It has been a little bit over a year and a half since I joined my new brokerage company, eXp Realty and I have to say that the training I have received has been top notch. I'm a bit of a techie (okay, I'm totally a techie) and I naturally gravitated towards the classes on inbound marketing and search engine optimization.
One of my best friends is a business owner and what I would consider a professional salesman. My mother-in-law used to say that he could "talk a hungry dog off a meat wagon" and I have to say it is true. He just has a natural gift to sell anything.
I was recently talking with him about how I have been implementing the skills I have learned from my weekly online training classes at eXp Realty on SEO and inbound marketing and he was telling me how powerful inbound marketing is for sales. It got me thinking about my success so far and I thought I would share it here with my friends on Active Rain.
In less than a year I have positioned my local Methuen real estate blog site on the first page of google for two of my target search terms. Here is a look at my first real estate blog's performance over the past year.
This was my first attempt at blogging and I have to admit that I made some mistakes when setting up my first blog. I think my site looks great now thanks to the great designers I have at my disposable here as an agent with eXp Realty (for free I might add).
Taking what I learned from my first blog I have recently started a new statewide blog targeting real estate leads throughout Massachusetts. I am already on the second page of google for my target search terms for that site and these search terms get around 100k searches a month. I'm looking forward to the day that I break through to the first page with those search terms! Here are my recent google analytics for my statewide blog site from the past month.
Notice that the Average time on this site is almost double my first site, the bounce rate is lower, and percent returning visitors is higher. If you are new to google analytics and have questions about this data please contact me and I will try to answer any questions that you might have.
The other exciting thing about my new site is that inbound leads are starting to come in. Inbound leads generated from organic search traffic, in my opinion, have an advantage over leads generated from other methods such as door knocking, cold calls, and leads from print, mail, or other types of advertisements. Not that those other methods are not effective, but having a prospect coming to you to inquire about your services is always nice.
Inbound leads on your site mean that someone found your site, saw a match in your services with their current needs and they contacted you for assistance. It can't get much better than that (other than word of mouth leads from your previous clients). Many of these leads inquire about specific homes that they are interested in. I have had some of these leads turn into single showings and offers on the first showing.
My real estate consumer leads are starting to come in slowly now, but in preparation for my influx of leads that I anticipate I will be getting next year I am looking to network with other agents in Massachusetts as referral partners throughout the state. If you are interested, please contact me to discuss any time and I will add you to my referral agent database.
In the mean time I will keep posting my referrals on the Active Rain referral network page.
I also wanted to extend this special offer out to all Massachusetts and New Hampshire real estate agents. If you join my team here at eXp Realty this winter during the slower months I will personally help you set up your own blog, identify target keywords for your local market, optimize your site for those keywords, and show you how to get your blog ranked high in the search engines for your target keywords.
Let me know if you are interested in learning more!
Thank you,
Chris
