| Have you been mostly ignoring all the new
emphasis upon Internet marketing in Real Estate? Well, you’re not alone. At a time
when perhaps 30% of online home buyers use the Internet to search for homes and find an
agent, 54% of real estate firms and something far less than 10% of agents have a web site.
Of those who do, perhaps less than one percent have a clue on how to effectively market
over on web. Conversely, agents who are
web-savvy are making a killing by getting many leads daily from their web sites. These
perhaps 2-3 skilled Internet marketers in each Orange County city are capturing the
lion’s share of web-generated leads that used to manifest themselves as calls
to an up desk or as walk-ins at a Realty firm. And as millions more potential buyers
world-wide get on-line, you’ll get even fewer up-desk calls and walk-ins.
What can you do? If you lack a home computer system,
immediately buy one. Great systems cost less than $900, including computer, screen,
printer and accessories. Next, get yourself online by signing up with a local Internet
Service Provider. A fast, easy, reliable one that I use is West Coast Internet in
Capistrano Beach at 714-487-3305. AOL? Forget it. They’re too slow for business use.
But no matter how, DO get online and start exploring the Internet on your own. Why?
Because to learn well, you have to get your feet wet on your own.
Know this: You don’t have to know much about
computers to be get around on the Internet. You only have to know how 10-12 buttons work
on your Internet browser. And emailing is so easy that you can learn it in ten minutes!
Once you play around with the Internet for a few weeks on
your own, then run, don’t walk, to your nearest Internet Real Estate marketing course
and sign up. OCAR has a great course (one of the few Board-sponsored ones in California)
developed by Technology Director Barbara Cox who is one of the rare people who truly does
understand real estate web marketing. Call OCAR today at (714) 586-6800 and get into
one of Barbara’s Internet courses.
What’s the alternative to not learning to market
over the Internet? Getting a progressively smaller piece of the buyer pie for yourself.
Did you know that most on-line buyers planning to move here from other states won’t
even deal with a California Realtor who lacks email. In fact, buyers often compare agent
web sites—one against the other—to select an agent to begin house-hunting for
them months before they plan moving here. Or, they’ll send a query to several agents
and then choose the one who answers back first with the most comprehensive answer,
assuming that agent will be more responsive over all than the others.
One Virginia buyer told me he contacted five Orange County
agents through their web sites and not one of the agents answered back—ever!
So when you do get on-line, check and answer your email several times daily.
Can you afford to ignore Internet marketing? Not any more.
Not if you want to grow your business instead of seeing it steadily decline as web-savvy
Realtors skim off the best buyers and sellers—whom I suspect are precisely the very
ones using the Internet to look for homes and agents.
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