Previous Article: Real Estate SEO vs PPC: The Battle for Your Marketing Dollars

PPC: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

• Competitive keywords can be costly.
• Competitors may continuously leapfrog your own bids.
• PPC fraud can quickly eat up your monthly budget.
• Successful pay per click campaigns typically convert only 1.5% - 2% of traffic into sales.
• Your PPC campaign must be continuously monitored for conversion factors and competing bids.
• Pay per click campaigns can bring immediate traffic to new websites.
• PPC campaigns that target niche markets or secondary keywords can still lead to successful sales conversions.

Real Estate SEO: Sound Investment or Smoke and Mirrors?

Real estate search engine optimization services offer many advantages over pay per click advertising services including managed costs as well as the ability to drive volume, targeted traffic over longer periods of time. When you hire an real estate SEO firm your costs are fixed based upon the size and scope of the project, making it much easier to manage your marketing budget.

At The Kosloff Group, we understand the importance of cash flow - especially when you're just starting out in the real estate business. That's why we provide monthly installment payments over the span of our 12-month real estate SEO contracts. But it gets even better than that - your payments for SEO services don't begin until the first full month that your web site is operational. For example, let's say you contract with us for a real estate web design and SEO project and your completed site is loaded to your web server on June 4th. Your 12-month billing cycle would not start until July 1st! Keep in mind that there is a deposit required to begin any project (consider it "good faith" money).

SEO Services: The Good, The Bad, and The Even Uglier

• Search engine optimization services have greater up front costs than PPC advertising.
• There are some companies that claim to offer search engine optimization services, but in reality do nothing more than change a few META tags. Do your homework and know the basics of a good search engine optimization program.
• There are SEO companies that employ high-risk techniques that can deliver top search engine rankings, but at the same time put your website at risk from being penalized or permanently banned from the search engines. Discuss the risk-reward factors with your SEO company if you choose to employ these tactics. The Kosloff Group does not advocate or employ the use of these techniques, and our contracts include a penalty clause if we knowingly use techniques that cause your website to be banned from a search engine.
• If an SEO company guarantees top search engine rankings, make sure it is for keywords that you mutually select and not keywords of their own choosing. Almost anyone can get top rankings for "fuzzy pink and purple polka dot slippers" (we actually rank #1 on Yahoo for this term - try it!). Some disreputable companies use this technique as well as the technique of short term PPC campaigns to get top search engine rankings for their customers.
• It can take many months for your website to be optimized, indexed, and ranked by the search engines. No SEO company can control when the search engines will visit your site or how many pages will be indexed. There are techniques to try and speed up the process (link building, directory listings, etc.), but they cannot be guaranteed.
• A properly executed search engine optimization program will provide successful long term results.
• A successful search engine optimization program will typically yield a 2% - 5% conversion factor of site visits to sales.

And The Winner Is...

Your best investment is to use a combination of the two campaigns. When you first establish your web site or hire a professional real estate search engine optimization company, begin a monitored pay-per-click program at the same time. Within 6-12 months, as your search engine marketing program begins to take effect, scale back or eliminate your PPC marketing. In the end, you will have a marketing campaign that drives volume, targeted traffic to your web site.

The Kosloff Group provides pay per click management services for all of our clients needing this service. Call us or visit our contact page for more information.

The Kosloff Group
P.O. Box 754
Bluffton, SC 29910
Telephone: 843.290.0031

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