structure, containing both ready-made and unique material. The difference is that custom websites depend largely on the real estate agent to provide the content that sells the sizzle. Though it creates some homework for the real estate agent (or an opportunity to invest in professional copywriting), the investment in good content always pays off both in attracting visitors and giving the search engines material to index.

Usually, the bottom line between template and custom design boils down to a quick website creation with long term regret due to paltry returns versus longer creation cycle with long term increasing return on investment.

As part of your grand real estate marketing campaign, you write an informative entry on your real estate blog detailing the changes in your local market of homes for sale…but no readers contact you. One small step can make your time blogging time well spent. In fact, there may be several areas in your marketing where one small step will increase your leads and your Internet exposure.

After you have written your blog entry (and checked the grammar and spelling) you upload it to your site. In your blog editor, look for an icon that looks like chain links. This is for adding hyperlinks - a coded link to another page on the Internet. By highlighting words in your article, such as your city’s name, your real estate agency’s name or the words “please contact me”, and clicking on the hyperlink icon you can link these words to your real estate website’s Contact Us page. In marketing, this is anticipating needs and shortening the steps. If your article triggers a website visitor’s interest, make the path to turning them into a lead easy - provide a link to your contact information. Use this technique when you add articles to your neighborhood news tool also.

Similarly, never send out an email without including your real estate website’s address in the signature. There are several reasons:

1. Reinforce your brand (as reflected in your domain name), and
2. Use every avenue to drive traffic to your website (how many of your emails get forwarded? OK, so sending really good jokes is now marketing!).

One of the ways Google measures your real estate website is by the traffic it generates. So while search engines lead traffic to your site, conversely, when the search engines detect your website getting a lot of traffic (directed from business cards, print ads, etc.) it benefits your real estate website’s search engine ranking.

Another underused area is answering machine messages. Include an invitation on your business answering machine to visit your website to search your listings, blog entries, and buyer and seller guides.

These are just a few ideas to examine the real estate marketing steps you are already taking and tweaking them to make the most of the opportunities.