Real Estate Marketing Techniques that Work!

Is DMoZ Dead now? No More Open Directory Project?

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:20:33 -0600

Do your hear the TAPS playing for DMOZ now? I do.

DMOZ is the Open Source Directory Project. Or was. I'm not sure if the service is dead. Dying or on Financial Life Support. All I know is the site is not working and nobody seems to care about fixing it. I've been trying DMOZ now for months. I get the same screen below every time I try to add a URL to them.

So Brett, Billie, Jane... I'm working away on your SEO... but I think someone out there just pulled out one of the legs on the chair I was standing on. It's not a death sentence, it just means we have to do more on incoming links, Twitter bursts and some page content.

Does anyone else out there on ActiveRain know anything about DMOZ? Enquiring minds want to know!

If you're not familiar with DMOZ, technically speaking, this is where the Internet started it's first catalog of everything on the planet.

Websites.

Cameras.

Even Real Estate offices.

It used to be that getting your Website into DMOZ was something to really Yahoo about (pun intended.). Getting listed into DMOZ means that AOL, Google and the other search engines could start indexing you and ranking you higher in the Natural Organic Search Engine Results Page results (SERP). Today, Blogging and Twittering seems to be a fast way to get this done but so many people are not Blogging the right way, and a lot more are not using Twitter effectively.

Google has become the household word now as evidenced that the phrase, "Google it," is now a part of Webster's dictionary now I think. Who uses the Yellow Pages anymore? Your computer, iPhone or Blackberry has Google so you just use that instead.

It's never been easy or fast to add your website to DMOZ largely because they are not run by robots, crawlers, and a lot of the automation doo-dah's you'd expect to find at Bing / MSN, Yahoo! or Google.

DMOZ is run by live people. They manually approve sites submitted to them. Sometimes it takes months to get even reviewed. Why? Because the editors are not paid to read your emails and try to figure out where to put your website if you submitted it to the wrong category. DMOZ Editors are non-paid volunteers.

The site is always asking for people to become editors, but that's not easy to become one, either.

Let's assume you're a real estate agent and you have a real estate website you want to get listed into DMOZ.

It sort of becomes a conflict of interest for you to be a REALTOR in Pleasantville and naturally, you want your site to be listed and you want to be an Editor at the same time. So you might not want other broker or agent websites to be listed in Pleasantville. Just yours.

For that reason alone, it's hard to fake your way into the good graces of DMOZ as an editor and getting your Real Estate Website listed at the same time.

So forget the Editor part. You submit your website. And you wait. And you wait. And you wait.

And weeks or sometimes months later -- you get approved. But 90% of them submitted get denied.

But getting approved means you have to make your website read like plain vanilla when you describe it.

You cannot use words like;

We're #1.
Premiere Realty in Pleasantville.
Etc., etc.

You must be very, very careful to tone down the use of any flowery, or puffy marketing statements about your site. So getting listed into DMOZ required that you wrote your description like a librarian is the only rule to follow.

Like the sample below.

DMOZ has been really quiet for year. I've yet to get anybody's website listed there for over 14 months now and in my opinion, they've been largely forgotten about and is about to become extinct.

If you Google the phrase: DMOZ is DEAD, you get a lot of links with other people like me who seem to be wondering where the Editors are, and what the heck is going on with DMOZ anymore.

Sharks can smell blood in the water, and the Bartman predicts that Steve Balmer (Microsoft) will want to buy DMOZ out or maybe one day, Google will. Until then, we should all keep a watchful eye on what happens with DMOZ.

Because once upon a time, it was the only way to guarantee your website would ever be seen in the Yahoo, Google and other search engines and directories.

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Follow Me on Twitter: My Google Rank Drops. Why?

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 11:08:18 -0600

For years now, we've been reading and seeing how to get our Websites ranking higher on a natural search results page on Google.

Two years ago, Twitter comes along and now the spirit of true, Herd Mentality, thousands of REALTORS have moooooved on over to copying what the other REALTORS are doing -- hoping and praying the technique will generate more leads and sales commissions.

We copy the same links; Follow Me on Twitter. And we make the mistake of putting too many Follow Me links on our home page despite the fact you've probably spent years trying to get people to COME to your website... you tell them to GO AWAY.

Weeks later, your visibility goes down and you are left wondering what the heck just happened?

Too many redirects from your home page is not only stupid, it's the fastest way to see your page one #1 Google rank drop to #2. Then, it drops to #3. And the slide just keeps on a-sliding down... down... down.

A former SEO client of mine has a website ranking page one #1 for seven years. Then a year ago, they added the Twitter Follow Me bug. And the Linked In Bug. And one from Christies Great Estates.

You spend thousand of dollars on a new site and SEO work. Then you spend MORE money with your offline marketing efforts telling next time home buyers to GO TO www.SantaFeProperties.com.

Then when you get people coming to your website, your home page tells them to GO AWAY. Find us on Twitter. Find us on LinkedIn. Find us on Facebook.

That might sound silly, but this is exactly what your website says to visitors you've tried to come to your website for months or even years of working to improve your Google ranking. Now that they find you, you tell them to find you someplace else.

Trust me, this can be leading up to; Lead sabotage. And thousands of REALTORS and brokers are just watching their leads drop, and they think by placing the Follow Me links on their website will increases leads... it can create the opposite effect.

People will click on things and links because you give them reason to do so. They are not immune to Herd Mentality either.

After a few clicks, is it any surprise why your visitor is now looking at properties from Amazing Realty instead of yours? For too many REALTOR websites, it's clear to me that too many of you are suffering from Mad Cow Disease, just like Denny Crane from Boston Legal.

It doesn't have to be that way. You can use Twitter and other links to your advantage, but you need to use them wisely and correctly.

There are SMARTER ways to use Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Below are Bartman's Top Ten SAFE Ways to Use Social Media effectively to keep people coming BACK to your website from other channels out there.

1.) Don't put offsite links on your home page.

If you have page one # 1 ranking on Google now, be careful how many links to offsite websites you ADD to your home page.

2.) Rule of thumb: Place your Follow Me on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn on your Contact Me pages and other pages inside. This is especially important if you are just now building links to your home page.

3.) One Way Link Bulding.

ActiveRain.com, Curbed.com and many other Real Estate blogs can be used to build one way, incoming links to your properties. Don't just link all links to your home page. This is not a smart idea. Build links to point to your properties and about the life style and communities you know about.

4.) 1888FreePressRelease.com.

A great place to post your FREE press releases with links pointing BACK to your website.

5.) PRWeb.com.

The BEST place to post your Press Releases. $100 - $200 cost each, but you get to go BACK and edit the links to make them SEO friendly and point them to your website pages.

6.) Get links from Title, Mortgage companies even Landscapers and custom home builders.

They might have a crappy looking website, but ask them for a one way link from their site to yours. NEVER give a link back to them as this will give you what is called Google PR Hemorrhage. Never give reciprocal links BACK to any website until AFTER one year AFTER you've held a page one position on Google.

7.) Social Media Pay per Post, Pay per Blog.

There is one firm out there that seems to have done it right. SocialSpark.com is the one to see. You can buy ads on this system to be inserted into popular blogs out there. This is a great way to build awareness of your website for geo-centric, local searches.

8.) StumbleUpon.com

It's a web site that says what id does and does what it says. It emails hundreds of thousands of people every week with suggested Websites they should visit. Visitors to the site indicate a few sites and topics they like. And weekly, StumbleUpon will deliver the user a cornucopia of Websites and some of them... NEED to be your real estate website.

9.) Sell LifeStyle. Don't sell just homes.

This is the big trap of conventional thinking. But next time home buyers today can get their house with or without a REALTOR. So when they come to your website, dazzle them with Life Style. We're just now completing a website for Jane Paulus of Edina Realty now. The website is here: www.TwinCitiesHomefinders.com -- See the emphasis on Live -- Work Play and the rich page content of living in Minneapolis. Google loves this stuff and so will your next time home buyers.

10.) Get your Banner Ads on the iPhone, BlackBerry and Mobile Devices.

Just because you're page one on Google doesn't mean you can't get more leads. Google now offers a Paid Search program that allows you to snag 50,000 banners for $18 bucks or thereabouts. Create Google Visual Ads that are shown on mobile devices. It's cheap and it's effective.

Lots more good stuff to come later. I'm trying to get our company moved to Colorado Springs, but if anyone needs more help on these items above, call me or email me.

I'm always glad to be of service.

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Thugs Making Calls from: 775-412-4499

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:06:07 -0600

I received a call today from that number at 9:07 am. Says UNAVAILABLE but the number is stamped: 775-412-4499.

I did some research on the Internet and found out a few thousand other people are getting the same calls. Apparently, to collect old debts from 1999 and back. Maybe you got a call from them, too?

I don't have any old debts, but I did used to do some programming for the old Chilton/TRW firm in Dallas, TX in the late 1980's when they modernized their three floors of file cabinets of consumer credit microfiche to computers. Today this firm is now -- Experian.

Suffice it to say, I went to the FTC do not call and complained and I asked the FTC (in the comments box) if they could please drop a small tactical nuke on the building where these calls are coming from. I hope I don't get a visit from some government people now by saying that. We'll see.

Here's the law people: There is NO debt public or private that can be collected on after 7 years.

If you have a debt that is older than 7 years and say it went to collections 7 years, one month ago... the debt is no longer collectible. This is different of course if you have an ACTIVE installment loan, car or of course a mortgage. I'm talking about the debts that you need to get rid of on your Credit Bureau reports that you haven't paid or confirmed in years.

Most of us have a bill we forgot to pay (or didn't want to pay) to the Yellow Pages ad. Or the Verizon bill that your kids ballooned up to $703.19 when your airtime charges were .33 cents a minute on an old bill from December 2002.

Cleaning up your credit reports is really child's play. But you have to know the rules; Meaning what to say, when to play dumb and shut up and when to take action with a letter, a #10 envelope and a stamp.

You have to write letters to the (3) Credit Bureaus and you must be diligent. The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act is a law that allows consumers to demand valid proof of any debt when you challenge them with the credit bureaus.

They get 30 days to confirm your debt is valid. Fortunately for you (the consumer) many businesses are going out of business now, or are being sold or merged with other firms. All too often, your account with that company can get really buried in a roll up acquisition. This is a good thing because when you go to DEMAND the Credit Bureau confirm the debt... in many cases they can't.

Getting the Credit Bureau to confirm your debt has to be done within those thirty days. If the debt is still there on day 31, you simply inform the Credit Bureau they did not confirm the debt and pursuant to the Fair Credit Reporting Act... the debt must come OFF by law.

Now -- I am NOT advocating ways for you to legally dump valid debts. But sometimes, we all have a few dings on our credit for silly or stupid bills and for some reason it sort of hangs onto your Credit Bureau. I got hit with a bad experience with credit card theft and I've done a pretty good job at getting rid of the bad credit Klingons on all of my (3) bureau reports.

STEP ONE: It is important to NEVER ACKNOWLEDGE to any collection agency that you have disputed the debt, but ignore it. Never Never Never confirm your debt is valid. That resets the CLOCK on the 7 year time limit. Bart Wilson? Verizon bill? I don't think so. (this needs to be your standard reply. Just be sure to use your name.. not mine. Hahahahahaha)

STEP TWO: Wait your seven years, deny the charges/debt on your credit bureau and start with Trans Union first. They are the easiest to push over and easiest to quickly remove any challenged debt(s) you have.. Once you clean up TransUnion, then work on Experian and Equifax.

Many large cities have an Experian or Equifax in your home town. Dress up nicely. Make an appointment and take your cleaned up TransUnion report with you along with your drivers license, any utility bill and your SSAN card.

Never Never Never (I mean NEVER) send copies of this information in an envelope and mail it to the credit bureaus. This is why ID theft is skyrocketing. Too many thugs working in the Credit Card Theft cartels have relationships with local mail carriers. They get paid to open up envelopes, copy your information, the envelope gets sealed with tape... and you will never know.

Until it is too late.

Good luck to all of you and fight fire with fire and report this 775-412-4499 bastards to the FTC do not call list.

If anyone know where they are, I will personally make a visit to them and our attorneys will bury them in so much legal paperwork, their grand kids will still be paying the bill.

Knowledge is Power. Power to the people.

-- Bartman (the one and the original)

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Is it Okay for an MLS to Restrict Your Listings?

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:49:33 -0600

Realcomp II, a local Detroit MLS just got spanked pretty hard this week by the FTC.

Apparenly, the FTC slapped them around a bit because they got caught restricting listings from local (discount) brokers who had agency exclusive listings. The FTC simply told Realcomp II to Publish the MLS Listings or else.

It's the same problem we've heard countless times before ranging from our own trade association to CMLS pulling the same stunts. You cannot restrict listings. FSBO's seem to be okay to restrict as they are not REALTOR sponsored and broker carried. But we all know an agent who DOES take a FSBO under their wings and then posts it to Realtor.com. At Bohnen Realty -- we did a few.

But it's NOT okay to restrict your listings just because you happen to own a discount brokerage like HelpUSell or Asssit2Sell.

It's criminal.

We cannot discriminate on who buys a house thanks to the Fair Housing Act, right?

But it's perfectly okay to restrict your listings if you work for a discount broker?

Sorry -- not in America. This cannot be allowed to happen. I applaud the FTC. I'm paying for MLS access. I've paid my NAR annual dues. Therefore I get to post my listings. The fact that they happen to belong to HelpUSell, or Assist2Sell is none of your damned business. You cannot penalize me because my business card doesn't read.; Sotheby's.

And every year it seems, some other smart ass MLS system thinks it's perfectly okay to toss ethics and discrimination out the window. It's pathetic, it's appalling and in today's economy... it's certainly unnecessary. The last thing we need is an MLS dictating to us how we can list our listings or not. We need to see some real leadership from our local MLS to help many of us keep our doors open. The last thing we need is predatory behavior like this.

Dozens of real estate brokerages are closing their doors every month. I've personally chronicled the death of 217 brokerages over the past 14 months. Six alone for Coldwell Banker, the most recent one being the Hunt Kennedy Group who died this past summer in Manhattan. The agents who still wanted to work went over to the Corcoran Group.

Okay, there's my rant. What's YOUR opinion?

Do you think it's okay to allow the local MLS to restrict their listings like that?

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Google Voice. Voice Mail was Never this Much Fun.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 20:21:06 -0500

Google Wave. Google Search. Google Docs. Google Apps. Let's face it. Lots of us are Goo-goo over Google.

And for good reason. Simplicity is what we all crave.

Aren't you just a little tired of dealing with five, seven or even ten different companies out there who mange your website, Top Producer, Settlement Room, Point2Agent, Reply! for leads.... aaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhh it makes you want to scream.

There'a a lot to like about Google when it comes to anyone streamlining their real estate business. They innovate constantly, which is something a lot of us should be doing, too. And best of all, Google is a big enough company to pay lots of propeller head engineers to come up with some impressive business solutions at a price tag that we all like.

FREE.

So... if you haven't heard of Google Voice, here's the skinny from the Bartman.

It's a single phone number that Google can set up for you, or in two weeks -- you can use your own phone number. But now on line, you can create any greeting you want. Forward calls to any phone number you want and it's pretty cool having ALL of your voice mail messages in one place.

My Google Gmail is about three years old, and I've got emails from now bankrupt and dead brokers like the Coldwell Banker Hunt Kennedy Group and All Pro Realty who closed their doors in October 2008.

So I guess it's time to go in and clean out some old Email "dust bunnies," here.

One really nice advantage of Google voice is that is can translate your voice mails into text and send it to your cell phone or email. This way, if all you want to do is get the voicemail to hurry up and give you the phone number to call back... Google can now grant your wish.

You can set up different outgoing voice mail greetings for your customers. Make another for your mom, one for your friends, etc. It's like a fancy Voice Mail PBX without the expensive price tag.

I've been using RingCentral.com and it's good. But I pay $49 a month. With Google, I can save that $49 and buy a tank of gas with my savings. I just need someone to invite me to Google voice so I can start using it.

Click here and watch the Google Voice Video.

While all of this sounds "too good to be true," it does come with a few "gotcha's."

1.) For now, Google is only available via invitation.

2.) Not all of these cool features (above) are going to be available unless you HAVE a Google Voice phone number.

Insiders for me at Google tell me that changes or STARTS to change in two more weeks. So stay tuned to my blog posts for more.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

ArGh! Now I Have to Sort Through Twitter Tweets.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 18:18:10 -0500

I've been micro-interrupted so many times with my iPhone with people Tweeting on Twitter I've just turned the damned service off so I can get some work done.

I could care less that Arnold was pissed off that a photographer caught his wife red handed driving with a phone stuck to her ear. I'm thankful that the California fires were put out, but Arnold like to Tweet a lot. He Tweets seven... sometimes fifteen times a day.

He should change his name to the Tweet-a-nator instead of Gov-a-nator.

President Obama only Tweets three or so times a day and it's usually to rally us or thank us for calling in for support of the helping to fix the Healthcare system. These are valuable Tweets, but when you add in Arnold and Tweets about the Balloon Boy from CNN I'm starting to lose my concentration. Nothing is getting done.

I turned all Tweet notifications OFF. I'm starting to hate the idiot who made the Tweet iPhone app even possible. How anybody gets any work done in this country and claims they can monitor 100 Tweets is a liar. You can tell them the Bartman said so.

It's impossible to focus and claiming you're a multi-tasking, Social Networking Twittering wizard and all your clients are happy and all your work is being done on time. I say it's pure BS. Employers are now starting to march their employees off to the front door for screwing off too many hours at the company's payroll expense.

Now Google and Microsoft says they're adding these same TWEETS to their search results now.

Fine. There goes the neighborhood. More crap that you and I have to wade through when we start searching for stuff online tomorrow.

The real estate market never sleeps and I guess it's fair to say that no matter how much we hate it... technology is going to be changing, too. So it's Bartman to the rescue to help all of us to make sense of this new fangled stuff.

Today Google and Microsoft's Bing (you've got porn!) are going to include Tweets in their seach. Meaning the Bit.ly... short domains you see out there attached to a story are going to be part of organic and (my best guess) even Paid search results.

So for everyone out there who's been groaning and complaining about not having the time to learn to Chirp on Twitter... you have to do it now. Because relevant searches and Tweets about homes in your area are going to be a big part of how folks find you in a few more months.

The problem with this might mean we're all going to be stuck with wading through a bunch of stupid, meaningless tweets about what somebody had for lunch. It's bad enough we have too much information overload coming at us now. How can we possibly deal with Google and Microsoft now heaping more stuff on our plates to sort through? It just seems totally unfair. Nobody asked me if it was okay for Google or Microsoft to start adding TWEETS to the search results. I have to kick out an average of 15 jerks, bozos and leaches OUT of my Twitter account every week now.

Now I have to brace myself for having to sort through meaningless Tweets as part of a Google or Microsoft search engine results page? Please, somebody shoot me now. I just can't take anymore.

The Bartman sees big problems with any real estate searches simply because there's the potential of having millions of "Tweets" which might be confusing if you search for Homes in your area.

"Did you see that last episode of House?" (and I'm referring to Hugh Laurie's TV show: HOUSE)

So how in God's good name are we going to find any relevance in that for a real estate search for homes in a certain area?

Hopefully smart people like Google's Matt Cutts can figure this one out.

It's clear that Google's AdWords and those SEO Rock Stars has a place for helping their customers get ranked on Google naturally. But adding TWEETS to a Google search results can only be more of a headache as it gives us all MORE crap to wade through to find what we want. We need LESS information on line, not more of it.

Asking Google and Microsoft Bing users to wade through a bunch of meaningless Tweets about what someone else had for lunch is only going to make me lose mine.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

The Bad People Lurking on Twitter and Facebook

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:59:22 -0500

Dean posted a good article on Twitter security today. Way to go Dean.

Twitter is not safe. Far from it. Too many of us like Facebook and Twitter. But less than 90% of us truly understand the grave risks that using these tools presents to your becoming just another victim of identity theft.

Twitter uses Cloud-based technology. Which essentially collects clusters of excess space (hard drive space) from lots of pools of other computers and there isn't much bullet proof security you can apply to that technology. It's hacked all the time.

Do the math. How many times has Twitter been hacked this year alone? Click the link on the left here and see for yourself. So you think Twitter is safe, eh? I rest my case.

The other problem is the sheer number of time wasting, ID stealing applications on Facebook.

Your friend pokes you, another sends you flip flops.

A friend sends you a Heart or invites you to a pillow fight.

Another wants to hug you or challenge you to Mafia Wars.

Every time you accept one of these stupid applications on FaceBook or allow yourself to have your Twitter accessed by a third party program... do you really know how well they built their software? No, you don't. It seems innocent af first and many of give it no real thought. Just click the OK button. Now you have a pillow fight. You get a stupid pair of colored flip flops.

Am I the only person who questions WHY I'm allowing my personal information and and birth date to some company I never heard of? And to make matters worse, you jsut let them have access to your friends information, emails and addresses and birthdays, too.

Wow. What a nice friend you are. Now you not only did you put yourself directly into harm's way, you just screwed your friends and colleagues by placing them at risk, too.

Do you have any clue if their coding is WC3 os ISO compliant? Nope. And yet thousands of us blindly trust them with our personal information. Fine. I have a lot of beach front real estate I want to sell you in Nevada.

Once your IDENTITY has been stolen like mine was, you get really cautions of this crap. Because the bad people are out there. They know how to scrape your information and eventually steal your life, credit cards and your online credit reports. My nightmare is far from over. I had FICO scores of 820. Used to. Now my scores on two of the bureaus are 710 and my Equifax is 610 and they reported only 9 months of credit, a new name and I was born in the 1980's instead of the late 1960's.

I've called and begged Equifax to restore my twenty year record of GOOD credit by sending them copies of my TransUnion and Experian reports. They cleaned up my credit, but they posted the WRONG birthday for me and only 9 months of credit. I'm screwed for five years now as my score will never get up much more from 610 to 640 by the end of the year. It shows I'm too young and don;'t have enough credit history. So what do I do? I can certainly get my attorneys to sue the morons at Equifax.

I end up talking to some nice Indian woman overseas every time I call and ask for a manager. I've jokingly asked to speak to Suze Orman. The woman from India is so polite and replies, "I'm sorry sir, Ms. Orman is just our national spokesperson." Fine, can I borrow her FICO Scores while you fix the mess you did to my financial life? I can't qualify now for that jumbo loan I want in Colorado Springs and you guys are holding me hostage to a report that reads I'm 25 years old and been working for 9 months. I'm 45! Did you not get the certified copies of my TransUnion and Experian reports? "Yes sir we did, but we cannot change your information we have on file."

Now I know why they use these people in India. You can't tell them off and use some really colorful language. They are so sweet and nice and polite. I just don't have the ability to curse them.

Did you know that there are right now, more than 202,913 gangs out there and more than 11.3 million people in the United States that can tap into your conversations and listen in with you and your conversations with Equifax, TransUnion or Experian? This is no BS. This is the one smoking gun that screams for secure communications when you are transmitting your SSAN over the web or a telephone.

I used to work in military intelligence. I used to tap into your phone lines. I was the breathing voice you heard on the other end of the line. It's called the Patriot Act and the military can do a lot of thigns that you are not going to happy to learn about. Your private conversations, your emails. We know what's in there. The problem with the military and government is, as we tap into this information and we send copies of this back to the NSA and CIA (computers), your personal data is once again at risk as it is being transmitted so the bad guys out there with the same equipment we have, can siphon off the information, too.

Any idiot with $140 bucks can buy themselves an operators handset which can tap into any twisted pair phone line. It's a problem in New York and many cities with large under ground sewers where the phone company runs millions of miles of copper and fiber optic cables. You pop open any manhole cover, you drop in or you just open up any one of thousands of phone junction boxes attached to your local shopping mall. Hacking into any existing phone line is child's play.

You have no clue who is listening in on your call as you cheerfully blab your SSAN, personal information, last two addresses over the phone.

Your risk of getting nailed by some punk in a gang copying down your information is now one out of fifteen. Envelopes you send to Equifax, TransUnion or Experian can be opened. Information is copied and sold to the gangs then steamed shut or taped shut and you'll never know about it. The safest thing you can do to fix your credit is to never check it online. Never talk to a credit bureau over the phone. You set up an appointment with the local office and you go there in person.

Credit Card cartels and gangs have infiltrated our postal system, and in my case, they worked part time at some of the more classy restaurants posing as cheerful waiters and waitresses. Restaurants today, represent more than 33% of all identity thefts in America and this is on the rise.

I was robbed blind by a young woman posing as a UNM student at an upscale restaurant who after we had several drinks, just asked what we did. She takes our company credit card back to a place where we cannot see her and puts two and two together. She logs into a browser, finds our company address, assumes that is where the company card goes to and she scribbles down the Visa #, expiration and the 3 digits on the back of the card. I had no clue.

A week later she quits her job, and takes my Visa with a $25,000 limit and starts her spending spree as she drives to Oakland, CA. She opens up credit posing as my wife and the rest is just to painful to tell you the rest of the facts. All I can say is her ass is tucked away in a Women's prison in California and her parole hearing is in 2016. I plan to be there in person to tell the parol board she needs to stay another 50 years for screwing up my life.

Sorry for the long post here, but you need to PRACTICE some SAFE ID stuff here if you are going to use Facebook or Twitter.

Here's my rules for staying out of trouble.

1.) Never post your REAL birthdate. Bump it up a few years. Change the day and month, too. Bad guys with wrong information can't steal your ID.

2.) IS your real name Bart on your birth certificate? Online, you post it's Bartholomew. Or Bartley. Again, bad guys with wrong info can't steal your ID.

3.) The stupid programs on Facebook - Forget Them. If you're a teenager, have fun. If you're a REALTOR, knock off the game playing and go sell some homes. Every time you accept a 3rd party program, you are placing your ID and personal information at risk including your friends and family you have saved in your Twitter account. According to NAR's homebuyer's report they published last year, they did not report one single instance of any REALTOR playing Mafia Wars that resulted in a home sale.

4.) Firms are firing employees for screwing off online. Kodak just did it. I used to work there in the 1990's. A friend of mine who is still there said that Kodak HR just marched three employees to the door for playing Mafia Wars on company time.

A Coldwell Banker office is about to implement the same strict policy for their marketing staff. No screwing off on social media networks on company time.

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

NEWS: Yahoo to Stop Paid Inclusion

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 17:00:29 -0500

It's not really any sad news, here if you do not (right now) have a natural page one presence on Yahoo.com.

Prudential still has the leads on Yahoo for a while longer. So if you're not a Prudential REALTOR, there's really nothing you can or should be doing with Yahoo as 70% of the leads generated (or more) on Yahoo are still going to Prudential's call centers.

If they have a qualifying buyer for one of your listings, trust me. They'll call you and you'll be asked to cough up 25 or 30% of your commission for the qualified buyer.

Which is why I continue to tell all REALTORS there's just no reason to focus on any Yahoo natural search engine results for SEO purposes unless you're a Prudential broker or REALTOR.

Steve Balmer might give Prudential the boot now that Microsoft owns Yahoo! so it's kinda hard to tell what's going to happen with the Yahoo-MSN Bing Menage-a-twa. time will tell. I do know that next week Windows 7 comes out and Apple is announcing a new line up of iMacs and I will be getting iMac #72. Brand new processors and a sportier new thinner chassis. I can't wait.

Sorry for getting into weeds there for a minute -- back to SEO and Yahoo.

In the off chance you are launching a brand new website anytime now and the end of the year, you might want to get $299 ready to shell out to Yahoo for PAID inclusion into the directory because as of 1 January 2010, it's gone. Or, hire your local SEO guru to get yourself listed into DMOZ as Yahoo still reads incoming from them.

Yahoo removed (already) it's standard Web submit forms and the new one they are redirecting everyone to is here.

Suffice it to say, Search Submit is on life support and this program dies on 31 December 2009.

You heard it from the Bartman here first. Goodbye Yahoo. Hello Google.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Coming Soon: The Virtual (LIVE) Open House

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:17:58 -0500

Did you hear the news? Adobe Systems -- makers of Adobe Photoshop, DreamWeaver, Illustrator and lots more software we all use made a bold statement.

NO MORE PRODUCT LAUNCHES..... EVER.

It used to be that Adobe, Apple Computer, Dell, Compaq, you name it... would create a BUZZ for a new product launch by inviting a lot of people to New York City, San Francisco, Dallas, Miami (or others) and pack thousands of people into a convention center or hotel to roll out new product.

Flying bar charts, dancing computer generated graphics that would humble Terminator 2 would thunder across a Sony Jumbo-Tron or big screen. There's be a wet bar so you could cozy up with free drinks, get a little bit tipsy then write them a check or break out the plastic for buying (or even PRE-buying) the new products.

But no more. The traditional product launch is dead. Rest In Peace.

Now, Adobe is going to do VIRTUAL product launches and it claims it was already successful. Click here to see the Video.

Adobe shifted 75% of all of it's traditional product launches and advertising to online.

Adobe did a test with a new product roll out by advertising the event on their website. 200,000 people signed up and Adobe used Webcams and their own streaming software to stream a power point like presentation. For those who missed the live event, it was recorded so people could come back and watch in on demand later.

So here's an idea. What if we did away with traditional Open houses? How many people show up to your typical open house?

Just announce the LIVE Open House of 14 Elm Street on your brokerage website. Tweet the event to Twitter and send it out to all of the people who are on your monthly drip marketing newsletters.

Some BENEFITS of the LIVE Open House

Instead of 7 couples and 4 individuals coming to the Open House, you now get 200 or more people watching it LIVE on your website.

You no longer have to kick the owners OUT of the house anymore.

You can do a LIVE open house one time, record it then stream the video from your website to anyone who missed it.

I would personally like to try this idea on for size. What do you think?

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Benefits of an Advertising Agency

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 15:06:40 -0500

A week ago, the four A's (American Association of Advertising Agencies) created a bit of a big stink.

They suggested that smaller advertising agencies and marketing firms are a bargain -- claiming billing rates are half or one third of their larger colleagues.

Which means if your brokerage was using J Walter Thompson (a New York ad agency) as opposed to say a firm like ours, Voyager International.

Shopping for anything on price or FREE can be a big mistake. When you go out shopping for creative talent, you need to focus on finding a firm that's a good fit for your needs.

1.) Are you a high maintenance client?

Do you need to call your ad agency creative staff three or five times a day? Are you neurotic? Do you have the book "Computers for Idiots," next to your laptop? Then you probably need an in-house person. You'll drive any outside marketing agency nuts and you'll get fired inside of 90 days.

2.) Do you know to use your computer? Does Internet Marketing frustrate you to no end?

Do you become annoyed even at simple explanations why your website isn't on Google two days after your website launches? These kind of clients are technology challenged and need an in-house person to constantly answer the same questions over and over again. Because asking your outside marketing or advertising agency these questions is a perfect recipe for you to get fired as a client. (It will be polite and apologetic. But nonetheless, you're simply being fired for being a high maintenance nag.)

3.) Can you afford $30,000 - $50,000 a year in outside marketing/advertising costs?

Small 10 agent shops typically fall under this umbrella. SEO and website services will run you $9,000 - $25,000 initially then another $900 - $2,000 a month in ongoing services. More SEO work (monthly) postcards, radio, and PRWeb.com Press Release ads, and lots of incoming links from the social media networks.

4.) Do you need to spend $150,000 - $500,000 a year in outside marketing costs?

Typical ad spend on marketing and advertising if you have three or more offices, or your REALTOR work force is 300 agents or above. SEO and website services will run you $20,000 - $40,000 initially then another $5,000 - $8,000 a month in ongoing services. Monthly sit down meetings are part of the service. Branding of your top selling agents with a semi-custom or custom website are often included with the larger agencies. More SEO work (monthly) postcards, radio, billboard and PRWeb.com Press Release ads, and lots of incoming links from the social media networks.

If you're a medium to large brokerage, it's certainly easy to see why using a large advertising agency can get pretty expensive. But there are good reasons for them to BE expensive.

1.) Top agencies have Top talent. If you need clip art and stock photos, you can go to iStockPhoto.com. But if you need to get your business name on the lips of everybody in town, nobody will out perform the creative and marketing talent you will get from a respected national advertising agency. Small agencies can do this too, it's just that with smaller teams, they can't turn on a dime quite as fast.

2.) Resources, Resources, Resources. If you need a billboard done across town, if you need to run a :30 second radio commercial, if you need to brainstorm on a 2nd website strategy... it's not a problem if you needed it done yesterday.

All of these things cost money.

Smaller creative and marketing shops like Voyager and many others are a different breed of ad agency.

Instead of big teams and big systems, you invest into the creative talent of a small group of multi-talented people. A day in the life doing my job, for example is spent often working 6 days a week, and working around the hours of some of my clients who can only brain storm with me at 7:45 pm my time... 10:45 pm east coast time. Being a small shop, we often have a creative hit list of outside freelance copywriters and Flash design gurus who love nothing more than to work the midnight oil on creative, crash and burn projects.

Small shops are tenacious and we have the tendency sometimes to be slow on completing things. All too often, clients like to micro-manage and add lots of feature creep requests which create their own slow downs. Smaller shops are also more technology and marketing savvy than their larger colleagues. This means a nice departure from the business as usual, "one-size-fits-all" marketing mix.

Down markets often result in the big players in your market pulling back on advertising. This is a tragic mistake that you can take advantage of. For example, the newspaper used to carry a full page ad of Amazing Realty. But for weeks, they've not advertised there anymore. Customers reading the newspaper get used to reading the ads from Amazing Realty. But now... they're not there anymore.

Next time home buyer are no different than next time car buyers. Or next time appliance or sofa buyers. They all read the newspaper. They all spend time on line surfing Google. They all drive around town and they listen to the radio.

If Broker Bob from Amazing Realty used to advertise in these places, and now they're not... there's a hole here that needs to be filled with another marketing message and it can be yours.

People need to be told that you're good at what you do. Impress them with a catchy tagline. Wow them with your new and improved website.

The two rules of getting more customers are the same today despite the fact we have Facebook, Twitter, and Google to get folks to come to your website.

1.) Frequency

2.) Reach

These two rules is why advertising agencies work. They know the two things that help people remember your name and your brand.

In today's marketing, everything you do to market to next time home buyers and sellers should drive people to your website. But getting people to get to your website has to be done with a traditional mix and the new media. Radio, newspaper (including CraigsList) and direct mail postcards work great.

But if you're not good at creating a consistent message that you can use on Facebook, newspaper, radio or postcards... then it's time for you to get some help from advertising agency. Saving money is the worst reason to do your own creative work. 90% of those who have tried will often fail. Sure, you know how to market and sell homes, but it doesn't mean you can call yourself an ad agency of one.

You might be good with a scalpel. You need sharp medical instruments so you can make a fabulous living carving animals out of a single block of wood. But you wouldn't operate on yourself if you needed your appendix taken out with that same scalpel.

A closing note about creative people and advertising agencies...

It doesn't matter if you choose a large or small agency to help you rebrand yourself and make more money in 2010. You'll find that any ad agency big or small is filled with creative people, passionate about helping you achieve your dreams of getting bigger, becoming more visible on Google and they will enjoy hearing that you are now pocketing more commissions.

90% of brokers and REALTORS will need some outside marketing help in 2010. My suggestion if you are in that group... Please spend lots of time researching firms big and small and find yourself a real marketing "partner." Someone who cares about making you a Real Estate Rock Star in your market. Once you find the right firm, be prepared to spend some money as you are only investing in yourself. Because no matter what the costs are, price becomes just another detail when you find yourself one day sitting page one on Google and enjoying a never ending stream of next time homebuyers coming to your website.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Authenticity: Why the Trust Economy Works for New Sales.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 16:37:39 -0500

I like to read the other posts on Active Rain sometimes. One caught my eye earlier today. It was a post by ActiveRainer Caroline Pigott. Her short article on Authenticity and Trust are hot topics of discussion right now. Caroline just didn't include enough information on her post to shed a lot more light on a disturbing trend we are now seeing in the fight for landing new customers. The lack of Trust.

Lots of websites make lots of claims. Many of them are misleading. Many say the same thing.

People are getting so much information from too many websites that all make the same claims. When this turns to excess information overload, how are next time homebuyers going to understand what you have to offer and how can you improve the chances of you getting a lead when your website looks exactly the same as 15,000 other websites?

Case in Point

It used to be that you could get a lot of clicks to your website simply because you're page one #1. We used to believe in that for a while. Our site, Voyager360.com has been page one #1 on Google now for seven years in a row. And for that matter, we're also page one #2.

If we're #1 on Google for selling virtual tour cameras, why is it that some of you here on ActiveRain never heard of us?

The same question can be said if you are a seasoned real estate agent Rockstar. Let's assume you're one of the top dogs in Minneapolis Minnesota.

But on-line, nobody ever heard of you. You're a real nobody.

In Minneapolis, you have radio and TV and billboard advertising. But if I'm moving from Santa Fe, NM to Minneapolis, Minnesota in 3 months, and I find you on Google and I click on the link and come to your website... what is it going to take for you to get me to register on your website so I can get homes from your local MLS automatically sent to my mailbox?

TRUST.

I have to trust you know what the hell you're talking about. I have to believe that you have a real handle on making my move to Minneapolis a smooth and bump free ride. And the problem is, you have to do this without talking to me and I have to GET that message inside of 7 to 10 seconds.

But how can you show that you're trust worthy? Ever agent says the same thing online. "Buy from me because I'm a lifetime resident and I know the area." You can drop in all the cryptic acronyms next to your name. ePro. ABR. CRS. GRI. Studies have shown these are not factors in choosing you over another agent in your area.

When customers go looking for homes and they find your website with the same, me-too template website that 15,000 other agents have right now... Does this help build trust? I have found out that many of the me-too real estate agent websites are not landing the customers they once did anymore.

One of my customers just today told me their $9,000 website they paid for at Real Estate Webmasters is not what they want and they told me to bull doze it. Quite ironically, this $9,000 website doesn't look much different than a $249 template you'd buy from AgentImage.com.

Does it have to cost $9,000 to build trust? No, it actually costs about $400 a year to build trust.

In addition to coaching lots of brokers who really need our help in retooling their business for Facebook, Linkedin.com and Twitter customers... we had to first eat our own dog food and then teach agents and brokers how to do what we did to keep our cash registering going Ka-ching every day.

Below are the 3 steps you can take right now to dramatically improve the quantity and quality of leads coming to your website.

Step One: Get rid of the me-too looking website. Show the world that you can spend a few marketing dollars and build a website that looks a bit more original.

Step Two: Register with the local BBB and get yourself online and get the TrustLink attached to your site.

Step Three: Privacy Policy. So many people are getting their Identity stolen and they do not want to get bombarded with email from banks, moving companies, mortgage outfits, or the local landscapers. Customers WANT to know BEFORE they sign up with your site WHAT and WHERE their personal information goes. Sign up with TrustE.com. When you create a good privacy policy, you get to sport that cool looking TrustE link on the bottom of your website like we have it on the bottom of ours. Click here and scroll down to the bottom of our webpage and SEE the BBB link and click on that. See the nice testimonials we have there?

Now click on the TrustE link and see our Privacy policy.

Since we have added these links to our website 90 days ago, we have been consistently closing on $15,000 sales or more every week. We're so booked up with client work now, that we cannot take on any new clients until mid December.

It's a nice problem to have.

For several of our customers, we are doing the same thing for agents and broker websites by building Trust into their websites and showing visitors this. So far, it's working out pretty darn good. In 90 days I will let you all see an official "ka-ching report," and how it helped grow new revenues for a handful of brokers and agents on these new ideas.

Please email me if you want a copy of this research.

-- Bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Google Opens OnLine Bookstore. Good for SEO, too.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 17:54:46 -0500

Competition for Amazon Bookstore? Maybe. It depends on how you look at it.

Amazon has gone Star Trek. Sort of.

Did you ever watch the TV show or any of the movies? All of them have these five inch by seven inch pads or electronic PADS. They seem to download stuff to, read them. Stacks of them in different colors were on Captain Picard's desk sometimes.

Google's plans for many books in fact will be complimentary or if you look at it this way -- ALTERNATIVES. Amazon offers the Kibble.

It's a box that sort of looks like your kids' "Etch a Sketch," pad but it loads up your favorite eBook in the "kibble" format.

Google will be letting you read the books either as a PDF download or on line as a Web version.

Considering the book publishing, and REALTORS destroy a lot of trees with millions of paper contracts, this is Google's way of going green as you won't have to buy the book anymore at your local book store or news stand.

Good for SEO

There more than a few smart REALTORs out there. Some of them are my friends and clients. Colleagues like Bernice Ross who is a syndicated columnist at Inman News is sure to like this news as she can no doubt get her books out to more REALTORS who need them.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

Need Leads? GoodBye HomeGain... Hello Google.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:46:25 -0500

Could there actually be an AGENT or BROKER without a Website somewhere in San Francisco or San Diego...?

According to Google, there has to be more than a few businesses out there without a website presumed hiding in San Diego or San Francisco.

Google is testing a new advertising program with a FLAT fee per lead. They are letting businesses in San Diego and San Francisco test drive a new Google Pay Per Lead advertising model that connects you to a potential customer right over the phone. Way cool. Of course, the program will work if you have a website or not. But Google's primary push is for the businesses in California that don't seem to have a website.

These businesses just want to put a dollar into a box, and they get a phone call from a potential customer. Nice idea. Now let's spin this to a GENUINE NEED for us REALTORS.

Google is innovating or reinventing themselves every few months it seems and now they're expanding on their highly profitable AdWords program.

For many of you that don't know a lot about Google AdWords; it's Google's Pay Per Click program and it's just now turned (version) 3. It's the third major upgrade since their Pay Per Click AdWords program started way back in 1999.

If you're a REALTOR or broker in the SFO bay area or in San Diego, here is how can get into this cool new program to help you land a lot more leads providing that you don't care about reading online reports about clicks or conversions. You just need leads. Fine. Put a few dollars into the box and you get phone calls. It's that simple.

It has been often said by many a seasoned REALTOR... GET me a customer on the phone. And I can sell them a house.

Well Google has heard you and they're delivering on this idea now. At least for two California markets, anyway to test it.

Here is how it works: You set up your AdWords account just as you would for any real estate centric term to the bay area, for example;

san francisco homes for sale or san francisco real estate or san francisco foreclosures

After you CREATED your AdWords ads or your banner ads, you get to make one more choice. You LINK your Pay Per Click AD to a voice phone number. (Google Voice). So people who click on your ads, will be connected to your phone. You get the Google whisper voice letting you know that your LEAD has come from your Google ad to your Google Voice number.

So what's a LEAD worth right now if Homegain calls you? 25% of your commission. Ouch. And you thought taking the Broker exam was painful.

You pay $3 for the same lead and you get connected to a buyer thanks to Google.

The DEATH of the Yellow Pages

Does anybody even use the Yellow Pages anymore? I don't. I was upset to see the yellow book tossed in my driveway packaged in a plastic wrapper a few months ago. So I called the Yellow Book people and the Other Book people and asked them to REMOVE me from all distribution.

The woman on the other end of the phone at the Yellow Pages was getting her feathers ruffled, "How are you going to find a local plumber," she scoffed.

"Google," I replied. We need stuff, we Google everything. I'm sorry lady, but your Yellow Pages are obsolete. Trust me, when people in their seventies and eighties die, you're really out of a job. People in this age group are the only ones keeping the Yellow Pages on life support."

She started to get pretty miffed at this point.

I asked her, "Do you have an 8-Track player in your car?" She immediately replied, "Of course not."

I said, "Well, you're the 8-track player for business listings, Google is the MP3 player and everybody wants the MP3 player."

She hung up on me. Well, that was no surprise.

Goodbye HomeGain, Farwell Reply!, So Long HouseValues. Hello Google

I used to work for a luxury broker here in Santa Fe. Every once in a while, one of the Lead Sharks would call us with a qualified buyer with fabulous FICO scores. I know that HomeGain and others still call agents today and try to get them to AGREE to the lead for 25% - 30% of your hard earned commissions.

If Google's new AdWords and Google Voice program is successful in the two test markets, I can see the death of HomeGain, Reply!, LendingTree and even HouseValues in 2010.

What REALTOR in their right mind will want to pay 25% of your hard earned commissions when you can get the same lead for $3 bucks?

Trust me. That day is coming.

-- bart

Bart Wilson | Chief Marketing Officer | SEO Rockstar

Voyager International. The Real Estate Marketing Company

Tel: (505) 466-2483 iPhone: (505) 204-8097

HomeGain Leads cost 25%. Google: $3 bucks. Wow.

Bart Wilson (Voyager International) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:40:54 -0500