One of the keys to success with a real estate website is developing fresh content. And I’m not just talking about updates about what your dog did last week – you need to have real estate related content. Not only does it keep website visitors engaged and coming back but it also gives you juice for search engines. Did you know that search engines regularly (sometimes daily for a good website) spider your sites looking for new content and reward (or ignore) you accordingly in their search results?

Does this all beg the question “where do I get this fresh content”? There are lots of ways to get good content, but one of the best sources of real estate information is to draw on your own knowledge and experiences. After all, you’re the expert right? It doesn’t take much time to develop your own content and it shows your prospects that you really know what you are doing.

Here’s a tip for a fresh topic that is on many of your prospect’s minds these days, or at least would be if they knew about it – the First-Time Homebuyer Tax Credit. Put a new page on your website that describes in brief what the credit is and who might qualify for it. If you have the ability to add a lead capture form to the page, add it and ask your prospects to contact you for more information or to find out if they qualify.

If you don’t already know all the details you can get more clarity from the article below from NAR:

http://www.realtor.org/home_buyers_and_sellers/2009_first_time_home_buyer_tax_credit?lid=ronav0019

If you don’t already have information about this on your real estate website, it’s a slam dunk as good, quality content that your prospects are sure to be interested in.

1. Add More Listings - Get Free Exposure on Real Estate Search Websites.
One of the major ways of getting more free traffic to your website is by taking advantage of Listing Syndication for your listings. Some website providers, including Z57, provide this service for you - posting your listings on popular real estate search websites like Zillow, Yahoo, Oodle, Trulia, Vast and LiveDeal, all of which generate free traffic back to your website! Make sure you don’t just frame your home listings into your website, doing this doesn’t get you this exposure - if you have a Z57 website, use the listings manager in your MCC.   If your website provider does not provide this valuable service for you, find a provider that does, or post your listings through someone like Postlets.

2. Craigslist/BackPage.com Postings
These two websites can generate you considerable buyer traffic for your home listings. All you have to do is look on either of these major websites and look for your nearest major city’s version and make posts for your individual home listings (and make sure your post has a link to the listing on your website). Even if your nearest major city listed on there is an hour away, it’s worth posting your individual home listings in that area to gain qualified traffic.
www.Craigslist.org
www.BackPage.com

3. Create Content/Start Blogging
A great way to get good rankings in the search engines and thus more free traffic is to create your own content. The more search engine friendly content you have, the more traffic you will generate. A great way to take advantage of this is by making use of your custom pages to build special promotion pages, or featured local resources and interview pages, and build your keyword phrases into them as much as possible. Blogging is also a great simple way of creating new content, which is great for search engine content and also very useful community resource for clients - it turns you into an expert and is great for driving repeat traffic. Here are some examples of good real estate blogs:
http://mirealestate.wordpress.com
http://www.raincityguide.com
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