RealTown's RealTalk

On Jan 22, 2008, at 6:52 PM, Rich Hudson wrote:
> Today, agents have the best of both worlds. Template sites have come
> a long way in design, content and the ability of users to make
> changes. Websites can be created to allow for what is referred to as
> Web-based editing.

Many people who contact me about Web site design are not aware that
Point2 sites truly do allow for "the best of both worlds" by making it
possible for a graphic designer to do full custom design right on top
of Point2's incredibly full-featured template system. I don't know of
any custom site vendors who offer a feature set comparable to Point2's.

Having worked from the ground up in developing a would-be competitor's
template site system ten years ago and having developed other types of
database-driven Web sites, I continue to be impressed by how much
design flexibility is built into the Point2 system. While designing on
top of Point2 sites is somewhat more difficult than designing a "pure"
custom site -- and consequently more expensive -- I feel that the
extra effort and expense may be outweighed by the benefits of Point2's
extensive features and services.

In particular, I recommend Point2 for its extensive syndicated
advertising program, which makes it easy for an agent to display his
or her listings on around two dozen other web sites with one click.
Syndication partners include high traffic CraigsList (where available)
and the highly ranked, high traffic Point2Homes.com site. Your
listings can also be displayed on hundreds of other local real estate
agent's sites through Point2's Handshake system. When moving client
sites from other vendors to Point2, I have seen client sites' traffic
increase as much as 20-30% instantly, thanks to syndication.

An overview of Point2's features:
http://nls.point2.com/Content/FeaturesServices/FeaturesServices.asp

Point2's syndicated advertising program:
tp://nls.point2.com/Content/FeaturesServices/SyndicationAdvertising.asp

Suzanne

Suzanne Hathcock Stephens
Point2 Design Partner
http://www.SuzStephens.com
Phone/fax: 360-666-0881

Win Singleton said:

"In a recent class I taught at the Northern Virginia Association of
REALTORS to agents less than 2 years in the business, the average
hourly rate they reported earning was between $50 to $75 per hour.
How long will it take you to flesh out a template site, including
adding in SEO techniques, etc.? Realistically 25 to 100 hours. Hmm.
25 hours X $50 per hour = $1,250. 100 hours X $50 per hour = $5,000."

Right on, Win. When it comes to link building, it can take dozens and
dozens of hours for the uninitiated make even marginal headway.

Full time agents already work long hours just doing their vital real
estate work. Adding the hassle and time of building and marketing a
website has to cut into their real estate tasks. In the long run, an
agent with even modest financial resources benefits enormously from
hiring good guidance for their web development.

Here's how to pay for it. Drop the worst performing marketing buys,
and apply that money to website development and marketing. Doing that
will have very little effect on an agents cash flow or overall
business, while their web professionals are working in the
background, positioning them for growth, going forward.

I know, it is hard to give up old traditional ways, but that is where
the money for this can come from, with little effect on the ongoing
business. Reduce some ad frequency, buy less ad space, stop using
methods that are marginal, put off buying tchotchkes for a year, etc.
Swap it out for a well-performing, good looking website that
generates leads and get professional guidance, to boot.

Best regards,

Dirk Johnson
Partner - Operations
DomainDrivers LLC
djohnson@domaindrivers.com
703-406-4698
http://domaindrivers.realtown.com
We're an approved RealTalk/RealTown vendor:
http://DomainDrivers.InternetCrusade.com

And just as an aside, it was recently rumored that the Google algo is
starting to favor the freshness of content (i.e. blogging) over
inbound links...!!!

Hasn't freshness of content always been important? It seems like every
time I make minor changes on my websites, they seem to do better with the
search engines and more people come to my sites. Since I changed
companies around Christmas, I had to make changes with every page on my web
sites. They are now doing much better than they did before and I've
gotten more leads.

Linda Grissette, JIM, GRI, LTG, ePRO Certified
Broker/Associate, River City Real Estate, St. Louis Area
Linda@Grissette.com http://www.FindStCharlesCountyRealEstate.com
Get the tools you need, http://www.RealEstateMarketingHelp.com

Search Engine Ranking Problems and its reflection on the Real Estate Industry and Society in General This is going to be long and winded but I feel that this is inherent to not only the subject I am writing about but is a reflection for the Entire Real Estate Industry. I think the issue I describe is one of the most important to us as realtors and answers some questions about most problems in our society. I will describe my problem first and identify the similarities with the Real Estate Industry in General and you can reflect on comparison of Society. Problem-Approximately 3 months ago I started working on the SEO of my website my goal being I want to open my own office and set up a limited number of agents up for success by driving prospects to them and SEO was one of the most important aspects this. I had a need to understand the process and have worked night and day and eating it for a snack on the side also. I experimented with software and things such as on-page and off-page optimization driving my rankings both up from things I did well and down from mistakes both unintentional and intentional which accelerated my learning curve. But the bottom line of Google the search engine that dominates the market is off-page optimization and that is linking. Reciprocal links is one aspect of this and most honest SEO companies agree that you should be able to drive up your page rank by having about 30 links which are higher than yours linking back to your website. (rem. - there are a few honest SEO practitioners) My site at the moment was a page rank one and I established more than 30 links with high page rank linking back to my site. Through Social Networking and posting Articles I established hundreds of links to my website and I did all this to coincide with the monthly review which is posted on my Google web-tools site. Well to my dismay that time came and Nota, Zip, Flat line, Toe tagged. I was still a page rank one. I was dismayed everything I had done and learned for three months was worthless. I wasn’t sleeping. But there were too many sources and too much information that I had consumed that said what I had done was correct. I pulled my hair for a few days and finally came across the answer. My website is a template created by a company called Point2 Networks. The reason I used them in the first place is they have a listing handshake that I think revolutionizes the Industry and allows us small guys to compete with the larger monsters that set Realtors up as revenue sources. I bragged to others that because of this and social networking that it was going to drive these Vampires monsters to the paid portion of SEO sometime in the next 5 or so years. Self delusion is great isn’t it? I found the problem in the last month Point2 created links page was full of page rank 0 websites linking with mine. Point2 was filtering off my page rank for their clients. (I wonder if some of these are free website members.) It finally dawned on me this is the Real Estate industry if I could establish this type of independence and drive clients to my company then I would no longer be a revenue source (Crack Whore) for them and the insiders in the industry that probably own the SEO companies preying on us. My recorded phone call to Point2 reflects this. I called them reported the problem and their response was I can unlink that page from my website. I pointed out to them that last month I could not edit this page and add links to it. At the time the page was blank stating it was under construction. There is report on my problems page reflecting this previous phone call. They told me that it was for future use but they had no plans for it in the present or near future so I ignored it. I pointed out the above and said the responsible thing for them to do would be to post high page rank websites on this list for a temporary basis to drive op my page rank for the next cycle. They shut the door by saying that my problem was perceived and it had nothing to do with them. They gave me one month credit on my account. That one month does not even add up to one hour of my time nor even touches the frustration and futility I feel in dealing with these companies This is the Real Estate Industry as long as you are providing them with a source of revenue they will ooze niceness. I believe in the Point2 handshake for listings and I think with some organizing on our parts that eventually we can drive these artificial entities that are not endowed with a soul by their creator whomever you believe or not into servants of We the People or in this case We the Realtors Thank You for your time. John Norton Associate Broker Realty Executives of DC http://www.johnnorton.us

Linda Wrote And just as an aside, it was recently rumored that the Google algo is starting to favor the freshness of content (i.e. blogging) over inbound links...!!! -------------------------------------------------------------------- Several other experts have spoken about content. go to https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/ Google still determines page rank by linking. or off page optimization. The amount of pages that can be indexed for your website is directly related to your page rank. Page rank 0 or 1 sites are only going to have 40 or so pages indexed by Google and those pages indexed before others will have the higher content. So you can have a thousand pages at page rank one but with no linking only about 40 pages will be indexed. MSN, Yahoo, Alta Vista etc.... Are more related to on page optimization this iincludes content, Keyword density, and placement. I can manipulate my rankings on these sites almost on a daily basis by manipulating these factors and adding content. I can not on Google which is based on Page Rank. Thank You John Norton Associate Broker Realty Executives of DC http://www.johnnorton.us

The real rumor is that google is adding social networking to its ranking. The proof of this is If you open webmaster tools and go to your indexed pages you will start to see icons next to your pages for social networking sites such as Stumble Upon if you added your pages to that site. I experimented with this and put one of my non indexed pages into Stumble Upon and it was indexed in 24 hours. Subtracting one of my other pages becuase I am limited by page rank.

On Jan 24, 2008, at 12:17 AM, Kelvie Cleverdon wrote:
> Susan,
> I just purchased a template site from alamode.com. It took me a
> while to get it started but so far I am pleased with my site. It
> has only been around for a day and I have some more links to add and
> some tweaking to do. But it was easy to add listings, virtual
> tours, photos and logos. There are over 300 templates to choose
> from. It has assorted themes and music available. I learned about
> it from a fellow Coldwell Banker agent.

Kelvie, it's good to hear that you've found a good fit with Alamode.
Their sites have some nice features. They've tried to recruit me to do
custom design for their clients, but I found there is so little that
can be customized that they aren't a suitable platform for the kind of
work I do. There are some companies customizing Alamode sites, but to
me their portfolio examples all still look like basic Alamode sites.
However, that doesn't mean that they aren't a good solution for agents
who don't need the level of custom design in which I specialize in.

Suzanne

Suzanne Hathcock Stephens
Point2 Design Partner
http://www.SuzStephens.com
Phone/fax: 360-666-0881