After reading this post I began wondering just how common $20,000 Realtor websites were nowadays - and did find that they were available in a few places that I checked.

I assume that the majority of the cost is for programming a custom IDX and maybe a customized CRM - perhaps those who have such websites can enlighten me further.

It doesn't seem so long ago when an expensive Realtor Website was considered to be $3000. When any of my clients would sign up for one of those expensive sites (not with me but with other providers) they would drop them after a year of two citing that there were fewer or lower quality leads than the package they had with me that was a fraction of the cost.

Granted, most of the results they were enjoying with me came as a result of having good search engine positions and not because of a leading edge design - but being found for searches is probably the #1 determining factor in how successful one is at generating new business from the web. (I am not talking about using a website as a destination for existing clients or those who arrive there from conventional advertising in a "farm" area etc.)

Still, I wonder how much more effective a very expensive custom IDX and CRM is than a nominally priced or free framed IDX and an off-site Customer Relationship Management system.

Realtors used to be a whole lot harder to separate money from - what happened that I missed?

Any comments?

I am spending $5,000 for a custom IDX to be added to my site as we speak. It is not up and running yet. It will be a few months before i can see if it is worth it.

I would be interested to hear your evaluation in a few months.

Bigtoe, can you share with us what prompted you to have a custom designed IDX?

Just trying to get ahead of the competition. Each listing will have it's own search engine friendly url which hopefully will help me in the serps and make the site even more sticky than it is. These days it is all about your site's stickiness.

I'd have to agree with what you say doug. Unless you plan on building something corporate-oriented, $20k seems pretty extreme to me. I could understand the costs affiliated with the whole custom IDX scenario, but I honestly don't believe it is worth any of the fancy functions or nice looking designs if you aren't in a high enough place in the search engines to be recognized. Then again, I guess if people can spend that kind of money on a website then using PPC marketing wouldn't be that much of a problem...

Bigtoe, I know you are knowledgeable in SEO issues and would have done your research before making your decision. My comments below are for the benefit of others who may want some ideas of what to consider when being "pitched" for a new IDX system.

A few years ago I did some checking when companies first started selling search engine friendly IDX as a benefit - in particular they were selling the idea that having all of the IDX pages would increase the size of your site and that in itself would raise Google rankings because, as they said, Google loves big sites!

I did not find that the websites they used for testimonials and other sites of theirs were ranking well because of all the IDX listings - I did find they were ranking well because they had hundreds of one-way links however. The idea that adding search engine friendly IDX pages would raise rankings turned out to be a fairy tale. Google may like big sites in some situations but just adding thousands of listings does not make a site a big site in Google's eyes.

I also found that only one of the provider's IDX pages would be returned for a search - seems the other sites' pages were looked at as duplicate content (listed in Google but not returned for the search). Only one of their customers actually received this benefit.

I can see that if a searcher drives by a sign, notes the address and then searches Google for the address there may be a chance your IDX page would be clicked on in the list of other IDX pages and Trulia, etc.

If you don't list the address in your publicly viewable listings and require registration for futher details - you would not have this benefit .

I think one needs to consider carefully the idea of search-engine-friendly IDX pages being a benefit - especially if the price tag ends up being in the $20,000 range.

I can see the real benefit of a custom IDX as a destination for current clients and prospects driven by advertising though as they may bookmark your site because it is easy to use and you can get business from it. I don't think you necessarily need to pay a high premium for that though.

I will never pay 20,000 for a site.

I created my own site and I am happy with it right now. it generates leads, between that and my blog.

It's a simple site, with the MLS provided IDX. Buyers really just want the listings. In one or two clicks they can get to them on my site.

Plus all of my listings are already on Weichert.com - let THEM pay $20,000 for a site. LOL

And I want to be ahead of the curve so that I am the one site that gets the credit.

But mostly what I am looking at is it appears the bounce rate of a site is becoming more and more important. With each listing on it's own page I am hoping that consumers will wander around on my site from page to page, listing to listing and improve my bounce rate. Plus, this in turn should help establish my site as an authority site.

Then there is the new content issue. Each day new listings will show up as new content.

I realize the search engines will realize what is going on and eventually/now none of this will matter except the part about the consumers staying on the site longer. The more time they spend on my site the more likely they will make contact which is the ultimate goal.

Providing the information on your website that a prospective client is looking for is always a good thing. It increases your chances for contact.

I personally do not subscribe to the view that Google uses bounce rate statistics for ranking purposes. I know that because there are stats for "bounce rate" in Google Analytics some suspect that this could be used for ranking purposes.

Google the search engine does not have access to "bounce rate" information for the vast majority of websites - only those using Analytics - so I doubt it would be used in any significant way. All Google can reliably track is a searcher's time between searches and not what a searcher does after clicking on a link in the serps.

The bounce rate, time spent on a website, and/or the number of pages a website has does not make a site an authority site for ranking purposes. Primarily inbound and outbound links to and from good content do that.

As you say, in the end the reason for a custom IDX is to encourage visitors to contact you and not someone else.

Realtors should weigh this before paying providers who push search engine benefits as a reason for paying highly inflated prices for the service.

If the searcher has the g tool bar/spy ware installed then g keeps track of everywhere the searcher goes on the net and how long they stay there. Run MS Fiddler while surfing in IE to see what I mean. From this info they can garner a sites bounce rate/stickiness/usability/authority/relevance/whatever you want to call it.

I have been watching g pull sites off the 2nd and 3rd pages and putting them in the #4-7 spots on the first page for a day and then sending them back to where they were and then bringing them back to the first page at different times.

If a site out performs the site it replaced it gets to stay, if it doesn't it goes back to where it was. This is how I got on the first page and I have seen some other sites do the same thing. This is only my observation but I have had others confirm seeing the same thing.

It makes sense to give others a try at the top and let consumers decide which sites they like the best. The link system is faulty and they really haven't mastered the ability to read content. They can analyze keyword density but they can't understand what is being said on the page. If content is king, only the user can answer the question as to whether a site has the content they are looking for. Hence their reliance on user activity.

I ended up going with a custom idx to generate more visitors to my site. I knew there would be a benefit to going that route for people who were searching for individual properties, but I didn't know how big it would be.

After being live for 3 months, the stats are an average of 88 visitors per day, generally equally split between yahoo and google, with the average length of time per visit at 4:02, which is really high.

I anticipate that these numbers will get better as I add the feature that allows users to save properties to a personal profile.

It all comes down to conversion though. Right now, I get about one solid buyer every 2 weeks who wants to see properties and is willing to sign an exclusive buyer broker agreement. I get other calls and emails, but haven't been able to convert those into something more.

I'm also looking at adding additional information I can add to the site to attract visitors and for my area it seems to be tax rates and mello roos tax information. Finding a way to incorporate that information on a large scale has been a challenge though as the only database I can find on-line, our tax assessor's office, only had this information available if you search by each individual address.

Depending on how the custom IDX is setup, it can have great SEO possibilities as long as there aren't too many dynamic variables involved on the URL.

That's one of the big differences with this versus with framed solutions. Search engines, for one, can't even see inside of frames. And even if the IDX is integrated with many companies' existing solutions, it's usually not great for SEO, still.

Ultimately, you need a custom IDX with someone that knows SEO well and isn't designing it to be applied to other agents' sites, just your's, which makes it very expensive.

That, and your CMS, could easily put a large site around $20k, depending on how extensive some of the features and the CMS are.

20k seems expensive. try elance.

I'd like to jump in and add my 2 cents.

There's a huge benefit to having a custom IDX on your site. The reason is, every listing on your website will have it's own page/URL. Everyone knows that Google likes websites with large number of pages. For example, in my area, there are about 15,000 homes currently for sale. If I had a custom IDX, I would have at least 15,000 pages on my website. You see the benefit?

Also, each one of those pages is getting spidered, which means that the MLS #, address of the property, description, etc., everything is getting spidered by the engine. So if someone is searching for a house with MLS # 8888888, the page from your site will show up. If someone is searching for a property for sale on 123 Happy Street, the page from your site will show up. If someone is searching for homes for sale in a specific subdivision, your site will show up. Everything on those 15,000 pages is getting spidered and the search engines know about it.

I've met many, many agents who went the custom IDX route and their number of visitors and leads went through the roof. I know plenty of agents who invested at least $20,000 into their websites and they're now making millions of dollars in sales. A personal friend of mine who invested $50,000 into his website (over a period of 2 years) and he sold $65,000,000 in real estate in 2007. After building a custom site with custom IDX, he went from just being an agent, to running a 14 person team. He's 100% internet based now.

Some people make a big mistake. They think that if they invest $20,000 into their site, it will just run until the end of days and it will make them millionaires. The website is like a car. It needs to be maintained. You need to constantly add fresh content. You want the visitors to come back. Yes, visitors want to see listings, but they also want to see dynamic websites. Your site has to be cutting edge and stay above the competition.

Hope this helps.