Hello Folks,

I have a couple of Real Estate Websites that are now starting to get traffic! I'm looking for the best conversion methods! Please advise?????

Are these "home listing" type sites? What are you offering your visitors. What reasons are you giving them to contact you?

Do you make it easy to contact you? Can they find your phone number and email address? If you have a contact form, is that easy to use?

Realty Presence...

thanks for your quick response!

Please take a quick look at my site and give me your thoughts www.SanDiego-House.com

I think all the things you mentioned have been well addressed! However, I'm open to idea's!

Do you have any type of user tracking system? Can you see where people are going once they get to your page? Which links are they clicking on?

Traffic Analyzer only! showing Url and Search term! Do you have one better that you would recommend?

I personally like AXS . You add a little bit of HTML to each page and it will track users around your site. You can see which pages most users visit, about how long they stay, where they come from, how they navigate the site etc.

RealtyPresence...what tracking system are you using!

I go into my site logs and see exactly where people are visiting, and where their coming from. Don't be adding any third party addins. Counters are the worst, but their are others, including many so called analizers. That information sits in your hosts logs, and your host likely provides you one, if not many ways to view it.

Logs are confusing, especially if you don't know what you're looking for. AXS is a useful tool that can help answer a lot of the questions I posted above, it's more accurate than an awstats or similar log viewing program too.

San Diego,

I looked at the SanDiego-House website, and had a couple thoughts. First, I'd change the menu title color to white. I think the gray is a bit difficult to see. I'd also center the home page because it looks better, and the rest of the pages are centered.

Second, I agree that having a content-rich site helps to keep visitors on your site. But IMO, what you say on your site is just as important. There are a lot of real estate sites out there. You need to give your visitors a reason to make you the one they contact. I'd put a marketing message on the home page that makes a compelling case for why someone should work with you as opposed to any other agent.

IMHO, this is an area that is usually overlooked. This doesn't refer directly to your site, but saying that you are #1, or Your [City] Real Estate Resource (that's a popular one), or that you work hard for your clients, or that you REALLY want their business just isn't an effective marketing message.

When you buy a car, do car companies sell you with "we work hard to make really good cars" or "we sold a lot of cars, so they must be good"? You may not need a market niche, but a unique marketing message to get people to contact you might just make a difference in your conversion rate!

San Diego, you've also got a LOT of great info on the site. I'd consider doing a very brief site intro on the home page, too, so people know the kinds of things they'll find if they go the Buyers or Sellers section, etc.

OK, I'll get off my soapbox now. I've just always noticed that everyone puts a lot of emphasis on the technical stuff, but almost no emphasis on the marketing message!

Kathleen

People want content, information and ease of use. They don't want a marketing message, they can get that anywhere, every other agent website has some boiler plate marketing message, nobody wants to see that.

RealtyPresence,

I agree with you. Its the boilerplate messages that are the problem. But, if you define your own brand, identity, Unique Selling Proposition, or whatever you want to call it, you will differentiate yourself from all the boilerplate!

For example, one agent sells himself as providing Sound Real Estate Solutions. His home page talks about:

A House is More than a Home - It's an Investment!

and he goes on to really speak to investors and folks who want their home to be a good investment. Its not really a niche, but just a reflection of how he does what he does.

Ah I gotcha, I agree too!

Hey guys thanks for the information! I really appreciate it! I have another question off topic! For some reason this Forum is not showing up in my BL's can you please fill me in!

They should over time, also I just noticed within your signature you have a bunch of keywords all pointing to your domain name. That's actually a waste of space becuase Google will count only 1 (ONE ) of those links which are going to the same place.