30 to 50 Return Visitors Each Day
Without realizing what I was doing my St Augustine real estate website has turned out to be very sticky. Several months after launching the site my stats were showing that the "page view count" was four to five times the visitors count and the number of returning visitors was more than the unique visitors.
This was great! I was getting 30 to 50 people returning to my website every day. But why? In developing the site concept I wanted to include content that home buyers wanted to see. It took a month of discussions with other Realtors to determine what I had to do. Most home buyers want access to the MLS home listings and I already had that planned. I built a list of suggestions from my Realtor clients and found that the most popular answer was.... buyers wanted to know about the neighborhoods. They would find a listing they liked and they wanted to know about the neighborhood. I had included neighborhood information in earlier websites but those pages did not attract many page views. So, people did not want to read a lot of commentary about neighborhoods. I decided to try something different. Utiliziing my digital camera I started collecting photos of neighborhoods (subdivisions). I took photos looking down the streets and photos of homes throughout the neighborhood. I created the equivilant of a drive through. With these photos I created individual neighborhood tours with a short description of the neighborhood.
I have only recently noticed a one line statistic in my site stats. It shows the percentage of site visitors who save the site in their favorite places. Since the first month this percentage has averaged 90%. Incredible!! On some days it is over 100% meaning that some site visitors are saving multiple individual pages to their favorite places.
I sell St Augustine Florida real estate. Visit my website at http://st-augustine-homesearch.com
Glenn,
Creat post, and thanks for sharing this with us.
HA! As I've been saying since 1995, all folks want to see on the Internet is photos of homes.
Ok, Glenn ... I will go check out your website NOW!!! pippa
FANTASTIC .... I love how you have the "neighborhood map" with pictures ... that is very sticky!!!! I LOVE the idea and will spend more time on your site later. pippa
I have created similar websites for my Realtor clients and every one of them produces the same results. It reallt works!
Awesome idea!!
Glenn- That is spectacular! Keep it up! Soon those favorites will turn into closed sales:) Katerina
Good ideas, glad things are looking good. Besides being 'sticky', get any deals yet?
Wow, that was alot of work for each area. Excellent idea you've had here.
Lyn,
Oh yes. I have written deals but more importantly I have built a "farm" of Internet leads and every month several mature and become active buyers.
Glenn, I checked out your site. Very interesting. I have thought of doing this too, even with a video tour. But there are so many neighborhoods, it seems overwhelming. Do you take pictures of all the houses or just some of them. I am very intrigued about this, and think I will start making a plan on how to break up our neighborhoods. It will take time, but I think the concept is spot on!!! Any suggestions you have when featuring a neighborhood would be welcomed!!!
Cheers,
It still amazes me how many agents put either just one picture, only exterior shots of a home, interior shots that are so dark you need a candle to see them on the screen, and others that are so tilted you can get seasick trying to view them. If you cannot take good pictures, pay talented agent in your office to do it for you. Or learn how to use the computer to correct problems electronically. I had one agent whose front view looked like the house was sliding off the screen at a 30 degree incline. Using the computer I went in, rotated it back 30 degrees, then cropped off the blank corners, and she ended up with a perfect front view of the home.
Personally, if other agents do sloppy pictures, I love it. When my sellers see mine they love them since even mine look great compared to many of the others.
Glenn,
Nice job. I'm going to have to add more pictures to my website now.
Rich
Kim,
I typically put up 20 to 30 photos. I select the neighborhoods based upon the potential for sales volume. I tried videos and found people did not view them for the reason that the view in video's moves too fast. People want to "study" a photo and absorb the details that they are loking at. On top of all else my neighborhood tour pages are getting page one positions on Google and the site is attracting visits from buyers searching by subdivision names.
Great idea, Glenn, I have taken some neighborhood photos but nothing what you describe.
I think you have just solved my problem. Neighborhood maps with photos? I can do that, too. This is going to be great! Thanks for the tips!!!
Glenn, those are great numbers and statistics. Congratulations.
Great job Glen. I have hundreds of photos from all around Austin the I need to get on the website. Love the your results have been so sticky.
I used to teach with a guy that taught 8th grade math, and he would go out on his bike with his video recorder and record wonderful footage of the most interesting places. He would schedule vacations with these video bike tours in mind. His reasoning is that he wanted to inspire the kids to work hard to succeed so that they could travel and see those place, he wanted to teach them about different places, and he wanted to find a way to keep the kids tuned in when they finished their practice sets. He always found ways to tie in the subject of math. It was great. I loved supervising him.
I've been meaning to get around to doing this for my real estate blog. You have reminded me of Mr. Toups and inspired me.
Evening Glenn, I went over to your site. Very different than I was expecting. I see the strategy and it really does make sense. Great post !
Sticky... very cool. It looks like you have put a lot of time into the site.
Great post Glenn. One of my clients had mentioned this to me as his plan to create the same type of Internet loyalty. He swore me to secrecy and so I have never suggested it as an idea...especially since it wasn't my own. Thanks for letting "the cat is out of the bag" so I can share this great idea with some of our clients.
For those who aren't sure how to track their visitors, I created a post on how to do it...and it was just by chance that this is featured today. Here is a link to the article on how to track your visitors in the event you aren't sure how to do it.
Thanks again for the great information!!!!
What a great idea! People who are planning to move to St. Augustine, Florida can get a glimpse of the neighborhoods without spending hours driving through in search of the ideal neighborhood and home. You're saving potential buyers a lot of time!
Hi Glenn. Congrats on your stickiness!:)
Congrats on the feature too!
Anyway, the subdivision thing is great. Customers want hyper local...
Thanks for writing,
Ken
Glenn - Congratulations on getting 30 to 50 people returning every day. I'm sure that will turn into some closed sales.
Great website and great post...Hyper-local works well, but word of warning - if the poster is looking for comments - it won't happen.
Excellent idea - another one is to start taking videos of the neighborhoods and putting them on YouTube.
Glenn,
Thanks for the great tip. I think I'll start compiling my own neighborhood virtual tours and post them on my website.
Here's hoping to get sticky!
Lydia
Glenn,
I just checked out your website and it looks great. Boy do I have some work to do...
Great idea, very creative - thanks for sharing!
Glenn, this is great information, thanks for sharing this with us! Love this idea.
Glenn, that is a great way to keep people coming back, as Lenn points out people want pics. I have started taking about 70 on new listings.
Hi Glenn, subdivisions is exactly what I am doing. However, I learned something new from you tonight. I am putting up slide shows, maybe single shots that they can study would do better? Even though they can stop a slide show on a particular photo, I have no way to track that.
Your insights based on your successful website is one of the reasons why I keep reading the blogs here.
I like the neighborhood walk through idea. Thanks for sharing this post.
A very intersting and insightful post. Looks like sticky is the road to success.
Glenn - I love your out of the box thinking! I love your website and applaud you for all the effort it took you to put all those individual neighorhood tours together. This is something I will definitely begin to implement for my website. Congrats on a well deserved feature!
Glenn, I love the research you did before making your website - you're right, people just LOVE photos. Brilliant!
Good idea Glenn, sounds like you have the website thing down. I am heading over to check it out now.
thanks for sharing
tom
Great Idea! How did you insert the schools page?
I need to get out and take some more neighborhood pictures. I've done some and need more.
Pictures, pictures and more pictures plus info on a listing and what encompasses and sourrounds it equals great "stickiness". Good work.
Sue of Robin and Sue
Gleen - great idea to use more pictures. I'm going to tweak my website with more neighborhood photos and posts. I'll let you know how it works out for me...Thanks for the idea.
Great ideas and website!!! It is all about giving the clients....or potential clients what they want isn't it???
Great job!
Glenn,
Thanks for sharing and good to hear that this all happened without you knowing what you were doing. That's something I AM good at! I'm off to check your website
Hi Glenn, I've been wanting to do this as well. Looks like it's time for me to get off the pot! If you do not mind, I'm using your website as a study guide. You did an awesome job and thank you for sharing!
Glenn - Love the photos on your website. I can see why it is so sticky. I could have spent hours just exploring the neighborhoods. Well done!
Well, I know that consumers want to get to what they are looking for quickly and the way you have it organized by communities and neighborhoods saves them a lot of time.
Thank you for the tip about writing about neighborhoods. I was wondering if people would object to your taking picture of their homes for the tour as they are not listed.
Your website is packed full of information. No matter buyers keep coming back. I learnt a tip or two too! Thanks for sharing.
Great idea Glenn! The site and info look great!
Thanks for the information - really interesting. I think this is the missing link that so many realtors don't include in their neighborhood profiles. Canned information just doesn't cut it.
Super! Definitely on my to do list!!
Thanks for the imput we have heard a simular response from another realtor from Kanas City. We will check out your website too.
Wait...you mean people aren't interested in my bragging about how great I am? Say it ain't so!
It sounds like you found another good idea. Maybe I will try it.
Thanks.
You know now that you've shared this you are right on with Gen X and Millennial Buyers !!!!!!!!!
Thanks to all....
Some answers: Over the time that I have been taking pictures I've had several people stop me and ask what I was doing. I explained that I was a Realtor preparing a neighborhood photo tour. The feedback was generally positive and of course I handed out my business cards.
The key seems to be using thumbnail views and then the full screen views. There has been an overwhelmingly positive response from my site visitors. When I have had inquiries on home listings I have provided additional info on the listings and included a link to the neighborhood that the home is in.
Interestingly...I have had many customers tell me that once they found my site they stopped surfing other sites. So, I am truely "capturing" my site visitors.
There are now over 1,400 photos on the site. I have progressed through several methods in taking the photos and in the process of uploading to the site in order to minimize the time (labor) involved. I have created a webpage describing this process. If you want to do this for your site e-mail me and I will send you a link to the page.
Glenn, I can see where neighborhood photos are an important aspect when people are searching for a place to live. Thanks.
Nice site. We don't really have large subdivisions in my market other than the a few 200+ unit townhome devolpments.
A picture is worth a thousand words I always say! This is a great post. Congratulations on the site and your success.
Guys...
If you really think this post is good reblog it to your favorite group!!
This is a great post. I was just discussing doing something similar for a new subdivision that one of our agents has listed.
Great post. Very creative!
Great info, Glenn. My web site is about as sticky as a used bandaid! Paid a fortune for it, too! I love the idea of videos of neighborhoods. Thanks for the idea!
Great idea Glenn! Thanks for sharing.
I think this is a great idea. One question... If you live in an area like I do that has Seasons, do you get pictures of the fall, summer, spring AND winter? Just curious.
yea that sounds like a pretty good idea you came up with will check out the site and see is about.
WOW After reading just half of these comments it looks like I am going to have no choice but to click on your website! .......drumroll........
Eric,
We prefer to use photos taken in the Spring and Summer. Though our Boise site has some wonderful snow scenes.
I am thinking of doing something similar to this on my website. Glad to hear from someone who has had success!
That is a great idea. We live in La Quinta, Ca. an area with alot of agted communities and snowbirds so people research for a home online from out of the area. I think they would love to be able to see the neighborhoods as they search for homes online.
A lot of agents are doing the same thing, so soon every web site will have all neighborhoods covered.
Val,
Website content is only one of many elements that are involved in creating a successful Internet marketing program. One can have neighborhood tours for all the subdivisions in a market but if the website is not on page one of the search results nobody will ever see it. If it is on page one but does not offer a value proposition and a compelling message it will not generate leads. So, this neighborhood tour concept is great but it is only one of many elements needed.
Glenn,
Thanks for sharing this with us........maybe people will no longer think that I am some sort of freak or nutcase when I am crusing the neighborhoods taking pics.
Honestly, I'm not..........I'm just trying to bring information about their neighborhood to the outside world so that they too can get as cool a neighbor as I am!
:)
Glen - Stickiness is very important ! What is the point of spending time and money getting to a site only for that site to lack any appeal ?? Great job !
I love it Glenn! Great job and thinking outside the box!