I'm planning to open my own small brokerage within the next year. I'm currently an agent for another firm, so I need to be cagey about the details, but in case it matters: I'm in a fairly small market with 3 or 4 healthy competitors and a few dozen small competitors. We are in a fairly desirable area and sell lots of second/vacation homes to out-of-state folks-- folks who are likely to make their initial contact via the web.

Because of that, I feel I can use the web to neutralize the big guys' market power/name recognition/fancy office location advantages. If I had my druthers, I'd sink $20k+ into my website. But I don't have my druthers. For argument's sake, let's say I can initially budget $6000 to create my new agency's website.

I know myself well enough to know that my comparative advantage is to sell real estate-- not to manage the website. Sure, I'll write new copy, swap out photos, and add listings myself... but I don't want to spend time fixing the property search page because the local MLS changed a field, or whatever. So I need some sort of turnkey solution.

Here's what I want:

*A nicely designed site-- the REW sites I've seen are lovely and would work just fine.

*Fancy, map-based IDX MLS searching with bells and whistles, like on
this site

*Decent seo. I'm realistic that this budget is unlikely to make me #1, of course.

*The ability to call someone on the phone for web help if needed, though I'm not super high maintenance.

*Ongoing monthly fees of under $100 (not including PPC monthly budget... here I mean for IDX, etc.).

Am I crazy? Can I get what I want for this type of money? If so, how? REW folks, please respond too.

Thanks in advance... BTW, I left REW a question this weekend via the web page "contact us" form, and no one has responded yet. From my agents, I'll expect faster resonse time than that. ;-)

You can certainly buy a site like that for the $ you are talking about but then getting it well ranked is a whole other story.
I spend and hour or more each day working on my sites and while I'm ranked relatively high I'm far from #1 for every keyword that I wish to go after.

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Coastal Delaware Real Estate Sales
REHOBOTH BEACH CONDOS | REHOBOTH BEACH REAL ESTATE | REHOBOTH BEACH MOBILE HOMES
* Results not typical. Individual results may vary.

Try contacting REW by telephone, although I hope Morgan sees that you haven't received a response from the contact form.

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Southwest Chicago Suburbs Real Estate is an affordable area with close access to downtown Chicago. Money Magazine says that Orland Park real estate is one of the best places to live in the U.S. Next door you can find Tinley Park homes for sale and get Orland Park amenities at a more affordable price.

Nevermind, I can see that you havent had a response. Hi there, I'm REW Receptionist, and Morgan's Personal assistant, and i frequent the forums. The contact forms are not the fastest way to get to us the first time. Feel free to give us a call at 250 753 9893 if you want to talk to someone directly, we will set you up with our Sales Reps.

I dont think your crazy, many people have started a site with a budget, and they often find it to be just as effective, but there is a certain amount of time that needs to go into the site, and whether you do it yourself, or you pay someone to do it, there are many ongoing things to tend to on your site like links and content and just general changes that are frequent on the web.

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Real Estate Webmasters

You can find my blog at ferociousfeline.com, I'm so cool I'm not even back linking myself!

Hey I'm REW folks!

Ok lets talk about IDX first as it seems to be your main component

Regular (Basic) IDX typically runs 20-30 hours of coding and design

Fancy IDX (Mapping etc) really the sky is the limit as we custom code these for each client but lets say 30-40 hours

REW Sites
Templates (See Judyo's sig) start at $740 USD + hosting and include 5 hours of customization

Customs: Custom REW sites start at $5000 USD and include 60 hours of design and 15 hours of programming (You save $2500 vs doing it hourly) any overage is billed at our hourly rate

Design $100 USD per hour
Programming $100 USD per hour
Search Engine friendly content $100 USD per hour
SEO consulting (With me) $250 USD per hour

There is a basic breakdown of our services - hosting is $30 per month per Gig (Paid yearly) and hosting includes content management system, lead manager, listings manager, 24/7 REW Customer Service Forum support, unlimited emails

So can you do an IDX and a website for $6000 USD? Absolutely! You would be looking at a template (Maybe with a few custom design hours) an IDX somewhere between $2000-$4000 USD depending on how fancy you decided to get and you would have some $ left over to do some consulting, copywriting or whatever.

Could you do a custom design AND custom IDX for $6000 USD - probably not if your IDX is fancy, although it has been done before

I hope I have answered your questions - please feel free to post if you need more info

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Strep throat! - Yup tis the season - boooo if you are wondering why you haven't seen me as much it's because I had strep throat for a week, feeling better just playing catch up. Merry Ho Ho folks

Incidentally, can you PM me your name, so that I can look it up in the lead manager and see if we received the submission you sent?

Thanks

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Strep throat! - Yup tis the season - boooo if you are wondering why you haven't seen me as much it's because I had strep throat for a week, feeling better just playing catch up. Merry Ho Ho folks

Thanks for the reply. That gives me much of the information I needed for planning purposes. So it sounds like I could get the site and IDX within the budget I mentioned, but not seo?

What is a ballpark seo number of hours up front, and then per month, for a site in a small metro area where I don't think any of my competitors are doing ANY seo at all?

(I will send you a PM as requested.)

In terms of SEO, if you are in a small market honestly you should need any more than an hour or 2 of consulting to address your needs - the rest you can learn for free here at REW it will just mean investment of time on your part doing keyword research, implementing unique content, and establishing a link portfolio

Judyo is a perfect example of this - we have provided her template and backend - and provide occasional CMS support etc, but in terms of her SEO she has done it all based on what she has learned here and other places on the web.

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Strep throat! - Yup tis the season - boooo if you are wondering why you haven't seen me as much it's because I had strep throat for a week, feeling better just playing catch up. Merry Ho Ho folks

I agree that this site is great for SEO tips. The biggest single thing I've learned is the importance of building good linkbacks to my site with quality link exchanges and one-ways. It's taken about 18 months of effort, but I've been able to get to the top 10 on most of my keywords with only 1 hour a week or less. Now that I'm seeing results, I'm looking to further improve the rankings and improve response rate.

If I had to do it all over again, I would have definitely hired REW or another top company to get me going quicker. For the cost of a couple deals, you get a huge advantage over your competition.

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Aaron

Minneapolis Real Estate | Twin Cities Real Estate | Edina Realty Agent

Oh.. I am so glad that I came across this post. I sent two requests via the contact form (in the past week) to do a new website and I thought I was getting blown off. I'll call tomorrow...

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Paul Francis

Las Vegas Real Estate - Summerlin Real Estate - Mesquite Nv Real Estate