Category: Online Marketing

The Importance of Alt-Text in SEO

What a lovely revelation I’ve just had! I’ve noticed that week-in and week-out, one of the most common search phrases used to find The Set Fee Real Estate Blog has been ‘Stand Out.’ What an odd search phrase, and even odder that it leads here! And yet, it is the number one search phrase people have used in the past 30 days to find me and the number two phrase in the past year!

So this morning I decided to do a little investigation. I wanted to find out what people were looking for when they used that phrase and why they were coming to my blog. I went to Google and searched for ‘Stand Out.’ Flipping through the first three pages of results, I saw no mention of the blog . . . so how could people be coming here using that search phrase? Then I thought, maybe they’re not looking for words, maybe they’re looking for pictures! So, with ‘Stand Out’ still in the search box, I clicked ‘Images,’ and searched for pictures tagged with the phrase. I recognized the first picture in the results. I’d used it in a post last year recapping our Help-U-Sell Success Summit. I followed the link, and, sure enough, there was my post.

Mystery solved. But why did my picture bring them here? Because, when I inserted the picture into the post, I’d used ‘Alt-Text’ to describe it. Let me explain.

Google is an amazing thing. It ‘reads’ billions of words of text every moment and indexes it all, evaluates it, assigns a weight to it and then displays it in a logical, ordered fashion. Wonderful! But the Internet is made up of far more than words. Think about all the video that’s out there today! Do you know, when Google comes across a video on the Internet and detects a spoken voice track in it, it will use its own speech-to-text tools to transcribe the audio voice track into text and then scan and index the text just like it does any other written material?! (By the way, that’s an SEO tip for anyone using video on their website: pictures and music are nice, but a spoken word audio track makes your video immensely more ‘findable’)

But what does Google do with pictures? Nothing. It can’t really ‘see’ them – I mean: it knows they are there, but it has no idea what the subject of the picture is . . . . unless you tell it. And that’s where ‘Alt-Text’ comes in.

When you use a photo or other graphic on your website, blog or other Internet posting, you are usually given the option of including ‘Alt-Text.’ You use that option to describe, in words, the picture you are posting. That way, Google knows what it is and can index it along with other Internet content. In my case, I’d used a photo in my post about the Success Summit and I’d described it as ‘Stand Out From The Crowd.’ Interestingly, when anyone does an Image Search for ‘Stand Out,’ they are probably going to see my picture – and it’s good enough that they likely will follow the link . . . and, Bingo! I have a hit. Here is a bit of a screen shot of the photo in the blog post. I’ve hovered over it with my mouse in the shot (I know, you can’t see the cursor, but it’s there), which causes the ‘Alt-Text’ to appear.

Standout

Cool picture, right? But nobody would ever find it if I hadn’t described it for Google with ‘Alt-Text.’ Next time you use a photo anywhere on the Internet, you do the same!

4 Reasons Why You Should Consider Using Google Voice in Your Real Estate Business

Right up front, I admit it: My name is James and I am a Google-holic. I’m not braggin’ or complainin’, but I love almost everything Google’s ever done and operate my electronic life largely within a Google universe. Sorry, Apple-ites. Your shiny white devices seem stodgy and old fashioned to me. I think when you pay for that new Iphone, 60% of what you’re buying is marketing. Just sayin’ . . .

So, leave it to me to tell you why I think you should consider Google Voice as the telephone system of choice for your real estate business.

1. Transcribed Voice Mail. When a caller on your GV number goes to voice mail, their message is transcribed into text and sent to you via email or text message. If you want to hear the message, you can still do that, but the beauty is that most times, you won’t need to. You’ll be able to get the information you need from the text. This can also be very helpful if you are occupied with something else and an important call comes in. For example, you are out showing property or in a meeting. A call comes in and goes to voice mail. In a minute you are reading a text or email version of the message. It’s something very important that needs your attention right away. Great. Now you can excuse yourself, step out and take care of the problem.

2. Amazing Forwarding Capabilities. You can program GV to forward your calls to any other device you may have: your home phone, your cell phone, your office phone. It’s very easy to change which device(s) ring. You can even put them on a schedule. But there’s more. Suppose you are in your office, on your office land line with a very important call. But you have an appointment out of the office and you have to leave NOW to make it on time. You don’t want to end the important call, so you push a button and suddenly all of your other devices begin to ring. The call seamlessly transfers to whichever device you answer, say your cell phone, and the caller never knows you’ve made the change.

3. Great Marketing Tracking. Google will give you ONE GV number for your Google account. (By the way: you get a Google account when you sign up for Gmail. The email address and password you set up there becomes your login credential for any other Google product). So, if you wanted to assign a different GV number to each marketing piece you did so you’d have a text record of how many calls each piece of marketing produced, you could. You’d have to open a number of different Gmail accounts, but think about it. Maybe you’d have one number for all of your signs. Maybe you’d use a different number for all of your mailbox marketing. Perhaps you’d have a number for print advertising and so on. Five or six numbers would probably give you the visibility you need. Now, I’ve heard that sometimes GV can take some time to assign you a phone number. That wasn’t the case for me: it was instantaneous. But, I did read about one person, wanting to track marketing via different Google Voice numbers, but delayed by Google’s backlog, who went to Ebay and bought accounts for about $6 apiece.

4. Personalized Greetings. Setting up a personalized greeting is so simple. You just find a contact in your messages and assign them a custom greeting. The first person to get a personalized greeting should probably be your spouse: ‘Hi, honey. Sorry I’m tied up, but I’ll call you as soon as I get free. Love you.’ Then do one for your kids. Then, every time you take a listing, take a minute to customize a greeting for each of your sellers: ‘Hi,Bill and Cathy. Sorry I can’t take your call at this moment, but you are among my most important callers, so rest assured I’ll be back to you as soon as I can. Thanks again for choosing me to market your home.’ Or maybe a specialized greeting for your buyers: ‘Hi, Sue. I’m probably out showing property at the moment, but I’ll call you back as soon as I can. If you’ve seen a house you like and want information about it, send me a text with the address and I’ll have all the details when I call you back’ (you may have just stopped Sue from calling the listing agent!). Or, how about this (it’s my favorite): a personal greeting for friends, family and business associates who call you a lot and don’t need to hear your long winded message: ‘Hey, Dan – leave a message.’

A long time ago . . . well, a couple of years . . . we had office switchboards, PBXs, and extensions with flashing lights for multiple lines. It was expensive and inefficient. Today you can actually run your business using a virtual phone system from Google. Google Voice plus a cell phone (or two) is probably all you need. Give it a look. (Be sure to watch the short video on ‘Block Callers’!)

Set Fee Blog Stats: 2012 In Review

WordPress creates an annual report for bloggers who use their service. I just (finally) opened mine and go some eye opening information:

  • In 2012, there were 67 new posts on The Set Fee Real Estate Blog, bringing the total to 292.
  • There were about 5,400 total views in the year, with the busiest day being February 15, with 72 views.
  • The post that garnered the most views on that day was about Maurine Grisso’s REO Training.
  • Most viewed posts for the year were (in order):
    1. How To Do It, Step 6: Accountabiity
    2. The Buyer Questionaire
    3. Old Scripts/ New Scripts
    4. Full Service Broker vs Limited Service Broker vs Discount Broker
    5. Clarifying Terms: Full Service Broker, Limited Service Broker, Discounter, Help-U-Sell

It seems pretty clear that the public is confused about the difference between full service, limited service, discount service and Help-U-Sell. I’d probably do myself a favor by writing more about this murky topic.

  • Most people came to this site via Networked Blogs, HelpUSell.com, and Facebook
  • My most active commenters were:
    1. Kirk Eisele
    2. Dan Desmond
    3. Don Taylor
    4. Robin Rowland
    5. Jeanne Strayer

Wouldn’t you like to put those five people in a room and then sit back and listen to them talk!

You can view the full report HERE.

Focus Your Website: For Buyers? Sellers? . . . or Both?

The primary function of most real estate broker websites is pretty obvious:  provide information to and hopefully capture prospective buyers.  That’s why the home search function is usually front an center and why IDX is so important.  This is certainly true of Help-U-Sell Broker websites with their scrolling ‘Featured Listings’ and nearly dominant search field.

It makes sense too:  almost every bit of advertising we do, from For Sale signs with URLs to flyers with QR codes, is intended – at least as a secondary function – to drive buyer traffic to the website where quality information and powerful search tools deliver value that makes  buyer lead capture more possible.

But what about Help-U-Sell?  Our whole marketing thrust for 36 years has been to target Sellers, take more than our share of listings and let the listings create Buyer Leads.  Since the lion’s share of real estate marketing has gone online – and since a major portion of that online presence centers on the office website – isn’t there a disconnect between the heavy Buyer orientation of Help-U-Sell Broker websites and our own ‘Secret Sauce?’  Maybe.

I’m not suggesting that our Broker sites shouldn’t LEAD with tools and tips for Buyers.  As I said, almost all of our advertising is designed to drive buyers to the website where a value experience makes them ‘capturable.’  In fact, I want our guys to be pulling Buyer leads OFF Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com and a dozen other online sources and offering them a better experience on their own Broker sites with language like:

Have you noticed that a lot of the listings you’re seeing on XXXXX.com are already sold?  Have you seen duplicates and inaccuracies?  That’s because that’s a National website trying to do a Local job.  They receive data from dozens of different sources and sometimes their machines have difficulty telling what is true and most recent.  How would you like to get up-t0-date access to the data in our Local MLS?  There is no better data anywhere for a home search here in Anytown.  You’ll be searching for homes just like I do, with the same information I use;  it’s free and easy to use.  Great – let me get your email address and I’ll set you up an account.

So, Buyer orientation and tools prominent on the first page:  YES!

But, are you also using your website to attract Sellers, to educate them about your program, to do the job so much of our marketing did in years gone by?  There are ways to do this you know.  Step one is to create a page (or pages) that provides the kind of information that caused Sellers to contact you in the past:

  • Sold and Saves
  • Testimonials
  • Easy Way/Smarter Way
  • Seller Savings Comparison
  • Brief Description of your program

Take out an old paper ETM – the one we delivered in thousands of mailboxes each month.  Can you build a page on your website with the same elements, presented in the same powerful way?  (By the way, the answer is ‘Yes.’  The tools are there and they are easy to use, especially when you have the Sarasota Tech Team standing by to help every step of the way).  The Sellers Savings Comparison has been up and operational for several months, and Robbie just introduced the new Sold And Saved banners (thanks to input from the great Brokers who attended this year’s Success Summit).

Step two is to start driving Seller traffic to this page, just like you drive Buyer traffic to page one of your Website.  That means first, buying an easy to remember URL for the new page, something like:  www.sell-and-save.com, and pointing it at the Seller page.  Then include it in every bit of advertising your do that may be seen by Sellers.  It also means taking advantage of new marketing opportunities to drive traffic:  QR codes on postcards that tease:  Find out how you can sell your home fast and save thousands.

I’m glossing over Step two rather quickly because it’s more about a way of thinking than anything else.  Attracting the Seller Inquiry has been so much a part of who we are that it is like breathing.  It’s automatic.  It’s a lifestyle.  But the real estate ditch of the last six years had us scrambling for Buyer Leads and Institutional Sellers, not genuine Seller Leads because they were (alas) non-existent.  It’s time to take the new seller tools we have for Broker Websites and become just as obsessed with exploiting them as we once were with our next ETM.

Step three is to build Landing Pages for your targeted call to action advertising.  These are simple fill-in web forms for gathering contact information on a potential client after an offer of something of value in return.  Here’s an example from the fine folks in Waynesboro, VA, Help-U-Sell Direct Savings Real Estate:  LINK.  This one is for a Market Analysis, something of great value to today’s homeowners.  You’d drive traffic to this landing page with postcards, flyers and other advertising, teasing:  Find out what your home is worth TODAY!

You might build similar landing pages for ‘Find out how you can save thousands when selling your home‘, or ‘Free E-Book:  How to Save Thousands When Selling Your Home.’  And so on.

Once again, when Boo probably would have been sufficient,  I’ve said Boo-H00-Hoo.  Forgive me:  I’m on vacation (Ole!).  But I hope you will take my enthusiasm for this topic and the new tools available to you to get back to doing what we have always been about:  Attracting inquiries from Sellers with our Superior Offer, Converting those Inquiries into Listings most of the time, and Letting the Marketing of those Listings drive a steady stream of Buyer Leads into our offices.

Pay-Per-Click, Step-By-Step

We all know that carefully planned pay-per-click advertising works.  It can effectively drive traffic to your website, where, if it is handled properly, it can turn into leads. We saw an example of that this morning on the Tech Time Tuesday Webinar, where Jack Bailey increased traffic to his office website by almost 1,000% over a four month period. ,due largely to his pay-per-click campaign on Google. Using Ad Words, he brought roughly 15,000 visitors to his website.  One of his ads – the one offering a free market analysis – had a 31% click-thru rate!  That’s crazy good!  And, assuming some of the traffic is converted to leads, some of which actually buy or sell real estate, the cost can be very low.  Really, Jack’s budget was $12 a day – a little less than $400 a month.

But, how do you do this?  How do you proceed step-by-step to take advantage of this Internet Marketing Bonanza?  Here’s how:

1.  Decide what kind of lead you are seeking.  Are you looking for Buyers or Sellers?  What kind of Buyers?  Buyers interested in Foreclosures?  Buyers looking in a specific neighborhood?  Buyers with little down payment money?  Sellers with equity?  Upside down sellers? Sellers in a specific geographic area?  Step one is all about getting very specific about your target.  The more specific you set your pay-per-click parameters, the more efficient your campaign will be.  In short:  you’ll attract fewer clicks from customers you don’t want (out of the area, just looking, unable to buy and so on).

2.  Build a landing page on your office website where people who click your ad will ‘land.’  A good landing page should address exactly what the ad mentioned.  If it was the offer of a free Market Analysis, that’s ALL that should be on the landing page:  just the contact information capture form and a tiny bit of verbiage explaining what will happen when they sign up.   Some experts say you should keep your branding, both personal and company, to a minimum on a good lead capture landing page.  The idea is that people may sign up online for something they perceive to be of value if they don’t associate it with an ordinary Realtor or real estate company.

3.  Decide where you are going to advertise.  Google is the 800 pound gorilla here.  If you choose this, your ads will appear when people who fit your demographic parameters search for the keywords and phrases around which you build your campaign.  Don’t overlook Facebook.  Their pay-per-click ads have been effective for many, and their targeting process is very specific.  And don’t forget:  not everybody searches with Google.  Some use Bing, some use Yahoo.  You may find more cost effective alternatives if you just look around.

4.  Design your ad.  Keep the verbiage to a minimum.  Stick to exactly what you’re offering. Use Google AdWords to determine which real estate search terms are most common in your area and build your campaign around them.   While Google pay-per-click is all words and links, Facebook allows you to include a photo or graphic in your ad.  If you’re using a photo, note that. sometimes it’s the quirky photo that catches the eye.  **TIP:  Include your phone number in your pay-per-click ad.  Some people will call rather than click, and you don’t pay if they don’t click!

5.  Set-up and budget your campaign.  You’ll set three ‘maximums’ when you initiate your campaign:  your total budget (the maximum you want to spend for the entire campaign), your daily maximum, and the maximum you’re willing to pay per click.  I mentioned Jack’s campaign:  his total budget was right at $1,500.  He was willing to spend up to $12 a day.  I don’t know what he agreed to pay-per-click, but what usually happens is the vendor (Google or Facebook or Yahoo)  will give you a range in which you should bid.  Let’s assume it’s $1.10 – $1.53 per click.  The higher you bid, the more frequently your ad will appear . . . until you hit one of your maximums.  When I’ve done pay-per-click, I’ve set my bid on the high side of the middle of the range.  By they way:  some clicks will come in at less than your bid; it all depends on how competitive the environment around your key words is at that moment.

6.  Track your results.  Conceptually, this step is number six.  But Chronologically?  You probably ought to move this to first.  BEFORE you do anything with any marketing, pay-per-click or otherwise, you must set up your system for tracking results.  How will you capture and track the leads that come in via your Internet contact form?  What about those leads that choose to pick up the phone and call?  And how will you get your staff to take all of this tracking as seriously as you do?  (I’ve always been a big fan of boiling in oil and/or burning at the stake for slackers, but the choice is yours).

7.  Manage your campaign.  Everyday, take a look at your results.  How many leads did you create?  What key words or phrases pulled the best?  Which keywords could you pause or drop from the campaign?  And so on.

Now it’s soapbox time.  This is the moment when all of us need inventory.  Listings are so low right now and the Listing Agent is in control.  This is happening because increased buyer activity as begun to push prices slightly higher – something we haven’t’ seen in years.  Homeowners are very curious right now about what their homes are worth.  They’ve seen the uptick in values and are wondering if they’re still upside down.  Now is the time to do a pay-per-click campaign aimed at these people.  How about a pay-per-click ad that simply says:  ‘Find Out What Your Home Is Worth Today’ . . . leading to the free market analysis page that’s already set up and is available on your office website.

So, let’s do it.  Do steps 6, 1, and 3 – get it all organized – and then call Tony in Sarasota.  He’ll be happy to help you finish the task.  And if you want to run any marketing ideas by me, I’m energized and available.

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