Booming with BoomTown!
I was engaged in a recent chat thread on a private Facebook group regarding the maximization of pay for clicks via Google AdWords to generate leads. I guess I took it for granted that if you pay thousands of dollars on ad words, then you would want to maximize lead generation. As it turns out, many in our industry are not doing this. They are simply wasting money or, better yet, de-maximizing their investment.
Here are some questions to ask when evaluating your lead capture. Does your ad copy on ad words match what the person “immediately” sees when they click and the page opens? For example, if the ad copy teases the consumer with ad stating “click here for local foreclosure deals” (which is always tantalizing for those looking for a good deal), does it take the consumer to an actual list of foreclosures or simply to their homepage or worse, their “ego page” telling everyone about them or their brokerage. Surprisingly, this happens with many brokerages.
My company, Steinborn & Associates Real Estate in Las Cruces, NM, has solved this issue by adding BoomTown to our tool box. BoomTown has created a boom in our lead conversion rates. We converted from Market Leader to BoomTown last year and have been quite favorably impressed with our lead conversion rates. National studies state that if you can convert 3% of your website traffic into leads then you are doing a fairly decent job. We’re doing quite a bit better.
Taking my company’s most recent 2,000 leads via our BoomTown managed lead generating site, here are the results…
- Of the 2,000 leads, 60% were harvested via Google Adwords and Craigslist.
- Visitors to the Actual Form Registration Opening Up: 72% on Craigslist / 44% on Google AdWords.
- Form Registration Opening and being Filled Out to Actual Leads: 15% Craigslist / 11% Google AdWords.
- Total Visits to Actual Leads Ratio: 11% Craiglist / 10% Google AdWords.
BoomTown does what so many ad word consultants do not do, they monitor and increase your return on investment, at least for me they have. They are pushing the needle forward in our industry and you should take a look at their offerings!
Mike McGee
Posted at 18:52h, 19 JanuaryWow, is GeekEstate turning into an unabashed advertising venue for certain vendors? Sure, it’s good advice to match one’s landing page to the copy on one’s PPC ads, but one doesn’t need to subscribe to a particular vendor to do that. Also, a lead from forced IDX registration is a completely different animal from a lead who actually asks you to contact them, so I’d be interested to see that breakdown. Further, I would be more interested in the “real” conversion rate, i.e. leads vs. closings.
Drew Meyers
Posted at 18:57h, 19 JanuaryMike-
John is a client of BoomTown. He shared real traffic numbers in a private FB group that I saw and asked him to share some of those numbers here. I believe real traffic figures are valuable for everyone as a data point to compare to. I’m absolutely willing to give you a chance to share some of your learnings as well in a post. Just send me an email and I’ll set you up.
And yes, as a general rule, I believe the good vendors absolutely deserve to be highlighted on this blog.
Bob Wilson
Posted at 12:21h, 20 JanuaryI think its great for people to share numbers. There is so much to be learned from data from different markets, platforms and marketing strategies.
John Hummer
Posted at 16:16h, 20 JanuaryHello Mike – I understand your comment. Typically I do not make a point to point out one vendor over the other. However, I do not believe all vendors for such lead generation products are created equal. Some rise above the pack. When they do, I like to recognize them. Having grappled with various other vendors, I felt inpspired to put in a plug for BoomTown. Unlike other vendors in their space, BoomTown will not just sign up anyone to use their product. They limit their membership based on market size. I also agree that the most important ratio is closings. We are in month 7 of converting to BoomTown. As you know, online buyers take time to nurture and close. However, anectdotally, and based on my brokers feedback, they are very pleased with the quality of leads and engagement by their clients with BoomTown’s website tools. Much more so than with are previous vendor. We have converted many closings via BoomTown over the last 7 months. At the end of year one, we will run our leads to closed ratio. Based on actual closings over the last 7 months and coupled with the quality of leads registered and engaged in the system, I am looking forward to posting strong results. Thank you for your feedback to my post.
Bob Wilson
Posted at 12:34h, 20 JanuaryYou cant fairly compare leads vs closings for a variety of reasons. The most obvious is skill of the agent handling the lead. The market you are in is also a big factor.
Jeff Manson
Posted at 19:05h, 20 JanuaryThose are good numbers.. Boomtown, Tigerleads and Real Geeks IMO are probably the highest converting platforms on the Market…
My Hawaii site numbers for; Form Registration Opening and being Filled Out to Actual Leads: 18% Google Organic Traffic.
Organic traffic usually will have a lower conversion rate than Google Adwords Traffic because you will get traffic for keywords that are not always the best for lead conversion. Especially if you rank for keywords like ” cost of living in hawaii ” or other general ones like ” Oahu Schools”. Keywords like ” hawaii real estate” or “homes for sale in Hawaii” will have a much higher conversion rate because of the users intent 🙂
Our Real Geeks clients that are in the Real Leads program who we manage their PPC usually see: Form Registration Opening and being Filled Out to Actual Leads: 18% – 25% Google Adwords Traffic
Total Visits to Actual Leads Ratio: 8% – 15% Google AdWords
Full Disclosure: I am a Hawaii http://www.adrhi.com & California broker in San Diego http://www.homesalessandiego.com that sells real estate in both markets that started Real Geeks http://www.realgeeks.com to run my own online real estate businesses because I could not find a solution that had a good conversion rate that was also SEO friendly with a great CRM (backend lead Management System).
Mike McGee
Posted at 13:41h, 20 JanuaryThanks for your reply, John. I’m sorry if I sounded negative, I just approach all vendor claims with a healthy degree of skepticism. Visits vs. leads is only a small part of the picture, and I think agents/brokers should ask many more questions before committing to any particular platform. How much money was spent over what period of time to capture those 2,000 leads? How many of those are forced-registration leads vs. people who actually asked to be contacted? How many provided fake contact info just to see the listing info and therefore aren’t really leads at all? What are the different closing ratios for those different types of leads? Could one accomplish similar numbers if one allocated a similar budget and directed one’s own PPC campaign?
I’m sure some will find Boomtown a good fit for them, while others will find it more cost effective to direct their own campaigns.
Sam DeBord, SeattleHome.com
Posted at 08:16h, 29 JanuaryI understand the concern, too, but I don’t think anyone is here to sell a company that they don’t believe in. I’ve seen Boomtown and it’s a great product. We use RealGeeks, which is the same style of heavy lead-capture/CRM/lead distribution platform. It changed the way we do business, and I’m happy to proselytize about it, too.
As long as we’re open about not having a personal financial stake in a company we’re praising, it’s helpful to the readers to know what’s working for us.
Ventura County Resident
Posted at 09:33h, 11 SeptemberBS! RealGeeks is horrible and a HUGE waste of money!!! Not sure about BoomTurds but heavy handed arrogant advertising and sales staff usually means one thing… crap!!
Sam DeBord
Posted at 09:42h, 11 SeptemberOK, tell that to my team that’s working leads every day from our 4 RealGeeks websites. It’s the best value we’ve found. Please explain “horrible”, because you can’t explain a “huge waste of money” since it’s an inexpensive platform that’s making us plenty of money.