Building your website on any platform has pros and cons. Use of a platform is key to your success for audience engagement and content management. There are many content management systems (CMS) from which to choose but one we recommend is WordPress.
WordPress is a Versatile Content Management System
Chances are you’ve heard mixed reviews regarding the WordPress platform. If you’ve heard of WordPress, you have some existing knowledge about the platform which is either awesome or very cumbersome. One of the key factors that influenced your review likely depended upon who you hired and his or her expertise to build your WordPress real estate website or your own DIY effort.
WordPress, at its core, is open source which means continuous improvement as time progresses due to community contributions to the platform. Thousands upon thousands of off the shelf themes and free plugins are available to add on and enhance website functionality quickly. The WordPress platform versatility, trusted by small businesses and large corporations, is why both novice and expert website designers use its platform as a foundation for site design success.
Website Design Using a Professional Looking Theme
Whether you are building the site yourself or have hired a web designer, there are numerous ways and varying levels of difficulty to achieve the most effective result. The design of your website and its connection to your brand and logo really help your visitors understand that you’re a professional and that you took the time to make your website unique and reflective of you. There is no shortage of premium and free themes targeted for real estate agent websites.
Keep in mind that a professional website is not the same thing as a high-performance site that brings you leads. Therefore, it is important to build with purpose so that your site’s design and functionality help you run your business more effectively.
IDX Integration Brings Listings Data into Your Website
As you consider site design and functionality, you want to use available plugins. What is a plugin? A plugin is a software add-on designed to provide additional functionality for your website. Most plugins are free and often come with little to no technical support. WordPress offers several plugins. Of interest to real estate agents is the use of IDX plugins.
Why are IDX plugins important? IDX integration is an essential element of your real estate website because you want your listings data to feed from your MLS to your website automatically. Today, there are a couple of dozen options for IDX plugins available through WordPress to enable addition or deactivation of listings, decision autonomy to show price or call for price options, address, listing or property types and more. This is in addition to serving as a website platform that enables you to know and grow your business.
Optimize for a High Performance Website Experience
WordPress is a very powerful tool that can be leveraged to help real estate agents, like you, to market your properties and capture prospective client information. Use of a broker subpage with limited versatility to reflect your brand may lead to website inaccessibility, slow loading pages or awkward mobile device display. The WordPress platform provides integration of social or digital marketing platforms like Facebook or YouTube for direct client engagement to your site based on your brand and customer message.
Make sure your website is built correctly, hosted securely and optimized for lead capture and lead generation. As visitors browse your website, you’ll want to capture their information in a contact form. One must-have is a contact form plugin that captures basic lead information such as name, email, phone, and message. Again, dozens of contact form options are available in WordPress.
Use a Pop-Up to Prompt a Call-to-Action
Another important aspect of a real estate website is to enable you to engage in value-added client-agent communication and enhance customer service. Going one step further beyond a basic contact form, it will be very helpful if you capture the listing number and address of the listing that your website visitor is interested in seeing. If you like to write or communicate with your customers in an e-mail list, you should consider a popup plugin that asks your visitors to subscribe to your communications. There are dozens of plugins that quickly allow you to show a popup to your visitors based on certain triggers.
Why the WordPress Platform is Perfect for Real Estate Websites
A minimal site for real estate agents needs a great theme, IDX integration, contact form capability, and a popup to capture e-mail for future marketing. WordPress offers these features and more which is why it serves as our foundation for Agent SITE. In addition to the features referenced, there is also an expert team ready to help you design a beautiful and functional website that helps you expand your reach, market effectively and connect with your customers.
What is the value of your time, client marketing and your brand management? Having a strong online presence with the help of an expert team can increase your value as a real estate agent. No hassle, no coding, your client, your brand, your business + WordPress platform, our Agent SITE solution = Unlimited Possibilities! Contact Us today and we’ll show you what makes our implementation of WordPress sites better than any DIY websites.
