Google Adwords / SEO is a Waste of Money for Estate Agents

August 3, 2017

If I had a pound for every time an agent contacted me asking me why they haven’t seen any discernible business from spending hundreds of pounds a month from Google Adwords or SEO.

Now of course, they spent their hard earned cash to bring people to their website ..and it did, it just it didn’t always convert or deliver the free vals and market appraisals the estate/letting had expected.

Its easy to spend loads of money on Adwords terms like …”Estate Agent in [your town]” or  “Letting Agent in [your town]”

I especially see it all the time with those new-fangled-dangled instant online valuation thingees on  (eg ValPal and others) on estate agents websites.

Lots of visitors clicking on the banner .. but the percentage going through to completing the form is tiny.

Yes, there are methods to purchase attention and get punters to your agency’s website— but let me ask you this …what happens when they get to your website?

What is on your website to make them stay on your website, let alone ring you for a free val?

…. And most importantly, how are you demonstrating that above all else, of all the other estate/letting agent websites they will also visit today, that you are the only/best/most trustworthy estate/letting agent to solve their problem?

Spending money on Google Adwords and SEO is like pasting £10 notes to your actual estate agency window  .. they will come to the window and have a look … but what is your strategy to get those internet window shoppers to walk through the proverbial door?

If your website visitors are not following through into more free vals and market appraisals, even after all this extra website traffic that is costing you hundreds of pounds a month … my intuition tells me you haven’t given them a reason to stay.

Homeowners and landlords are looking for a reason to stay.

It’s your job as an agent to give them a reason

I wonder why this estate / letting agent gets hundreds of unique visitors a day – without spending one penny on SEO or Google Adwords http://chelmsfordpropertyblog.co.uk

Christopher

PS If you use the most excellent ValPal, some of my clients have found a most excellent method of capturing those 80% to 95% of people that don’t fill in their details to the Val form.. drop me a line and I will tell you – so simple yet so effective

 

 

Christopher Watkin

I teach, guide, support, mentor, consult, counsel, partner many hundreds of UK Estate and Letting Agents in their quest to grow their estate and lettings agencies business. Old school techniques of touting, landlords wanted leaflets, ring us for a free valuation, we have sold this in your street leaflets don't work anymore. There are too many competitor agents .. meaning cheap fees are epidemic, overvaluing is almost a norm to get the stock and don’t even mention about the online/hybrid threat. So a few years ago, I set about looking around the UK and spotted that certain agents (not many mind you) in certain towns were still seen as the ‘go to person on property’, the person the newspaper editor rang up every week for a comment and I looked at what they did and they were doing some thing quite remarkable…. Only one thing but they were doing it so well .. and reaping the reward in terms of decent listings and decent fees, happy staff, decent sales pipeline and exchange income, managed lettings portfolios in the many hundreds .. but more importantly, they really enjoyed the job… they enjoyed getting up in the morning and people looked up to them Over 400 agents around the UK are on a mission to change the way our Estate and Lettings agency profession is perceived and looked upon, doing it town by town, city by city. I guide these 400 agents, teach them, mentor them and support them to be seen in a different light, to be seen as the ‘go to person for property’, actually be the ‘local property expert’ and prove it. Christopher Watkin 07950 147 572 christopher@christopherwatkin.co.uk

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