Control your own destiny with your own website

In the Internet world, it’s a simple but brutal fact.

In real estate, every link and every click is extremely valuable. Precious. A path to leads. Sales. But only if you control the click-path.

So why are so many agents still directing links and clicks to their company website, or “their page” on the company website, or even worse, a competitor destination portal like Zillow?

There are so many incredible tools available for an agent to own their own site, including the WordPress for real estate web service offered by HJWebsites.

Because here’s the brutal reality.

When you create a blog, or leave a comment or tell a friend about a web site, if you are directing them with a link or a click to visit the company website, you are losing that precious contact you worked so hard to develop.

When they go to the company website, it’s no longer about you and your prospect. It’s about the company. And all the other agents working for that company listed on that site.

Sure, a person might go looking for you, but maybe he comes across Agent A and notices she has a nice smile. Or Agent B, who happens to be promoting a house that looks really cool. Or Agent C, who specializes in equestrian communities and the prospect just loves horses!

Sure, you’re a nice person and probably a very professional agent, but Agent D used to live in Denver and your prospect lived there one time too!

Get the point?  When you send a prospect to a company website, there’s a real chance you could lose that opportunity.

Same goes for links. Write a blog and post a link to the company website, or post a comment somewhere with a link to the company website, or participate in a forum and put a link to the company website, guess who you are promoting? Not you, but rather the company website.

Not to knock your company website, but as an agent, you’ve got to carve out your own path. In today’s world, that path is your own individual website on the Internet, where 90% of people look first for real estate information.

By owning your own website, you can customize that path. Target certain neighborhoods and continually post content about that neighborhood so when people search for homes in that neighborhood, they find you and your site.

Fill that website with big, colorful photos of  home listings, so when someone wants to sell their home, they see you are THAT agent who is going to do a great job of promoting THEIR home.

Post hyper-local content on that website, such as Home Junction’s SpatialMatch neighborhood real  estate search tool that provides a way to search listings AND lifestyle amenities at the same time.

Is someone is looking for a three-bedroom  house next to a top-rated middle school by a fitness center and close to a sushi restaurant? Yea, you can show all that with one tool, SpatialMatch.

Hopefully you get the point by now. You are responsible for gathering your own buyers and sellers. Be sure you have the right platform to do that, an easy-to-administer, state-of-the-art WordPress website. (See example below).

Here’s a link to an agent who is saying the same thing about owning your own website.

Here’s a link to HJWebsites to get you started on that path.