Marketing Your Real Estate Business Online

So you just completed all of the testing required to get your real estate license and now you are looking to find some new clients. It makes sense, you need clients to make any money, which means that you need a great way to market your business, and these days the Internet is the way to go.

I am not going to lie to you here and say that it will be an easy road, when in fact it will take a fair amount of work, time and dedication to start seeing any results from your new web presence. Many people setup a website and wait for the clients to come rolling in by the truckloads, only to later give up on all of their work when that doesn’t happen. First let me explain why your new promotions will take a while, and then I will show you how to beat the system.

Why Most Real Estate Professionals Fail Online:
Plain and simple, because many Real Estate professionals have absolutely no idea what is involved in promoting their business online. Sure, you probably know quite a bit about Real Estate, but the Internet is a whole other ballpark. Many of you think that simply setting up a quick website or blog(weblog) will bring in the clients, but consider this, how do you think those clients will find you online? Do you think that you will be the only person or company about Real Estate on the web? Absolutely not, in fact there are at present 550 million, yes million, Google search results for the term “Real Estate”, and those numbers are climbing at a steady rate.

The term “Real Estate” is one of the most difficult terms to drive any traffic to your site from the search engines, simply because the sheer number of competitors, and rest assure that there are millions of professional Internet marketers, spending millions of dollars to climb through the ranks and drive traffic to their websites for that particular search term. Needless to say, you don’t have a chance against them, they have spent years and years learning the secrets of the search engines, in order to rank higher in the search results for highly competitive search terms, just like “Real Estate”.

Now don’t get discouraged and run off, you do have a chance at building a presence online, you are just going to have to approach it in a different manner.

How to Effectively Market Your Real Estate Business Online:
Alright, on to the meat of the article here, where you can learn how to get those targeted clients to your website and build an effective presence online. First I am going to tell you three secret words - Blog, Blog and Blog! In the world of the web you have two options, a static website and a Dynamic website.



Lets break down the two:

1. A static website: Think back a few years and remember the “traditional” websites that were everywhere online. They are rarely updated, which means that they are not appealing to the search engines. They are often boring and lack the appeal of fresh new information, which is what the web is all about.


2. Dynamic websites: They even sound more interesting, just the word dynamic shouts powerful. A blog is a perfect example of a dynamic website, they update on a dime, you type an article in a simple interface and hit publish, now your website is loaded with fresh new content for Google to come by and eat up, they love it.

Hopefully by now we are on the same page and you realize that if you plan to increase your effectiveness on the web you need to be running a blog. If you are not sure what a blog is, you are reading one right now. Looks just like any old website, with the exception of how it works on the back end, which coincidently is much simpler for those of us that lack web design experience, I am guessing that is most of you.

There are several are several options available to you for setting up a company blog, personally I use WordPress, which is a free blogging platform, supported by most web hosting providers. Many of them also have a one click install for WordPress applications which means that you need no technical knowledge to setup your new site.

As I mentioned, there are several options, but for sake of argument, and the most professionalism, I am going to assume that you will be using WordPress for your business. One of my favorite features of WordPress is that there are a ton of free themes, or templates, to customize your blog with its own unique look and feel. Below is a quick list of Real Estate related templates to get you started:

Real Estate Related WordPress Themes:

• Listing Beautifier


• Real Estate Clean 1.0


• Real Estate Info 1.0


• Realtee


• SL-Real Estate


• Real Estate 1.0


• Real Estate Appraisal


• Moving Time


• Really Real Estate 1.0

That should be enough to get you started!

How to Get Started Using WordPress for Your Real Estate Blog:
WordPress is a self hosted application, which in short means that you are going to need a hosting provider for your new site. There are a lot of options here, the web is home to thousands of great web hosting companies, I use and recommend Media Temple, right now their service will run you a respectable twenty dollars a month. You can also find a list of hosting services that support WordPress on the official WordPress website, prices vary.

Next up is a domain name, a domain name is what gives you a place on the web. For example my domain here is Lake-Side-Realtors.com. Domains are a booming business so don’t be stunned to find the domain you want is not available, just keep looking. There are some tools to help you find a good one, my favorite is Nameboy. Simply type in a related word to your topic and hit enter, the free service will respond with a list of available domains that it generates, its that simple. When you are setting up your hosting service, you will have the option to register a new domain name through them, I recommend that route as it will be easier than buying a domain from another company and redirecting it to your new servers.

Once you have a web hosting provider and a domain name in place, its time to install WordPress. If you use any of the services I provided links to they will have a one click installation process to simplify the task of installing your new site. All you need to do is click install WordPress, fill in the requested information and you are ready to go. If you need more help with this process feel free to contact myself or your hosting provider’s tech support team.

Now you just need to install your new theme, to customize the look and feel of your new Wordpress blog. I gave you a list of Real Estate related themes above, feel free to use one of those or hunt down one you like on the Internet. While installing a WordPress theme is a pretty easy process, it takes a lot to explain it so I will just point you to this site for more information on installing a WordPress theme.

That’s it! Congratulations on setting up your new Real Estate blog, now you need to get it out there for people to find. You need Clients!

How to Build Traffic to Your New Real Estate Site:
Well, as I mentioned above this is going to be the hardest and most time consuming part of the whole process. There is a lot more to building a successful web presence than just typing away till your heart’s content, you have to target the site towards the types of clients you want. If you are a Washington based Realtor, people looking to buy a home in Michigan won’t do you much good.

There are several methods used to bring in targeted visitors to your site and the most important of those are your site’s keywords and local directories. Lets start by covering the easiest of the two, local directories.

Directories list sites by category, that way people searching for a specific topic can find sites relevant to what they are looking for. Some of these directories also use location to further breakdown the results. If I am looking for a Realtor in Washington for instance, I could use a directory to find exactly that. There are literally thousands and thousands of directories out there, so you will have to do a little work to find the right ones. Some of these directories will charge you for the inclusion of your site, while others offer free listings. Here is a Google search results page with some directories to get you started. I would suggest spending a good deal of time on this and begin including your site in as many directories as you can. Not only will the links make your site look better and thus rank you higher in the search engines, you can also bring in some genuine targeted visitors to your blog from these directories.

Now on to the keywords. Every time you search for something on Google, Yahoo or any other search engine, you are using keywords. Keywords are how a search engine is able to bring you the most relevant results. The trick for businesses online is to choose keywords that do not have to much competition and also target the right type of customers or clients in your case.

I am going to briefly cover some of the tips and tricks to targeting keywords since it is such a long topic. First let me say that Internet marketers spend a fortune on software that tracks niche keywords in which they can make a profit from, for what we are doing that is not really necessary. We are simply looking for a way to bring in a little more traffic to the site and of course sell some houses, for many Realtors a lot of their site traffic is brought in from people they meet in their day to day to business. You hand someone a card and they later visit your website for more information about you and homes you currently have available. With that said it is still important to spend a little time targeting specific keywords or key phrases.

Lets say that you are again a Washington based Realtor, rather than constantly writing information about Real Estate in general, You may want to focus more heavily in terms like Washington Real Estate or Puget Sound Real Estate. You will not only include those specific terms in the body of your articles but also in the titles of each article and maybe even the title of your blog itself. What this will do is tell the search engines, hey my blog is about Washington Real Estate, and as such they will place you in the listings when people search for those terms. For more detailed information on keywords I recommend you take a look at Introduction to Keyword Sniping.

To appear in the coveted top 10 search results in Google, you will need to build your blog up as an authority on the topic. This is primarily done with building links to your site across the web. Directories as mentioned above, is a great way to do this, the more sites that link to yours the better chance you have of climbing to the top of the search results. Mind you this does require a lot of work and time, but can be done. The biggest trick to getting traffic to your new site, link building it works great.

The Conclusion:
While I am not a marketing guru, the methods I have shared with you are the same methods I use to build my business every day. They really do work and I am living proof. I urge you to stay focused on the task at hand while building a new real estate business, especially with all of your online efforts, it can be tough out there, but with dedication you will have clients knocking down the door. I wish all of you the best of luck in everything you do.

Real Estate Investment Basic Strategies For Beginners

The real estate industry houses a pool of one-day millionaires or one-day flops, literally and figuratively. Do you think you have what it takes to gain success in this field? Like any business it only has one aim – to double or triple profit at once or through a series of events. The secret is to build real estate investment strategies according to your experience and selling capabilities.

There are several misconceptions that result in either bankruptcy or not being able to reach sales targets. Novice real estate investors need to consider these misconceptions as warnings before venturing into the complex world of real estate investment.

Common misconceptions/mistakes of investors:

1. Buy low and sell high.

Real estate is largely dependent on the market. So if you stick to the old basic strategy in real estate investment which is to buy low and sell high, you’re probably putting yourself in big trouble. Real estate investment requires more than just hovering around this simplicity.

For one, unlike other buy-and-sell products with almost fixed prices, real estate is largely dependent on the market. Depreciation and appreciation affect real estate properties all the time. There are basic strategies you can apply, though, to maintain the high value of your properties.

What you can do?

Increase-value strategy – this requires keenness to details, such as perceiving unrealized potentials in a property (i.e. a wide untrimmed lawn, or a fabulous but unpolished façade). After purchase, immediately make the necessary changes with the help of an expert to increase the property’s value. Generally, the value has to be increased by 20% in a period of six months for this strategy to work.

2. Speculating vs. Investing.

Both of these are worlds apart in meaning in the real estate realm. Senior investors can tell you that “no one” can tell which areas will appreciate or depreciate in value in the future. This misconception begins when an investor purchases a property thinking that it will appreciate eventually.

What you can do?

To avoid falling into the pit of speculation, learn to make deals rather than wait until the market is hot. Some investors stick to low-to-medium class homes built within solid neighborhoods because any improvement within the neighborhood increases the value of your property. This applies both to rented or leased properties as well as those for sale.

Be practical. The reason behind this is that when the economy improves, many low-income families will move to medium class homes. On the other hand, when the economy falls, medium-income families will move down to low class homes. Take note that unlike the Stocks that fluctuate in a matter of hours or days, real estate investment requires months or years of planning.

3. Extravagant homes are where money is.

While this might be true in a sense, not everyone can afford it. And, although multi-family homes in posh neighborhoods, condos or resorts, offer faster buck they also carry with them higher risk. Novice investors should not go into high-risk investments.

What you can do?

If you want long-term success, senior investors suggest keeping your real estate investment within budget, single-family homes in beautiful neighborhoods. Most of these are sold at discounted prices because they need some remodeling but should be good to go once redone. Basic homes sell faster providing you with consistent revenues and profits rather than shoot for the moon.

4. The more tenants, the better.

Fast turnover of tenants could mean faster influx of profits, but this is not always true. If you’re in the real estate rentals business, choose tenants like debtors choose creditors. Do a background checks such as checking credit history and business references, including other landlord references.

Real estate investment is one of the most serious types of business ventures, but with the right strategies and the proper outlook you should be well on your way to a successful real estate investment career.

How To Survive The Real Estate Investing Game

In theory, this business is easy. Just do some marketing, buy some houses, and make millions before you know it. Of course, we all know theory is a bunch of B.S. This business is tough and there is plenty of evidence to prove it. Few people achieve millionaire status or even survive the first 12 months. So how do you survive the first 12 months? Well, I am going to give you the “magic” pill (that’s not really magic at all).
The “magic” pill is to just keep plugging along with the end goal in mind. I remember when I first started in this business, I would attend all of the real estate investor meetings and ask all of the successful folks how they did it. What was their secret? Their secret was that they worked hard, never gave up and were consistently marketing. That is my secret too.

This business certainly does not take any genius or above average intelligence. It takes someone who can look themselves in the mirror and tell themselves that they will never quit, despite all obstacles.

A while back I was out to lunch with an investor friend of mine who was having some tough times with his business. I asked him what he was going to do and he told me “I am going to keep moving, I looked at the alternative. The alternative is spending the next 30 years in a cubicle, so right now things really aren’t that bad.”

I thought that was such a profound statement. Even if you want to quit this business (which we all do at times, especially in the beginning-I wanted to quit at least once a month) look at the alternative if you do quit. You will be doing the same job, getting the same results, and you will not be creating a strong financial future for yourself. Even if you don’t want to build a real estate empire, simply buying a few houses will make you a millionaire and give you a very comfortable retirement.

So when self-doubt creeps in (and it will) and the devil is on your shoulder trying to get you to quit, do the following:

• Read the classics “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill and “The Magic of Thinking Big” by David Schwartz.
• Look at the big picture and see yourself 10 years from now with all of your houses and a huge confident smile on your face.
• Call your mentor, your friend, or whomever and let them give you some words of encouragement.
• Remember “Quitters never win, and winners never quit”

If I could reach through my computer and shake some sense into you when you were trying to quit, I would. I hate to see people quit, especially when I know anyone can do this business. On the flip side, as I always tell my students, because most people will quit this business, there never really is any competition at the top.

So keep plugging along, read positive books and believe in yourself, because I do.

Residential Sector in Real Estate.

The legal arrangement for the right to occupy a dwelling is known as the housing tenure. Types of housing tenure include owner occupancy, Tenancy, housing cooperative, condominiums (individually parceled properties in a single building), public housing, and squatting. Variants include timeshares and cohousing.

Residences can be classified by if and how they are connected to neighboring residences and land. Different types of housing tenure can be used for the same physical type. For example, connected residents might be owned by a single entity and leased out, or owned separately with an agreement covering the relationship between units and common areas and concerns.

Major physical categories in North America and Europe include:

1. Attached / multi-unit dwellings

• Apartment ("flat" outside
  North America) - An individual unit in a multi-unit building. The boundaries of
  the apartment are generally defined by a perimeter of locked or lockable doors.
  Often seen in multi-story apartment
  buildings.
• Multi-family
  house - Often seen in multi-story detached buildings, where each floor is a
  separate apartment or unit.
• Terraced house (a.k.a.
  townhouse or rowhouse) - A number of single or multi-unit buildings in a
  continuous row with shared walls and no intervening space.
• Condominium - Building or
  complex, similar to apartments, owned by individuals. Common grounds are owned
  and shared jointly. There are townhouse or rowhouse style condominiums as
  well.

2. Semi-detached
dwellings

• Duplex - Two units
  with one shared wall.

3. Single-family
detached home

4. Portable dwellings

• Mobile homes - Potentially a
  full-time residence which can be (might not in practice be) movable on
  wheels.
• Houseboats - A floating
  home
• Tents - Usually
  very temporary, with roof and walls consisting only of fabric-like
  material.

The size of an apartment or house can be described in square feet or meters. In the United States this includes the area of "living space", excluding the garage and other non-living spaces. The "square meters" figure of a house in Europe reports the area of the walls enclosing the home, and thus includes any attached garage and non-living spaces.

It can also be described more roughly by the number of rooms. A studio apartment has a single bedroom with no living room (possibly a separate kitchen). A one-bedroom apartment has a living or dining room, separate from the bedroom. Two bedroom, three bedroom, and larger units are also common. (A bedroom is defined as a room with a closet for clothes storage.)

See List of house types for a complete listing of housing types and layouts, real estate trends for shifts in the market and house or home for more general information.

Business Sector in Real Estate

With the development of private property ownership, real estate has become a major area of business. Purchasing real estate requires a significant investment, and each parcel of land has unique characteristics, so the real estate industry has evolved into several distinct fields. Specialists are often called on to valuate real estate and facilitate transactions. Some kinds of real estate businesses include:

• Appraisal: Professional valuation services
• Brokerages: Assisting buyers and sellers in transactions
• Development: Improving land for use by adding or replacing buildings
• Property management: Managing a property for its owner(s)
• Real Estate Marketing: Managing the sales side of the property business
• Real Estate Investing: Managing the investment of real estate
• Relocation services: Relocating people or business to a different country
• Corporate Real Estate: Managing the real estate held by a corporation to support its core business—unlike managing the real estate held by an investor to generate income

Within each field, a business may specialize in a particular type of real estate, such as residential, commercial, or industrial property. In addition, almost all construction business effectively has a connection to real estate.

"Internet Real Estate" is a term coined by the internet investment community relating to ownership of domain names and the similarities between high quality internet domain names and real-world, prime real estate.

Real Estate Terminology and Practice outside the United States

Real estate as "real property" in the U.K.

In British usage, “real property”, often shortened to just “property”, generally refers to land and fixtures as such while the term “real estate” is used mostly in the context of probate law, and means all interests in land held by a deceased person at death excluding interests in money arising under a trust for sale of or charged on land.[4]

See Real property for a definition and Estate agent for a description of the practice in the UK.

French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish and German usages of the Term

In French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish and German, real estate is called "immovables" (French: immobilier, Italian: immobiliare, Spanish: inmueble Portuguese: imóvel, Romanian: imobiliare and German: Immobilie); other property is called "movables" (French: mobilier, Spanish: mueble, and German: Bewegliche Sachen).

Real estate in Mexico and Central America

The real estate business in Mexico and Central America is different from the way that it is conducted in the United States.

Some similarities include a variety of legal formalities (with professionals such as real estate agents generally employed to assist the buyer); taxes need to be paid (but typically less than those in U.S.); legal paperwork will ensure title; and a neutral party such as a title company will handle documentation and monies in order to smoothly make the exchange between the parties. Increasingly, U.S. title companies are doing work for U.S. buyers in Mexico and Central America.
Prices are often much cheaper than most areas of the U.S., but in many locations prices of houses and lots are as expensive as the U.S., one example being Mexico City. U.S. banks have begun to give home loans for properties in Mexico, but, so far, not for other Latin American countries.

One important difference from the United States is that each country has rules regarding where foreigners can buy. For example, in Mexico, foreigners cannot buy land or homes within 50km of the coast or 100km from a border, while, in Honduras, they may buy beach front property. There are also different special rules regarding certain types of property: ejidos—communally held farm property—cannot be sold to anyone, but that does not prevent them from being offered for sale.
Many websites advertising and selling Mexican and Central American real estate exist, but they may need to be researched.
In Costa Rica, real estate agents do not need a license to operate, but the transfer of property requires a lawyer.

Explaining Real Estate and It's Etymology

(Definitions from Wikipedia please follow link)

Real estate is a legal term (in some jurisdictions, notably in the USA, United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia) that encompasses land along with anything permanently affixed to the land, such as buildings, specifically property that is stationary, or fixed in location.[1] Real estate is often considered synonymous with real property (also sometimes called realty), in contrast with personal property (also sometimes called chattel or personalty). However, in some situations the term "real estate" refers to the land and fixtures together, as distinguished from "real property," referring to ownership rights of the land itself.

The terms real estate and real property are used primarily in common law, while civil law jurisdictions refer instead to immovable property.

Etymology:
In law, the word real means relating to a thing (res/rei, thing, from O.Fr. reel, from L.L. realis "actual," from Latin. res, "matter, thing"[2]), as distinguished from a person. Thus the law broadly distinguishes between "real" property (land and anything affixed to it) and "personal" property (everything else, e.g., clothing, furniture, money). The conceptual difference was between immovable property, which would transfer title along with the land, and movable property, which a person would retain title to. The oldest use of the term "Real Estate" that has been preserved in historical records was in 1666 .[2]
The use of "real" to refer to land also reflects the ancient preference for land, and the ownership thereof (and the owners thereof). This, in turn reflects the values of the medieval feudal system, which is the ultimate root of the common law.

It has been argued that the word Real is derived from "royal" (The word royal—and its Spanish cognate real—come from the related Latin word rex-regis, meaning king. For hundreds of years the Royal family / King owned the land, and the peasants paid rent or property taxes to be on the Royal's land. The word "Real" in Spanish is "Royal". Similar to El Camino Real, or Royal street. Today, just like hundreds of years in the past, we pay property taxes, or rent to be on the government's land or the Royal Estate). However, the "real" in "real property" is derived from the Latin for "thing"[3].