There are two concepts to gaining prospects: 1) Go and Get the Business and 2) Get the Business to come to you.

If you like #2 then Internet Marketing is where you will want to focus your business plan. Merely getting a website may not be enough. A website that is invisible will not help you to get noticed and capture leads.

A)Included in an effective website is IDX which is data exchange with your local MLS. You will need to find a capable data exchange provider. If you find a good one, they will work with you on how to best capture leads and integrate IDX to your site. You will want to make sure that the IDX Provider has successfully helped other members of your mls and are accurately updating the data to their sites. You will want to make sure that the IDX provider will be able to also lock down information for you so that you are the only agent link available and that all leads come to the email of your choice directly.

B)You will need an automated system to help you with leads that you do get. Provide an automatic response. Provide automatic email notification of new listings and offer something useful to the prospect so the genuine Buyer and Seller are motivated to sign up.

C)You will need an SEO strategy to help you with your on line presence. SEO stands for search engine optimization. You can hire professionals to handle this or you can do your own SEO. SEO can be a very expensive endeavor, but there are reasonable companies out there with good reputations if you are willing to spend the time on research. When you research Internet Marketing Providers, you will learn a lot of great tips and tricks as they dazzle you with their products and demonstrations too.

There are companies that will provide just one facet of the Internet Marketing and others that will design, host and service IDX and SEO for you. There are Internet Marketing Companies that specialize in Real Estate and companies that help businesses from many different industries. The great beauty of the Internet is that if you have lots of time and no money, all this can be learned and put together by you.

A, B and C are what used to be the cutting edge in Internet marketing and now there are other very important components arising on an almost daily basis.

Blogging is now a very effective way to get noticed on the Internet too. Twitter is also a new shorter type of blog that is taking flight. Social networking with Linkedin, Active Rain, facebook etc. is yet another effective way to market yourself and the price is right too.

If you think you do not have time to do these things on line, just ask yourself how much time do you spend visiting with friends and clients? If your goal is to be in category 2 then you must find a way to manage and organize your time so that you can meet your goals by spending time each day on your Internet Marketing. If you are completely intimidated by the computer your first goal might be to upgrade your computer skills. There are actually some free classes at Hewlett and Packard Website for begining comuter users. Again the price is right.