We've all heard the statistics - 85% of prospects start their home search online. Yeah, yeah - but how on earth do you get a piece of that? Simple.

First - you have to have a website! Not just any website will do - you need a website that is appealing to both search engines and human beings. For the search engines to like your website, you have to have clean code they can spider easily, good content, optimal use of keyword phrases throughout and links from other websites. Let me explain further:

1. Clean Code: If Google has a hard time sifting through messy code such as flash (Google can't read it), Javascript menus (Google can't see your links) or just messy HTML and tables that go on and on, you won't have much success. Also keep in mind duplicate content worries - if you have a site from a template provider, your content is exactly the same as the other thousands of customers. Google et al want to see unique content, excellent code and well optimized pages with many links coming in from other websites.

2. Curb Appeal: If you want humans to (gasp!) leave you their contact information, you need to ask for it after you get their attention, build up their interest and create some desire. They will not take any action if you skip those steps. Have no doubts that simply throwing up a website is not going to do anything to increase your business. You need to consider carefully your target audience and create a clean website with as much content as possible so once a visitor is there, they don't want to leave. I recently was seeking an agent to help sell my home - I was stunned and amazed at how difficult it was to find a 'Free CMA' form or even an email address, for that matter. These sites were clunky, had zero information that interested me (I don't want to see the same boring 'seller' articles, thank you) and none provided WIIFM or What's In It For Me? Why should I contact any of these agents? I didn't.

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