9 Ways to Increase Web Traffic in 2009

© 2010, Brandon Cornett. All rights reserved.

Anyone with a business website can benefit from an increase in web traffic, and that obviously includes real estate websites. Increasing your traffic makes all the other aspects of Internet marketing a lot easier.

With more traffic, you'll be able to...

• Increase your visibility within your market area
• Generate more leads from your website
• Enjoy more feedback from your web visitors
• Make your website more profitable overall
• Grow your business by tapping an infinite audience

In other words, when you increase your web traffic you make your entire Internet marketing program more successful. I think we can all agree on this so far. The question is, how do you get more website visitors? What kind of marketing techniques can you use to drive more traffic to your site?

This is where a lot of people get stuck, and it's often the result of vague articles and "tutorials" published online. These articles stress the importance of increasing web traffic, but they don't offer any specific tips for doing it. So in this blog post, I'd like to give you a list of specific techniques you can use to increase your web traffic consistently over time.

But first, a couple of key points:

Point #1 -- Website traffic is not the ultimate goal of your Internet marketing program. It's a good first step, but there are more steps to follow. To benefit from your web traffic you must find a way to capitalize on it. For real estate websites, this usually means generating leads and inquiries.

Point #2 -- Not all of the ideas on this list will apply to your business, your audience and your marketing goals. So you'll have to experiment with the strategies you feel are most applicable to your situation. But with so many ideas on one page, you're bound to find something that works for you.

Ideas for Web Traffic

With those disclaimers out of the way, let's jump right into the list. I've mined all of the articles and e-books I've written in the past to come up with a list of proven strategies. I hope you find it useful in your web marketing efforts.

1. Do a thorough round of keyword research to identify topics and phrases with the potential to drive web traffic, and then make sure you're covering them on your site. If you need to, add pages of content to cover all of your key phrases.
2. If you're not already blogging, start a blog and publish content through it on a regular basis. This is a great way to implement the topics you identified in the previous tip.
   
3. Add new content to your blog as often as possible. The more keyword-rich content you have on your site, the more search traffic you can earn. Here are some content ideas to help you update your blog on a regular basis. And speaking of blogging for traffic ...
   
4. Follow the news and blog about hot topics on your website. Nothing drives Internet search patterns like the media and current events. You'll get a lot more traffic from search engines if you do this on a regular basis.
5. Create your own real estate maps with listings, open houses and other events. You can use Google Maps to do this, and it's easier than you think. I've created a real estate mashup guide to help you get started. This will keep visitors coming back, and it will also make them more inclined to recommend your site to others.
6. By adding useful resources to your site (like the map idea above), you are also making your website more link worthy. When other bloggers and webmasters link to your site, it will boost your search engine rankings. And that means even more web traffic over time.
7. When you make noteworthy additions to your website, you can also distribute an optimized press release online. If you do it right, this can help you increase web traffic and search engine visibility at the same time. Just make sure you have something newsworthy to say before using this strategy.
8. Experiment with pay-per-click marketing with programs such a Google AdWords. You could put your sponsored listing at the top of Google for certain key phrases, and you could have it there immediately (depending on how much you bid). Just be sure to do some research into AdWords marketing before using this strategy. It's a good way to increase web traffic, but it can also be a money-loser if you don't know what you're doing.
9. Download your copy of Top Ten Agent and learn how to increase your search engine optimization with proven SEO techniques.
   

So there you them, nine ways to increase your website traffic for online success. Actually, each of these ideas will naturally lead you into other techniques for traffic generation. So you could use these ideas every day for the next year and never run out of ammunition. Good luck with your Internet marketing.

12 Ways to Find More Real Estate Clients in a Slow Market

© 2010, Brandon Cornett. All rights reserved.

Times are tough for most real estate agents these days. Slow markets and a general lack of clients have driven some agents out of the industry completely.

But then there's always that one guy or gal in every market who seems to whether the storm with ease, attracting more real estate clients while other agents come up empty. How do these agents do it? Well, they probably cast a wider marketing net for one thing. Smart agents realize the importance of diversity, when it comes to marketing. There are dozens of ways to find more real estate clients in your city or town, and the more channels you use the better.

Nobody can tell you how to run your real estate marketing program. You must find your own way, based on your own strengths and weaknesses, your specific marketing goals, and your personal preferences. But it always helps to have ideas to ponder, and that's what this blog post is all about. Below, I've made a list of ways you might be able to find more real estate clients in your market.

Ways to Find Real Estate Clients

Not every idea on this list will be right for you. How you promote your business will depend on what you're trying to accomplish. But with so many marketing and networking ideas in one place, there's bound to be something worth trying.

1. Conduct a home buying seminar for first-time buyers in your town. Now is a great time for this kind of strategy, because first-timers are apprehensive about the real estate process. Who better to talk them through it than you? It's also a great way to get clients
   
2. If you don't already have a Facebook account, set one up as a way to connect with old friends and colleagues. I've spoke to more than one agent who gets an occasional real estate client through their Facebook connections.
3. You can also experiment with some of the other networking websites. Here are some that have a business focus: LinkedIn.com, gibLink.com, Ryze.com and Spoke.com.
4. Start a blog, if you don't have one already. You can install a blog onto your existing website in less than an hour, and it's a great way to publish new content on a regular basis. This new content will help you pull in more traffic via search engines, and that could mean more real estate clients as well.
5. Keep a handful of business cards on you at all times. You could encounter a potential client when you least expect it. Imagine you're standing in line at a coffee shop and you overhear two people talking about the real estate market. One says she want to buy a home soon. There's nothing wrong with saying, "Excuse me. I couldn't help but overhear..." And then you offer a business card and go along your way.
6. Does your car advertise your services? If not, you might want to consider a magnetic sign. A lady who lives up the street from me drives around with her sign on her car, and I know two people personally who have contacted her for help selling their homes. Her magnetic door sign is generating real estate clients from the neighborhood, and it's not costing her anything extra.
7. Have you experimented with door hangers / flyers? I never put much stock into this before, as a marketing technique. But in the neighborhood where I've lived the last four years, there's an agent who puts her real estate newsletter on my door twice a month. It doesn't have the usual stock content and fluff -- it has real market data, recent home sales, local real estate news, etc. She is the only agent doing this, and as a result I hear her name mentioned by my neighbor's all the time. They say things like, "Did you see the Jenny report this month?" She's like the unofficial neighborhood agent for this whole area, and I'm sure she gets a steady stream of real estate clients from sellers in the area.
8. Networking with local bankers and mortgage brokers is always a good way to get more real estate clients in your town, especially if they're not already partnering with an agent. It's a mutual marketing technique that has a long history of positive results.
9. Does your local chamber of commerce have monthly meetings or social events? My wife used to attend these events all the time, on behalf of the bank where she worked. She said it was a networking extravaganza, and that there was always a real estate agent or two in the crowd. I'm sure those agents were getting clients from it, or they wouldn't have been coming back each month.
10. Have you considered expanding your services to include collateral area, such as home staging for sellers? This full-service approach is a popular trend among real estate companies right now. One of my former clients (a Dallas brokerage) had a lot of success with this. They paid a professional home stager to give an in-home consultation to their home-selling clients, and it set them apart from most of their competitors.
    
11. Real estate PR is always a smart (but often overlooked) strategy for agent marketing. Local news outlets are always looking for insight from the field, especially in times like this. For example, you could contribute to a newspaper article about how it's a great time for qualified buyers to purchase a home right now, despite reluctance many consumers are feeling. You've probably seen agents in your local newspaper before, or even on television. Why not let it be you next time? It's a surefire way to get more real estate clients -- and it doesn't cost anything but time and effort.
12. Many agents claim that referrals are their biggest source of new business. This comes from treating clients right during the relationship and, more importantly, helping them succeed with the sale or purchase of the home. When you add to this an effective follow-up program after the sale, such as birthday cards, you have another source of clients.
    

Hopefully, this list of marketing and networking ideas has caused those little synapses to start firing in your brain. What kind of ideas can you come up with? What motivates you toward action? Which marketing techniques do you get excited about? Those are the ones worth pursuing.

Attracting more real estate clients is not a "one-size-fits-all" concept. There is no right or wrong way to start the process. You have to experiment with different strategies and find something that works for you.