Somewhere along the line I got involved in the real estate market. Not so much that I was actually involved in buying or selling real estate but more like integrating real estate listings into websites. This all came about shortly after my obsession with search engine optimization and search engine marketing. It did not take too long to figure out that the two seemed to go hand in hand. Anybody that is looking to list their property on the internet also wants to make sure that people are seeing it.

From there Websting.com was transformed into a real estate web design company.

Well, that was back in 2003 when the real estate market was booming and real estate web sites were a top priority.

Nowadays, real estate agents (and everybody else) are doing whatever they can to scrape in enough just to stay afloat. The economy is doing terrible and homes just aren’t selling all that well. I saw this coming a few years ago and have been checking out alternative markets that would sound interesting. I needed to come up with a way to make a living off something other than real estate web design. I have maintained the real estate market as my primary source of income for a few years now so it has been tough to find other alternatives.

I created this blog several years ago but have never written much. I love to read, but I hate to write. The purpose for creating this blog was to increase the traffic to my website and therefore increase my customer base. However, due to the fact the this is a real estate related website, I needed to keep things on track with the real estate market. Just in case you don’t know, the more focused my website is, the more traffic the search engines send my way. This kind of make things extra hard on me because this sort of blog requires you to provide information on a specific topic. That has always frustrated me because a) I hate to write and b) I especially don’t like to write about real estate web design. It is hard enough to read up on this kind of information for myself, let alone write about it.  Therefore, I have been thinking about it and maybe I have found something that I can write about.

As much as I don’t like to write about real estate web design, I do like to brag about some of the traffic that I receive to some of my websites and some of the things I have been doing with that traffic. I figure that this can tie in to the real estate market in some off the beaten path way. The way that I look at it is that we are all trying to make a buck these days and I may as well share some of the ideas that I am doing to try to get ahead. I know full well that the majority of the visitors who come to my site are somehow related to the real estate industry so I will try to keep this interesting for them.

I constantly get people asking me how to get more traffic to their sites and once they get that traffic how to convert that traffic into sales. My answer always is, if you put the effort in that it takes to drive traffic to your site, then the sales will just come naturally. The reason is that it really takes a lot of constant effort to drive and maintain traffic to your website. This effort requires you to consistently add content to your website and also add backlinks to your website wherever possible. In order to get any kind of traffic from the search engines your website needs to appear as an authority on the subject that you are presenting.

Now, here is my problem (and solution). Over the years I have somehow managed to drive around 15,000 visitors a month to my website. I must admit that this has been great and has pretty much been my main way for getting new business. However, the downturn of the real estate market has really created a lot of extra work and unfortunately a lot of accounts receivable issues. Not that I am blaming anyone, I understand the situation, many real estate agents are changing companies and several others are trying to change their marketing strategy. I have always thought that I get way too much traffic for the amount of business that I can actually keep up with and I have always looked for other sources of income to earn from this this traffic and this is what I have discovered. Google Adsense and Affiliate Marketing.

For the past few years I have been experimenting with both Google Adsense and Affiliate Marketing and about a year or two later I am ready to confess that it might actually be worth the effort. My income from each has steadily increased over time and the fact that there are customer issues to deal with i.e. site creation, billing, maintenance. It has been nice. The weird thing about it is that this is an income that has been made in the deep back end of my website. The part that most people who come to my site are not really looking for. Sure, I am turning away a few customers, but at least I am getting paid for the ones that I do.

Now that I have said all of this and wasted a lot of time writing just for the sole purpose of gaining traffic. I will now make the announcement. I have decided that I want to bring the ads and the affiliate marketing to the forefront and pull it out of the deep back end of my website. I have just begun a new transformation that I hope to complete by next year. I am trying to come up with a product list to display and ad placement. Hopefully, I will be able to blog about it to anyone interested. The reason that I want to let others know about this is because the real estate market is tough right now and there are a lot of people out there trying to make ends meet. Maybe you will get some ideas on how increase traffic to your own website, increase your brand awareness, and more importantly, make a few bucks in the process.

Hopefully it won’t be another two years until I blog again.

1) Domains purchased for Search Engine Placement

The purpose of these domains is to rank high in the search engines, because the actual domain name contains the keywords being searched for. Search Engine domains are very rarely brandable, and are mostly used exclusively as side Internet properties to redirect traffic to the main site. A company who sells real estate in the San Francisco Bay Area would benefit from acquiring sanfranciscobayarearealestate.com and bayarea.com, because that domain name has a high probability of ranking at, or very near to, the top of a search for ‘bay area real estate’. A tool that I use to find what is being searched for on the internet is: Overture Keywords (http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/). The only problem with this strategy is that the competition for these names to actually rank well is fierce. You can check many search engine specific domain names and find that the name is nowhere near the top of the list. This is why I feel that you would really only need to consider this kind of name if you are planning on a Search Engine Optimization campaign. Keep in mind that this type of campaign often requires a lot of time and effort to make it work.

2) Branding Domains

When starting a new web venture, the obvious choice for brand domains is to start with your own personal name. This can be relatively successful if you have a common name (like mine Brian Baker), and can provide new potential clients with an easy name to remember. In the case that your name is not as easy to spell or pronounce as mine, you might consider a creative approach of a brandable name. A domain that is about 5 letters long is highly desirable for a brand. However, the domain must sound right as well. I have heard opions on both sides whether or not to use your own name or a branded domain name. I have always started with the fact that personal names will more than likely show up near the top of the search engine list. This provides the name a ‘phone book’ type of status. If you purchase and develop a site in your own name, chances are that you will show up at the top when someone does a search for your name. This is different than search engine domains because the competition is far less competitive and chances are that you are doing a great deal of off line marketing and your personal name gets its own memorable brand. At least potential clients have a way of finding you.

3) General Term Domains

General term domains are the most popular choice. Generic words like realestate.com and lender.com have a value of their own that cannot be ignored. Like Search Engine Placement Domains, which attract a large number of visitors through search engine referrals, so do generic word domains. For this reason, generic word names are still very much desired and their value continues to rise. These type of names cover all areas for a good domain. They are easily branded and search engine friendly. The only problem here is that the names are not availble for purchase. There are other smart marketers out there that have owned these names for many years and they are not about to let them go, often asking thousands of dollars just for the purchase of the domain name itself. I have strong feelings whether or not these names are ever worth the asking price (at least in the real estate and lender market). The only reason being that real estate tends to be a more local effort. Lenders might consider the purchase of one of these names purely because their marketing costs on the internet can already be quite expensive. I have mentioned in a previous post that Google Adwords can cost more than $5 per visitor. This could easily add up to thousands of dollars in cost pretty quick. A general domain name would instantly bring this traffic at no extra cost (people just type in these names first before even going to Google to see what comes up).

There are enough relatively inexpensive options available to get the word out, but the bottom line is, you need to get the word out.