Hello everyone,

I am a real estate broker in a medium-sized company.and I have the problem to get enough referrals to our web page.

I need arround 40 referrals per month in North America and we have nice properties but we still under this averrage!

Thank you in advance!

Hi DCD - I could not make sense of your message either. You didn't really ask a question, and you didn't really provide much in the way of details of your website.

Trying to understand what you are saying, I think you are asking for "how do you increase the traffic (and leads) to your website?".

3 main ways to do that:

1. Pay Per Click - where you pay for placement at the top, or side of search results in the various engines (yahoo, google, etc). Can be set up fairly quickly, and see some fast results.

2. SEO (search engine optimization) - this is where you are you trying to get higher placement in the organic search results. For competitive markets, this can be a very time consuming process. Slow results for the most competitive markets, but can yield the most desirable long term results from a ROI perspective.

3. Old school: print advertising, promotional flyers, newspaper ads, etc. Get your website stuck in people's head so that they know exactly what to type to find you.



Generally, a combination of all 3 isn't a bad thing to have.

Hope that helps.

Malok,

That's all fine and dandy in residential, but most viable commercial prospects are not obtained through passive means of advertising.

In my market I do not know of one single successful commercial broker that has a personal website they promote online, does pay-per click, or SEO. Their firms do advertise in commercial trade journals. Most commercial business is developed through prospecting for leads through cold-calling and industry networking at business/industry functions, etc.

Two of the largest commercial brokerages in my area have their own websites. I wish more commercial brokerages would have their own sites, instead of signing them up only on the "pay to play" sites. They'd get tons more traffic, and I'd bet there would be more sales as well.

Neudot,
Sure, commercial brokerages have their own sites, but any commercial broker worth his salt does not rely on the internet for their primary source of leads. It's a very different business than residential.

@El Luchador - The question in this thread, as I understand it, is about getting traffic to his website. Not about where does the business come from - which you seem insistent on dwelling.

You've made 3 responses to this thread: you've provided a negative critique of the person asking the question, whose first language is obviously not English, and have offered little in the way of positive input regarding answering the question - and are instead determined to drum your own agenda.

So, to respond to your hijacking of this thread: I never said the internet was the primary source for commercial, and your snide insinuation to the contrary is unfounded.

Regardless, your market is ripe for opportunity then. Even if you assume 90% of the business is generated through more traditional means (relationships, conventional advertising, trade journals, cold calling, scabbing other existing tenants from your competition, etc), if there is ZERO competition online - then you can essentially dominate the remaining 10% without any competition whatsoever, and do so with VERY little effort/cost.

And even if you assume that 0% is generated through online sources, getting established on the internet now is still the smart move, as it places you in a good position for the future.

You of course have made it quite clear, that your assessment differs - and reminds me of the persons that stuck with horse & buggies, back when cars were being introduced.


Now, hopefully we can get back to the topic of answering this persons question: how to drive traffic/referrals to his website.

Malok is right a few posts before.

In Commercial Real Estate, first optimize your website for relevant keywords that will be searched by your potential clients. Then keep it current with news or blogs that are relevant to your business like "May, 1 2009 - 200,000 SF of Industrial Space is leased in ____city by out of state company" even if your company didn't do the lease. This is an art, and you have to have an understanding of search engines, metatags, and common keywords associated with your business: i.e. "commercial real estate".

Second, utilize some of your keywords and pay for ads on Google & Yahoo. Between those two, you will have 98% of the internet covered as they outsource their ads to smaller specialized search engines and sites.

Third, get your website on as many other relevant commercial real estate sites as possible. Yellowpages and others like it will charge a monthly fee to list your ad under "COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE BROKERS". The more relevant links from other pages, the better.

Finally - Wait. Stay diligent about keeping your site current and relevant. It may take several months to rise in the natural listings. Depending on the area or niche you do, you will increase leads if people are looking for you.

Malok - I absolutely did not give a negative critique of the person who wrote the original message - that was Vermont. And I have no bones with anyone who speaks/writes English as a second language. Both of my parents are non-native English speakers and I have lived abroad myself. So for you to imply that I'm critiquing the original poster partly or wholly because of his English skills is B.S.

Now, regarding the web, you say that if there is little or no competition then you can dominate online. One little problem - most commercial prospects using the internet go right to Loopnet or if they have access, CoStar. Also, if they do go the Google route, even if your firm is in the top 3 of Google, they probably will not choose you unless there is so overwhelming reason to contact you. And even if you do get calls...and let's say it is 10%, keep it, it's yours...

P.S. - If you are going to get on your high horse and accuse me of being behind the times because I don't use the web the way you do, it would help if you don't have any typos on your profile on your website. Consider the advice gratis.

Earl,
I enjoy your posts as they are always informative, but but I've got to disagree with you on this one. Of course you are going to write that Malok is right as you are the marketing manager for a commercial real estate company.

In my experience most internet leads and many sign calls are often a waste of time. If they are investors, many of these leads are commercial real estate newbies that have no idea what they are doing. Or if they are prospective tenants, often they have no business plan, no financing, never heard of a NNN lease -and are insisting on seeing the inside of the space. No thank you.

At the end of the day, full time commercial brokers go out and find quality leads, they don't find you.

El Luchador,

The thread is about WEBSITES. And how to get more TRAFFIC and REFERRALS to that website.


I've started a new thread regarding all the other answers you seem intent on providing: Whats the best source for deals?



If you would like to discuss the other various off topic matters: who took first swing at whom in this thread, why generating multiple business sources ensures long term viability, why typos are important (& can be a good thing), and even if something is not productive/useful/beneficial today - it may be 5 or 20 years from now, etc, etc - feel free to Private Message me.

And what is the reason to try to drive traffic to your website? Surely that's not the end-game for you, is it? Last time I checked, we are in the business of doing deals - and that is the bigger context of what I have been speaking to. And so no, I firmly believe I did not "hijack" this thread as you so accused me of.

Since you're now the forum police, I sure hope you will be monitoring the threads for any deviation - there are a lot of stray responses out there...

El Luchador - he didn't ask "Is this a good idea". If he wanted to know if it was a good idea, he would have asked it.

But that wasn't the question.

He asked how to get more people to the website.


You've yet provided a response that answers the question.




So, if someone asks: What does 2+2 equal, do you go on a tangent about how they don't need to know what 2+2 equals and provide them answers on what you think they need to know - instead of just answering their question?

That may be "fine and dandy" for your market, but in our market, we attempt to answer the questions that persons ask - and if needed, provide additional input & clarification as necessary. [Just had to sling that snide/arrogant "fine and dandy" insult back at you. :P]



Its obvious that you are clearly intent on NOT providing an answer to the question - and instead want to provide numerous answers/advice to nearly everything else that wasn't even asked.


Its also apparent that not entirely unlike the schoolyard bully, you want to make sure you get the last word, so I will allow you that opportunity - so you can "win" (cause everyone knows whomever had last say is the one that really won the debate, right?).

Please post your final response, so you can have 7 posts in the thread - that never even answer the question that was asked.

I won't be responding to you on this thread.

Ciao.


(And make sure its full of some off topic hate, and rationalizations of answers to questions that were never asked. I don't want to be disappointed. Who knows - maybe if you try hard enough, you can get a dozen posts in here without answering the question. I got faith in you to deliver. )

"Off topic hate?" Malok, that is completely uncalled for. You are seeing things that aren't there.

Let me ask you Malok - and be honest - how many commercial transactions have you done? I'm sure you'll probably inflate the number anyway...