Realtor Websites - Real Web Results Blog

I was thinking today….

Many Realtors spend hundreds of dollars each month on pay-per-click advertising such as Google Adwords and even Homegain’s BuyerLink product to generate traffic to their website. I have a bunch of existing well-ranked Realtor websites currently without Realtors - why not use those websites to direct traffic to the IDX Search and lead generating pages of your existing websites that perhaps are languishing in the search engine results?

I have some existing clients that have been doing this successfully for quite a while already - one has been doing it for over 4 years. The idea of redirecting traffic to the IDX search and lead pages of the website a Realtor has elsewhere - that is not one of ours - is not something that I ever offered before but was willing to do if asked.

The Realtor website landscape has changed a lot in the last couple of years however and I realize that often agents are spending many thousands of dollars on customized IDX searches and websites - which is not something that we offer. Agents can always use a little help in directing traffic to those high priced websites and IDX search services - and perhaps that is where our system can be of help.

The traffic that comes to our websites is high quality traffic that arrives by searching the big 3 search engines  for “city real estate” and other popular real estate keywords. It is not traffic that comes from deceptive advertising and popups etc. It is the same traffic you strive for when you work to have your current website ranking well in search engines. When visitors to sites we provide click on links to the search forms and listing searches on our sites - they can be directed to the IDX search and forms on your current site. The websites we provide would be personalized with your information - just as if you were not redirecting the traffic - so visitors would know right from the start that you are the Realtor providing the information to them. It would not be like Homegain’s BuyerLink service where visitors are redirected to a totally different Realtor (surprise!).

If this is an idea that holds some interest for you, check out our website for more information on our Realtor Websites.

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Many years ago using frames in the designing of a website was known as “poor man’s cloaking” because it was possible to stuff the frame controller page full of keywords and links which would then assist in ranking the website. That came to an end a few years ago when links leaving the site were no longer counted in the frame controller page. The frame controller page was still useful though as links were still followed to pages within the site and this helped search engines spider the site. The title and keywords within the frame controller page were used as well.

Domain registrars and some hosts began using frames to forward parked domains - often calling the service “masking” - because using frames prevents the domain from changing in the address bar when the domain is forwarded to a website. This has become a popular way of forwarding parked domains and depending on how it was set up - worked well.

That all has changed however. I first noticed the change a few months ago with the Agents Online Real Estate Forums. The forums ran in a frame because the old version of the software was a cgi script that that could not be accessed by search engines. Using frames allowed links to be placed in the frame controller page which allowed search engines to spider the site. It worked well and the forums were #1 in search engines for many years.

When the forum software was upgraded the frames remained even though the new forums were search engine friendly - simply because they were working well and it was not worth changing and having ranks drop. A few months ago Google stopped reading the frame controller page and treated it like a redirect - using the information on the framed page instead of on the frame controller page. I guess that was when the change took place.

Something happened in the past week which really made me take notice though. A client discontinued our website service  due to the poor economic conditions and decided to have her domain and email hosted with Internet Crusade who would then forward her domain to the free website that her company provides. At that point her domain (and the website she had with us) had been ranking very well for a long time in search engines  due to our efforts - including a #3 for “city real estate” in Google.

I suppose that she expected that her domain would continue to rank well,  she would no longer have to pay us, and she would have more money as a result of the change. It did not work out that way however. Her new host used frames to forward the domain  and within 48 hours the change was reflected in Google with a drop to page 5 of results!

Her domain dissapeared from Google to be replaced by the url for her company web page way back on page 5. All of the “link juice”was lost immediately which is not something that would have happened just a few months ago.  A few months ago the domain would have remained in the search engine results and would have continued to rank well on the strength of links alone. Now the forwarding using frames is treated as a redirect without the benefit of the “link juice” being transferred as would be done if a 301 redirect was used.

If you have domains being forwarded using what your registrar or host calls “masking” - I would suggest you check your domains and change that forwarding to 301 redirects.

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The most valuable thing you have is your time and how that time is spent will determine your wealth, health, and happiness.

Ever since the inception of the web, there have been many opportunities to participate in activities that are a waste of time. I first wrote about this long before there was such a thing as blogs - but the issues were the same. Back in September 1999 I wrote an article titled “Get off the computer and back to work!” in my newsletter that was subscribed to by thousands of Realtors at the time - the forerunner of this blog.

Spending your time maintaining a real estate blog at one of the many blog communities may just be a colossal waste of time. Yes, I know that statement is politically incorrect but I did not say blogging was necessarily a waste of time - just the reasons most agents give for frequently writing blog posts at blogging communities may no longer be valid.

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The free , no fee, no referral real estate leads will now be posted at www.leadsforreal.com

Today’s leads are already up so check it out !

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It dawned on me today that if I keep posting free real estate leads on this blog no other posts will be visible soon. So, since I do intend on making informative and interesting posts other that giving away free leads - I will be giving away the free leads on another site beginning in a day or two. Watch this blog for details….

Today’s Seller Leads…. Houston TX, Calgary AB

Today’s Buyer Leads…. Ocala FL, Fort Lauderdale FL, Savannah GA, Vernon BC, Windsor ON, Langley BC, Nanaimo BC, Peterborough ON, Surrey BC, Prince George BC, Yorkton SK, Pembroke ON, Thunder Bay ON

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Today’s Seller Lead is… Houston TX

Buyer Leads….Buffalo NY, Macon GA, Vernon BC, Grande Prairie AB, Pembroke ON, Langley BC, Nanaimo BC, Moose Jaw SK, Lloydminster AB, Niagara-On-The-Lake ON, Port Coquitlam BC

Information about these leads and how to contact me to obtain the lead for your area can be found in a previous post - Free No Fee, No Referral Real Estate Leads

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Today’s Buyer leads….

Orlando FL, St. Catharines ON, Lloydminster SK, Regina SK

Information about these leads and how to contact me to obtain the lead for your area can be found in a previous post - Free No Fee, No Referral Real Estate Leads

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Information about these leads and how to contact me to obtain the lead for your area can be found in a previous post - Free No Fee, No Referral Real Estate Leads

Buyer Leads - Wasaga Beach ON, Surrey BC, Peterborough ON, Thunder Bay ON, Lloydminster AB

Seller Leads - Niagara Falls ON

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Information about these leads and how to contact me to obtain the lead for your area can be found in a previous post - Free No Fee, No Referral Real Estate Leads

Buyer Leads - Toledo OH, Regina SK, Leduc AB, North Bay ON, Thunder Bay ON, Pembroke ON, Lloydminster AB

Seller Leads - Merced CA

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Being in the business of providing Realtor websites, I sometimes have websites up and ranking in search engines - waiting for a Realtor to take over the spot. When that happens I often get members of the public filling in the request forms (even though the site is identified as being in need of a Realtor).

Instead of letting these leads “fall on the floor” as I have been doing up until now, I have decided to make them available to local agents at no cost, no referral and no strings attached! I will be posting fresh (from within the last 24 hours) leads - usually daily - here on this blog. The leads include the prospects needs and their email address and phone number to make it easy to contact them.

If you are a Realtor who works in one of the areas posted and are interested in working one of the leads - simply email me letting me know of your interest and which market area and I will forward the lead to you.

Most of the buyer leads will be from Canada as the buyer traffic from US websites is being directed to local Realtors already. There will still be some US seller leads though so keep checking back to see if there is one in your area.

**I will be limiting the number of leads sent to any one agent to six - but you can always have all of the leads by simply taking our website package for the available area. We only produce one website package in each market area - so areas are exclusive.

To get started, below are todays leads…

Seller Leads - Fort Worth TX

Buyer Leads - Regina SK, Windsor ON, North Bay ON, Thunder Bay ON, Orillia ON, St. Catharines ON, Pembroke ON, Medicine Hat AB

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Last month, Google penalized Realtor websites from Advanced Access, RealEstateWebmasters.com, and a couple of other providers as well. According to Matt Cutts from Google’s spam team this was a “shot across the bow” to the real estate website industry to warn that extensive reciprocal linking is not acceptable to Google. This was a manually applied penalty and not something (at this point) that happened algorithmically. Continue Reading »

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In addition to having my own web server, I use the services of over a dozen web hosts and in some cases have multiple accounts with each. I have usually done a bit of research prior to signing up with a new hosting company and have generally had few problems until recently.

It seems that the barriers to entering the web hosting business have lowered to the point where almost anyone can now set up shop as a web hosting company and present the appearance of a large, stable, and experienced web host - even though they may have entered the business only a few months ago and be flying by the seat of their pants. Continue Reading »

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