Have you figured out how to go beyond just staying in the game to really winning in these turbulent times?
Lasso’s upcoming complimentary webinar on September 21st – CRACK the code to +30% Close Ratios .. . Guaranteed! - will feature new home sales and marketing authorities, Myers Barnes and Mike Lyon.
We have asked Myers and Mike to present this one-time webinar where they will deliver a roadmap to success that is achieving 30% (and higher) close rates for homebuilders across North America.
They will demonstrate how to make the successful connection between online marketing to onsite sales with a proven formula that is not only pragmatic and 'doable', their combination of people, process and technology delivers proven results. Time after time!
Learning Outcomes:
- Successful integration between online & offline sales
- Role of the Online Sales Counsellor
- The transition to the Sales Team
- Define the lead follow-up process
- Master a paint-by-numbers sales process
- Double your conversion ratios
For more information and to register, click here.
Lasso holds educational webinars every 4-6 weeks. View our past webinars, featuring Mike Lyon, Jeff Shore, Jim Adams and Carol Flammer, here.
What do you do after you send a mass mail to your prospective home buyers or Realtors and brokers?
Chances are you put a lot of effort into the design of the email, then you spend time testing the email and then you send it. Right after you send the mass mail, you likely have a look at the quick stats to see how many people opened it, but what do you do next?
Often we see the regular blasting of a registrant list all with similar results over and over (in fact, sometimes with declining open rates). A 20% open rate is not bad, but we think you can probably do better with a few suggestions on what you can do after you send out the mass mail (or before you send out your next email!)
- Read and review the mass mail detail report in Lasso. You’ll see who opened the email, who clicked on a link, who unsubscribed, as well as who didn’t receive the email because of a failure.
- Learn what the delivery failures mean and update your registrants accordingly. If you see that an email address has bounced, pick up the phone and ask the prospect if they are still interested in receiving information. If they are, ask for a new email address. A great opportunity to touch base with potential home buyers!
- Make sure that the “From” email address in your mass mail is a valid address. Often when you send out email, you receive “out-of-office” responses and many times a registrant will reply with a query. It’s important that this email is monitored and someone is responsible for responding.
- Update invalid email addresses. These are the email addresses with a typo, such as “hotmial” instead of “hotmail”.
- Try resending your email. Yes, you heard me correctly. I’m suggesting that you send it out again. But this time, don’t send it to everyone, just send it to those who didn’t open it the first time. You may want to change the subject line to include “Update” or “Reminder” or “Last chance . . .”. We’ve had a number of clients use this approach (albeit, carefully – you don’t want to be sending email so often that you annoy people). They have seen a surprisingly good open rate the second time around.
- Have a follow-up email ready to go out. If you have a link in your first email about one-bedroom units and 75 people click on this link, have a follow-up email ready to go that provides further information and pricing incentives on one-bedroom units!
- Plan some human interaction. We get so caught up in email today; however, it’s important for a human touch. Use the mass mail reporting to follow-up with those registrants who haven’t opened an email in awhile, or maybe even those registrants who have unsubscribed. Some people just aren’t into email. It doesn’t mean they aren’t interested. Don’t ignore them!
Follow these ideas and you will find that your email subscribers are more engaged and your open rates are going in the right direction . . . up!! More appointments, offers and sales will follow.
John Jantsch is a marketing coach and author of Duct Tape Marketing. He wrote this post recently for Open Forum and we think it's definitely worth sharing. 
He has suggested some great tools that can help determine what keywords new home buyers may be using to search for their new home online. Competition for placement of keywords is fierce and the challenge is that there are constantly changes and updates. It can be tough to stay on top of it all.
Real estate marketing professionals need to dig through search data to find the opportunities to make their way to the top in search and then stay there!
Below are a list of five relatively unknown tools that as John Jantsch indicates “give you insight and a competitive advantage when it comes to determining the best topics for your new content and how to adjust existing content to rise in the search engines.”
- Topsy – Think of Topsy as a people trend engine for Twitter. Topsy looks at the way people are connected and the conversations they are having with each other all over the web.
- YouTube Keyword Tool – Most people are familiar with Google’s keyword research and related search tools, but did you know that YouTube (the second largest search engine) has the same tools? By visiting and using these tools you can find some great insights about video topics that are hot and ways to optimize your video content to take advantage of what people are searching for on YouTube.
- Facebook Posts by Everyone – There aren’t many ways to track what’s going on inside of Facebook (unless you are a large advertiser) but you can use the search function to do searches and get some insight into who is talking about key phrases and how you might join those conversations. Make sure you click on the posts by everyone and not just your friends. You might also consider taking a look at the search tool Kurrently.
- WordTracker Question Search – WordTracker is the paid keyword research tool of choice for most serious SEO folks, but they also have a number of great free tools. One of my favorites is the question search tool. A growing number of searches are questions posed by folks looking for something. This tool allows you to find search volume for questions related to your key phrases. When trying to determine blog post content, this is a killer place to look. If you can answer the questions people are asking most, you’ll score some big long tail search results.
- Bing xRank – xRank is focused on capturing what’s hot right now. There are a number of trending monitoring tools, including Google Trends, but Bing’s is a sleeper and returns richer results.
Do you have some favourite online tools? Let us know.
Real estate project websites have never been more important than they are today. This first impression of your project often determines if a prospect comes back or registers for more information.
But before these prospects even get to your website, they need to be able to find you. Search engine optimization (SEO) is an important component to a real estate marketing professional’s strategy. In many cases, home builders and developers turn the website optimization over to their web developers and/or an SEO company. This is okay, but it’s important to have an understanding of how you can make a difference and contribute positively to improving your position in search. It’s all about being on page 1 on search engines!
Jim Adams, CEO of NewHomesDirectory.com has written a book called ‘Little Black Book of SEO Secrets – Search Engine Optimization Made Simple’.
All the SEO tactics presented in his book have been accepted, endorsed, and recommended by all major search engines, and will stand the test of even the most discriminating human reviewer.
The book is all about how to get your website found on search engines such as Google, Bing, Yahoo and YouTube.
Not only does it cover the basics of what search engine marketing is, but it also covers:
- Keyword research
- Paid search vs organic search
- Website design and important elements that assist with search
- Developing compelling content
- How to hire a SEO company
Included are helpful tips as well as things that you should avoid. For example, having well thought out title tags on each webpage is an important part of a website strategy. But at the same time, it’s important to always avoid having pages with the same title tag, as well as just having your company name in the title tag. Read the book to learn why!
Jim has laid out the book in an easy to read, concise format that will get you on your way to understanding search and what you need to do to get your project website found!
To order his book, visit his profile page at www.jimadams.me
In this world of online marketing and the overwhelming amount of information that is available to us, it’s sometimes hard to know where to even start to try to find the information we need and importantly, keep abreast of what’s going on in the residential real estate world. We all have our favourite local blogs that keep the buzz going about new projects and developments in our own locations; however, it’s important to be able to monitor who’s talking about you online along with keeping up with what your friendly competitors are doing!
You’re likely familiar with Google Alerts – a fantastic tool that allows you to create alerts on key words that are applicable to you (e.g. your company name, project name, etc.). These alerts can be emailed to you and you’ll receive a link to whatever website has referenced your key phrase. This tool is free, easy to use and you can add, delete, modify as much as you want. Check it out.
There’s another online alert tool that’s extremely important in today’s social world. It’s called Social Mention. In a nutshell, it’s Google Alerts but for social media. You can receive daily alerts about you, your company, the people who work with you, and your competitors. When you do conduct a search, you’ll also get some interesting statistics that show you who is contributing to your star status and blogging or chatting about you. This is important information that allows you the opportunity to engage and participate in the conversation about your new developments.
Let us know what your favourite online tools are!
Search engine analyst, Jim Adams, recently presented the fourth webinar in Lasso's 2010 Homebuilder Webinar Series.
Entitled, What it Takes to Get Found Online, the 40-minute webinar is now available to view online and provides homebuilders and developers with a brief overview of why it's so important to be found online, how you can get found through search engine optimization (SEO), and where you can get found.
76% of Americans are online; and, we've heard over and over that 90% of new home buyers are starting their search online. We are living in an internet culture which has completely changed how we do business. With over 50 billion web pages, finding your site is like finding a needle in a haystack. Many homebuilders and developers hire website developers to look after search engine optimization; however, it's important to have some SEO knowledge to ensure you're on the right track. The webinar will provide real estate professionals with a good understanding of what's needed to improve your online presence.
View this recording, along with previous webinars that feature Mike Lyon, Jeff Shore, and Carol Flammer here.
How to Improve Your Online Presence and Get Found Online...
If you want to sell more houses locally, it's likely your goal is to be at the top of the list for most online searches. John Jantsch from DuctTapeMarketing.com has recently written an article on 5 Ways to Get More from Local Search. Here are some of the highlights that we think you will benefit the most from.
Real estate project marketing goals must include a strong online presence today, when a majority of prospective homebuyers turn to the Internet first when beginning their search for a new home. By following these tips, you can look forward to receiving more traffic to your website and to your sales center.
Increase your online presence by customizing your website, individual landing pages, online content, online profiles on social media networks, and more.
- Localize Your Website - Take the time to review your website. Add geography based terms to your page titles, footers, URLs and keywords on your website.
- Create Individual Landing Pages - If your business serves more than one location or community, create individual pages that feature content exclusive to each of these communities. Add information about local community news and events, nearby facilities, schools, churches, etc. Remember to customize your meta-tag descriptions and keywords in the HTML for each individual page! Local SEO Specialist Dev Basu provides very helpful tips on How to Create Effective Local Business Landing Pages.
- Online Content - When adding videos, photos, whitepapers about your company on sites like YouTube, and Slideshare and Flickr, take the time to add localized descriptors, links, and filenames to your content information.
- Online Profiles - If you haven't already done so, create a business profile page on social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn. This blog article from SitePoint lists 20 Social Networking Sites for Business Professionals. Browse through to find those that suit you best.
- Get listed on Online Business Directories - Sign up with popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing, AOL, Microsoft, and Ask.
- Tap into your Networks - Get your friends, associates, and happy customers to talk about you. LinkedIn offers testimonials and you can publish testimonials on your website. Create a Partners page where you feature and link to all the great people you work with from builders, developers, realtors, etc. Ask them to link back to your site.
In addition to the above, there are several real estate-specific directories that are worth exploring. These directories are typically focused on a specific location. There's been a lot of discussion regarding the importance of Craigslist and NewHomesDirectory.com is a directory service specifically for home builders. It positions itself well in the organic search rankings for keywords such as "New Homes San Diego" and "New Homes in Chicago" and their main objective is driving prospective purchasers to your project website.
A few weeks ago, homebuilder sales and marketing consultant, 
Mike Lyon and NewHomesDirectory.com CEO, Jim Adams, held a "sold-out" webinar entitled - Craigslist for Home builders. This webinar is now available on-demand as a recording.
Did you know Craigslist has a staggering 664 million searches? If you didn't, you can now consider yourself educated on the numerical power of Craigslist. Most home builders have caught on to the growing social media trend by either allocating resources to Facebook and Twitter or making plans to do so due to their large numbers of consumers, but is Craigslist being ignored?
Craigslist is as important as Google when it comes to selling new homes. The real estate audience surfing the Craigslist wave is larger than many give credit. Home builders who want to sell their homes will not ignore the site that is captivating future home buyers.
In this free webinar you will learn how to utilize the following Craigslist power selling tools:
- How to post attention getting ads
- How to operate within the Craigslist Terms of Service
- What days are the best to post
- Subject lines that get you clicks
Sign-up to view the recording here.
Upcoming Lasso Webinar: Jim Adams is the featured presenter at our next webinar on Thursday, June 24th. Learn what it takes to get found online!
Real estate project marketers need to have a wide variety of skills - whether it's the planning of the next big launch or event, designing and producing brochures and direct mail pieces, defining and developing the lead nurturing process, or the many, many other responsibilities that come with the job. Email marketing can play an important role in the marketing of a project, but often the resources to call upon to help create the email are scarce!
Have you ever been frustrated when creating an HTML email? One of the challenges I have, I'll admit, is that I'm not an HTML coder. I do a lot of the creation of email right in design mode or in an HTML editor, like Dreamweaver. Many will tell you that you really need to know HTML in order to create an effective email. No question, it does help and it may eliminate some grief, but take it from me it can be done - especially when there are templates available so you're not starting from scratch!
There are always many things to consider when creating an email. One of the most important things to keep in mind is that an HTML email cannot be created exactly like you would a web page. It's coded the same way, but you need to keep it REALLY simple. All the cool things you can do in HTML web pages today won't necessarily render properly in certain email providers. So you must test your email and test it again, and again! Focus on your message, not the creativity bursting within!
Here are a few things to consider:
- Use tables. Because email providers use different HTML rendering systems - it could be Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome or in many cases Microsoft Outlook, which uses Word to read the HTML code and can cause a lot of problems! Using tables allows you to control where the text and images are placed.
- Keep your emails to a maximum of 600 pixels wide. Design your emails for the preview pane. Most preview panes are no wider than this and much of the message will be missing if you don't confine your email to a 600 pixel table. What a recipient sees in their preview pane could determine whether they want to learn more, or not!
- Don't assume people are going to see the images. By default the majority of recipients will have images turned off. Look at the email you're creating in this mode - can a recipient still get the gist of the message?
- Browser-based email providers like gmail and hotmail will strip away certain code and CSS (cascading style sheets). And Microsoft is no different - there are even differences between Outlook 2003 and 2007 - for example, background images won't work in Outlook 2007. And sometimes background colours don't work so be cautious of using text colour that may not show up on a white background. Keep it simple!
- If you are contracting a web developer or designer to create your email, ask them to code it like it was for a website from 15 years ago - don't use fancy features that won't work and will only cause your recipients to be frustrated. Ensure there's a good balance of text and images.
For more email suggestions for improved design, development and delivery, view this email marketing white paper. Before you know it, you'll be creating HTML emails like someone who codes them!
Interested in getting trained in real estate email marketing? Contact Lasso Support - support@mylasso.com
Lasso Data Systems, leaders in customer relationship software (CRM) for real estate homebuilders and developers, is pleased to announce that CEO, Dave Clements and Vice President Sales, Dave Betcher, have been added as faculty members to the BuilderRadio network. Adding to BuilderRadio's distinguished list of real estate professionals, they will provide sales and marketing resources to builder executives, managers and new home marketing and sales specialists.
"Our membership frequently tells us that one of the biggest challenges faced today is using automation in real estate marketing and sales and Lasso truly is a leader in the CRM domain with an exceptional reputation in the homebuilding industry, as both Dave Clements and Dave Betcher have broad comprehensive knowledge of the residential housing industry having been involved in hundreds of CRM implementations throughout North America," stated Jerry Rouleau, Principal of BuilderRadio. "Both Clements and Betcher possess a deep understanding of the challenges facing sales and marketing professionals today," added Rouleau.
The Lasso representatives will deliver educational webinars as well as provide expert panelist representation on various podcasts and sessions on topics such as technology strategy in new home sales, online marketing, email marketing, lead and prospect management, amongst other topics.
"We are delighted to be part of the BuilderRadio faculty", stated Dave Clements, Lasso Data Systems, CEO. "Our mandate is to equip builders and developers with the technology tools to sell their projects and communities faster and more profitably. Core to the mandate is being passionate about providing education and delivering topical, high value information to homebuilders. We are excited to work with Jerry Rouleau and Scott Stroud and to be amongst a terrific group of industry leaders," added Clements.
Read complete article here.