Real Estate’s Top Performers Do the Right Things More Often
July 17, 2008
Real Estate Marketing Innovator, Success Coach and Bestselling Author, Ray Wood reveals the 50 Top Success Ideas Used by Real Estate’s Best.
Queensland, Australia (PRWEB) July 17, 2008 — Ray Wood’s Bestselling book (How To Sell Your Home For More) has sold more than 50,000 copies but that is just part of his enterprise. Ray is CEO of Bestagents, a marketing company for real estate teams and individuals. His unique system uses innovative tools, like his book, to bring real estate professionals and property sellers together. He believes Relationship Marketing is the key to real estate success. He also believes that many in real estate could quickly improve and more than double their income simply by doing the right things more often.
In a recent interview with business writer Martin Williams, Ray shared his ideas about real estate’s top performers and how they are able to stay in the top 5 percent of the industry.
The following answer was in response to Martin’s question: “Is it possible for a newcomer in real estate to become quickly successful and can you give me an example?” Here is Ray’s answer:
“About six months ago, I started working with 2 real estate newcomers. I remember it clearly because they both had the same first and last name. And although they worked in real estate offices 1000 miles apart, it was the same brand. But that was where the similarities stopped.
I gave both rookies my getting started kit and asked them to study the 50 Free Success Ideas which are available as a download from my website.
I noticed almost instantly that one guy was eager to learn and had the discipline to stick to the right success actions that would let him hit the ground running. He asked all the right questions and when we set deadlines, goals and targets, he never missed a beat.
The second guy was enthusiastic but tried to ’second guess’ almost every task and function we set. His Direct Mail Letters missed critical components, his telephone follow up was non-productive because he completely ignored our guidelines and tried to ‘reinvented the wheel’ at every opportunity.
So what happened? Some six months later, David is number two in his office averaging 6 listings and four sales month in month out while trhe other David is doing less than half that.
I believe there are only really two major breakthroughs to revolutionise the real estate industry. One is the telephone, the other is the internet. These tools are tailor made for real estate and make it easier for us to communicate. The rest is simply doing the right actions to produce predictable and consistent results”.
To Download Ray’s 50 Free Success Ideas click on this link: http://www.raywood.net/2008/50_free_success_ideas.html
Realtors Returning to Relationship Marketing, Says Real Estate Newsletter Expert
July 9, 2008
As the housing market in the United States shifts, successful Realtors are focusing on traditionally effective marketing techniques to make sure they thrive, says a real estate newsletter marketing expert. He provides 5 important tips to help Realtors succeed in these changing times.
Toronto, ON (PRWEB) July 9, 2008 — As the housing market in the United States shifts, successful Realtors are focusing on traditionally effective marketing techniques to make sure they thrive, says a real estate newsletter marketing expert.
Simon Payn, of Ready to Go Newsletters, says he has noticed an increase in the number of Realtors subscribing to his real estate newsletters.
“Realtors who want to continue being successful understand the need to build a relationship with their clients, past clients and sphere of influence,” says Payn.
“Now that the market has slowed, the smartest real estate agents and brokers are investing in tools to build and maintain that relationship.
“They understand that people like to do business with people they know and trust, so it is becoming crucial in this competitive market to build trusting relationships with householders.”
While the number of subscribers to his real estate newsletter service continues to grow, Payn says he has seen several real estate agents leave the profession.
“There are two things happening,” says Payn. “Some are going back to their old careers and leaving real estate but others are digging in, investing in marketing tools, and working hard to make a successful real estate business in these challenging times.”
–Essentials of Relationship Marketing for Realtors–
Payn advises Realtors to do the following to build a strong relationship with their farm:
1) Develop a way of communicating regularly with people, using print newsletters, email newsletters, postcards or greetings cards. Write and design communication devices yourself, or choose an off-the-shelf product.
2) Make sure to provide valuable, interesting and entertaining information to prove your expertise and to be of genuine service to your clients and prospects. Beware of cookie-cutter newsletters that don’t allow you to customize the content. To build a genuine relationship with your farm you need to provide relevant, personal information to your readers.
3) Communicate on a regular basis — at least every month — in order to build and maintain that relationship. People have short memories, so it’s important to have a continual presence in clients’ lives to maintain a strong connection with them.
4) Be aware that building relationships with householders in your farm and with clients is a long-term project — keep communicating with them on a regular basis for months and years to get the best results.
5) Understand that marketing is an investment, not a cost. If, for example, you close just one transaction per year as a result of your newsletter program you will have paid for it many times over.
A strong relationship with your farm and clients is like an insurance against a slow housing market, according to Payn. Realtors who invest in these relationships will thrive during tough times.
Try this real estate newsletter for free.
Ready to Go Newsletters is offering a one-month “test drive” of its real estate newsletter service. More information can be found at http://www.readytogonewsletters.com
LuxuryProperty.com Breaks New Ground in Online Real Estate Marketing
July 6, 2008
It can be hard to find objective information about real estate amongst the welter of self-serving advertorial being dished up by real estate companies. One company has taken the innovative approach of employing a professional real estate blogger to provide a breath of fresh air to its corporate web site: The Luxury Property Blog.
(PRWEB) May 22, 2008 — Responding to the market trends of growing internet usage and a decline in the consumption of traditional media, Luxury Property.com have taken the unprecedented step of hiring an independent professional blogger to drive their new media marketing strategy, the Luxury Property Blog - Mark Knowles
Corporate blogs have historically been dull and self-promotional, perhaps because producing content has been left to traditional marketing departments. Effective blogs, which attract thousands of readers daily, require a completely different skill set from traditional marketing, but attract a demographic which is very difficult to reach through mainstream media.
This applies to the wealthy consumer also, and, according to the Luxury Institute, “wealthy-consumer participation in online social networks is on the rise. Whilst Unity Marketing, a luxury market research firm, states that the internet is playing an increasingly larger role in influencing luxury consumers.
Michael D Murphy, CEO of Luxury Property.com said, “Building, maintaining, and promoting a corporate blog is part of our strategy to usher in an era of advanced online marketing for the luxury real estate industry.”
According to homestomper.com, 77% of home buyers begin their research process online.
The term “Blog,” is short for “Web log,” a specialized site that allows an individual or group of individuals to share a running log of events and personal insights with online audiences. Bloggers tend to be highly-opinionated mavericks and the term “Executive Blogger,” almost seems like an oxymoron. When asked if the corporate environment would stifle Mark’s creative thought process, Mr. Murphy responded:
“Absolutely not. Mark is a professional and an expert, and he has to be able to call it like he sees it, or the blog loses all its value to the readers. We think he had a fair point when he criticized our failure to properly launch the Luxury Property main site within our projected time frame. Unfortunately that was outside our control due to a poor choice of contractor for the site’s construction. We have since moved these operations in-house and will be re-launching this summer.”
Mr. Knowles is a long-time blogger with experience both of blogging and real estate. He has written and operated several internationally recognized property blogs. His past experience also includes managing a successful photographic processing laboratory servicing real estate marketer’s needs.
His plans for the blog include creating a number of foreign language versions, including a Chinese version of the luxury property blog with guest bloggers from around the world contributing regularly. When interviewed about the becoming the world’s first executive blogger, Mark said:
“This job fits very well with my skill set, and LuxuryProperty.com is an extremely progressive website with a good grasp of the future, both in the luxury real estate world and the marketing possibilities of Internet Video. I am very happy to be a part of this team and looking forward to taking blogging, and Internet Video Marketing to the next level. With a little luck, I might even be able to cut down on the amount of horrible real estate videos I see posted to YouTube.”
When asked about this aspect, Michael D. Murphy said:
“In my opinion, what most internet users enjoy about blogs is their authenticity. If Mark wants to make an example of the poor quality real estate videos on YouTube, we’re certainly not going to stop him. If anything, such a practice should serve to raise the standard of online marketing - and that is what our company is all about.”
The job description, “Executive blogger,” is not widely-used, and only time will tell if this becomes as mainstream as blogging has done recently. Technocrati claim to be tracking over 112 million blogs, not including the estimated 73 million Chinese-language blogs, although the Blog Herald asks “Have we reached such a great amount of blogs that we no longer feel the need to count them?
About:
Mark Knowles is a pro-blogger and has, in the past, written for several other well-known property blogs including the International Property Investment Blog. For quotes, photos and more information, please email.
LUX, based in Denver, CO and Chicago, IL, specializes in the development and operation of a growing network of luxury-themed websites and services: LUXURY PROPERTY, LUXURY SOIREE, LUXURY FILM, and an international network of luxury blogs.
Tom Hakala Knows How to Handle Internet Marketing As Shown with His Use of IDX Broker
July 4, 2008
With the benefits of the IDX Broker custom IDX solution, real estate professionals take their customer service to the next level.
PR9.NET May 06, 2008 - EUGENE, ORE. – IDX, Inc. is pleased to include Tom Hakala with Independent Brokers Realty in Lakeville, Minnesota with the multitude of real estate professionals who are using their custom flagship application, IDX Broker. With the inclusion of these search tools, Hakala is now able to allow his website visitors easy access to the thousands of property listings from the Northstar MLS (Northstar), Multiple Listing Service. These days, with over 80% of real estate consumers exploring the internet first, it makes sense to have an easy to use application that can be indexed by one of the common search engines.
The IDX process is, on the realtor’s end, an easy one. IDX, Inc. hosts the data on their servers but gives Hakala his own administrative access page where he can change, update and format the information based on his personal preferences. He can utilize tools such as traffic statistics and lead generation to maintain a clear idea of what his visitors are looking at what their needs are, along with displaying attractive additions such as slideshows and mortgage calculators.
In addition to the administrative tools, IDX Broker provides Hakala with an attractively integrated search interface. It is designed by the professional programmers at IDX to fit perfectly into Hakala’s existing website design, making it look and feel like another part of his site. Visitors are then free to search with a basic search criterion, an advanced one or a MLS number. They can save their searches, request more information and sign up for automatically emailed updates. All of these options will help make Hakala’s website stand out of the crowd.
BIRDVIEW Widens On-Line Marketing Reach for Real Estate Brokerage Clients
July 3, 2008
Real estate listings advertised on popular consumer portals.
Lombard, IL (PRWEB) June 19, 2008 — BIRDVIEW Technologies announced that it has completed the addition of several new portals to its HOMECAST™ property publishing platform for its residential real estate brokerage clients. Zillow, Cyberhomes, and Front Door by HGTV are BIRDVIEW’s latest portal partners. A true single entry system, HOMECAST™ eliminates the need for manual entry in supported Multiple Listing Services.
The demand for the tool is stimulated by slowing market conditions, and growing motivation to market listings to a wider audience. Brokerages needed a simple and effective tool to get their property listings distributed quickly and easily
“These latest destinations expand our client’s opportunities to market their property listing inventory on some truly prime locations on the Internet,” said Julie Mategrano, Director of Industry Relations for BIRDVIEW, and who spearheads the search for, and addition of new portal partners. The addition of Cyberhomes is a particularly advantageous one. “With Cyberhomes,” says Mategrano, “clients get a 3-in-1 bonus because Cyberhomes has partner agreements with giants AOL and YAHOO.”
HOMECAST™, the innovative property publishing software, was introduced last year for BIRDVIEW clients, and at that time included Google, Lycos, Trulia, and Propsmart. “From its inception, HOMECAST™ has been aggressively absorbed by our clients,” said Avo Mavilian, BIRDVIEW Director of Sales. “The demand for the tool is stimulated by slowing market conditions, and growing motivation to market listings to a wider audience. Brokerages needed a simple and effective tool to get their property listings distributed quickly and easily,” states Mavilian, “and HOMECAST™ hit the bulls-eye for them.”
Even more portal additions are in the works including some international sites. “We’re excited about the global opportunities that are unfolding for our clients,” said Bedros Bedrosian, President of BIRDVIEW Technologies. “These are the times when the real estate industry shifts into a higher gear looking for more creative marketing and advertising outlets, while also economizing. That’s a challenge we’re equipped to help them meet.”
About BIRDVIEW Technologies
BIRDVIEW Technologies, www.birdview.com, combines a consultative approach with innovative technologies to help real estate brokerages build better online businesses. The Company’s suite of web-based solutions helps real estate brokerages service the needs of over 2 million prospective home buyers each month.
Real Estate Marketing
July 2, 2008
The new trend in real estate marketing is incorporating Web 2.0 into your marketing strategies using social media. But how do you actually use social media to market your real estate business? It really is not as hard as it may sound or time consuming as you might think.
Everyone does things a little different, so what works for me, might not work for you. So don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t work for you, the key is trying to increase your online presence! Use social networks, participate on forums, submit articles, press releases and BLOG!
To me, it is important to drive as much traffic as I can to my real estate website and blog. Since my blog is attached to my website, it makes it pretty easy to only have to drive traffic to one website. Below is a list of some sites that I use to increase my exposure and gain back links to my website:
- WannaNetwork.com (Real Estate Social Network)
- ActiveRain.com (Real Estate Blogging Platform)
- Linkedin.com (Business Social Networking)
- Technorati.com (An Internet search engine that indexes and searches blogs)
- Propeller.com (Social News aggregator similar to Digg.com)
- Naymz.com (Reputation Network)
- MerchantCircle.com (Business Listing Site)
- RealEstateForum.com (Real Estate Forum)
- RealEstateWebmasters.com (Real Estate Forum)
This is just a short list of sites that I use to promote my business and drive traffic back to my Las Vegas Real Estate website. It is imperative to have a plan and stick to your plan in order to create a massive on-line presence.
