[Podcast ] So How Do You Get It All Done?

One of the most common asked questions I received is, “how do you get it all done?”this is the first podcast in a short series of podcasts where I will help you to get your systems in place and find out what is important in your business and what you can delegate.  I will be speaking about how to get more of your tasks accomplished.

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Make sure to subscribe to my podcast on itunes here:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/rising-above-noise-growth/id810838153

You can also download each podcast to your computer or other device by clicking on the audio file here in this post.

 

So How Do You Get It All Done Podcast:

00:21 – How do you get it all done?

01:03 – Delegating and outsourcing

05:07 – How to Delegate?

08:17 – How to use my system, how to train virtual assistants and how you can use my virtual assistants

 

I look forward to sharing more with you.

 

When It Comes to Your Digital Marketing Strategy, Taking the First Step Can Make or Break You

The last few weeks have been busier than normal. What else is new, right? But really, it has been super busy. I've been working on creating a huge new project that has been keeping me up at night. Being busy is actually a good thing. I would rather be actively engaged in good causes than be bored or lazy. 

This project has been on my mind for a couple of years now but I did not know how exactly to put it all together.  I am so excited about this new project. 

The reason I'm so excited is this focuses on answering the question that has been keeping me up at night: 

“How can I help busy real estate agents to get their SEO best practices up and running faster and more efficiently? In other words, what exactly would this look like? What does it take to get on the #FastTrack to SEO your site to the top of the search engines and still be able to work with buyers and sellers and not go broke?” 

 

 

I realized it has been over 10 years now since I started learning about SEO and applying all that I learned to our real estate company website and our brand. Zig Ziglar once said, “if you want to be an expert in a subject study one hour a day for five years and you will know more than most people who are in that field.” I did the math and started studying about SEO for 6 to 8 hours a night when the rest of the family was sleeping. In one year, I was able to apply what I learned. 

Blogging about SEO and creating tutorials for agents to follow, sharing our successes and helping ActiveRain members was how it all got started with paying it forward. Back in the day, there was no ActiveRain University. 

This is what inspired me to create the popular course: SEO to the Top. For years agents have been taking SEO to the Top modules and trainings. 

It seems as though time keeps going by faster and faster. This got me to thinking about how Universities and High Schools now offer fast tracks to get through school faster and more efficiently. 

Over the years I've had the opportunity to personally coach individual agents just like you. This has helped me create more efficient programs and modules for you to use in your marketing and businesses. 

I've also had the awesome blessing of helping many of these agents rise to the top of the search engines. Agents who have applied what I teach enjoy page one placement for their keyword phrases which results in listings and buyers as well as very good branding. 

Through this journey I kept not only a watchful eye, performed testing on keywords and other SEO strategies but also kept data and notes on which techniques are getting real estate agents up to the top of google faster than before. Over 10 years of data, of defining, of testing and of learning from the great masters of SEO on the internet has transformed into #FastTrackSEO to the Top. 

The point is during that time I've amassed an incredible amount of knowledge, skills, information and applications about what it takes to get to page one on Google and the other search engines which in turn you can then apply to hopefully get the same benefits as I have and all the agents whom I have helped have. 

So why would any of this keep me up at night? 

Simple. It's one thing to know this stuff. It is something quite different to take everything about the SEO best practices and put it into some kind of immediately usable format that can help you to get to where you want to go more rapidly. 

Well, I have it figured out. It's take a long time and it's a lot of work putting it together, but I have now built a full out end to end system which will teach anyone how to do this including you and other busy agents. 

I'd like to share more specifics about the actual #FastTrack SEO to the Top path however there are still some more pieces to get nailed down. For one thing, I'm trying to decide how many people I can accommodate and I don't want to raise expectations and then not be able to meet those obligations. And the last thing I want is a bunch of disappointed agents on my hands! 

Do you have 1 minute to help me help you to #FastTrack your SEO strategies? 

There is one other thing… 

You see, I like think I've covered all of the elements of my new #FastTrackSEO to the Top system. In fact, I'm thrilled to say after two years of hard work I'm about to finalize everything for this system. 

But before I do, I want to make sure I've covered all the bases. This is where you come in…. 

I want know your thoughts about fast tracking your SEO strategies and best practices. 

I've made it incredibly easy for you to send your thoughts and ideas to me. Just click here right now:  

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FastTrackSEO

Now, I can't promise an individual answer to each of your questions and comments- with over 2500 subscribers on ActiveRain and over 4500 followers on Facebook there is no way that I can do that. But I can promise you that I will be personally reading each and every one of your questions- and I might be answering some of those on my blog. 

Thanks in advance for sharing your questions with me, I promise I will take good notes! 

Remember to click the link below to send me your SEO questions. I really appreciate your help! 

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FastTrackSEO

Early Bird Notification List is Ready for #FastTrackSEO to the Top

Early Bird Notification List is Ready for #FastTrackSEO to the Top – the new revamped SEO to the Top course. 

Back by popular demand- we are getting ready to launch an all new SEO program on the Fast Track.    

Being on the early bird notification list makes sure that you get first notice of the product launching. 

The anticipated date of the course start date is May 27, 2015. 

SEO to the Top is a very popular course but there have been a lot of Google algorithm changes in the last couple of years. 

We are putting this SEO training on the #FastTrackSEO just like colleges and universities have Fast Track courses. 

This course will be taught in live webinar format for the first launch. 

There will be some amazing bonuses added to the course so don't miss out!

Get on the list! 

You will be send some important information about how to sign up which you will have first priority to do. 

The doors will close when we reach 200 members so it is important to be on the early bird notification list for #FastTrackSEO to the Top. 

We will also be sending you some great content along this journey to the launch! Stay tuned! 

Here is the link to get on the #FastTrackSEO to the Top course: 

https://coachkaterina.leadpages.net/fasttrackwebinar/

What’s Your Biggest Question About SEO and Digital Marketing

What's Your Biggest Question About SEO and Digital Marketing? 

If we had lunch together…

and you could only ask me your biggest question-

what would that be?

Go here to take this one question survey…

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BJWVVDB

 

After you answer that one question head on over to

the early bird registration for #Fast Track SEO to the Top!

The link to the early bird registration will be on the survey monkey thank you page.

Because you are one of my subscribers you get first dibs at securing your spot for #FastTrackSEO to the Top webinar coming up soon.

There is limited seating on webinars so you must register on the early bird notification list to secure your spot.

 

After you take the one question survey you will be redirected to the Survey Monkey thank you page. On that page there will be a link to the early bird notification list.

 

Afterwards you will get a thank you email and a few minutes later a confirmation email.

You will need to click on the link in that confirmation email in order to confirm your being on the priority list.

Pay attention to your email inbox after your confirmation for important details to how to get on the webinar, the webinar registration link and the important news and trainings prior to the webinar.  You will be getting a checklist to download and print prior to the webinar.

 

Don’t snooze! Take the survey now.  

 

Video – How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market – Digital Marketing Strategies

Video – How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market – Digital Marketing Strategies. 

Here is the video version of “How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market”.

In case you don't have time to read the text version and if you are a very visual person, this may be the best way for you to embrace the content.

 

Here is the link to the text version of How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market.

 

Here is the link to the podcast version in case you like to listen and learn:

Click here to go to the podcast post where you can download the audio file.

 

Here is the link to my iTunes channel where you can subscribe to my podcast and listen at your leisure:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/rising-above-noise-growth/id810838153

Make sure you subscribe to my blog to keep up to date with Digital Marketing Strategies.

Podcast- How To Choose The Right Website For Your Target Market- Digital Marketing Strategies

Welcome to another episode of my podcast. How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market.  We are going to go over the five most important steps in making the right choice in your website design and application. You can listen to my podcast by subscribing in iTunes too.

If you would like to read the text version of this podcast – click here. There are images of screenshots of different website samples that are not shown on the podcast.

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You can click the above player and the media file will automatically download to your media files.

Or you can subscribe to my iTunes channel in the iTunes store:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/rising-above-noise-growth/id810838153

 

In the podcast:

0:23 – Step 1 – Find out who your avatar is, your ideal client, target market, etc.

0:41 – Step 2 – Choose a website design that serves a purpose not your ego

7:05 – Step 3 – Make sure your site is mobile friendly

8:52 – Step 4 – Choose the website platform that is going to resonate with your avatar and be easy for you to use and add content to on the blog post at least.

23:24 – Step 5 – Now that you have chosen which website you are going to run with get ALL your content together at once.

How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market

How to Choose the Right Website for Your Target Market

Websites – What Kind of a Website Should I Get? 

What kind of website do you need to have? 

What kind of website do you want to have? 

Before you answer either of those questions the first step to choosing a website is to find out: 

• Who is your avatar? 
• Who is your ideal client? 
• Who is your target market?
• What are they hungry for? 

The famous copywriter Gary Halbert would ask his students: 

“If you were to open a restaurant what would be the single most important factor for your success?” 

The students would give answers like: 

1. have the best tasting hamburgers 
2. offer the highest quality ingredients 
3. have better service than the other nearby restaurants

Gary Halbert would say they were all wrong. 

 

What you need is a bunch of HUNGRY customers!!!! 

 

 

 

It is the same thing with opening up a website. 

You need to be in front of the customers that want something that you have to offer. 

 

If you have these words at the top of your website: 

“Our real estate company works with integrity and we are honest”  Who cares? I am not saying that people want to work with crooked salespeople but that is just not what they are hungry for when they are searching on the internet. 

 

I highly doubt this is the search being put into google right now by buyers and sellers: 

” hard working honest real estate agent full of integrity in Wellington Florida ..”

 

You MUST first and foremost KNOW what resonates with your avatar, what is she or he really looking for? What kind of information do they crave that they are not finding on the other sites? 

 

 

Choose a website design that serves a purpose not your ego. 

 

The biggest mistake that REALTORS® make is they go out to buy a website BEFORE they even know who their target market is. They buy a website based on what THEY like! 

 

Get over yourself. Your website is not about what you like and want unless it is your vanity page. 

 

If you are going to choose a website for your ideal customers – do your research and find out what they want the site to look like. 

 

Don't buy websites because your other real estate friends are buying a certain site. Don't buy websites and pay for high design fees just to look pretty on the internet. That is a recipe for disaster. When agents hire me to coach them many of them have spent over $10,000 on websites that will never rank in Google or be very very hard to rank. 

 

 

Make sure that your site is mobile friendly.

There are millions of websites that are not mobile friendly now. It has become such a problem that Google is actually sending out emails to website owners to warn them that their websites are not mobile friendly. Read more on this post I wrote about Google sending out mobile friendly notices. 

 

If you are starting all over again or are at the stage of choosing a website there are different options and most of those options now have a mobile friendly version that is a click of a button and some edits. There is no reason to have to pay for two websites, one that is mobile friendly and one for computer screens. A small upgrade in price for custom designed sites to add on the mobile compatibilities is normal. 

 

 

Choose the website platform that is going to resonate with your avatar and be easy for you to use and add content to on the blog page at least. 

 

There are many different platforms and we have tried most of them. After using different platforms and with Mary McKnight's design input when she was here – these are the best suggestions we have: 

 

1. Custom designed wordpress sites that are high end and highly functional will cost you around $6,000 and up. We know a fabulous custom designer for this area of design- Inna Hardison. Not all agents need a site such as this because not all consumers are looking for this style of a site. Let me know if you need an introduction.

 

2. Semi-custom designed wordpress sites that you can build yourself or have us build for you. If you want to build your own site with a very flexible theme that can have the blog page running down the home page or on a blog page and then have a home page design with a call to action- these will run you around $2,900. 

 

You will need to have your own hosting account on Bluehost, not godaddy. You can get a hosting account for a very low price. I have seen sales at about $3.95 per month which you pay annually. 

 

This style of site works well in Luxury niche markets and to market to sellers. We do not use IDX on our sites anymore. Instead of a lot of pages of unimportant content and duplicate content from IDX providers- we use home search widgets that serve a higher purpose. 

 

Here is a screenshot of one of the websites that I designed for a REALTOR® in North Carolina: 

 

 

Her home search widgets go right to her Market Leader site where she can capture them in her Market Leader CRM. That way, everything is in one place, saving a lot of time, effort and money. 

 

The website is not totally finished yet. I am still waiting for items from her in order to finish the site.

Visit her site at: http://asheboronchomesforsale.net 

 

Here is a brand new site that I am currently building for a REALTOR® in Canada. Again, the focus on this site is for sellers to contact him. Here is a screenshot of the home page which is the only page nearly completed at this time.

This is the link to the website if you want to see how it flows on the home page.

 

 

 

We re-designed his sell my home page and turned that into a squeeze page.

 

A squeeze page has ONLY one call to action and NO menu bar or navigation to be able to click around. The purpose is to either get the person to call you or give his email address. The email address part is not functional yet. They had a very outdated website before we started this one: 

 

The only cost to these websites is your design services and then yearly hosting fees and on the back end you should have a CRM or at least a place where the visitors land for their home search. You can use RealBird for this as well. Many of you have direct MLS home search widgets that you can use and will do the job just fine. 

 

3. DIY yourself Themes in WordPress: you can build your own websites if you have the time and some eye for color and design. 

 

BEWARE: 

• Don't use FREE themes UNLESS they are the ones that wordpress offers- You get what you pay for here. Most developers who create free themes do not keep up with updates for security breaches. They put out a free theme and rarely update it. If you have a very old free theme it is most likely not mobile friendly and also may have been hacked. However, the free themes you get when you install wordpress on your hosting account- the “twenty-thirteen” and  “twenty-twelve” are safe. They are consistently updated and they are also mobile-friendly. 

• Don't buy a theme expecting that when you upload the zip file to your wordpress account that the theme will look like the one you saw before you paid for it!!! That was the toughest lesson I learned. I spend hundreds of dollars over the years buying themes that I was hoping would be ones that I could just add my photos to and it would look like the demo site. Unless you know some html language or some CSS you are not going to have it be looking the same way as the demo. 

 

The theme that I recommend for faster building is ThriveThemes. ThriveThemes has a very nice variety of themes that you can purchase very inexpensively. They also have a wordpress plugin that you can purchase and edit all your themes in a visual drag and drop format that is quick to learn and easy to implement.

 

Shane, the developer is from Sweden and is very exacting and methodical in his design and applications. He provides great tutorials on how to use his themes and he also have a membership forum where you can ask questions about how to do this and that. The team is very responsive. I always get an answer back within a few hours with our time difference. I suggest the yearly membership because it is very very low cost but high support and also you can use ALL of his themes within your membership and the WP plugin. 

 

Here it the link to go to to get ThriveThemes:  Thrive Themes WordPress Website Builder

(I am an affiliate of this product.)

 

4. Wix Websites:  Wix had a great Super Bowl ad this year. If you want something simple and fast, then Wix sites may just be for your audience. 

 

Wix sites are in html5 and with just a couple of tweaks to their mobile friendly site you have a great looking site. Wix sites are templated sites with full customization options that you just drag and drop, hold handles to resize and a lot more. You can customize to your heart's content or be very simple. 

 

The sites are free but for SEO you need to upgrade from the free version. You also need to upgrade if you are going to use your own domain name. The hosting is very reasonable. It runs about $8 per month when you wait for a holiday sale. They offer their sites for 50% off on holidays. 

 

Click here to learn more about creating your own Wix website. 

 

Here is a screenshot of a website I created in Wix for a dentist. He is already getting patients from this website and it was just completed a couple of weeks ago. 

 

 

Here is the link to his site if you want to browse the menu tabs and see how the rest of the pages were built: http://BestBoyntonBeachDentist.com 

 

You can build these yourself but if you want us to build one for you – the pricing is based on what you want on your website. The site prices for us to build one start at $997.00. 

 

5. If your audience is only buyers, if you are a buyer's agent then you can start with a very inexpensive site at Placester.com at only $10 per month. 

 

The placestor option offer templated clean designs for you to choose from. There is no customization available and you can not add a bunch of widgets etc to the sites. But heck, you can't beat that price!!! It does include a blog page. They have a library of content that you can add to your site but I don't recommend that at all- it will dilute the authority of your website. Create your own content! 

 

Your MLS gets pulled in through their home search results pages and of course, your MLS must approve the site. You can use domain names that you already own on the site. 

 

This is also a great option if you want to test a specific niche market before you spend money on site design. 

 

Here is a screenshot of the home page of the placester site that we just started: 

 

 

Now that you have chosen which website you are going to run with get ALL of your content together at one time. 

 

The biggest complaint that REALTORS® have about web designers is that their sites are unfinished. Most of the time, the agents have not provided necessary items that are requested by the web designer. Make sure you stop and take the time to put together the items that you will need.

 

Here is a partial list: 

• Your Logo
• Your mobile phone number you want prospects to call you on – include area code
• Your photo in high resolution and in a png or jpg file format 
• Your company Logo if your company requires it 
• Your company broker name and company name per state requirements 
• Your company address per state requirements if applicable in your state 
• Your geo market! I can't tell you how many times that is not provided. We can't read minds:). 
• Images that YOU have taken or you have the license to use of homes typical of your area and the price points of your avatar 
• Images of your community- parks, shopping centers, etc. 
• Your community information 
• Your email address and fax number
• Your social platform links 

 

That is a partial list but it is always good to have all of those items in a folder labeled with your name on google drive. 

 

Now you are off to a great start with getting your new website!!

See you at the Top! Subscribe to my blog to stay in touch with Digital Marketing Strategies! 

Google Sends Notices – Your Site is NOT Mobile Friendly

Google Webmaster Tools is sending out notices to let you know your website is not mobile-friendly. 

They ask you in the notice to follow the steps to make sure your website is mobile-friendly. 

If you do not make your website mobile-friendly Google will not have your website indexed for mobile search. 

What that means is that you will still be on the search engine for your keywords when people search from their desktop computers but you will not be visible to those same people if they search on their smart phones or iPads. 

 

Making your site mobile-friendly in most cases is very simple and you can do it yourself. 

 

Don't get sucked into those companies that call you to charge you big bucks to make your website mobile-friendly. 

 

If your site is hosted on WordPress, it is as simple as updating your theme. If you are using any of the WordPress themes that come with WordPress installations they are mobile friendly. 

 

If you have purchased a theme from another company – they should have an update for you which makes the theme mobile-friendly. 

 

Here is the link to the Google Developers guide on making your site mobile-friendly: 

 

https://developers.google.com/webmasters/mobile-sites/get-started/

 

They have solutions for most kinds of websites: wordpress, joomla, etc. 

 

After you complete the steps you can check your website at this URL to see if it passes the Google test for mobile-friendly: 

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/

 

The page looks like this: 

With so much search these days coming from mobile devices don't get left out! 

Make sure that your website is mobile-friendly!