Chris Koerner advises targeting real estate agents with outdated websites rather than those with none. Use BuiltWith to find them, then build on WordPress with IDX plugins or platforms like Carrot. Charge $2,000 and up, reach out with mockup screenshots, and call or text directly.
February 19, 2024
About $2,000
IDX (WordPress IDX plugin)
Setting up websites for small businesses. So to start off, I've kind of niched down to real estate agents. I got a list of a bunch of agents from realtor.com who don't have websites. So I can cold email them with an offer to make a website for them for. I'm starting off with like two grand, but I don't know if this is, if it's just totally unfounded. I don't have a ton of data that I'm going off of. And so I keep kind of getting this like, I don't know, like heavy doubts with it or I don't know if it'll, if I can validate kind of what I'm doing as I'm going through or if I'm wasting my time in certain areas. So I'd love kind of like an audit of just where I could be improving, just the general business process and what I shouldn't be worrying about.
Okay, so your general idea is to make custom websites for real estate agents that don't have a website, right?
Yeah.
Okay, and is this still in the ideation phase or do you have a customer yet?
Yeah, still in the ideation phase. I just sent out my first like cold email yesterday with a quick little, you know, hey, we could make a, I can make a website for you. And I attached a, a screenshot of what it would look like with like their face, their name and the area that they cover with their real estate to kind of see if that would work. So, so just very early stages.
Have you thought of trying a different approach and going after real estate agents that already have a website that might be unoptimized or just for lack of a better word, crappy and like pitching to them why their website needs to be improved or should be improved and what they could get from a more optimized website. Because I don't like the idea of finding realtors that don't have websites because a, there's a good chance they don't have a website because they are an inactive agent and like you scrape their data and it's six months or six years old or somewhere in between and so they don't want a website. They don't even want to do anything with real estate. I also don't like it because it could be the opposite end of the spectrum and you've got this small town agent that just crushes it. And I don't need a website. I do. Just, they're right, you know, like, they could do much better if they had a website but it's not your job to convince them of that because you probably won't. Right?
Right.
And so I'm thinking if you, if you use Built with to. Let's say, let's say you use Built with to, to scrape all of the websites that have a certain WordPress plugin, right? Like maybe you know what IDX is.
The coding platform.
Yeah. IDX is like the API for real estate. Right. Where it's like you link your MLS to your website. So you go to staceyrealtor.com and you can, you know, you can view houses, not just her listings, but like it's, it's just like an API that pulls from the local MLS like Zillow does. Oh, that's awesome. So I, I imagine, I assume that WordPress has a plugin for IDX. So therefore they have to. There's a million WordPress plugins. If you find that plugin that supports IDX and then use built with to export the hundred thousand plus websites that use that plugin, the. Then you can infer that those WordPress websites are realtor websites because they're using the IDX plugin. So now you know that all of these people have WordPress websites that are real estate websites that are probably, they probably look really bad and. Or they probably don't convert well and, or they're probably outdated. And so then you could use those people and go find like, what was their website called? Like Grasshopper or Carrot or something. Like there's a half a dozen SaaS platforms out there that will basically make real estate websites that look really, really good. And you don't need to reinvent the wheel. You can still charge $2,000. I know people that use card templates and charge $2,000 and it takes them 30 minutes to set up a site. Right. Like you, you don't have to make this custom. You, you could just piggyback off of some overfunded Silicon Valley real estate website startup.
I love that.
And just. Yeah, exactly. And just say, hey, and you don't even need to have a customer first. You could just point to other real estate websites that are using that same platform and say, hey, Stacy, I see you're on WordPress. Good for you for having a website because it's surprising how many Realtors don't. So you're going to kind of compliment them. But like, did you know that a website that has X, Y and Z features results in 36% more leads to real estate agents? And it doesn't cost any more than WordPress, so it's like they want to know immediately how can a better website actually lead to more money in their pocket? Right. Because you don't want to sell them. Oh, your website's ugly. I'll make it look better. This will lead to more money in your pocket and you pointing to other websites that are using that same platform. The implication is that these are case studies, these are your old customers. But no, you're just showing them examples. Right.
I love that.
Yeah, you can pull stats off of the platform's website, like the 36% or whatever it is, because I'm sure they have those stats and just piggyback on those stats. You can build your own website with that platform even though you're not a realtor. And then you can go after people that are already sold on having a website. They know it's important. A website is one of those things where it's been outdated forever. You know it's outdated and you know you need to fix it. You know you should fix it, but you're not going to until you get a cold email. You know, like something has to be the impetus for you to do that. And so you could be that cold email. You can still charge what you want. It doesn't have to be custom. You can, you can copy and paste all these websites literally like you do on call on card and then swap out the city and the name. Sweet.
Okay. I love this. This is a fantastic. I feel like this is the kind of that last key in place to really make this work. I love this.
Good. Yeah, I think, I think this will work. And honestly, you can, you can text them as well. There's the good and bad about selling to realtors. I've done it. My wife is one. The good is that you can get their info super easily. The bad is that because of that everyone is pitching to them non stop. But there is more good than bad because of all the people you're going to cold call, they are the most likely to answer their phone because it could be a listing. So that's what I would do.
Okay, thank you. I feel like I've got some good direction here.
Absolutely. Good luck.
