Top three ways of generating Real Estate Leads or Mortgage Leads Part 2

Create a website that generates Mortgage Leads or Real Estate Leads.

There are literally hundreds of website development companies, potentially hundreds just in the Real Estate and Mortgage arenas. The question you have to ask yourself and them if you get the chance is what is the site designed to do. If the site is designed to show your listing or show how low your rates are, it is worthless as a Real Estate Lead or Mortgage Lead generator. Instead start a Facebook page and pay nothing for it. This way you at least save the money on a site that would not have worked anyway.

It used to be that agents and lenders expected to create Real Estate Leads and Mortgage Leads from their sites. Now days the sites have let so many Real Estate professionals down that the new norm is that people don’t even expect to generate Real Estate Leads from their sites and they are only used as electronic brochures to prove that you are relevant. That doesn’t have to be the case. Mortgage Leads and Real Estate Leads can be generated online if and when the site developer moves off of his or her assembly line business practice.

Creating a good looking site is not a problem. Creating a site with lots of properties on it is not a problem. Creating a site with a mortgage calculator is not a problem. The problem is in creating a site that performs as more than a static display. This seems to escape those people who have no experience in the industry that we ask them to build a website for. I have built sites that generate 1 Real Estate Lead for every 2 visitors and Mortgage Leads have been generated by sites I have built at the pace of 1 in 5 visitors. But I have experience in the industry and feel comfortable knowing how and when to ask the potential buyer to contact me. This is knowledge that only you as the professional has. Website developers don’t understand unless they have been in your shoes and then you have to ask yourself if they were any good why did they quit? It is a complicated situation that you as the client needs to insert yourself in to the process of building your own site.

Great websites create Leads. Either Real Estate Leads or Mortgage Leads. They don’t educate and they don’t entertain, they create interest and then they create a Lead from that interest. A great site needs a few things if it is to create what you need to create…. more business.

A. A good URL (Rule of thumb….never use your name)

B. An easy navigational process (rule of thumb….simple is best)

C. Multiple calls to action (provide value…then ask for something)

If your site doesn’t have any or all of these items listed above your site will suffer and you may fall trap to becoming one of the thousands of agents or loan officers that believe that the internet doesn’t work for creating quality Real Estate Leads. Well your right if you think the site should sell homes for you. Real Estate has always been and will always be best when we respect the human element of making connections with each other. When we try to automate the process and remove the human element, it is just not going to work nearly as well as we would like. Ask yourself “would I have my kids use a virtual doctor?” the answer is probably “No”. People want to interact with other people and people feel more comfortable when they talk to people. Your goal needs to be to generate Real Estate Leads, lots of Real Estate Leads or lots of mortgage Leads and then work those Leads with zeal and energy and reap the rewards while meeting lots of nice people along the way.