Kelan and I take you through the ActiveRain Hit Router. Watch as I explain how we are going to increase your business and get the traffic looking in your market to your website.
IMPORTANT NOTE
The "Hit Router" will ONLY show up on your pages when LOGGED OUT of ActiveRain.
How will you make sure there isn't any click fraud? What if I just keep clicking on the link on my page that someone is paying for in order to earn more money for myself?
That is a big problem with pay per click. Google has some technology to address this and bans people who get caught.
Our developers will have some monitoring in place to curb click fraud. We will also take a very progressive stance on monitoring it. Through IP addresses we are able to determine who is doing what.
Will click fraud ever happen? It's certainly possible.....will we have SEVERE punishment if someone is caught, YES.
Thank you Kelan, very good focus and presentation. This looks like the best thing to come out of AR to really help the bottom line, which is not so good lately...... Thanks, Bob!
Bob It sounds awesome of course but inquiring minds want to know...how does the traffic get distributed if they come from a re-blog...sorry I had to ask:)
Bob - It looks like a very interesting feature, and something that can help to capture what would have been lost traffic. Thanks for mentioning my name during the video so many times! I will get in touch with Claire about the shirt - just had to give you a hard time.
He did, but I just want to see your cutieness in person. Auntie Mana and Auntie Elaine will take you to the California beach while our blogs are home making money.
Hi Bob - this was a great visual explanation of how this is anticipated to work. And I'm glad you clarified Tim's question about someone just clicking to run up accounts.
How does this work if there are multiple AR members from the same area, all paying whatever the fee is?
Interesting! Kelan held my attention, you lost me at times! Does anyone actually receive money, or is it just a credit account type thing??? Oh, and by the way, what about that contest??? Rout that!!! Thanks, Joe, The Plumber
Hey, Bob & Kelan. This sounds great. Can my competitors come in and take over my territory or must we share?
Also, I have a q for any one to answer. Will this actually help our IDX site's SEO? I heard that Google is going to alter their algorithm to include the "who you know" factor. Thinking when they do, my individual site can better compete with the good ol' boys!
Bob, Great Idea. Kelan is a cutie and a great kid. I know how difficult it can be to keep one eye on him while concentrating on what you are doing. You guys did a great job.
Hi Bob - In some of the major markets where you may have 10-20 agents all willing to pay for traffic to their IDX sites, how will Listing Router determine whose site to send the traffic to? If someone reading Missy's blog in Ann Arbor enters "Search for Homes in Las Vegas" and there are 15 Las Vegas agents participating in Listing Router, who gets that traffic?
interesting, but I have a question??? Can you set a limit on what you are willing to spend for traffic each month. I mean we all have budgets right? With pay per click things I've used before I had a budget... X per day, X per month... will we be able to set this up on a budget?
If three people are buying clicks in Seattle, click one will go to the first person that set up the campaign, click two will go the second person, click three will go to the third person and click four will go back to the first person......and it will keep going like that until one of those three hits their cap (which they set) and then it would route between the remaining two people.
If there were ten, it would work in a similar fashion.
Currently it is only set up for credits that can be used to buy traffic from others. We understand that for someone like you, you may accrue a high number of credits and never buy traffic from anyone else. We are working on things that members can use their credits to purchase. ActiveRain shirts, third party services......stuff like that.
There may be minimal SEO benefit from your customized banner but the traffic router will not provide SEO benefit to your site as the routing takes place behind the scenes and doesn't appear as a link of any kind of your site.
I have a question to toss in the ring. What if no one from a specific area has paid for clicks to their site? Where will the visitor be directed when searching for listings in that area? (Did that make sense?)
You have to admit that we were good for not meanting it AT ALL before you prepared this (from the KWAA meeting). Glad I have a copy of you presenting it with another format.
Obvious question: how to budget and how to forecast how many leads we might get?
Very cool stuff. When you IDX will we be able to just send them to a page on our sites such as a search page? I am just worried mine might not work for this...
We have a national company that is willing to buy excess inventory. The referring member will still receive credit just as they would if the traffic was being sent to another members IDX site.
Karen,
You will be able to determine your maximum budget. We are not sure how much traffic is going to be available in specific markets, so it may be that you do not use your entire budget. You will only be charged for what you use.
Shane,
Optimally, you would want to be able to send them to the SPECIFIC page on your site that has listings in the area they searched. If your site doesn't function in that manner, you will certainly convert a lower percentage of clicks to leads.
Bob I was thinking....we have what...5 or 6 of you that are overseeing everything re-blogs, features, training, fixing problems, traveling around, and monitoring, etc. Just to be the Devils Advocate how can you tell if someone starts "clicking away" for their own gain, in order to consequence them?
1) How does this affect the referrals that are already in place?
2) If someone opt's out what is the effect other than they won't be part of the IDX network, and a possible lead?
3) How is that $2 per click supposed to be paid....is it like the original ads where you paid upfront, or billing like localism sponsorship?
4) As was asked is there a way to limit the amout of clicks we're charged for?
Thanks.......looks like a lot of work was put into that...and am wondering how that will change the way people use this site.
The click fraud component will be monitored automatically by software built by our developers. It won't be something we have to check on, we will be alerted of suspicious clicking.
1. It doesn't. The referrals today should be clients you already know who need help in an area you don't service. This feature will affect people from the search engines who land on our site and don't match up to your market. Today, they leave and go back to google and search for something else to find listings. Now they will be able to search them from your post. If they are in your market, you send them to your IDX for free, if they are looking in someone else's market, you can get credit for sending them to someone else who is willing to pay for that traffic to their site.
2. If someone opts out, they won't be able to send traffic to others for credit. It only effects their ability to benefit from traffic that would otherwise leave their pages anyways.
3. The $2 is paid in this fashion. You give us your credit card and you say I want to have a campaign of $X. We pre-authorize your card for $X. At the end of the month, we see how much of $X you have used to drive traffic to your site and we charge the exact amount. So if you said I am willing to spend $50 but we could only get you 20 clicks, that would mean you only spent $40 and you would only be charged for $40.
4. Yes, you will be able to determine your budget.
Will there be reports available so we can see what sites (or geographic locations) are sending traffic to us, and what sites we are sending traffic to? Also, will we be able to see how many searches are done per month for a particular city? That info would help in establishing monthly budgets.
We plan on having some rather detailed reporting around this function. When it is released tomorrow it will not be there just yet.......as we won't have any data to show you where clicks are coming from and that sort of thing. One of the first pieces of reporting you will get is the ability to see which of your posts are sending traffic to others outside your market and getting you credit.
Once we start to amass data over the coming months, we will have some reporting functions to help members in determining how to best utilize the feature.
Thanks for that info Bob. Now for another question: Are there a certain number of "spots" per area, or can a limitless number of people buy clicks for that area? Also, you said that the national company will be buying "excess" inventory. Does this also mean that they will not be buying inventory for areas that AR members have paid for? Thanks for all the info and clarification.
Bob, first of all: THANK YOU for yet another great feature!
I am starting to understand the idea of sending clicks out to other agents and receiving them if you participate in the program. How about the clicks within your own market? Will they come in from each particular blog?
BTW: I've reblogged this post and the other one and featured them both to all my groups, so that all of my associates can benefit from this great new service. I will do the same with Brad's post as soon as it comes out.
Jeremy: I have X-site set up and for only $10 per month you can obtain IDX from our board. I'll see if I can get you a free X-site for a while. I'll call my rep right now.
The national company will be allowed to purchase clicks in areas our members are paying for and they will be inserted on a round robin basis just like if there were 4 people buying clicks in one area.
Mirela,
Clicks in your own market, from your own blog will be sent to you for free. You will just need to tell us what your market covers once the feature is live and that traffic will be sent to you for free.
Bob- I just read your response to Candis' original question: So if I read this right....
1) If someone doesn't have an area, or opts out whoever lands on their blog will be redirected to the "National Company" is this the "National Company" that came on last year as a sponsor?
2) Let's just say you are an AR Member.....and opt out, but you are a member of that "National Company" now you might get the click of the person that read your blog in the first place? Is this what you're saying?
3) So my competition here in my town that isn't on Ar but pays that National Company could get the benefit from my blogging if I opt Out?
If you opt out, no one can search for houses outside your market on your posts and we don't send any traffic away from you. You get a personal search banner at the top of your blog, posts, and profile that you can point to your own site. It doesn't give them the chance to search outside or inside your market, it's just a link to your website.
If you opt out you are not sending traffic anywhere!!
If you opt out you are not sending traffic anywhere!!
All of your questions can be answered by understanding that if you opt out, you are not sending traffic away from your posts.
No you don't have to go back. It will just appear at the top of your posts. What you will need to do is go in and set your settings up to capture traffic in your market, from your posts for free.
You will do this by letting us know every market you cover. When someone searches on your blog for a city you tell us you cover, that traffic will be sent to your IDX site for free.
Jeremy: Here is what you have to do to get a website for free for the next 3 weeks, so you can link it to IDX and take advantage of the system, in case you haven't found another way already:
just go to alamode.com and order the site for free for 3 weeks. If you keep it, it's very affordable (under $ 500 per year). Meanwhile you can figure out some other solution, but at least you'll be viable right away.
I hope this helps!
Wait a minute! I forgot-you are supposed to be my competitor...
Too late now: you've earned the title of "team member". My team!
One of the first pieces of reporting you will get is the ability to see which of your posts are sending traffic to others outside your market and getting you credit.
Yes, if there are 15 people that want traffic in Ann Arbor, that traffic will be rotated between those 15. However, if one of them is Missy and Missy is getting traffic to her posts that want to search in Ann Arbor, Missy can set it up so that all searches on her own pages (for markets she covers, of which Ann Arbor is one) are sent to her IDX site for FREE, and no one else can buy that traffic.
The traffic that the 15 people are buying (in a round robin fashion) is traffic from other members that do not service Ann Arbor and are willing to send their traffic to someone else in exchange for credit back for that traffic.
I am looking forward to that reporting as well. I think it will really help our members understand what kind of posts consumers are finding right before they start looking for houses. This allows you to write those kinds of posts and make them specific to your area. We will certainly be highlighting some of the highest trafficked posts on the network and showing members how those posts drive traffic and the results for the person that wrote the post.
It should be very cool to help us look into consumer behavior as they get ready to start looking at homes. I was on the math team in high school so these sort of statistics are very cool to me. I am very excited.
Bob, I loved the video. Kelan did an awesome job. This is an excellent feature!!! You guys truly are cutting edge when it comes to thinking these things up. Very cool.
I've been doing Pay per Click for 2 years, 42% of all my closings are from it. So this ROCKS !!
Thanks for explaining it first before we saw those banners and thought, WHAT???
I share my Pay Per Click site with 4 agents in Ann Arbor, we all have TEAMS and we get more leads than we can handle, so if anyone is concerned the round robin works great !!
Yeah, launching with an explanation for our members is such a novel concept, right? haha. The only thing is that members can't get in and use the feature and give us that fantastic feedback we are so accustomed to. I'm sure tomorrow once everyone gets their hands on the thing that we will get lots of great feedback.
Bob - I think your Kelan did a better job explaining than you did - just kidding! It's very interesting to say the least and I'm really excited about all this.
Seems like a great idea. So how does this help a commercial real estate agent who is not a Realtor and does not use IDX or any listing service that would be controlled by a Board of Realtors? I do have a website that has listings (and those listings are on Loopnet), but I'd rather not pay for a lot of traffic for home buyers to view my commercial real estate website.
It's great to have both visual and textual explanations, and in advance. I think I'll have more problems with the limitation of our board's IDX than with your side.
Ok... I get it more after watching thanks! Here are my comments:
1. Can I borrow the hat for a picture? 2. Kelan does a really good job 3. Ummm not quite CommonCraft, but good job 4. Yay for Missy & Ann Arbor shout outs :)
The first version of listing router is geared toward residential agents. Our other members will have to trust that we value their participation and we will be working toward solutions that add value to their bottom line. So in the beginning, it's not going to benefit a commerical agent but they will be able to direct traffic and receive credit from searches that occur because of their posts.(or they can opt out and have their own custom banner that they create)
Sharon,
haha, ....'in advance' is big for us. Maybe we are growing up a little bit, haha. I hope you can find something that works for your IDX site.
Does the person coming in from another persons blog that we have paid the $2.00 for have to sign in to get access to the IDX site or do we have to have a sign in screen at our site?
Wow! thanks for setting this up. I am so tired of getting "clicked on" in google searches on my pay-per-click ads from other businesses trying to solicit "me" and spend all my click money. Now, the clicks will be within ActiveRain and hopefully hidden from those evil solicitors!!!
However your IDX site operates will be how they access it. Some sights can give people full access and never ask them to register. Some give them a look at a few listings then ask them to register. Some make people register right away.
We have been dealing with driving traffic to briorealty.com for a number of years and we found that letting them view a few properties, then asking them to register was the most effective. It's really up to how your own IDX site is handled.
Do we have to participate in the pay-per-click in order to get the local searches that come through our own pages? I think members should have the option to get the IDX traffic that their own posts generate without having to pay for incoming clicks.
You will be able to save traffic in your local markets that comes in through your blog. If you have ten cities (or 100) in and around Vegas, you can direct anyone searching in those markets to your own site, for free. Traffic you send to other markets will get build you credits. If you never pay out of your own pocket for traffic, you can still use the credits you have accumulated for sending traffic to others to buy traffic back to your ten (or 100) markets.
So yes, you can participate even if you choose not to pay.
Alternately, you can send all traffic to your own site with the opt out option. Meaning you will get no credit and everyone will go to your site.
It's very similar to Google PPC. The differentiating factor is that people will have already searched for some kind of real estate information that landed them on a blog on ActiveRain. In a perfect world, they will have gotten that crucial piece of information that leads them to know they CAN buy a house. That extra step will help filter out a lot of traffic that shouldn't be looking for homes.
There is no ceiling......however, we will only be able to deliver so many clicks. Of course, we will only be able to charge for what we can deliver. So if you want $1000 worth of clicks in Fort Worth and we can only deliver 30 clicks, you would only be charged $2.00 x 30 = $60. (minus your discount for how many points you have and minus your credits for traffic you have sent to others)
Bob, Activerain just keeps on adding new stuff. Just when you think what else can happen you guys come up with something else. Kelan kept my attention. For a while I was worried about that marker in his mouth.
Bob - This looks very exciting! Cant wait to see how this works. Also still waiting for our tee shirts dude. lol Thanks again for all these cool new features you guys/girls are coming up with. I'll be sending along that localism update soon I hope. Coooool! Bob H.
Bob, thanks for the video. It was a lot easier to listen to you explain it and following what you were putting up on the board then trying to understand it from Rich's blog. I guess I am just a visual person.
I get it!!!!! soooooo, the more I Blog on Active Rain, the more information is avaialble to the google search engines and therefore more traffic will be driven to my website - right? One important key is that I need to be writting Blogs everyday with words pertinent to my marketplace and written in simple format. Please note that I am only 24 hours into ActiveRain. Bob - talk to me like a 2 year old!! Could my Blog have keywords that might attract likeminded people that I would want to work with as well as statements about RE? Does that make sense? Should I do daily Blogs pertaining to my listings? Please tell me I'm right - this stuff boggles my brain!!!
Sorry about doing this twice - I'm still learning!!! But anyway I think I get it!!!!! soooooo, the more I Blog on Active Rain, the more information is avaialble to the google search engines and therefore more traffic will be driven to my website - right? One important key is that I need to be writting Blogs everyday with words pertinent to my marketplace and written in simple format. Please note that I am only 24 hours into ActiveRain. Bob - talk to me like a 2 year old!! Could my Blog have keywords that might attract likeminded people that I would want to work with as well as statements about RE? Does that make sense? Should I do daily Blogs pertaining to my listings? Please tell me I'm right - this stuff boggles my brain!!!
this is great - however - my IDX - is ruled by my MLS - and it does not allow this - so... they will have to be simply redirected to my site - great idea - great project - just wish my MLS was a little easier to work with...
PS...Re Stephanie, and taking the blog button away, :-( You know, if you made that menu bar two rows high instead of only one, you could fit lots more items in. :-)
OK I think I see the value .. but I also think it could take a ton on managing on my part.. tell me this going to be easy..and not a land rush gone bust thing
Oh, how exciting! Most of the real estate agents aren't from corporate america/tech biz start-ups and don't understand whiteboards. I used to be in VoIP business development(sold/as bis dev, the first VOIP switch to Charter in St. Louis) so I hold whiteboarding near and dear to my heart. I quit. Got tired of travelling North America and my mom had been in the biz forever.
The fact that you brought your son in the mix(I'm wowed!). Keep up the good work. I can definitely relate.
That is Awesome! Bring on the leads! This is a just another great reason to write great content and drive people to your site. Another thing is that those that write content towards more popular areas will definitly generate more clicks. So it is good to write more than just to your small local market.
I've seen the video twice and read Jeff's blog. I have a ton of questions, well maybe 5 or so. Can we have a Q&A session? I am excited with the concept but I do want more info.
I'll have to watch the video later, but I just left a long comment on Rich's blog, about this. I definitely have to research it more because right now, it sounds like I'm expected to spend money, instead of being able to refer buyers to agent/bloggers I've already grown to trust. Is this taking away my ability to gain a referral fee? Because I DO NOT like spending money when I've already done the work to cover all the bases to avoid this. My time is the money I've invested in my business.
Thanks for the whiteboard explanation. It's been a long working day, so that helped after I read Jeff's post too.
What kind of keywords are people searching on A/R member's blogs that more often than not they are leaving??? Is it that more people seem to be searching for listings on A/R than other type of keyword content.
I understand wanting to garner more traffic for the members. I don't understand the "why most people are coming to a blog they don't really want to be on or is unrelated to them?"......Just looking for the why.
Bob-Thank you for that very good explaination of how listing router is going to work. I have been wanting to do PPC for a long time, just did not have the time to do all the correct keyword research and ads set up to test against each winner in order to get the most value out of our ads. This eliminates a lot of that work for me.
Sally, I certainly don't know about Wisconsin, but here in Southern California all of the major MLSs offer a simple, free IDX solution to any member. It's usually either in the form of a little widget, or a page that can be "framed" on your own web site. It's available to any and all agents regardless of whether the broker is using it or not. You might check into that.
Hi Bob - I guess I'm not understanding part of the response back to John Novak that you wrote:
<You will be able to save traffic in your local markets that comes in through your blog. If you have ten cities (or 100) in and around Vegas, you can direct anyone searching in those markets to your own site, for free. Traffic you send to other markets will get build you credits. If you never pay out of your own pocket for traffic, you can still use the credits you have accumulated for sending traffic to others to buy traffic back to your ten (or 100) markets.
So yes, you can participate even if you choose not to pay.
Alternately, you can send all traffic to your own site with the opt out option. Meaning you will get no credit and everyone will go to your site.>
When you said to him that we can direct traffic to our own sites for me - did you mean just by continuing to write posts, that's how we'd get the traffic for free?
And with your 'alternatively' response, are you referring to just doing our writing as we've been doing, with inks to our own IDX or other sites of our own?
Just trying to understand all the various responses to the different questions asked, especially those that John and Kathy asked.
Good morning Bob, I saw the MLS box on the very top of the main page before logging on but not anything more - are we still on to get this started today?
This is awesome and should general more business for all of us. Questions . . . for those of us on Active Rain in the same market area who will all want to have those surrounding towns on our site also . . . how will that work?
I understand it a little bit better now but I still can not get over the fact that anyone with less than 25,000 points will get NO DISCOUNT. If you are a heavy hitter with some 300,000 points, this will be a breeze. Thanks for the creativity but newbies needs a break too. What about reversing? Give newbies a BIGGER discount for participating :-)
I was soooo worried about the baby biting off the head of that marker (I think its a green marker)and than sucking on it continuously at the beginning of the blog, that I had to go play it again and listen without watching. But GREAT idea!
Sweet video Bob. I think you guys did come up with a great idea on this one. I would ask when it is going to be live, but I am sure that has been answered in the last 150 comments.
BTW: Nice to see the Hawks pride in the hat. Only 2 games out of 1st following the beat down of SF :)
I likey! I was concerned about click fraud and also statistics but you have answered those questions early on.
Kelan was a bit of a distraction cuz I was only wondering what he was going to be for halloween when he was in your arms :) I paid attention when he was out of site though! Too cute.
Bob, I have access to the listings in our area through my site even though it is not a true IDX. It is actually the IDX of my company but has a link on home page...can I still use it?
Thanks to AR for this creation...I have asked all our Brokers at out Firm to review your "lesson" a couple of times. I Do have a question...since we are conservation/eco-friendly LAND Specialists...(as opposed to residential specialists) could the term at the top of the routing bar include homes and LAND...or just properties???...that way both residential and LAND brokers could win.
Please do watch and re-read. Any traffic routed through this feature will be people that never would have reached out to you. If you don't buy that.....then all you have to do is opt out. It's that simple.
Rebecca,
There are thousands and thousands of searchers every day that come to ActiveRain and leave after viewing one page. They do searches like: how to get qualified for a loan, steps to follow to get a home ready to list, finding a real estate agent to represent me. They do thousands of searches a day (without geographical indicators) that lead them to ActiveRain. If you are an agent in Seattle who has written about 'steps to follow to get a house ready to list' and the person is interested in the Austin TX market, they will hit your blog, get the info they want, see you are from Seattle and then leave your post never to be seen or heard from again. With the new listing router there is the chance they will start looking for homes in Austin, someone can buy that traffic from you and you get a credit to buy traffic looking in Seattle from someone who can not service it.
Are we allowed to offer our IDX site to those members here that we network together with - like mortgage peeps and stagers on their site so that when someone goes to their blogs and uses the "search" option they are directed to us?
You can go about setting up your markets and campaigns now if you want. I encourage you to go in and SET UP YOUR 'MY MARKET' component. This is very important so that you are saving traffic in your own markets from your posts FOR FREE.
You can set this up now. There are a number of tutorials on the main feature board at activerain.com from Brad Andersohn that take you through setting things up.
Very powerful Bob. The only thing I would recommend is working with the City/State search box. When I tried it out, typed in "big bear lake, ca" it showed 0. Then a type in "big bear lake" and it showed up. Some people will get confused with that. Maybe having two boxes, one for city, other for state would clear that up. Otherwise, looks good so far. Thanks.
Bob ~ Alright, I just set up "My Market". So when people go to my blog and search my area it goes to the IDX on my website. I went to some other A|R blogs and when I checked my area it went to Just Listed. Does this mean that nobody has set a campaign for my city yet?
WOW! I think this is amazing. Three some what related observations. 1. There is no way our son (14-months) would have been as cooperative... he would have shredded everything in sight... 2. I too call our son Bubba :) 3. I am a lefty too! ~Rita
Thank you! We just sent that over to the developer and you should see some improvement on that soon.
Ryan,
Yes, that means no one has set up a campaign for that area. If you were to go to your own posts and search your market (assuming you set something up for the city you search) you will be sent to your IDX site.
Rita,
Well your son has two more months.....mine is 16 months. But he is very chill.......a really good little boy, I am blessed! Great nickname! and lefty's rule!!!
This looks good, but I would think instead of doing another monetary deal, I thought it would be that that we could input ourlistings in a database or Activerain MLS like Zillow and when a person typed say Seattle it would pull up homes in seattle and personal branding for those agents who put their homes in the database.
Second is people with the top points in the area would be featured or say get 1 or two featured listings. I really think that AR has diminished the points system and not given people more reason or reward for being the top contributer. When a change comes it is purchased and not earned. I hope you guys start to gear more around the top point earners in each area, because the fact is they have been proven to be the biggest contributors.
Kudos on the opt out. I was starting to think My traffic and page were going to get hyjakked. AR needs to always respect the privacy and content people load on their own blog when it comes to integrating things and I think they have done a good job so far.
I, for one, am very excited at this new concept on AR. It really makes sense to direct traffic to the proper markets, and in the end, can only benefit us all. Thanks for all the behind the scenes work everyone does here at AR to improve the site.
Posted by 
This looks good, but I would think instead of doing another monetary deal, I thought it would be that that we could input ourlistings in a database or Activerain MLS like Zillow and when a person typed say Seattle it would pull up homes in seattle and personal branding for those agents who put their homes in the database.
Make sure to check out Jeff's post explaining Listing Router as well.