Category Archives: Websites

A positive byproduct of my quest to revamp my personal website is that I came in contact with some great companies that will be the innovators of tomorrow’s real estate tech industry.  One website designer and custom IDX provider that caught my eye in a big way was the Dislpet RETS/IDX  and their highly customizable solution that I came to study as a result of the comment thread in my brutally honest case study here on GEB. They are a relatively new company but it’s … Read More »

Here at Geek Estate, we’re going to undertake a fun iniative in 2012, which will be called “Geek Build 2012” (maybe we’ll do this again next year). What is it? Building a local real estate website/blog (or several) from scratch, with all decisions voted on by the Geek Estate community. And documenting the entire journey here on Geek Estate. Over the past few years speaking to agents all over the country, I often get asked how to build a local blog that consistently generates leads … Read More »

How to make your customers fall in love with your website In the court of online real estate, your customers are judge and jury, but the testimony that you hear will take place out of earshot. The rules are unwritten but they are set in stone. Give your customers a really good reason to trust you, like you and feel like you can serve their needs and they will toss aside their inhibitions, along with their reluctance to part with their business. That’s because they … Read More »

In any vertical, the goal of a business website is to help you make money. Real estate is no different, meaning your local real estate website needs to bring you clients in order to be worth the time and money it takes to operate it. In the real estate vertical, the vast majority (let’s just call it 80% conservatively) of your website conversions WILL occur as a result of buyers searching for properties on your website and registering for email alerts or updates — but you … Read More »

What are the best and worst real estate agent/broker websites on the web today? Best Here are two of the best in my mind. MSQRealty.com What’s not to like? My prediction — this will be the best site in the entire industry within 6 months. I’ve seen some of the new stuff Dominic has been working on the last few weeks (such as new “building” pages) — and they are wicked cool. Disclosure: Dominic Morrocco, a partner with M Squared, and I are good friends, … Read More »

[Pre-emption of syndication flack:  I syndicate.  Most brokers do.  Many value the additional exposure in the current situation.  This isn't a blanket condemnation of syndication.  It's merely an analysis of the SEO byproduct of that action.] The real estate industry is buzzing about Edina Realty and ARG pulling their listings from syndicators.  The announcement, one strong view, and a different response. Most of the arguments about syndication are ignoring the elephant in the room. Real estate brokers and syndication sites are battling for SEO. 9 … Read More »

We all need to make money from the activities we spend our time on. Social media is no different. Every so often, there is talk about social media being a waste of time and the ROI not being there since most agents can’t directly attribute transactions back to clients they received from social media. But, make no mistake about it — there are agents and brokers making money from social media. But not in the way that you think. You want to know how agents … Read More »

Real Estate Social “Notworking?” It was getting close to Inman Connect NY, and I could feel the urgency in a text message from Matt Beall, ”did you get my email regarding the social media case study for Inman?” I’m sure somewhere—in the ether that is my inbox—sat an email from Mr. Beall. Knee deep in a Hawaii Life interface redesign, however, my Gmail account was left unmanaged and overflowing its 200G limit. Since integrating social media into our real estate search in September 2011, I hadn’t really thought … Read More »

At a recent real estate marketing conference that I attended, they pushed the idea of building multiple community sites that are laser focused on one area to compliment your big central site.  I thought the idea was interesting and worth consideration but I am not totally sold on it.  There are two schools of thought on this issue. One says that it is smart to build smaller niche community sites that will help to further brand you in neighborhoods you are interested in.  They can … Read More »

If you are searching for a good domain name for your real estate business, give it some thought before you take the plunge. With millions of websites in the world, you need every advantage you can get. Here are a few things to think about when choosing a domain name. 1. Your name is great but maybe not for real estate Though you should own the URL for your name, that shouldn’t be the primary way people find your site. With annual domain name registration … Read More »