Dear Friend,

Let’s talk about your website this week.

My latest observation is that websites have overtake full color super-deluxe personal branding brochures as the biggest money-sucking black hole in the real estate universe.

It’s true.

I see people spending thousands and thousands of dollars on the latest flash and animation technology to get dancing chickens and music on their websites…with an attitude of…

“If I just get ONE transaction it will MORE than pay for itself…”

I don’t want that to be you.

I’ve developed a formula for internet marketing success…

Eyeballs + Emails + Hearts = Faces

It may seem like a simple formula, but when you apply it to your website, you’ll be amazed at how well it works.

First of all, the formula is opposite of what most website training tells you.

You’ve probably heard that you’ve got to have a “sticky” website…where people will stay for 20 minutes at a time, bookmark your site so they can come back later and when they get ready to buy a home it just makes sense they’ll contact you.

But that’s not what happens in the real world.

People are NOT going to bookmark your site. In fact, they’ll probably never come back to your website again.

That’s why it’s important to make the most of the ONE opportunity you have…while they’re at your website the first time.

I want people to come to your website and slide right through into a meeting with you….so you can help them find a home and get a mortgage.

When most people think about marketing on the internet, their first thought is always about getting the latest, greatest whiz bang website complete with all the dancing chickens, whirling planets and their favorite song playing in the background.

If it’s new and cutting edge, it must be great!

The most powerful secret about internet marketing is not even your website.

It’s about email.

Email is your instant connection to real people one at a time as individuals.

Even more important than having someone come to your website and stay there for hours at a time or bookmark it so they can come back later (anonymously) without you ever knowing it, is that they come to your site and identify themselves quickly.

The industry calls these high content portal-type sites “Sticky” sites.

I’d much rather have a “Slippery” website.

I want people to come to my website, quickly find an offer they’d like and ask for it using just their name and email address.

Simple.

Just a little baby step.

It’s not about having them fill out a 4-page form with their bank balance and their blood type, just to get a free report.

It’s about offering something as simple as a free report on “how to buy a house in happytown with no downpayment” that someone can ask for from a pop-up window, banner or from a registration page on your website.

Once you’ve successfully attracted someone’s email address, your website has done it’s job.

Now you’re moving in to the most important part of internet marketing ‐ connecting with those “individuals” by name and starting a dialogue with them.

Your website is a monologue.

Email starts a dialogue.

This podcast is not about how to get more people to your website — that’s the easy part.

This week’s podcast is about how to get more of the people who come to your website to start a dialogue, and what to say and do with those people so they’ll take the next step and ultimately choose to work with you.

Developing the skill of email dialougue with your prospects, your current customers and your sphere of influence is one of the most profitable skills you can develop.

The good news is that it’s a skill you CAN develop.

When people come to me for help with internet marketing, I ask them two questions:

1. Do you know how many visitors you’re getting?
2. How many visitors out of 100 do you connect with?

Unfortunately, the answer to those questions is usually “I don’t know”

If you’re going to create a web strategy that works, you’ll have to know the EXACT answers to those questions.

I’m always surprised that most people don’t even have a way to know how many visitors they’re getting to their site.

Not even a counter.

Don’t let that be YOU.

If you don’t have at least a counter on your site, get over

to http://www.freestats.com and get yourself their free stats program.

It takes less than 4 minutes from start to finish to sign-up, set up the tracker and start getting accurate numbers on the visitors that come to your site.

Once you’ve got a way to track the number of people coming

to your site, we can get a better idea of what’s happening.

Most people know the number of people (approximately) that contact them each week, or month, and they’ll tell me they get “3 or 4” e-mails a week / month / quarter….whatever.

Just knowing how many people contact you doesn’t help figure out what you need to do next.

If you’re getting 3 or 4 e-mails each week from the 5 or 6 people that come to your site, you’re doing great!

If you’re getting 3 or 4 e-mails a week from 400 people who come to your site, we’ve got trouble.

Big trouble.

Your site isn’t connecting with people in a way that compels them to want to get in touch with you.

And you’ll never know it — unless you know your numbers!

So, it’s usually one of two problems. Not enough visitors, or not enough compelling offers to convert those visitors to prospects.

Since you already have a way to predictably get visitors to your site, we can focus on the second problem — not enough prospects to connect with.

I can’t say this enough. The PRIMARY purpose of your website should be to at least attract the e-mail address of your visitors.

If you have that, you can start a dialogue with your visitors, and continue to make offers to them even AFTER they’ve left your site.

If people come to your site and don’t at least respond for something with their e-mail address…you’re losing out on at least 50% of the response you could get if you were able to follow-up with them after they leave.

I’m serious.

The chances of someone bookmarking and returning to your site (even with the best intentions) are very low.

You’ve got to act like you only have ONE opportunity to connect with them, and do everything you can to make sure you do.

How do you do this?

Well, you make offers for valuable information your visitors can get by e-mail.

Offers like FREE Reports by autoresponder, a FREE List of the best homes for sale in a particular price range, a FREE list of homes that just sold in their neighborhood…etc.

There are all kinds of things you can offer to prospects, and most people already have great stuff on their website they could package into an e-mail report.

Honestly, most of the real estate websites I see have too MUCH stuff with not enough focus on response.

The most important thing you can do to increase the number of people who respond at your website is to make those offers on the FRONT PAGE.

Try this:

Go to your homepage and notice when the page has loaded, just how much of your page is visible in the screen without scrolling down.

What you see there, is the most VALUABLE piece of real estate on your website.

What you see there, is the one single part of your website that every single visitor is guaranteed to see.

That’s where they all start.

Now, if you have 6,8,10,12 different options for them to click on, and your e-mail offer is behind one of those clicks…you now have only a 1 in 12 chance that they’re even going to SEE your e-mail offer.

As soon as they click on any one of the buttons or links on your front page, you’re chances of connecting with them have been drastically lowered.

On the other hand, if you make your e-mail offer on the front page of your website, in the immediately visible screen area, your chances of connecting with them by email are considerably higher.

Just this one change to your website can increase the number of email addresses you get by 10 times!

I’d like to talk about connecting with prospects that come from your websites, as email contacts.

The ones who come to your website and decide to fill out your form, or if you’ve been following the eyeballs + emails + hearts = faces formula,the people who leave their name and email address in exchange for some information you promise on your website.

It’s important that you have a game plan for these leads, or it will end up being a big frustration for you. So, here are a couple of tips that will help you build a plan for YOUR email prospects.

Know What You Want Them To Do.

If you don’t know what you want them to do next, how can you expect them to do it?

You have to keep in mind that every lead you generate, whether just an email address, or someone who has filled out your form, is just the beginning.

It’s just one step up in the formula.

If they leave an email address, the next thing you want to do is have them share the desires of their heart with you.

If they fill out your form and tell you who they are, what they’re looking for, and basically ask for your help ‐ your goal is to get them out of a cyber relationship and into a real relationship.

Every communication you have with your prospects should really be designed to advance your prospects to the NEXT step.

It all starts on your website.

If you’re doing a good job of making offers on your website, you should be getting lots of people who share their email address with you while they’re at your site.

If they do it by asking for a FREE Report by email, or sign up for your FREE Home Buying Nuggets or whatever, the objective is to get them to take the next step right away.

Let’s say someone comes to your website, and they see an offer for a free report on “how to buy a home in Boise with Zero Down Payment… Just enter your name and email address”

So they do.

Now, what I usually see next is the biggest lost opportunity on your website.

If someone is excited enough about something you’re offering to leave their name and email address to get it, never in the history of your relationship with them have they liked you more than that moment.

They have taken a step forward and revealed a part of themselves to you.

As soon as they hit that submit button, they’re no longer anonymous.

What usually happens is they are sent the Free Report they asked for and it’s the biggest lost opportunity you could ever have on your website.

Think about it for a second. The person who has just submitted that information is saying “Hey, I’m interested in a zero down mortgage!”

The best thing you could do right now, would be to make an offer to them RIGHT NOW to take the next step — While they’re in forward momentum.

So, instead of sending a message that says, “Thank You, here’s your Free Report”, you might send them an email that offers them a free list of homes, a free pre-approval, or find out EXACTLY how much house you can afford in just a few minutes.

You might make an offer for your FREE HomeLoan Finder service, and your FREE Home Finder Service.

The point is, once you have a prospects email address, you should only be making offers that will get them to share their hearts with you, and it should start IMMEDIATELY.

Don’t just thank them and send them back to the beginning.

Keep them moving forward.

If you make these kinds of offers to people immediately after they’ve left their name and email address, you’ll see a dramatic improvement in the number of prospects who ultimately share their heart with you.

Not everyone will though. So, if you’ve got someone who shared their email with you, but didn’t take the next step, what you do next is very important.

I’m always going to people’s websites and filling out their email offers (the ones that actually have an email offer) and I always find the same thing.

An automated reply, and a series of other automated replies that appear like, feel like, smell like auto replies — impersonal and dead.

Keep this in mind, when someone asks for information on your website, it’s never really about the INFORMATION.

It’s always about the end result. You’ve heard that people don’t want drills, they want ¼” holes.

It’s the same way with people on your website.

They don’t want INFORMATION on Zero Down Home Loans, they want to buy a house with zero down, and your follow-up with them should always be about helping them buy a house with zero down and not about the information.

The worst thing you can do is just send out an impersonal piece of information like a free report.

And in my opinion, you would be much better off having your autoresponder delay sending out the information by at least 24hrs so you can create the appearance that you put together this information especially for them.

Why would you do that?

Well, autoresponders are great tools.

They save you time, and they help you automate the process of following up with a high volume of leads, but they can really be impersonal.

What you really want, is the appearance that you are one person, speaking directly to one person.

To be most effective, autoresponder messages should have 3 critical elements. They should be

1. Personalized
2. Short and conversational
3. Expecting a reply

Personalized means you should use their name.

It really helps.

Especially if you delay the sending of the message, instead of sending it right away.

As soon as someone sees a “personalized” message in their inbox 30 seconds after they request something, they know it wasn’t YOU.

If they get it the next day, it appears that you came in the next day and responded to their message.

It’s a little thing, but it makes a huge difference in perception.

If you’re not using their name, and they’re getting the information right away, they’re going to treat it as just information.

The best thing you can do, is instead of just sending out a report that starts with a headline and goes right into the report, use a short personal and conversational note before the headline almost like a cover letter.

Hi Bob,

Here’s the free report you asked for yesterday on my website…

Would you like to find out how much house you can afford with zero down?

We have 6 different programs available, and you can get all
the details on a free recorded message at 1-800-800-8000
Let me know…

Dean

Here’s How To Buy A House In Boise With Zero Downpayment. (include the free report below…)

Short. Personal. Expecting a reply.

Much better than just blasting out a free report instantly and following it up with another report and another.

What you should follow up with, are more short, personal notes always expecting a reply.

When you expect a reply from people, and make it easy for them to do it, you’ll find far more of them are willing to take the next step than if you just left it up to them.

Remember, people are silently begging to be led.

So, be a leader!

Until next time…

Dean Jackson