The Coral Gables Story Real Estate Blog Case Study
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well folks, 9 months later we did it! we finally got this blog up! for those interested, read the attached.
well folks, 9 months later we did it! we finally got this blog up! for those interested, read the attached.
What are the metrics we are concerned with?
We are going to track our ROI on both our social media and internet lead generation methods for the next 6-9 months.
Lead Generation will use PPC, SEO to an IDX site, Craigslist, etc.
Social Media will use Facebook, Twitter, Video, Foursquare, Flickr, Posterous, etc.
We will attempt to track numbers, lead traffic and conversion vs. resources spent (time and money)
Any and all suggestions are welcome
I will try to at least update you all once a week
At the end I will try and compile all the data
I know this is really laying it out there, but this is for the RE.net to learn (the good, the bad and the ugly) so be gentle on me in your comments, but constructive criticism and debate is always welcome, that is how we learn the most....
Click here to find an easy to subscibe to RSS bundle feed of my hand selected must read blog feeds to feed my brain.
I am always on the hunt for great material so if you have a blog suggestion, please add it to the comments.
Well, I've short listed my top 5 themes for my new real estate blog. Mr. X is reviewing them for feedback.
http://wpbest.com/themes/gorilla-themes/vanity/
http://wpbest.com/themes/woothemes/daily-edition/
http://wpbest.com/themes/wp-now/bloom/
http://www.acosmin.com/acosminsimple/demo/
http://wpbest.com/themes/gorilla-themes/smooth-real-estate/
Let me know of any other themes you know of which you like.
Must be clean and simple, preferably have sliders at the top, a place for video, easy to navigate....
The next step in developing my new Real Estate blog is getting our heads around an effective architecture for the site. How will visitors flow? WIll it be useful to them? Easy to understand? Good for SEO? Lots of questions flooded my head. I did not realize how big the architecture question could be until lately. I read several great posts by Bob Wilson over at Agent Genius and he was even gracious enough to speak to me at length on the phone regarding the importance of architecture for effective website construction.
As we fleshed out how the site might be constructed, Mr. X set us up on Jumpstart's webbased Wireframe application. This allows you to collaborate via the web and "sketch" out the architecture and basically build a wireframe of your new site, just as you would build a wireframe for a sculpture. It allows you to "see" the flow and connectivity of pages within the site (thank GAWD for Mr. X!!)
We've been working on the architecture and are now looking at Wordpress themes that will allow us, out of the box (or close to) to integrate our new structure into a theme without having to totally customize the site. One of the main reasons I have taken soooo long to branch off and start by own blog away from the Active Rain one (MiamibyLandandSea.com) (which has served me QUITE well since I started there in early 2007, none of the anit-Active Rain snobbery you find sometimes from me) was the thought that a blog had to be fully customized, meaning thousands and thousands of dollars. Once I started to look around, I found that A) many very very successful real estate bloggers work with a pre-packaged or semi-custom theme and B) the themes out there are very sophisticated and can really serve your needs well without having to drop thousands to a website developer (a good graphics person might be helpful). Big Excuse #1 to not branch out hit the dust.
So we are short listing our favorite themes and there are some really great ones out there. I am looking for clean looks, flexibility, and easily understood architecture. By next week, we hope to have the theme finalized. I am very excited, we are making big progress!
If you liked anything you read, please share in the comments section so I can learn from you! Also, if you have a theme(s) to suggest, I am all ears (or eyes as the case may be)
In order to know if you are successful you have to have an intended goal to measure yourself against. Mr. X and I have been looking at the various metrics we want to track. There are the obvious ones such as site visits and google page rank, but more important still is bounce rate, stickiness (how long do they stay) and conversion. So while we do want a lot of traffic, we want quality traffic over quantity. I'd rather have far fewer buyers and sellers of real estate well targeted for our geographic area, than huge numbers of "drive bys" just checking out the Miami market from Timbuktu (like the one 17 year old who signed herself up looking at $3M homes, a quick google search found her on My Space, working at Wallmart!)...
So the goals are being sorted out; page views, back-links, indexed pages, bounce rate, time on site, conversion rate.... Most importantly, is, of course, real potential clients, that trumps all else...
Do you have goals for your site? Have you thought about what, exactly, you want your efforts to yield? If not, how will you know if you are "getting it right"?
So, being the girl that I am, I wanted to be all over looking at themes and fun stuff like plug-ins and all the snazzy stuff, you know, like decorating the house before you buy it? Well, Mr. X reigned me and and said, "hold on, we've got to know what kind of house we are building here. We have to know who is going to visit our house, why and what they want from us and us from them." "Uh, Oh, OK", my deflated self said....
So Mr. X set up a Google Doc page (I love this part, I am ALL about the graph and chart!) and set me on my merry way to do my homework... So off I went and had to figure out who exactly was our target audience (uh, duh, buyers and sellers in Miami) but really who were they? demograhic, where they would likely search on the web, what are they looking for on a real estate website, etc. "Ohhhh Coral Gables and Coconut Grove buyers and sellers of historic, luxury and unique homes" OK, we are getting closer.
And what do they look for on a Real Estate website? Ummm lots of good content, search features, local neigbhorhood info, stats, etc. Yes. So off to Google Docs I go and map out a nice content mix for over 6 months of posts to reach the type of buyers and sellers who we would enjoy working with and who would find useful what we and our site, have to offer.
This is a little harder than you think.... and a little too close to my homework as a graduate student. But the chart filled up nicely and the road is paved....
More to come. Like what you read? Have an opinion? I'd like to hear about it, comment below! Thanks for visiting!
After four years of having various professional blogs and websites, I have finally decided to man-up (or woman-up) and get serious and put them all together into one blog and shed the rest.
This is a daunting task as our livlihood relies on getting this right. A very large amount of our business comes from our online activities. There is SEO, content, design, etc. involved and they need to be dead-on to be worth the investment in time and money.
I have a secret weapon, Mr. X, who is helping me pull this together.
This blog will track the process, so that if you are thinking of building a new blog, maybe you might learn a bit along with me as we build this blog from the ground up. Target deadline for the new blog is the beginning of the year...
