Before you even set up your Google Adwords PPC account, here's what you must do.

Don't pay to bring them to your site if it isn't ready:
Why do real estate professionals decide to do PPC, Pay Per Click marketing? Also called SEM, Search Engine Marketing, this is paying for clicks to your site, primarily through the major player, Google Adwords.

Obviously, they believe that paying to get a visitor interested in "theirtown real estate" gives them a chance to convert them to a customer & a commission at some point. The problem is that most sites are far from ready to convert the visitor, so they shouldn't be wasting their money in paying to get them to come to a dysfunctional site.
Have relevant information valuable to the visitor:
This is NOT "I am the greatest!" statements. This is NOT "I'm a top producer" page. The visitor doesn't care. They don't care about you, they care about their needs & the information search that brought them to your PPC ad & site.

They primarily want to search for listings, so an IDX search page is critical. They also want to find information about "yourtown real estate," so you need all types of articles & information that explains your market & keeps the visitor current on trends & statistics. If you don't have stuff like this, don't waste your money on PPC.
Create landing pages for ads - not your home page:
When you create a PPC ad, something I'll show you later in this series of articles, you are luring the prospect to click on your ad & come to your site. These ads should each have a unique & specific purpose, & the visitor that clicks should find exactly what they expect when they arrive at your site.

When you run a Google Adwords ad headlined with "Search Yourtown Listings," & you take them on the click to your home page, you'll be wasting your money more than half the time. They aren't going to click again to find the IDX search. Whether a search or other information, the "landing" page is critical.
Have lead capture strategies in place:
Once you've paid for that click & the visitor is at your site, you still have a major task-capturing their contact information. Capture is a poor word choice, as you want them to willingly give it to you, as well as permission to continue to stay in touch via email.

Whether you use special reports, statistical reports, white papers, or some other value-add material they must request, you must have various offerings that they will be willing to give up their contact information to receive. While they may be happy with the information on the landing page, they will leave & forget you if you don't follow up.
Execute well-planned follow-up lead nurturing:
If you've done everything right to this point, you have converted a "suspect" who came to your site on a PPC search to a "prospect" who gave you their name & email address in exchange for a report or other offering. Now comes the more extended task; staying top-of-mind with the prospect until they're ready for a more personal contact or to buy & sell real estate.

This is done with drip email campaigns that send the prospect pre-scheduled emails in a series. They can't be a sales pitch, instead providing more valuable information about your real estate market.
You don't have to be the highest bidder:
A very big mistaken impression about Google Adwords is that your position in the paid ads is solely dependent on how much you're willing to pay, or bid, for a click. While this is the main criteria, Google rewards score points to your ad based on multiple factors.

The relevance of your landing page, your ad's CTR, Click-Through-Ratio, & other factors enter into this score. As your ad campaign begins to attract clicks, Google will use this score in positioning your ad. You can be in a higher position than a competitor's ad but be paying less. I know because my clicks cost me a lot less than my competitors.
PPC, Pay-Per-Click Marketing for Real Estate Works - If You Do It Right:
When you read about real estate professionals who say they had no luck with PPC & wasted a lot of money, many times it's simply because they did it horribly wrong.

They didn't properly set up their ads, create good ad headlines & text.
The visitor isn't taken to a relevant landing page, or all are taken to the home page.
Visitors don't find the information they wanted on the landing page.
There are no lead capture systems in place to get their contact information.
Follow-up is poor, & the customer forgets about them.

Just avoiding these mistakes will give you a head start to success. Good content & following up regularly without the "hard sell" will do the rest.

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