Hello,
I was just switching out some of my AdWords budgets - the costs-per-click in my area seem to be going up and up.
I mostly serve the urban markets of Nashville, TN. Historically the words that have given me the most clicks are:

• Nashville Lofts
• Nashville Condos

I tend to get a lot of rental inquiries which is a part of the business I don't handle. I'm considering dropping the above terms in favor of strings more like:

• Condos for sale in Nashville
• Nashville, TN lofts for sale

I know this will drastically cut back my clicks, but in addition to saving money those that do click through would hopefully be more focused and more targeted.
What do you think? Thanks for your help!

p.s. - There is really no way to make money off those rental leads around here.

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Stephanie Crawford
Zeitlin InTown Realtors
Nesting In Nashville real estate services

Specializing in Nashville Condos, Downtown Lofts & Urban Homes

Stephanie - are you currently using negative keyword phrases to weed out rental related keywords? Are you using broad, phrase or exact match (combination?) - have you done any search query reports to find out where these rental clicks are coming from etc?

Adding operators such as "for sale" is always a good idea, the more specific, generally the better converting - but as you say, it's a balance. The keywords you mention are not historically all that bad in my circles so perhaps you have not optimized your Google adwords correctly.

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Don't miss out on the 12 days of Christmas promo

Man tell me about it. We keep getting these property management leads that we pretty much drop the ball on because we either 1 can't make enough money off of it or 2, can't figure out a way to make money off of it. Either way, it's annoying.

There's 2 schools of thought. 1, cast your net wide enough, sift through enough people and you'll get a conversion. 2, cast a narrow focused net, and you won't have to sift, and you can get a conversion.

Your switch out follows the more narrow, focused terms. Granted yea, you'll be killing your ppc base, you'll be getting more focused higher converting people.

I looked at the keywords. You're going from an 8,100 click base down to ~1,000. That's a drastic cut. The real kicker is in the price. Your initial term is $.89 per click while your new term Condos for Sale in Nashville is at $2.05. So that's as if you're cutting your costs by 1/4 (Total drop in traffic is 1/8 while increase price is 2x).

All things considering, I think this switch isn't bad. It'll save you some money. The real question comes in when you're looking at your conversions. Are you converting at an adequate rate? If the conversion rate isn't netting you the same money as before then don't do it. Of course you, won't be able to tell for about 2-3 months but that's not a terrible amount of time.

On a separate note, did you remember to use the keyword exclusion when you were making your Adwords Campaign? Might help cut costs on your original terms.

Personally, I think you should work on your SEO. Being at 34 for Nashville Condo is better than we're doing for Seattle Real Estate by a ton, but we're constantly working to get ours higher. Follow that and it would allow you to go up higher in visitors w/o spending the constant money.

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Incolo Real Estate - Primary Technologist

P.S. That's Mr. Buffet's house behind me. 2nd Richest man in the free world lives there. Pretty humbling.

I do have negative words in there for (rent, rental, lease, apartment). I'm no AdWords expert, but I think the renters are getting there from the generic Nashville Loft/Condo terms. I am using a combination of exact and broad terms so there's really no telling. Consequently I rank 4th organically on the term Nashville Loft so I'm sure I'll still get the inquiries.

I don't know how to run a query to see where the renters are coming from. Can I do that from Google Analytics? My website is a company template and pretty basic.

As for conversion rates, well, I don't really keep up with them. But I can tell you that my sales are
D
O
W
N
this year. I might get 30 or so IDX registrations per month and only convert one... if I'm lucky. I've had the opportunity to meet and show a lot of buyers this year that never bought. I'm optimistic though. I have enough savings to get me through this year at least. I've also had the chance to incorporate some new systems, web pages, and documents.

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Stephanie Crawford
Zeitlin InTown Realtors
Nesting In Nashville real estate services

Specializing in Nashville Condos, Downtown Lofts & Urban Homes

Whoops, i apologize. I was looking at the price of Nashville Lofts instead of Nashville Condos. That would cut your costs by 1/8.

We're right there with you. We feel we'll have to button down for the year before we'll actually see any return on the people we're talking to this year.

Personally, I think you're doing the right thing by trying to button down the hatches for the rest of the year. There are always other ways. I've been told going to social events, holding classes converts quite well, but I have yet to try those avenues myself.

My $.02, best of luck to you... and to me... us =)

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Incolo Real Estate - Primary Technologist

P.S. That's Mr. Buffet's house behind me. 2nd Richest man in the free world lives there. Pretty humbling.

Hi Stephanie,

Have you considered a local revenue generation partnership for your rental inquiries? There is always someone who can benefit from your rental inquiries. Perhaps that someone can offer you something your prospects or clients may value and tell others about. Then you have a Viral/WOM tool that can become a valuable resource moving forward.

In addition, it sounds like your broad PPC campaign and site messaging is not clear on whom it is you can help and whom you cannot. This uncertainty within your messaging can drive your marketing cost up as you scale your existing campaigns to generate more leads, decreasing conversion rates in the process.

As Mr. Carey stated, more targeted keywords (with “for sale” for example) tend to generate higher converting leads because the individual(s) are likely further along the sales cycle than others searching with broader terms.

I would suggest you review your messaging before spending another penny on PPC.

Just my opinion of course.

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Rick Durand
Lic. Real Estate Broker
Innovative Real Estate Group, LLC
(o) 813.333.0605
(c) 813.695.3077
Tampa Real Estate
Commercial Property Management Tampa FL
Commercial Properties Tampa FL