Your Key to Online Lead Generation – YOUR LISTINGS!

Your listings are the single most strategic online opportunity you have to generate leads online… IF you know how to use them!
You might be like many agents who say they never get any business from their web site. That’s because people rarely look for your web site… but they DO look for listings online. If you have listings, there are definitely ways to get yourself noticed online. Agents who last in this business know that it’s the Listing Agents who last because they control the inventory. They have the signs up and the business comes to them. It’s the same online as offline. But you have to leverage your listings online to get business. And now, with new media, listing syndication, video, photos, etc., Your listings can go out all over the internet driving traffic back to you.

Taking a Listing should be the trigger point for ALL your online media.  Just broaden your listing checklist and you can cover online and offline all at once.  Adding online can multiply your efforts and explode your business.

Here is a list of what you need to add to your new listing Checklist IMMEDIATELY.

• Syndicate your listings to all real estate related web sites (aprox. 200 sites)
This drives traffic to your web site, inquires to your email and phone. It dramatically improves your online presence. You’ll need to subscribe to a service to do this. But if your Broker is doing it, the Broker info overrides yours.

• Create Video of your listing and post online and syndicate to Video sites
YouTube is the second highest traffic site, second only to Google. Video of your listings gives you more exposure and gives you higher ranking on sites like Realtor.com. Of course always include key words and links back to your site.

• Create an Online E-Brochure
This is critical to be able to forward to email inquirers and to send to prospects. You’ll also want to post a nice e-brochure in Social Media.

• Post your listing in all Social Media with links to your blog post
There are dozens of Social Media sites. You’ll want to cover the major ones like Facebook, Twitter, Plaxo, etc. But there are many others you’ll want to post to for more exposure, more traffic, more leads.

• Schedule your Open Houses and post your open house to real estate web sites
These days you could do an Open House with NO SIGNS and still have more traffic than the old way. Buyers search online before they go out looking. Getting your Open House online assures you that you won’t waste your Saturday and Sunday in an empty house with no traffic.

• Customize your listing in Realtor.com
Realtor.com is simply the highest traffic site for real estate online. Your listings MUST be dominate here. You’ll come up higher in the results if you add a video tour. You can only get leads if you can add YOUR contact information, personal profile, web site, and customize the property description. A Showcase listing account allows you to do this plus add headlines and Open Houses. If your Broker does not provide you with your own Showcase listings account, you’ll have to pay for your own. $200-$500 per month depending on how many listings you have.

Note: If you are a Prudential Agent, all of this is done for you automatically when you take a listing at no charge. See how here.

If you have 5 Listings, you should be getting 40-50 quality online leads per month …minimum!

Make sure your Broker is not Overriding Your Listings
If you work for a Broker who uses all company listings to generate their own online leads, the Broker’s feed will override will wipe out all your online efforts. The Broker’s Listing Syndication will override your contact information and replace it with the Brokers. Check to see if your listings on Realtor.com have your information or your Broker’s information. If they have your Broker’s information, there’s really nothing you can do. Your leads go to an e-team or call center of new agents who know nothing about the property and have weak sales skills. At some point you have to calculate the cost to you of working in that kind of outdated system. For example: if you have 5 active listings, even if you only generate 2 leads per listing each week, that’s 10 high quality leads per week or 40 leads per month. How many additional deals could you close per month with 40 quality leads from YOUR listings?

How do you find TIME or MONEY to get this all done?
Frankly, I’ve found it’s impossible for an agent to actually sell real estate AND be an online pro. Besides the expense of your time, it would require an Assistant at the cost of $30,000 to $40,000 per year. At Prudential, we’ve created tools and support for our agents so this is automated and done for them.

There is a way to get is all done at no charge with systems and tools that won’t cost you anything. Check it out here.

Create a Plan, Know the Right Tools, and Have a System
Online marketing just happens to be my personal passion. I’ve been working with agents and small business owners for over 10 years. It all starts with a plan and a few key tools and systems you need. I provide a no cost initial consultation to get you on the right track. Just give me a ring or a ping!

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