And get this. Want to know what the devices are? Think they have anything to do with mortgage lending? NOT A THING! Then what are they? They are devices to “protect” you from using too much energy. Okay, let’s say this the rational way. They are locks that THEY ONLY have the key for to turn your gas off (can you say “residential emissions”). I think that I’ll come up with a lock that I can put on YOUR home that only I have the key to and call it “cap-and locks”. BTW- If you look at the patent, it looks like a 3rd grade science project.

Can you believe it? Now, after putting us in a horrible housing crisis by going all in for sub-prime loans (yeah, I know agents thought these were great at the time) now that they get a bail-out for as much money as they want, they’ve decided that they’re not to good at lending money, but this “cap-and-trade” idea just might make them money . . . a LOT of money. And to whose detriment? OURS. I only have one question Mr. Obama.

How do we get rid of this overreaching dinasaur of a conglomorate called Fannie Mae?

Well let’s start out with a quick definition of what RSS is. This is an acronym for Really Simple Syndication. Think of it as a subscription, just like your newspaper or magazine subscriptions. Almost anything electronic on the Internet such as email, websites, blog sites, Facebook sites, Twitter sites, etc can be subscribed to. Consider not only subscribing not only to the New York Times, but more narrowly, subscribe just to the Gardening and Real Estate sections of the New York Times. Get the idea?

Now that you see the benefits of subscribing to others information, you can easily see that your own blog sites, websites, etc can also have RSS tags on them for others to subscribe. The secret here is to make them interesting enough to make others motivated to want to subscribe to what you have to say. And that is what this first of 2 “pocket presentations” is meant to show you. This will give you an overview of the full video on the subject.

This video is gives some quick tips on how to create/modify your domain name.

Being an internet marketer for many years now I have heard some really out of whack misconceptions when it comes to SEO and how it helps grow a business online.

Here are some of the most important misconceptions of SEO that I think should be called out:

1. It is all Technical – Search engine optimization is only about 15-20% technical. The rest requires a marketing approach. Think about it, if you are trying to get rankings in the search engines don’t you have to put yourself in your audiences shoes and anticipate what they search for, what they read and what they want to see on your website? That requires a marketing hat.

2. Rankings Happen Quick – Search engine optimization is time and labor intensive. It takes time to get things moving in any direction. Nothing happens over night or even in one month or two.

3. I Only Need to Do It for 2 Months – SEO does not have a finish line. When you take a marketing approach to your SEO it is something you never really stop doing. Why would you stop marketing your company? You wouldn’t and that is why your SEO should never stop either. Rankings are not the only goal for search engine marketing. Building many relevant one way links is also a goal. This can only happen over time.

4. SEO Costs $39.95 – When it comes to search engine marketing you really get what you pay for. That doesn’t mean it should cost an arm and a leg but price should be appropriate to amount of work and man hours put into a certain effort in order to get it right. Prices that sound to good to be true usually are. Do you really think you can grow a business online successfully for the same cost as a cup of coffee per day?

5. SEO Software Should Do the Trick – Search engine optimization cannot be put on auto pilot by some software program. Some software’s are capable of isolating gaps or errors in your website or campaign but that still requires you as a business owner or marketer to make the necessary changes to get things moving in the right direction.

There are many misconceptions in the SEO industry and over time they should all be cleared up as the industry continues to mature and evolve. I only highlighted several that came to my mind, please feel free to share any that you may have heard.

Therefore focusing on developing the keyword phrases which receive lower volumes of search traffic will lead to an increase in the overall amount of visitors from search engines to your website. Tune in to this short “pocket presentation” to learn more.

Randy Eagar, CRS

It’s the beginning of a new year and many of you are making resolutions. Many of these have to do with making your website work for you. This means that you are in the process of hiring an SEO company or an SEO professional like WebsTarget SEO to optimize your real estate website. This can be a daunting task due to the fact that the technical world of Search Engine Optimization involves questions your not even qualified to ask. I’d like to share the 10 most important questions to ask when interviewing an SEO company.

1.    How do you research your keyword phrases?

One of the first things that most agents ask us is how do we research the best keyword phrases for their particular circumstance, and can we get them to the top of their market. The easiest way to research this is to ask the SEO specialist what some of the keyword phrases are that they try to optimize for and see how good they are. If they can’t answer this request, run the other way.

2.    What is your specialty?

The world of website technology has become like medicine. The best professionals to go to are the specialists.The next question that you want to know is if they create websites AND do SEO, or if they just specialize in SEO. Companies that try to do both have neither the manpower nor the resources to do both effectively; especially if they are a large company. Too often I see large website companies that say they also do SEO, only to find out that their style of optimization is the old “cookie cutter” approach wherein you get the same code as their other clients only with the location changed.

3.    Do you offer a guarantee?

To be honest, for many years even we didn’t offer a guarantee due to the constant change of algorithms with the search engines. However our people are so good now that we have full confidence of offering a money-back guarantee. Almost no one else will offer this quality of service.

4.    Do you have references I can call?

This is a very valid question and gets to the heart of whether the SEO company delivers on their promises. In addition, you can do actual searches on these people if provided to see where they come up one various searches. In addition to references, the SEO company should have a list of testimonials that you can research. These should be non-requested testimonials.

5.    Can you get my website to rank on the first page of Google?

This is a trick question and you should be very interested in the answer. If the response is simply “Yes” or “Yes of course”, run the other way. Why? Because not all websites are created equal. For example websites built by particular vendors whom I shall not name here are so bad and inflexible that they are nearly impossible to get to the top of the major search engines, let alone Google. Other times you may have a strong custom website that has all the right trimmings, but if it has just been built, it will typically take some time for Google to recognize it without some major “on-page” and “off-page” efforts. The correct answer to the question is “Tell me first of all a little bit about your website”.

6.    What is your experience in the real estate industry?

It’s amazing to me how many people think that just because they know a lot about SEO, they think that they can be highly qualified to do vertical marketing for industries such as real estate. Without having been in the trenches and working with buyers, you are not going to know what questions they ask and what they are looking for when first looking at a real estate website. Your SEO professional should understand what questions will attract a buyer to a website, what widgets should be used to make the website compelling, what types of content should be used on the website and where. There are many other specifics that I don’t have room for here, but suffice it to say that we have developed over the years a list of 125 real estate specific keyword phrases that we test out for each client. This is before we even know their specialty such as short sale, foreclosures, luxury condos, etc. The final list can top 500 and you can’t just walk into this type of knowledge.

7.    What can you tell me about my current “Google Score” or website quality?

This is another key question. Your “Google Score” (a name we made up) is a term we use to define the quality of your overall website. To give you just a feel about what this report will give you, the first page highlights your score, your relative ranking and your metadata keyword phrases. You’ll also receive excellent off-page information such as your domain aging/expiration information, your Google PageRank and the number of Google indexed pages. The 3^rd section will give you all you need to know about the blogosphere and the information about your blog site and how it ranks.

One of the more interesting parts of this report is the “Social Mediasphere” analysis which shows you how the social media that we’ll be talking about ties into your website. This report will quickly tell you how your website and your social media all tie together. It’s invaluable to you, and it’s free. Plus again, if you want to see how your website compares with one of your competitors, we’ll do the comparison for you.

8.    How many keyword phrases do you usually try to get ranked on page 1?

One of the most misused concept about SEO is the thinking that you are trying to get found under a specific keyword phrase. If you understand nothing else about SEO, you must understand this: Websites are likely to receive most of their search engine visitors through a large variety of low-volume search queries instead of a handful of major keyword phrases. Therefore focusing on developing the keyword phrases which receive lower volumes of search traffic will lead to an increase in the overall amount of visitors from search engines to your website. What does this mean? It means that if you live in San Diego, forget trying to get found under “San Diego real estate”. It’s too competitive and is not even the most popular keyword phrase for the area. Believe it or not, “San Diego CA real estate” is. In fact it is 4 times as requested with 3 times fewer websites that are going after it.

Thus the answer to this question should be a well thought out plan to get dozens and dozens of “low-volume” search queries in addition to the few competitive ones as well.

9.    How can I tell what services and features you will do for me before I buy?

One of the worst feelings is that of not knowing what you are buying and having to “trust” the salesman on the other end of the line in a technology that you may think you need, but you don’t understand. This is why you should be able to be directed to the company’s website for all the information you need to become knowledgeable about the process. The SEO company’s website should be a “due diligence” site that explains every service and feature that they offer.

10. How much is the service, how long do I pay and what is the contractual obligation?

Notice that I’ve left the big question to the last. I’ll spend more time here as this is the heart of most agents’ concerns. Here’s my question to you. Which is more important; saving money or making money? Most people say saving money, which is why they don’t invest in themselves or their marketing. Ever heard of the expression “Penny wise and pound foolish?” You might save a dollar today, but you’ll lose two or three tomorrow.

The biggest question for you is what is the value of the service and can I afford it now, to make more in the future? If SEO was not making money for so many agents, they would have stopped doing it years ago. Instead, the competition is only getting stronger for those few ranking positions.

Cost therefore is the value you place upon it and what you perceive the return on investment. Yes, I said investment as that is what it is. SEO does not yield immediate results but sometimes can take months and patience.

How long you pay for the service is quite a different matter. Nearly every service that I know of has a monthly fee in that like a good stock broker or financial advisor, your investment should be worked on constantly. And as your investment is worked on constantly, you should expect reports sent to you at least on a monthly basis to hold the SEO specialist accountable.

There are two major business models that are in play today. The more popular model is to pay for the service upfront and have a smaller monthly service fee. The reason why this is more popular is that it typically does not involve an annual contract to lock you in for a time period. The other business model is to spread out the cost of the entire upfront and service fee over the life of the service with a mandatory yearly contract. The benefit of this is that the upfront cost is lower, yet the monthly cost is higher and if the service is not what you expect, you are locked in. There are benefits and detriments to each method, but only if the service is poor.

Too many businesses large and small look at search engine optimization as a nuisance and an expense, since when is promoting your business online a nuisance and expense? Search engine optimization and marketing should be viewed as an investment. When you approach you’re online marketing from just a rankings stand point it can be quite difficult to see the value in search engine marketing.

I regularly read the SEOMozBlog posts as they seem to be the definitive source for what is going on in the Search Engine Optimization field. This post was originally posted by randfish on December 16th, 2009 at 1:40 am Online Marketing. I’ve modified it somewhat to fit the real estate SEO industry.

#1 – This Real-Time Search Thing is Outta Here

Microsoft initially beat Google to the punch in announcing their integration with Twitter data in their SERPs (Search Engine Ranking Positions). And in response, Google released what is, in my opinion, an early test version of Twitter integration that’s nowhere near ready for prime-time. In other words both Microsoft (say Bing) and Google are now trying to get search results so relevant that they are going for “real-time” searches that come straight of the press of Twitter and other social media.

#2 – Twitter’s “Link Graph” is the Real Deal

All that real-time integration bashing aside, I’m a firm believer in my original hypothesis that Twitter is cannibalizing the web’s link graph. In fact, I think a rough history of “recommendation sources” looks something like:

Google has always strived to keep up with the latest ways that content is being recommended and suggested. It’s how they determined popularity and relevance with PageRank and I think Twitter’s data is merely the next evolution.

Today, SEOs want to turn tweets into links so they can get SEO benefit. My feeling is that tweets are going to carry their own weight in helping pages rank in the not-too-distant future.

This is particularly relevant to real estate agents when they tweet using their keyword phrases that link nicely with their blog sites and websites.

#3 – Personalized Search is Here to Stay

Is it merely clickthroughs from the organic results? Does visit history play a role? Or clicks from other vertical search services Google offers? What about clicks from paid search ads – either in the SERPs or from AdSense/DoubleClick?

If it’s proven that you can get organic benefits by attracting PPC clickthrough, this may be the new “paid inclusion” for 2010, and could drive bid prices up massively as companies compete not only for paid listing clicks, but for the chance to earn “organic” positioning as well.

Personalization means a few things for SEOs, but it doesn’t fundamentally change the game, IMO:

• The Rich Get Richer – It’s now truer than ever. If you rank well, and earn solid traffic, you’re going to be even harder to unseat. Startups and upstarts are going to have an even greater uphill battle to climb than before. If you haven’t decided to optimize your website yet, it’s still not too late, but there is no time like the present to get started.
• Branding is More Important – you want your loyal visitors and fans scouring the SERPs for your listings, and clicking them more so than anything else. Your visitors like to see professionalized websites, but most of all, they want to see content. The combination of brand identity and a compelling site with widgets that offer “MLS Search” and “Subscribe to New Listings” drip marketing will make the viewer want to give you their name and email.
• There is No Normal Ranking – Or, at least, there’s no “normal” ranking that’s “average” in a personalized SERPs world. Stop thinking “Denver real estate” and start focusing on targeted searches like “Denver luxury condos” or “Denver short sales”. Rank tracking may still carry some value to understand how non-personalized searchers see your pages, but that data is going to be less useful in comparison to what your analytics report about search traffic and the trends. Win the “personalization” battle, and you may start to care less about the classic/competitive “rankings” battle.

#4 – It’s Going to Be a Two-Engine, 80/20 World

I believe that a year from now, most webmasters will be looking at a scenario where Comscore/Hitwise reports Binghoo! has ~25-28% market share, (remember that they count searches on all Microsoft and Yahoo! properties – even internal searches – while Google tends to send the vast majority of their search traffic externally to other sites).

#5 – Site Explorer & Linkdomain will Disappear

The expense of maintaining a web index isn’t something Yahoo!’s willing to invest in once they don’t have to, and Bing’s given no indication that they’re going to re-open the portal to link information. The best we can hope for is an acceleration in the functionality offered by Bing Webmaster Tools, but even that’s unlikely to offer competitive link intelligence.

#6 – SEO Spending Will Rise Dramatically

Forrester put out a great report on US Interactive Marketing Spend (a little pricey at $1749, but interesting). Two graphics struck me as particularly compelling:

SEO trails only social media and online video as places where marketers (not just search marketers, but ALL marketers) will be shifting dollars.

 Meanwhile, SEO continues to outpace PPC in terms of CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate). We’ve still got a long way to go before balance is established between the share of clicks SEO commands and the fraction of spend it receives, but the gap is slowly closing.

#7 – 2010 is the Year of Conversion Rate Optimization

SEO is so effective that if I were doing another startup today, it would focus on software for conversion rate optimization. I think this is still the most under-utilized and highest ROI activities in the marketing department, but more awareness is on its way. CRO isn’t just about testing; it’s about building a process for improving conversion over time. Online businesses can generate so much revenue from this, yet few invest. I think 2010 is the year, simply because it’s an inflection point for companies to assess their spend and where they derive value.

#8 – More Queries will Send Less Traffic

Google & Bing are both doing more to make their visitors stickier and get their queries answered without ever having to leave the engine. This is a good product practice for both companies, and I’m surprised Google’s taken so long to move away from their “get people off Google” point-of-view, but it’s definitely happening. Check out some recent examples:

Everything I need to know is right there – the last game score, the record, the opponent, their next match day and time. The only thing missing? What channel it’s playing on in my area.

I don’t even have to complete my query! Google’s got that weather report sitting in the suggest box. They wrote about this feature here which launched last week. Google O/S had another good post on the topic.

Thankfully, I’m not actually headed to Kodiak, but those results are pretty spiffy, and are likely to prevent me from needing to visit Alaskaair.com and get that flight info.

The customer service number is something Bing’s started to provide more and more (though there’s one company even they don’t have that data on). With Fedex, you don’t even need to leave Bing to track a package (Google also offers similar functionality).

My perception is that the more the engines can apply “instant answers” to search queries, the more they will, and the less any other sites will see traffic from those queries. It’s a better user experience this way, and I’m certain it’s one of the biggest things that engenders loyalty and return queries – something both engines are desperately competing for.

The Bottom Line for 2010

The bottom line for 2010 is that if you haven’t already invested into optimizing your website, blog site and/or social media sites, you are already way behind the 8-ball. Like the smart phone, the digital camera and the website, it’s not a matter of if you’ll eventually optimize or market your website . . . but when. The race is on for who can do the best job at servicing the client for website marketing or search engine optimization. The tools are here today. The time to act is now.

Randy Eagar, CRS
President WebsTarget SEO
www.WebsTarget.com
Randy@WebsTarget.com
Follow Me on Twitter

For more information of this post, go to http://www.seomoz.org/blog/8-predictions-for-seo-in-2010