I am the Real Estate Business Guide writer for the New York Times Real Estate Business website at About.com. Because I've written a lot there about websites and Internet marketing, I get emails every week from frustrated real estate professionals trying to develop a lead generation strategy on the Web. Many are not happy with their websites which they've now had up for a few years, and wonder what to do about it. I hear all of the time that a real estate agent would like to make a change, but it seems like just too big of a task.
Get the hardhat...we're going in!
Sure, it's not an easy decision to change your entire Web presence. However, there's really only one question to ask yourself. Is my website generating leads and commissions? Isn't that what you built it for in the first place? I've changed website platforms numerous times, as I have a half dozen websites for various activities and businesses. When I changed my real estate website the first time, I learned a lot.
Lesson #1: I didn't have to do it all at once. I built out the new site over about three months, letting the old site stay up.
Lesson #2: I could move content from the old site and not have to re-create it. The content that I liked in the old site was moved. I would simply copy it, and paste into the new template site. Actually, you don't copy, you cut. As I gradually moved content, it would disappear out of the old site and re-appear in the new one. Sure, this made the old site a bit thread-bare the second and third months, but I wanted to avoid any duplicate content issues.
Lesson #3: You don't take a terrible SEO hit if you do it this way. Basically, Google was still crawling the old site, and beginning to crawl the new one. Once it was substantially complete, I simply transferred the domain name to the new site. There was hardly a hiccup in my search engine positioning, and I was on the first page. However, if you're unhappy with your current results, this is hardly a consideration. You aren't generating business from your site, so do something to make it happen.
If you've decided that it's time to do something about a vegetative website, first put together a plan for a transition. Look at the content on your current site, and check out the analytics if available. If you see certain content getting consistent visits, it's worth moving. If there is a lot of content that rarely gets a page view, consider forgetting about it and creating new content on the new site.
Lay out a plan for your new site, main navigation, page titles, sub-pages, etc. Don't just use what's in the old site...remember, it's not working. You don't have to write any content at this stage, just decide on what type of content you're going to put up and how it will be arranged.
You probably know some competitors who are doing well with their websites. No, not the ones that always talk a good game but never seem to have two dimes to rub together, but someone who seems to always be busy and has a website that you like. Check out what they're doing and how they're doing it on the Web. Look at their buttons, tabs and other navigation. What's different about their site from yours?
Keep in mind that many who may be regularly using your site to search in the IDX will probably have the page bookmarked. So, if it's going to move in the navigation structure (likely), you'll want to send out an email to your list if you have one and direct them to the search and any other popular pages they may have been visiting. It's nice to let them know about a new site anyway, just before you move the domain name is a great time.
Or, you can ask your site vendor to help you with a 301 redirect. Basically, since you're moving your domain name, you might have an old IDX page at YourDomain.com/MLSSearch. At your new site, it's at YourDomain.com/IDXSearch. You can create a redirect from the old page to the new one, and the old visitors won't have to change a thing. It just points the old page to the new one. Of course, just naming the page exactly the same would take care of the issue without any special tactics.
Now, I know you knew this was coming...:). I am after all the Chief Evangelist for RealtySoft.com, so that's where I want you to look for your new website. In previous posts I showed you how RealtySoft makes SEO easier for you. And, your SEO gets a huge boost because RealtySoft's IDX isn't framed, instead it's hosted entirely on your site, so your site gets credit for all of those keywords in the listings. The first step to generating business is getting visitors to your site, so SEO is important.
I've been setting up an entirely new RealtySoft site for my tiny real estate market in Taos, NM as a test and to write about it in this blog, so you'll be getting more specific commentary about the features of the site and what I'm doing to get it going. I've only worked on it for maybe 6 hours, and there's enough there to go live. RealtySoft provides a great deal of template content, but also modifies it automatically with your specific neighborhoods, cities, and the keywords for them. So, it's really a lot faster to get going than you think.
And, you won't need a hardhat!
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