I curently have a website, www.jameskaleda.com but I am having it profesionaly redone.

I have seen alot of common features in my area: a buyers page, a sellers page, a search the mls page (which requires a name adress & phone number), local info page, real estate articles page, a blog.

Before I spend money, does anyone have any sugjestions on site features that have actually generated leads?

Thanks

James Kaleda
www.firstyearinrealestate.com www.firstyearinrealestate.com

James:

Information about content, as well as contact information capture here:

http://www.technologyforrealestate.com/web-site-presence/site_content.htm

Have people sign-in to search the MLS!

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James, as with any business, specialization increases your focus on a target market. The things you've mentioned are generalities, which you should have, but your largest prospect generator will be your reaching of specialized markets. What is your speciality and how have you segmented that specific market? Your website should concentrate on that market. The more specialized you become, the easier it is to speak to that market segment.

Don,t have people sign in. Give them information. Give them substance and something to comeback for. Respond to them quickly and you will generate 10x the business you will gett by having them register their fake names and info. My marketing director has created a very functional and user friendly web site that keeps people coming back to use our site. The more they come, the more comfortable they will be will you do that you can start to develop a relationship with them. Don't piss them off at the start because they'll just go some where else like my site that isn't trying to trap them.

check our site out at http://www.realestate-edmonton.ca

A sound feature that I'm thinking of implementing on my site is a free appraisal option. It'll draw and soak more visitors to my site and will also give me a record of their name and address so that I can contact them. Ditech.com beat me to the punch but I'm near completed with mine.

Free Reports...For first time home buyers, investors, SEller. They love it.

If you know what your doing, this doesn't happen.

I just found a new low cost streaming media provider, just 9.99 a month and I am going to incorporate streaming video "greeting" as well as my "featured listings" each one just 30 secs or so.

Go here http://www.helloworld.com/US/Tour_Start_Consumer.aspx?ID=seattlevmail and check it out.

This was really good to me,
Site: (uder construction)

This is what i did - i have about 1000 registered people although alot of people use false info which is a pain as i have to manually delete it.

You need to set it up so that if they give false info they don't get access!

I'm not big on having people register for the MLS. Many potential buyer clients will move on to the next site in your area with free MLS access.

However, if you are part of the 50% of real estate web site owners that swears by MLS registration, here's a way to prevent phony email information.

All that you need to do is is change your registration form to send a confirmation email to the email address that they provide. Then provide them with a confirmation link that adds their info to your database and then redirects them to the MLS entry page.

This way, if they do not provide you with a correct email address they cannot access MLS data.

I am talking to a friend who is going to help me make a "PHP" form for people to send me their information,
Does anyone have ideas whether it would be worthwhile to have the forms go to a database or just emaikl me the info?

If you use a database on your web site, then you can also create a web application to work with the DB data (i.e. send newsletters, drip email, add your own notes, delete users, stop email to users, etc.). Be sure that your form also includes the "date sent" in your database - you will need date info in the future more than you realize.

You should also create a way to manually enter email addresses and other contact info that you have received from other sources. As a courtesy, you should ask these people if you can add their info to your automated lists.

If you don't use a web DB for contact management, you should immediately enter the data in whatever contact management system you are using for other meetings and correspondance.

I am thinking page one is my intro (30secs) video and my current listing links to mls and the form....

What format are you using for video?

Whatever you use, remember that close to 50% of all web surfers us dial up for their connection. Your best option may be to NOT set the video to autoplay. And if your server does not have video streaming capabilities, make sure that your video buffer size is adequate.

If you are using actual video (not animation) your best bet is to use encode the video with Flash Video, then use a Flash Video player.

Actually the service I use makes the video available in streaming format in three speeds 33k dsl and "LAN" or cable,
Plus it is streaming and not player dependant,
So far it has been flawless!!
But those are good points one of the choices available is a flash player,