How do you stack up online? Find out with these 4 free tools

The majority of real estate agents I meet have no idea if their online efforts are paying off at all.

They are told they need to have a Facebook page, that SEO is important and that they should be sending out a regular email newsletter to stay top-of-mind with clients.

This can all be overwhelming for a busy agent especially because real-time demands such as listings, showings and contracts simply cannot wait until after the perfect email marketing newsletter has been crafted.

Even agents who do enjoy online marketing still find it hard to measure their ROI and validate the time and money they spend online. With so many marketing channels, droves of competition and limited time, it can be hard to determine if what you’re doing online is actually having any impact on your real estate business.

If you are wondering if your efforts are for naught, or how you stack up compared to competition, here are four free tools that you can use to measure your online impact.

Google Analytics

If you don’t have a Google Analytics account, it’s time to get one. Google Analytics will let you know everything there is to know about traffic to your website down to the most granular detail.

Find out who is visiting your site, how they are interacting with your content and where they are coming from. Set up goals, and see how effective your marketing efforts are.

Google Analytics will let you know which marketing channels are delivering the best results.

For example, you can determine how many people have landed on your site from Facebook, and of those people, how many have performed a goal action (such as signed up for your newsletter).

Know which pages on your site get the most traffic, which capital cities your website users come from and if they are browsing your site via mobile, desktop or tablet.

This completely free tool is imperative to understanding the effectiveness of your website and how different traffic sources impact your overall web traffic.

Website Grader

Website Grader is another free tool that ranks your website out of 100 in key areas such as performance, mobile optimization, SEO and security.

All of these on-page factors have a role in SEO and how your website ranks organically online.

Learn if your page size and page speed are in the optimal range, find out if your website is responsive and mobile friendly, see where you stand with SEO and learn if your site adheres to the latest safety and security standards.

Klout

You can measure the impact of your social media efforts with Klout. Set up a free account, connect your social profiles, and Klout will give you a Klout Score out of 100.

Not only will Klout give you a score based on your social media impact, but it will also notify you of your influencer status and expertise level on certain topics.

Google Search Console

Another brilliant free tool from Google, Google Search Console will show you how visible you are in the search results for specific keywords, search analytics for your site and much more.

For the purpose of seeing how you stack up online without getting too techie, go to “Search Traffic” and “Search Analytics.”

Here you can see the search terms that you rank for, the number of impressions and clicks for each search term and your average position in the search results page. Those who love analytics will get lost in the rabbit hole of data available on Google Search Console.

Don’t let another minute of time spent on your online marketing efforts go to waste. Use these tools to fully grasp how you stack up online, identify opportunities for improvement and take your online game to the next level.

Meghan Zuvelek is the owner of Realmm and a Realtor in Squamish, British Columbia. Connect with her on Instagram or LinkedIn.