You bid $3.00 for keyword and I bid $1.00 for a keyword. You get placed #7 and I get placed #2. You might think . . . that makes no sense because you were willing to pay three times more than I was.
Google was the first search engine to actually look at revenue versus bidding. Yahoo was one of the last to convert to a revenue model. So by now you might be wondering what I am talking about. Here it is very simple . . .
You bid $3.00 per keyword and get 100 clicks in a month for a total to Google of $300.00
I bid $1.00 per keyword and get 400 clicks in a month for total to Google of $400.00.
Guess what? Google is going to put me on top of you because I am performing better and making more money for Google. If you don't understand this, I suggest you email or call me. This is something you need to understand before you start spending money on Google.
Two other huge issues we see with real estate agents and brokers throwing money away on Google is bidding the same amount for all keywords and not understanding the value of phrase, match and broad. We'll look at these in upcoming posts.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section or email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com . I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
Friday, November 27, 2009
Google Bidding - How Much?
I recently reviewed a broker's Google bidding as we were getting ready to manage their Sponsored Links. What was most shocking (and common) is the bidding of one bid on all keywords. In this case, it was $3.00. HUGE mistake.
We have set up Sponsored Link accounts with 600,000 different keyword combinations. I'm not kidding, but we'll explain how that happens in another post. For the $3 bidder, they were missing a true breakout of Campaigns and Ad Groups. Basically, you want to bid the most on keywords that demonstrate the web surfer is closest to making a decision.
Here's an example. When we work with clients selling a product, we want to focus on item number. If someone is looking for a printer online, and they type in HP7400, that keyword is far more valuable to us than someone searching on the keyword "printers."
And the same holds true for real estate. You want to bid more for someone searching for "real estate agent in Palm City" then you do for someone searching for "Florida real estate." In fact, you probably do not want to even be bidding on someone searching for "Florida real estate."
The rule of thumb we use is 10:1. Someone that is searching for a real estate agent is 10 times more valuable to us than someone poking around real estate websites for pricing, ideas or just something to do.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section or email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
We have set up Sponsored Link accounts with 600,000 different keyword combinations. I'm not kidding, but we'll explain how that happens in another post. For the $3 bidder, they were missing a true breakout of Campaigns and Ad Groups. Basically, you want to bid the most on keywords that demonstrate the web surfer is closest to making a decision.
Here's an example. When we work with clients selling a product, we want to focus on item number. If someone is looking for a printer online, and they type in HP7400, that keyword is far more valuable to us than someone searching on the keyword "printers."
And the same holds true for real estate. You want to bid more for someone searching for "real estate agent in Palm City" then you do for someone searching for "Florida real estate." In fact, you probably do not want to even be bidding on someone searching for "Florida real estate."
The rule of thumb we use is 10:1. Someone that is searching for a real estate agent is 10 times more valuable to us than someone poking around real estate websites for pricing, ideas or just something to do.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section or email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
Creating Google Ad Campaigns - What, Why, When, How
In the prior post I wrote about creating a USA Ad Campaign and a Canadian Ad Campaign . . . if you have a considerable amount of Canadian business. Florida is a prime example of a market with Canadian business, but there is quite a bit in California, Nevada, Washington, Portland, Maine, etc.
I will back up for a minute and actually recommend two individual accounts, one targeting Canada and one targeting the USA, but for most agents this gets to be a little bit too much, so creating a Canadian Ad Campaign is fine, but you will not be able to make it as broad as the USA Campaigns.
The next step on your march to a robust Google Sponsored Links account is setting up Ad Campaigns to cover all of your markets. Here's an example of Ad Campaigns created for Florida real estate brokers in Martin County.
1-Martin County
2-Palm Beach County
3-St. Lucie County
4-Treasure Coast
5-Waterfront Homes
6-Luxury Homes
7-Communities
8-Condos
9-Single Family Homes
10-TownHomes
11-Vacant Land
12-Investments
These Ad Campaigns then allow you to set up 100 Ad Groups within each Ad Campaign. You will use the individual Ad Campaigns and nested Ad Groups to cover as many keywords as possible, while using a rifle instead of a shotgun to target the keywords with specific Titles, Copy, Visible URLs and Destination URLs.
I know . . . what the heck is he talking about with Visible URLs and Destination URLs. I'll get to it in a future post. And for those of you that have experience with Google, who are thinking . . . Google doesn't allow different visible or vanity URLs, stay tuned. I'll show you how to tweak the system.
The 12 suggested Ad Campaigns above would be modified if you are in the mountains or New York City, etc. Instead of Waterfront, you may have Mountain View or Downtown, etc. The point is to break your markets into logical segments.
In the next post I will break off from the logical next step to discuss why you need to consider duplicating Ad Campaigns and segmenting them by Pure Google and Network. Then we will continue with what goes into the Ad Campaigns.
At this point, if you have just the 12 Ad Campaigns with 100 Ad Groups in each and 200 keywords in each Ad Group, you'd be at 240,000 different keyword combinations. You can see how quickly you get to 600,000+.
Adwords Editor - You are not actually typing in all of these keywords. You will be using Adwords Editor to copy and duplicate. Then you simply do a find and replace to tweak the copy to the new placement. I will get to it all. For now, if you have questions, feel free to post them here. I will respond to all of them.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section. I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: http://www.mikemorgan7.com/
I will back up for a minute and actually recommend two individual accounts, one targeting Canada and one targeting the USA, but for most agents this gets to be a little bit too much, so creating a Canadian Ad Campaign is fine, but you will not be able to make it as broad as the USA Campaigns.
The next step on your march to a robust Google Sponsored Links account is setting up Ad Campaigns to cover all of your markets. Here's an example of Ad Campaigns created for Florida real estate brokers in Martin County.
1-Martin County
2-Palm Beach County
3-St. Lucie County
4-Treasure Coast
5-Waterfront Homes
6-Luxury Homes
7-Communities
8-Condos
9-Single Family Homes
10-TownHomes
11-Vacant Land
12-Investments
These Ad Campaigns then allow you to set up 100 Ad Groups within each Ad Campaign. You will use the individual Ad Campaigns and nested Ad Groups to cover as many keywords as possible, while using a rifle instead of a shotgun to target the keywords with specific Titles, Copy, Visible URLs and Destination URLs.
I know . . . what the heck is he talking about with Visible URLs and Destination URLs. I'll get to it in a future post. And for those of you that have experience with Google, who are thinking . . . Google doesn't allow different visible or vanity URLs, stay tuned. I'll show you how to tweak the system.
The 12 suggested Ad Campaigns above would be modified if you are in the mountains or New York City, etc. Instead of Waterfront, you may have Mountain View or Downtown, etc. The point is to break your markets into logical segments.
In the next post I will break off from the logical next step to discuss why you need to consider duplicating Ad Campaigns and segmenting them by Pure Google and Network. Then we will continue with what goes into the Ad Campaigns.
At this point, if you have just the 12 Ad Campaigns with 100 Ad Groups in each and 200 keywords in each Ad Group, you'd be at 240,000 different keyword combinations. You can see how quickly you get to 600,000+.
Adwords Editor - You are not actually typing in all of these keywords. You will be using Adwords Editor to copy and duplicate. Then you simply do a find and replace to tweak the copy to the new placement. I will get to it all. For now, if you have questions, feel free to post them here. I will respond to all of them.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section. I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: http://www.mikemorgan7.com/
600,000+ Google Keywords in One Account
I'll explain that number for those that think I am either drinking or smoking something I should not be. I don't do either by the way.
Let's start with 25 Ad Campaigns in an account. Here is an example of how you might get to 25.
1 - USA
2 - Canada
OK, let's stop there and explain. We recommend you set up a US and Canadian campaign because you want to do three things. First, you want to bid differently when distributing ads to Canadians. Second, you want to feature three different rotating ads.
You want to target the Canadians, just like you want to target different groups here . . . seniors, first time buyers, investors, etc. This requires different ad copy.
And the third reason for two campaigns, is you want to drop your visitors on different pages on your website.
Yes, you can certainly take this a step further, and break this down for other foreign countries. You can also break it down within the US. For example, if you are in Florida, you might want to target snowbirds. As for foreign country selection, be very careful. I will explain this in an upcoming post. If you don't manage this properly, you can get clobbered with ghost hits.
As you can see, when we say Sponsored Links is like playing chess on 16 levels . . . blindfolded, you can start to understand how complicated this can get. I will leave you with #1 and #2 in the campaigns, and pick up with 3-25 tomorrow.
As for the count to 600,000, let's just say you will have 100 Ad Groups in each of your two Ad Campaigns, and each ad group will have 250 keywords. So we have 2 x 100 = 200, and then 200 x 250 = 50,000 keywords combinations.
If you're interested in having one of our Sponsored Links experts manage your program, there are monthly programs starting at $1,000. One or two additional deals a year pays for that and more.
Tomorrow I will discuss the next group of Ad Campaigns, and after getting to 600,000, I will discuss each component in depth.
If you have a question about this post, please post a comment or feel free to email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
Let's start with 25 Ad Campaigns in an account. Here is an example of how you might get to 25.
1 - USA
2 - Canada
OK, let's stop there and explain. We recommend you set up a US and Canadian campaign because you want to do three things. First, you want to bid differently when distributing ads to Canadians. Second, you want to feature three different rotating ads.
You want to target the Canadians, just like you want to target different groups here . . . seniors, first time buyers, investors, etc. This requires different ad copy.
And the third reason for two campaigns, is you want to drop your visitors on different pages on your website.
Yes, you can certainly take this a step further, and break this down for other foreign countries. You can also break it down within the US. For example, if you are in Florida, you might want to target snowbirds. As for foreign country selection, be very careful. I will explain this in an upcoming post. If you don't manage this properly, you can get clobbered with ghost hits.
As you can see, when we say Sponsored Links is like playing chess on 16 levels . . . blindfolded, you can start to understand how complicated this can get. I will leave you with #1 and #2 in the campaigns, and pick up with 3-25 tomorrow.
As for the count to 600,000, let's just say you will have 100 Ad Groups in each of your two Ad Campaigns, and each ad group will have 250 keywords. So we have 2 x 100 = 200, and then 200 x 250 = 50,000 keywords combinations.
If you're interested in having one of our Sponsored Links experts manage your program, there are monthly programs starting at $1,000. One or two additional deals a year pays for that and more.
Tomorrow I will discuss the next group of Ad Campaigns, and after getting to 600,000, I will discuss each component in depth.
If you have a question about this post, please post a comment or feel free to email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Google Adwords - Pure Google, Network or Content
Knowing the difference between Pure Google, Network and Content is critical. The short version is, you don't want Network or Content, unless you set the bids for these areas at 1/10th or less to the Pure Google bid. For agents and brokers that want to maximize the dollars they are spending, we suggest you uncheck the boxes for Network and Content . . . and only display on Google.
Network is a huge group of websites from the New York Times to Habba Bobba's Swap Shop. Generally, Google will try to match your keywords to the content on the page of these Network sites. But remember this . . . these people are not searching for you or your product. They are reading an article or a web page. So they are not worth near as much to you as someone that is actually searching for you.
Content is even worse. This could be a junky as those one page splash pages with misleading URLs. For example, if you meant to type in www.realtor.com and instead you typed in www.realter.com you will be dropped on a page that is doing nothing but displaying Sponsored Links.
So for limited budgets, stick with Pure Google, and let your competitors waste money on the junk in Network and Content.
If you have a question about this post, please post a comment or feel free to email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: http://www.mikemorgan7.com/
Network is a huge group of websites from the New York Times to Habba Bobba's Swap Shop. Generally, Google will try to match your keywords to the content on the page of these Network sites. But remember this . . . these people are not searching for you or your product. They are reading an article or a web page. So they are not worth near as much to you as someone that is actually searching for you.
Content is even worse. This could be a junky as those one page splash pages with misleading URLs. For example, if you meant to type in www.realtor.com and instead you typed in www.realter.com you will be dropped on a page that is doing nothing but displaying Sponsored Links.
So for limited budgets, stick with Pure Google, and let your competitors waste money on the junk in Network and Content.
If you have a question about this post, please post a comment or feel free to email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: http://www.mikemorgan7.com/
Xsites by "a la mode" - Forms Manager Issues
There are two things on the Xsites form manager that really bug me.
1 - There is no email confirm. You know, where you enter your email twice and it must match. The powers to be at "a la mode" feel it is not needed. It is. We trick the system by adding a second field for email, and in this field we title it "Confirm Email." Now it will not actully function as a confirmation, but you now know if there is a bad email if they don't match. For an example visit - http://www.floridahomes.pro/home_search and look at the set up of the form at the bottom of the page.
2 - Another thing that really bugs me, is Xsites have a hard code Phone Number request on all forms. There are a lot of folks that will not give you their phone number and get offended when you ask, so we bury the Phone request at the bottom of the form. See the same link below. It is not required field with Xsites, but it still shows up, and there is no way to delete it. Once again the Tech Gurus at "a la mode" feel there is a reason to drive us all crazy with the phone request. You know . . . if we want the phone number, we can include it in our form.
If you have questions about Xsite forms - how to create them, how to tweak them, how to make them most effective, please post a Question/Comment here or email me at Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Subscribe to this blog using the Subscribe To section to the right.
1 - There is no email confirm. You know, where you enter your email twice and it must match. The powers to be at "a la mode" feel it is not needed. It is. We trick the system by adding a second field for email, and in this field we title it "Confirm Email." Now it will not actully function as a confirmation, but you now know if there is a bad email if they don't match. For an example visit - http://www.floridahomes.pro/home_search and look at the set up of the form at the bottom of the page.
2 - Another thing that really bugs me, is Xsites have a hard code Phone Number request on all forms. There are a lot of folks that will not give you their phone number and get offended when you ask, so we bury the Phone request at the bottom of the form. See the same link below. It is not required field with Xsites, but it still shows up, and there is no way to delete it. Once again the Tech Gurus at "a la mode" feel there is a reason to drive us all crazy with the phone request. You know . . . if we want the phone number, we can include it in our form.
If you have questions about Xsite forms - how to create them, how to tweak them, how to make them most effective, please post a Question/Comment here or email me at Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Subscribe to this blog using the Subscribe To section to the right.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Site Maps on Real Estate Websites
The format of this blog is going to be Q&A along with a few posts I will make. But I am here for you if you have questions about Internet Marketing - SEO, SEM, Sponsored Links, Websites, etc.
Below is a question received, followed by my response.
Thanks Mike - Is it important to have a site map on your website? And I have older websites and want to update them and would like your opinion on who you think builds the best real estate websites (templates) so we can add to them ourselves?
To Laxson Associates -
In response to your question about site maps. YES, they are extremely important and these act as maps for the Google crawlers.
As for the second question about real estate websites, there are several website builders, but I prefer A la Mode for the ease of use and the best tech support in the industry. I am going to do an entire series on A la Mode in the future. If you decide to go with them, let me know and I will give you some pointers before you sign up.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section or email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
Below is a question received, followed by my response.
Thanks Mike - Is it important to have a site map on your website? And I have older websites and want to update them and would like your opinion on who you think builds the best real estate websites (templates) so we can add to them ourselves?
To Laxson Associates -
In response to your question about site maps. YES, they are extremely important and these act as maps for the Google crawlers.
As for the second question about real estate websites, there are several website builders, but I prefer A la Mode for the ease of use and the best tech support in the industry. I am going to do an entire series on A la Mode in the future. If you decide to go with them, let me know and I will give you some pointers before you sign up.
If you have a question about this post, please post in the comments section or email me Mike@MikeMorgan7.com I will respond to all questions posted.
Mike Morgan, J.D., CRS, GRI, SRES, e-PRO, REO TRANS Platinum
"Internet Marketing for Real Estate Professionals"
Phone: (772) 260-5448
Email: Mike@MikeMorgan7.com
Website: www.MikeMorgan7.com
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