Online Lead conversion time

[new_webmaster]

I have a question for those with established websites. How long, on average, does it take for a visitor to your site to turn into someone who contacts you about buying (or selling)? Also, does having a blog help at all?

As a new webmaster, it's something that concerns me. I get a good number of visitors, and I'm starting to notice that some are coming directly from bookmarks, or are returning visitors (I get this data using Google analytics), but very few contacts. I know it takes time, but what's the average?

Thanks for your help.

[Oaklandhomespecialist]

I dont have an "established" site yet, but I've been learning a lot about online leads both here and elsewhere. At Prudential, we have an affiliation with Yahoo! real estate so when people request info (or just register) on Yahoo we get those leads sent to us. So Prudential has staff who's job it is to train us to analyze and research the trends of the leads to maximize conversion.

Their consensus is that it takes around 6 mos to a year for most buyers to actually purchase or sell, so follow up is critical. How many unique visitors a day are you getting?

A good and realistic conversion rate to shoot for is at least 6% from what they say.

As for a blog, I really dont know how much that would help with converting leads but it can help your SEO.

[new_webmaster]

I'm putting my broker's listings on craigslist, and putting a link to my site search at the bottom. I'd get a good 50-100 visitors per day, from having about 3-4 ads on there.

This has been going on for a month, but I've only gotten about 3-4 emails out of it, and I think I've done a good job converting them. Those people are now receiving listings by email from me and ask me questions about them.

Maybe it's craigslist. My site is nothing special, community specific searches with photos, a contact form, another form to subscribe to automated searches.

I've also noticed direct and repeat visitors, which I guess is a good sign.

P.S.
Maybe it's craigslist...I noticed it's generally a penny-pinching crowd who are just looking for a good deal. Many are probbly aware of the MLS search and don't care about the ones posted on craigslist.

[Oaklandhomespecialist]

I'm putting my broker's listings on craigslist, and putting a link to my site search at the bottom. I'd get a good 50-100 visitors per day, from having about 3-4 ads on there.

This has been going on for a month, but I've only gotten about 3-4 emails out of it, and I think I've done a good job converting them. Those people are now receiving listings by email from me and ask me questions about them.

Maybe it's craigslist. My site is nothing special, community specific searches with photos, a contact form, another form to subscribe to automated searches.

I've also noticed direct and repeat visitors, which I guess is a good sign.

P.S.
Maybe it's craigslist...I noticed it's generally a penny-pinching crowd who are just looking for a good deal. Many are probbly aware of the MLS search and don't care about the ones posted on craigslist.

I would have to agree with you about craigslist, I advertise all my listings there and in my experience the calls I get from them are usually from lookey-loos. I know there are plenty of people who probably do buy from there, but I think it's less.

This is a numbers game, so study SEO and try to get your traffic up, that should lead to more emails and conversions. There are people on this forum getting over 1000 visitors a day to their sites, and that's where Im trying to be.

Also have some of the webmasters here review your site and give you suggestions on usablity.

Good luck, we're in the same boat.

[new_webmaster]

Thanks, I'm already ranking for a few very specific search words, and got several visitors. This is after a few weeks of google knowing about my site.

I guess I shouldn't expect the CL visitors to convert too well and focus on search traffic instead.

[Eric Blackwell]

New;

First of all, there is not really an "average" time. About three years ago, I went to a seminar of the leading brokerages in the U.S. One of the speakers was from a major online lending lead gen company.

They claimed at the time that 30-40% will buy (whether from you or not or whether in your area or not) within the first 4 months, then a few percent per month would convert after that with a spike around 12 months and another spike of activity at 16-18 months. They said that virtually ALL (96% if memory serves) would convert somewhere with someone within the 18 month time frame.

I have found this to be VERY accurate, but am now starting to experience faster conversions for our 110 agents. I am not sure whether the model has changed or we are just getting better at getting 'em in. I would suspect it is the first. I think as internet home shopping hits the mainstream, folks are buying more quickly.

For the record, our sie is getting the kind of traffic you were discussing...so we have a decent database to evaluate it from.

Best;

Eric

BTW-If you will put a little more info in your profile (like where you are located), we can get to know you better!

[Las Vegas]

lol

[Eric Blackwell]

Vegas;

Thanks for asling. I will provide some detail here about what I do. (Probably more than you care to know----)

Yes. My "main job" is as Director of Technology, Technologist, or whatever other moniker that you want to supply (grin) to a large and progressive RE/MAX office in Louisville Kentucky. If you click on my signature link you will go to their site. Our broker/owner is a progressive guy who is willing to invest smartly in technology and provide the BEST environment to our agents. He pays me well to do what I do. I trust him and he trusts me. That's loyalty I value highly.

We are currently at 110 agents (and growing a bit right now as well). I personally train them on e-commerce, lead generation, technology and so forth.

I do some outside SEO and consulting as well, but mostly in areas that are outside of the real estate genre. The real estate thing consumes much of my time). You'd be amazed at how much of my day is consumed with being the Technologist for 110 agents! That's masochistic enough for most people. Notice the time of this post!

One of the wierd things about trying to provide a solid web presence for 110 agents is that if you can pull it off, then by definition, you KNOW that an agent who makes it to the top of Google is making SERIOUS gravy. (Hint: Anyone that reads this CAN and SHOULD be able to build a successful web presence using what they can learn from this forum).

I manage an internal staff of 4 people (they work for the brokerage) who provide listing and closing managment to our agents as well as traditional marketing services (postcad campaigns, virtual tours, flyers, newspaper ad placement etc) for our agents. This gives me a pretty unique perspective in that I can see what works and what does not. I handle the website and internet stuff and agent training personally. These 4 people are the BEST. I would not trade them for anyone.

For the record. at our office we do ZERO pay per click on our website. I do teach our agents how to do it ( and how to SEO if they'd like). I have written white papers on how to target keywords for PPC and we teach them how to blog (just started that). We do NOT do PPC because it would compete with our own agents in bidding for terms. We try to avoid that! (Our agents are the most effective in L-ville however at capturing market share from it-grin)

We teach our agents how to use our search engine presence as an effective listing tool as well. This gives them a pretty good advantage in a buyers market when someone asks, "What do you do differently than others to market my home?" We give the competition the Google test!! (grin)

OK, so why do I contribute / moderate here?

One-I beleive strongly in Morgan's approach to SEO and in his honesty in providing QUALITY information to the real estate industry (and others) about Search Engine Marketing and e-commerce in general.

Two- I have NEVER been a customer of REW'S, but if I was an agent starting out building a site and didn;t want to do the coding myself I would be. For link building I definately would be. (grin) That's just the unvarnished truth. REW is a GREAT SEO/Web Dev firm. I am pretty much a control freak, so I like to keep most every thing I can in house. Usually in MY house. (grin)

Three- I enjoy this community. Many of the "colorful" characters who post a ton of stuff in here have become personal friends of mine (even though we have never met in person in many cases). When you are competing for keywords in Chicago, San Diego, Florida, Georgia, Vegas etc, these folks are facing much stiffer competition than I do and I respect them immensely for that. I learn from them and hopefully they learn from my mistake and successes as well. Each person tends to bring their own strengths. Ronnie G for example knows a ton about PPC and I have learned some good stuff by reading his posts. I tend to TEST everything I read here and then apply what I agree with after testing.

Ok- so there you have a little about me...(grin) It's almost 5am and I need to get a post in on the REW blog...OOYYYY.

Best (and thanks for your patience in reading a LONG post) ;

Eric

[u2man]

Ok...were still figuring this whole thing out but here are our numbers. We convert (close) about 5-7 internet leads per 100. Some are last months registrations and some are last years. We are trying to get that up to at least 10 closings per 100. We average about 130 uniques/day and climbing. Out of 130 uniques we get about 10-15 registrations.The website is 8 months old and the traffic is a combination of ppc and organic. We rank pretty well on both msn and yahoo but aren't doing anything in google yet. Went from 1 agent to 4 in less than a year and looking to bring more agents on and I attribute that to ppc. Can't beat the roi. We are always trying to get better on the internet leads process. Would like to hear about others on what their conversion time and rate are on the internet registrations.

[new_webmaster]

Ok, sounds like I'm just getting the wrong kind of visitor from CL. Does anyone have conversion numbers when you don't use forced registration to search?