Website AnatomyYour homepage is the most important page of your real estate website. It has to appeal to both new and repeat visitors alike. While it’s main job is to convert your visitors into leads and customers, you also need to build trust, communicate value and solve visitor problems. This guide will help you think through the process from a customers perspective.

Header/NavigationCarousel

What’s Above the Fold

Property Search

Featured Properties

INTERACTIVE Website Anatomy.1 Key Attributes of a Real Estate Home Page

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Getting Started

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What Makes a Website Good?Most people find it hard to imagine a website as more than some nice design and pretty images to show off to customers, colleagues, friends and family.  This can make determining what attributes are more important than others a very difficult task. We should start off by stating that this guide is specifically about a business website and focused on real estate marketing, a segment of website owners that has very specific needs.

Begin the process by asking questions. First and foremost, “what do you want your website to accomplish?”.

Determining Your Website GoalsHere are five crucial objectives every real estate marketing website should strive for:

Instill Trust – having people believe that you are trustworthy.Amplify Awareness – having more people know that you exist.Improve Efficiency – streamlining an activity, e.g. property or location research, education.Increase Sales – nurturing prospective and existing customers through your sales cycle.Create a Marketing Hub – a central location to focus your in-bound and paid marketing activities.

Section 1

Website Planning

Here’s a simple checklist to get you started in your website design and development process.

Interactive: Website Development Checklist

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Interactive: WordPress Theme Design Pinch to zoom image

Simple, Agile, Engaging And Search Friendly

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Section 1

What Good RE Design Looks Like

Design is More Than Beautiful ImagesOnce you’ve decided to launch a blog or real estate website. and you’ve determined your business objectives, your target audience, and the tone and voice of your site, your next step should be to figure out how you’re going to manage all of this once it's built. In web development speak, you’ll need a CMS (Content Management System) to give your site structure. A good CMS will help you simplify all the activities associated with publishing content, enabling search, managing edits, using plug-ins to add features and functionality, managing your layout, de-termining site structure, SEO, and lots of other helpful things you’d rather not have to be an expert on.

Lean, Agile and Built for SpeedOnline marketing has changed dramatically in the last few years, the concept of planning for months to design and launch the perfect website can cost a business it’s competitive edge or insure that it’s not even in the running. Flexibility and agility are imperative in today’s fast moving online marketplace. The prolif-eration of world class technology has enabled the lean startup movement to leapfrog beyond the tech world. The concept is simple, build cheaply, test and iterate. Contemporary website design is no different. Avoid expensive custom development at all costs, build on a scaleable platform spend the majority of your marketing dollars on, marketing. Rinse and repeat.

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Design Gallery 2.1

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1Consumers shouldn’t have to guess at what you do.

H1 / Header

H1 / Header

INTERACTIVE 1.1 H1/Header Example

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2 H2 / Sub-header

INTERACTIVE 2.1 H2 / Sub-header Example

H2 / Sub-headerA short description of what you do and how you’re valuable.

3 Navigation

INTERACTIVE 3.1 Navigation Example

NavigationProviding a clear path into your website helps reduce bounce rates.

4 Benefit

INTERACTIVE 4.1 Benefit Ex-ample

BenefitsWhat value do you offer to your website visitors?

5 Primary Image

INTERACTIVE 5.1 Primary Im-age Example

Primary ImagesA time for eye candy.

6 Primary Call ToAction

INTERACTIVE 6.1 Primary Call To Action Example

Primary Call To ActionYour primary acton is to get a visitor engaged.

7 Teaser Properties

INTERACTIVE 7.1 Teaser Prop-erties Example

Teaser PropertiesFeatured properties allow you to entice a visitor to dig deeper.

8 Sharing and Saving Opportunities

INTERACTIVE 8.1 Sharing and Saving Opportunities Example

Sharing & Saving Opportunities

9Recruitment Messaging

Recruitment Messaging

INTERACTIVE 9.1 Recruitment Messaging Example

Showcase your team ethos.

10Secondary Calls To Action

Secondary Calls to Action

INTERACTIVE 10.1 Secondary Calls to Action Example

Provide multiple opportunities to engage.

11 Up-To-Date Blog Content

INTERACTIVE 11.1 Up-To-Date Blog Content Example

Up-To-Date Blog ContentNo one is engaged by bad content.

12 Testimonials

INTERACTIVE 12.1 Testimoni-als Example

TestimonialsConsumers trust you more when others trust you first.

13 Additional Resources

INTERACTIVE 13.1 Additional Resources Example

Additional ResourcesGive away great stuff in exchange for contact info.

14 Secondary Navigation

INTERACTIVE 14.1 Secondary Navigation Example

Secondary NavigationMake it easy to get around.

15 More Social Proof

INTERACTIVE 15.1 More Social Proof Example

More Social ProofThe greater the authority the better the proof.

16Footer Calls To Action

Footer Calls To Action

INTERACTIVE 16.1 Footer Calls To Action Example

Provide value in every pixel of your site.

17 Your Physical Address

INTERACTIVE 17.1 Physical Ad-dress Example

Physical AddressLocal search engines like to know you really exist.

18Phone Number

Phone Number

INTERACTIVE 18.1 Phone Num-ber Example

Don’t hide your contact information, nobody likes that.

Thank You!If you want to learn more about online marketing specifically for real estate. Visit Placester’s Real Estate Marketing Academy for tons of free educational info. http://Placester.com/Academy

If you want a real estate website like the one in this infographic

Give us a shout:http://placester.comTwitter.com/placesterFacebook.com/placesterGoogle+ PlacesterEmail: academy@placester.comPhone: (800) 723-8391

Anatomy of a Real Estate Website Infographic

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