Until They Buy Or Die!

by Rory Wilfong

I am consistently amazed at the number of real estate professionals that blame the "market" for the fact that they're not making any money. At GetMyHomesValue.com we're constantly working to keep our agents focused because, as impossible as it may sound, many leads get ignored by agents.

If you ever find yourself not wanting to follow up with a lead you receive, from whatever source, just remember … someone else closes each lead you ignore. My mindset from day one in real estate has been to follow up -- until they buy or die.

You must work every single lead that you receive from every lead generation source until they buy or die. Period. If you can adopt this concept into your everyday way of life you will be successful in every type of market conditions. I have had leads that I have contacted one time and had the appointment. And I have had leads that I have contacted 20 times before I got the appointment -- either way I got the appointment.

What I mean by die: If they literally die (which has happened to me) or they have become contractually obligated to another real estate agent, they may as well be dead, because they are dead to me.

Let's look at Online Lead Generation which is an incredible way to get leads early before they have been tainted by another Realtor, Loan Officer or other influences. Because of this early stage you have an incredible opportunity to be the only one to build the relationship with that lead, you can control whether that lead looks for help from others or just you.

I remember an online lead I received one time who put his name in as "Matt" with no last name and a wrong phone number but the correct address. So I used the whitepages.com to check for the phone number and it appeared the name Matt was correct but the phone number was not listed. So I ventured to the home, knocked on the door and nobody was home, so I left my business card and a note card with some type of message telling them to call me.

They did not return my call -- so I continued visiting daily for about a week and a half (leaving something different each time) until one night I found Matt working in his garage, so I went up and introduced myself to him. He informed me that they were just looking to refinance. I said, "Great, my Loan Officer Steve and I can help you with that. Would you like to get together here tomorrow at 4:00 or Thursday at 7:00?"

He told me that they met with their bank earlier that day and were proceeding with them and were not really interested. I spoke up and said, "Do you not feel you deserve to at least get a second opinion before you commit to your bank?" After all, I am pretty sure Steve and I can get you a better rate." After some convincing and picking their brains a little more about their needs, I was able to schedule a meeting with them.

To make a long story short, Steve and I went into the meeting and found out that there were a lot of things they did not like about their existing home and we showed them how they could sell and buy and get what they wanted. By the next day I had their home listed, they were under Buyer Agency with me and Steve had begun their Pre-Approval.

Remember, this was a lead where the only thing accurate was the first name and the street address! Many real estate agents (maybe you?!?) call this a bogus lead. Please send me all of your bogus leads.

Another example comes to mind from an online lead who put her name as Queen Latifah, but the phone number and address were correct. When I called I found out that the Queen was a King and there actually was no Queen. He began to explain that he did not put his name down so he would not be harassed by real estate agents. I began to explain that he needs an agent in order to get the most money for his home in the shortest period of time.

He hung up on me. So I did the most logical thing and called back. Of course, I got the answering machine and I left a very detailed message. Over the course of the next month I called and visited the King at least 20 times and on that final time he asked me "Why are you so persistent when I do nothing but blow you off?" I told him "Because it is my job to prove to you how aggressive I am going to be in my efforts to sell your home for the most money possible."

The next day I had the listing, which went UA in 45 days -- and he was moving to Florida, so I received 25 percent for referring him to an agent in Florida. Again, many of you would view this lead as bogus.

Adopt the Buy or Die attitude with every single lead in your Pipeline and even though some will Die most of them will Buy.

Published: October 31, 2007

Nearly Half of Realtors’ Business Originates From Internet

RISMEDIA, Oct. 11, 2007- Realtors® said that nearly half - 44% - of their business originates from Internet, according to the California Association of Realtors® (C.A.R.) “2007 Use of Technology Survey.” In 2003, the first year C.A.R. conducted the “Use of Technology Survey,” REALTORS® said that only 19% of their business originated from the Internet.

The annual survey, conducted in the third quarter, tracks current trends in technology used by the Association’s members. Realtors are queried on topics ranging from computer and technology adoption to Internet usage and trends.

C.A.R. Executive Vice President Joel Singer presented the survey results at “REALTOR® 2.0: The Next Big Thing,” the general session kickoff to Tech Tuesday at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California. Tech Tuesday offered a full day of technology training and information preceding the California Realtor® EXPO 2007.

“Realtors are striving to meet the demands of their clientele by delivering an unmatched customer experience as well as stay on the cutting edge in terms of Web 2.0-the “mash-ups” of data and second-generation Internet resources and software tools,” said C.A.R. President Colleen Badagliacco. “As Realtors move toward becoming more ‘2.0,’ it will offer an opportunity for greater productivity and efficiency in the real estate transaction as well as contributing to the value Realtors add to the real estate transaction.”

Realtors also are turning to high-tech instruments such as handheld Internet devices, e-mail, and Web sites to communicate with their clients. With 25% of Realtors using their handheld wireless Internet device “all the time,” 28% of respondents said they answered clients’ e-mails instantly and another 36% within 30 minutes to one hour.

Additional survey highlights include:

- 97% of REALTORS® have a high-speed Internet connection at home.
- 27% use a laptop or tablet computer in the field primarily to conduct listing presentations.
- 20% indicated that a new computer was their most important business upgrade in the last 12 months, followed by a hands-free phone at 19% and handheld Internet device at 13%.
- 87% find the Internet extremely or very important in the marketing and promotion of their business, up from 69% one year earlier.
- 9% of REALTORS® say they participate in online real estate forums or blogs.

For more information, visit www.car.org.

How to Handle a Google Penalty - And, an Example from the Field of Real Estate

Last week, I interviewed the head of Google's spam team, Matt Cutts, about a lot of different issues. One of the most intriguing to webmasters appears to have been the discussion in the 2nd video (around 6:00) where we go into a chat about the real estate industry online, where thousands of websites have recently lost rankings due to participation in egregious manipulation through reciprocal link campaigns.

During the chat, I referred to this thread at RealEstateWebmasters (14 pages and 132 replies) discussing the "shot across the bow" that Matt's team fired in mid-May. Obviously, that site has long recommended link exchanges as a way to get ranks, and honestly, it's hard to find fault with their advice since until just recently, the tactics were very effective. Here's how it usually works in the real estate website world:

• A new realtor launches her site and finds that Google traffic is the best thing since sliced bread
• Naturally, wanting more, she starts reading online about how to get Google rankings to real estate websites
• Many of the popular forums & guides suggest forming relationships with other site owners in the real estate world and trading links
• Our realtor takes the hint - she works in Bend, Oregon, so she contacts site owners from Poughkeepsie to Puyallup seeking link exchanges
• Each site places a link to the other on a "links" page (a good example would be this one from a Missouri real estate agent)
• Our realtor gets a bit in rankings from the link love and she's thrilled
• Matt comes in and ruins her day :)

Seriously, though, what's taking place is clearly in violation of Google's guidelines (the old ones and the new ones). Google has no interest in ranking a site higher because they've traded links with realtors around the country anonymously and primarily for the purpose of rankings. Now, granted, there is a tough line to draw here because there may, in fact, be realtors who do have some relationships in other cities or states and genuinely want to endorse one another's services. In the SEO world, this happens naturally all the time - I might meet an SEO from Delaware and link to them because of their great services and they, in kind, might link to SEOmoz, recommending our work in Seattle. That's pretty kosher, and Matt & Co. probably do want to respect those links.

The problem is - how do they tell the two apart?

One method might be sheer volume. It's not a huge deal to link to 5, 10 or maybe even 20 of your friends from the industry. But, push that to 50, 100 or more and things start looking pretty suspicious. If you're linking out to 10 dozen sites and they all link back to you and all of these outbound links appear on one page (particularly when that pages is named links.html - 38,000 results or links.htm - 26,000 results), Matt's spam busters are going to get mighty suspicious.

Here's the reason I feel empathy for these webmasters - many of them are just small business owners who want to get some leads on the Internet. They've probably never read Google's guidelines or even thought about the "algorithm" or a "spam team." By and large, they know about selling houses in good neighborhoods and covering up the flaws in a fixer-upper. They went online, got themselves a website, stumbled across the first way to market it they found and listened to the general consensus of advice. It's tough to blame them the same way you might blame a site that's trying to rank for "buy viagra" use link injections and cloaking.

So, on to the meat of the post... What should these thousands of real estate webmasters do? And, what should you do if you find yourself similarly penalized. Well, luckily I've made one of my patented, late-night flowcharts:
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This flowchart isn't going to solve all your problems, but it's definitely a good starting point. And perhaps, if Matt swings by (or the next time I interview him), we can chat a bit more about whether this system fits with what he'd recommend.

Just to help out, I'm going to walk through a quick example from someone in the RealEstateWebmasters.com forum's thread:

• We'll start with Hgrealtor's site - www.oaklandhomespecialist.com
• The site's still indexed - it has 94 pages in Google
• It ranks #1 on a search for the brand name - oaklandhomespecialist - that tells me we're not dealing with a "sandbox"-like effect
• It's ranking #67 on a search of the home page's full title tag - Oakland Real Estate | Oakland California Homes for Sale | Realtor - that's definitely a bad sign
• On the plus side, they rank #7 for - crocker highlands homes - so they're not as badly buried as others I've seen
• And, they're #3 for temescal homes
• This leads me to believe that while they might have had some of their links de-valued, the site isn't in grave danger, or even necessarily in need of a re-inclusion request

The Power of a Case Study

Most average newsletters and websites have several testimonials sharing the greatness of the product or service offered. That’s all well and good, but the way to really capitalize on your superior offering is to highlight a detailed example of a job well done through a case study.

A case study is a mini-article that is two to three short paragraphs long and includes two or three pictures. The pictures may be the before and after comparisons and a photo of the person. The text can describe the problem in the first paragraph, the solution you provided in the second paragraph and a quote from the satisfied customer in the third paragraph.

Case studies tell the story of your business brilliance. They are a much more effective way of saying how great you are because someone else is saying it. Including a single case study in each newsletter is a savvy way to keep people interested in your product and offering satisfied customers a way to show off their wisdom in choosing your product or service.

Please Do Not Disturb

Sometimes the hardest thing about working at home is getting uninterrupted time in which to take care of business. Here are some five tips for setting up some boundaries to increase your productivity.

Make your office your office only. Donbt take your work into your home or bring your home into your office. Set yourself up for a block of time by preparing your coffee, water and snacks prior to going to the office.

Schedule your office hours and stick to them. Publishing them on your website and advertisements keeps you on track. Make sure your friends and family know these hours and encourage them to support your success by honoring them. A bDo Not Disturbb sign for your office doorknob can be helpful as well.

Do not allow yourself to be interrupted by a doorbell. Pretend that you are not at home when a solicitor rings the bell and do not even check to see who it is unless you are expecting someone.

Make a communication space at your front door so people can leave messages. A small box with a notepad and pen can work just fine.

Resist the temptation to take calls when the phone rings. Screen your calls on both your land line and cell phone if you use either for both personal and business purposes.

CopyrightB) 2007, FrogPond. All rights reserved . FrogPond offers you More Royalty-Free Reprintable Articles at FrogPond.com

Widget Me That!

by Jason Heller, Tuesday, Sep 25, 2007 6:00 AM ET

CONGRATULATIONS AGAIN WIDGET! IN MERELY a matter of months you went from a buzzword towards a tipping point, if not there already. It's time to do it right this time around. As I wrote last month in "Widget Me This: A Buzzword in Perspective", widgets may be a major buzzword in the current digital marketing lexicon, however the term achieved that status based on merit. The Web experience is evolving as we enter a more interoperable and platform-agnostic era. Content and experiences becoming portable databased assets with easy connections to any platform or channel will create another major shift in media consumption, and with it will come a world of new marketing and advertising opportunities. Amazon last week announced its official entry into widget-world. Of course, Amazon has offered API's to developers for several years now, but never had offered widgets in such a manner. I think the angle is pretty slick. The original king of the affiliate program, rolled out these widgets for its affiliates. Some of the widgets are quite clever ways of extending Amazon's product catalog and opportunity for relevant placement. An example of one of the more clever ideas is the Slide-show Widget, which "Makes elegant slide-show widgets out of images chosen from products across the entire Amazon catalog -- CD cover art, DVD's, books, anything!" They also have rolled out widgets that add contextual links inside blog or site content. As a major player in the ecommerce world, Amazon will most likely incite a bandwagon of commerce related widgets to follow...and a bandwagon is not necessarily a bad thing when it progresses the market. Like I've mentioned before, buzzwords are like folklore, they almost always have some firm root in reality. The trend of increasing demand for and supply of content and utility across digital boundaries, so to speak, is driving a lot of innovation and providing consumers with better experiences and features than ever before. Welcome to the brave new web. Go Go Google Gadget Another big announcement last week -- Google Gadgets are officially being integrated into the Ad Words program, which now combines the power and breadth of their massive market place of publishers and consumers, with an incredibly engaging and flexible means of reaching targeted audiences with relevant communication and commerce experiences. Previous forays into graphical ads were not as successful, this may fuel some change in that regard. The concept of digital media mobility, which I rant about regularly, is approaching a tipping point, or maybe we're there already. The ability to provide consumers with the experiences they want, and some they didn't realize they wanted, on-demand, anywhere, on any platform, is going to spawn another spurt of growth for digital media and marketing consumption in the near future. I'm psyched! This is great news! In the spirit of Facebook opening up their back end to developers earlier this year, and Yahoo recently following suit, Google (in pure Google fashion) is one-upping the rest of the industry by going one step further and actually providing funding to start ups to help develop revenue-generating widgets for the Gadgets product. Plenty of VC's are also eyeing this space and betting on the future being an interoperable one. Investments in Web 2.0 and widget development projects seem to be at a crescendo. The interesting part for me personally, is how excited about these developments I am as a consumer, as well as a marketing strategist. Usually the scale tips in one direction or another. The "open source ecosystem" we are evolving towards is ripe for innovation and growth, and the future's bright for both consumers and marketers alike. Let the next marketing renaissance begin. Jason Heller is an independent digital media consultant. Most recently he held the position of Managing Director of Horizon Interactive, the digital arm of the largest independent media buying agency in the U.S. In 2005 Horizon acquired Mass Transit Interactive, a successful digital media agency that Heller co-founded in 1998.

To Score A Home Sale In This Market, Step Up To The Plate

Develop A Competitive Edge

BY KATHLEEN DOLER FOR INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Price with carrying costs in mind, now that it's taking months to move a property

The residential real estate market's showing a cruel twist to the maxim that time is money.
Real estate agents warn that now a seller may have to pay more directly or indirectly to get a property sold in a timely fashion. So many homes are for sale that finding a buyer amid the competition can take extra effort and strategy.
U.S. median home prices have been falling and the inventory of existing unsold residences rising. About 4.6 million homes are available. That's nearly a third more than a year ago and it would take 9.6 months at the current sales pace to sell them all, the National Association of Realtors says.
Homes stay stuck on the market longer. While last year a NAR consumer survey put the average at six weeks, homes now tend to remain unsold at least a couple months.
"Based on the historic relationship between this (annual) survey and our monthly read on supply, the current national time on market is in the range of eight to 10 weeks," said Walter Molony, a spokesman for the group.
Those figures may underestimate how tough it is to sell now as they don't include sellers who've given up, says Brock Harris, owner of Brock Real Estate in Los Angeles.
"Sellers are pulling their homes off the market," he said.
What's a seller to do? One recommendation from housing industry specialists is to get the most experienced Realtor available, someone who's been in the business more than five or even 10 years and has sold before in a down market.
How do you find the right real estate agent? Some online sites such as HomeGain .com offer referrals and agent comparisons, but wordof-mouth referrals are a tried-andtrue approach. An alternative is to look for the most active Realtors in your area. Who has had the listings that you've seen sell?
Once you've got some names, interview at least three agents and ask tough questions about how they're going to get your house sold.
"It really is a job," Harris said. "And you want someone who will be straight with you — absolute candor."
Price For Now, Not Yesterday
The agent needs to be able to advise you on how to price your property and say what upgrades are needed to make it marketable in the slow sales environment, he says.
"We're seeing a lot more overpriced listings than we ever have," Harris said.
He thinks sellers and agents are putting too much emphasis on dated comparables. A home that sold a month ago isn't necessarily a good comparable for pricing a listing now, he says, because that home was probably put on the market five or six months ago.
"Sellers need to be very, very realistic," Harris said. "They have to under-price their home. Buyers have so much choice they're only going to look at the cheap ones."
It's a particularly poor time for premium pricing and real estate agent commission discounts, according to specialists, who say sellers should expect to pay for expertise, experience and aggressive marketing.
"Real estate is a competitive, cutthroat business, and Realtors are always hungry," Harris said. "If anything, now's the time to pay an extra commission, especially to buyers' agents. We're seeing like 4% to the buyer's agent. In this market, it takes two good agents to pull a deal through."
Getting through a deal usually involves financing. So you want a real estate agent who's knowledgeable about home financing and who has very good contacts with mortgage brokers. Sure, the buyer's agent will probably steer a potential buyer toward a mortgage broker, but more names can't hurt.
Survive Tighter Financing
Buyers may have a tougher time getting a good mortgage, given the recent tightening of credit standards. So sellers may consider financing part of the deal themselves, a tactic used to close deals in other real estate downturns.
"You'll want a Realtor who has the experience to help you through this," said Bradley Inman, founder of Emeryville, Calif.-based Inman News, which runs a real estate investing Web site (inman .com).
Getting an offer, and thus to the financing step, requires "PEA — price, maximum exposure through advertising and accessibility," said broker George Stephens, at ERA Stephens Properties in Houston.
Make your property shine for its showing, and take care of repairs so it compares well, Stephens says. He recommends having some properties pre-inspected, before an escrow, so a seller can identify and fix problems that might quash a sale.
Spur The Sale
Be diligent about using traditional sales tactics, too.
Make sure the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) entry that describes your home to Realtors and househunters is detailed and includes great photos. Ask your agent to ensure that the property gets as much exposure on Web sites — the broker's, your Realtor's and other spots — as possible.
A great flyer is a must. The flyer box needs to be stocked regularly.
Invite neighbors to view the property — maybe they have friends interested in moving to the area. Your agent should hold a broker's open house as well as several buyer open houses.
Beyond open houses, Stephens says sellers need to make their properties accessible for showing "seven days a week between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m."
He cautions sellers that if they limit one or more of the PEA factors, they're placing barriers to their objective of achieving a timely sale under current market conditions.

Open house signs fill a corner in Altadena, Calif., on Sunday, Aug. 26, 2007. Sales of existing homes have dropped to the slowest pace in nearly five years and are 9% below a year ago. Amid that, the median home price has slipped. AP