Introduction to Real Estate Blogging

With this article, I am launching a new series of informational posts about blogging for real estate professionals, which you will find here on Real Estate and How.I'm seeing several other businesses promoting their blogging services, or their advice, for sale regarding real estate blogging. I wanted to provide you with the same information for free.I've been blogging professionally since 2004, and have published websites going back to 1997. I've been engaged in affiliate marketing since 1999, and have been doing this as my full time career since 2003. So, I think I know something about it.Why Blog?The biggest reason is to build trust with your website visitors. An article written by you, in a first-person perspective, is a great way to break the ice and make your prospective clients feel comfortable.Search engine referrals are also a big reason. Google, Yahoo, and MSN, the top three search engines, seem to spider blog content immediately, often within minutes of it being published. There are also theories that Google gives higher page rank value to blog posts. I'm not sure if this is totally true, or if it has more to do with blog posts being indexed immediately. Either way, there's nothing like a blog to elevate search engine positioning of a website.Syndication of content is another big reason. How would you like to have other websites republishing your content, complete with links back to your website? Better yet, how would you like it to be automated as soon as you post an article? That's what an RSS feed does, and all blogs support RSS feeds.And speaking of automation, that's also what a blog does for you. Once a blog is set up on your website, you don't have to do much else other than write your article and click the "Publish" button. That's it. Perfect for Realtors, right?Will A Blog Cost You More Money?Technically, no. You can launch a blog for free. John Mudd, probably the most successful real estate blogger to date, runs a blog which he pays zero for. (Update, John Mudd has since passed away)However, there are other options that do cost money. Moreover, you may want to contact the person that built or maintains your website to find out about integrating a blog, or linking your website to your blog, or syndicating content from your blog into your website. We'll get to that in the future.Real Estate Blogging 101Real Estate Blogging 101 is my series of articles designed to help you understand what blogging means to your Internet marketing strategy, and how to actually get it done.Visit the Real Estate Blogging archive page to find an index of all articles in this series.Check back to this website regularly for more.

Why Start a Real Estate Blog?

In my Introduction to Real Estate Blogging, I included a section entitled, "Why Blog". I want to expand on that, to give you a further understanding on why you start a real estate blog.Why Start a Real Estate Blog?The main reason is to increase your exposure. The better blogger you become, the more people will take notice of you.But instead of getting more people to notice you, how about getting more people to notice your real estate website? How about getting more people to notice your properties? It can be done.One thing that blogs tend to do better than standard websites is that they attract links, mainly other blogs. Getting links from other sites and blogs is the primary means of improving your position on Google, Yahoo, and all the other search engines.As your blog attracts incoming links and Google page rank, you'll want to distribute that value to your existing website, where you promote yourself and your properties.Why do blogs attract links?It's largely because the general public views blogs as personal, like an informal expression of one's thoughts, a diary if you will. Other bloggers and website users like to comment about someone else's thoughts by linking to that person's blog post, and then rambling on.Consider that there are millions of other blogs out there, many of them personal in nature. These bloggers love to write, and are always looking for something to inspire them. They often use blog search engines like Technorati to help them find interesting blog posts. When they find an interesting blog post, they write their own blog post in response to it, and provide a reference link.Think about your existing real estate website. Are there any pages on this website that other bloggers might something inspiring to write about? Probably not. I imagine your website is strictly business. But what if you added a blog that incorporated something more personal, or with some eye-opening insider information? Now you're giving other bloggers food for response, and reasons to write about you.Blogs as a selling pointA blog is also a great way to give your potential clients an inside look at who you really are. That is, people can read something about you beyond the typical website brochure you already have. By writing a blog, you're providing your clients with an informal resume of yourself.To make this effective, you'll have to put the blog on the homepage of your website. I'd recommend you do this for all the reasons we explained above. In fact, this is what I recommend in order to get the maximum benefit of blogging, put it right on the homepage of your main real estate website. I'll go into this further later on.Listing your properties through bloggingYou could actually publish the details of a property through a blog. You'd have to update this blog post whenever the details change, such as a reprice, or if it gets taken off the market. But, by doing this your properties will get indexed into Google, as well as all the blog search engines too.In fact, you could launch a dedicated blog just for your properties, and another one for your writings. You can have them linked together, or better yet, have them both hosted on your real estate website. A great way to draw more traffic to your site.

Menifee Real Estate Blog

One of the problems that real estate professionals face with launching a blog is that they can't attract loyal readers, that is, they only attract visitors in the market for buying or selling a property.The reason why that's an issue is because a real estate professional can't develop a relationship with their audience. Their audience doesn't know them; the audience has only seen their website for the first time, and doesn't visit again.Pat Kitano, who writes the real estate blog, "Transparent RE", describes the same problem in an article here...http://transparentre.com/....hyperlocal-content.aspxSo, I've tried to solve that problem by introducing a "1-2" punch, with the launch of my new real estate blog "Menifee Homes"...http://homes.menifee247.comWhat makes it different than most, is that it's a sister blog to my Menifee news blog, "Menifee 24/7".Menifee 24/7 publishes news and announcements of what's going on my in local community of Menifee, CA. It has attracted a steadily growing audience of local residents. These residents are also very much interested in the real estate market because many of them are home owners in a market that saw a crazy rise in appreciation, and is now seeing a crazy rise foreclosures.By introducing a sister real estate blog, "Menifee Homes", I can use the same audience to build a real estate audience.I recruited a few local real estate agents and brokers to write the content for me. I've given their names, photos, and contact info prominent placement on the blog, and allowed them sign each article they post with their name, contact, and website link.The bottom line is that these real estate agents and brokers are writing to a loyal audience that revisits the blog reguarly to read new content, and are able to establish their own "brand" within the community. I'm able to get a benefit from this because it not only attracts new readers to my Menifee 24/7 blog, but I can also monetize it with AdSense.

Hosting a Real Estate Blog

What's the best way to host a real estate blog?In short...
Register your own domain name (www.mydomainname.com)
Find webspace on a host other than the host your agent site is hosted on
Use a well known blogging platform (Blogger, WordPress, TypePad)One of the biggest reasons for creating a real estate blog, is to help build PageRank to your agent website. Think of it as a tool to create some backlinks to your agent site, in addition to driving some referrals.When Google evaluates all the websites that link to your agent site, it doesn't count every inbound link. Inbound links from sites that are spammish, or where links appeared to have been sold, or sites that have no editorial oversight, are ignored and don't transfer any PageRank to your site.But Google seems to like blogs, particularly those with lots of content, and content that isn't duplicated on other sites. So by creating your own blog, on its own domain name, and on a server other than the one your agent site is hosted on, it's an easy way to get one or more backlinks counted towards your PageRank.The reason why you want to host the blog on its own domain name is because these blogs carry more PageRank value, as opposed to blogs hosted on Blogger's, WordPress', or TypePad's subdomain.The reason why you want to host the blog on a server other than the server your agent site is hosted on, is because this mimics a real life scenario where someone else is linking to you. There's concensus that when two websites are hosted on the same IP address, Google can tell that these two sites are owned by the same owner.Lastly, the reason why you want to use a well-known blogging platform is because Google seems to know these platforms better. I'm convinced that Google prefers blogs from Blogger, because of the fact that Google owns Blogger. But, I know there are many people who will argue that Google plays no favorites.If you don't know how to set up a blog in this fashion, any website design company can do it for you. The company that set up your agent site can do it for you.And you don't need to stop at just one blog. You can set up a blog for real estate matters in your hometown. Another blog for real estate in general. Another blog for just what's going on in your community. Another blog for your personal stuff. Another blog for your hobbies....On each blog, link to your agent site. You don't need to link from your agent site to your blog(s) however. Through an RSS feed, and by pinging Google's BlogSearch, Google will automatically find your blog.When you link to your agent site from a blog, do it from within an article. You can also do it from a "Blogroll" on a side bar, but linking from within an article is seen by Google as having greater value.

Blogger or WordPress - Which?

A big debate on blogging is often on which platform to use, Blogger or WordPress.I've built up a successful business using Blogger blogs, one of which is the blog you're reading now. They're really easy to set up, free to use, and they seem to get indexed faster into Google.Let me clarify that again, they get indexed faster, I didn't say they get a PageRank boost.Google owns Blogger. There has been much discussion in SEO circles on whether or not Google gives Blogger blogs any extra weight in PageRank. I don't believe so. But does Google give Blogger blogs any other kind of advantage?I think they do, in the form of speedier indexing.Blogger is tied into Google Blog SearchGoogle has its own dedicated blog search engine, "Google Blog Search", and Blogger has a pipeline into it.Blogger provides its publishers with a control setting called, "Let search engines find your blog"... This setting allows you to get your blog indexed by Google Blog Search. By default, it's set to "Yes".This tells me that a Blogger blog and its articles will automatically get into Google Blog Search, instanteously, within seconds. And once in Google Blog Search, it's sure to get into Google Web Search.But the truth is that WordPress blogs can get into Google Blog Search too. It's just that it's not joined at the hip to it. Instead, WordPress blogs have to ping Google Blog Search to get in there.So the question is, how fast is Google's ping service? I don't have the answers to that. But I have done my own tests to get some circustantial evidence.One such peculiarity I often find is that certain extremely popular blogs, such as Gizmodo for example, will have their articles syndicated on other blogs, in full. Many times, Google Blog Search will index the articles on those other blogs, before it indexes the same articles on Gizmodo. Assuming that Gizmodo is pinging Google Blog Search, how is it that its content doesn't show up there before the syndicated content?Bottom LineWhat all this means is that when people run searches on Google Blog Search, they're more likely to find Blogger content before they find WordPress content.And while this does provide Blogger blogs with a small advantage, it's not a significant advantage by any means. The fact is that many WordPress blogs have become very popular blogs. But so have Blogger blogs.I'd wish that more SEO consultants would start a discussion on the connection between Google Web Search and Google Blog Search, to see how the two influence each other.

Writing Good Blog Titles

How do you know what title to use when writing a new blog article?As a rule, you combine two elements:
What keyword/phrase variation do people search for, and
What phrase will lure people into clickingIt's not enough to just pack your keywords into the blog title, and hope that it shows up at #1 on Google's listings. You have to write the title in such a way as to make people want to click on it. To do that, figure out what will make the title SO compelling, that it convinces people to think that your page is the best page.Writing Compelling TitlesA compelling title is a combination of two things;
Providing the right phrase that Google searchers will connect with, and
Not saying too much, so as to create a hint of mystery.In other words, you want your blog article title to sound like it will answer the questions that searchers have in mind, yet be vague enough to make them want to click. Maintaining some ambiguity in the title makes searchers ask themselves, "Hmmm, I think this has what I want, let me check to see if it does".A title that "connects" with Google searchers is one that acknowledges their question. For example, if you searched Google for, "how to write a good blog title", and among the results you saw one that read, "Writing Good Blog Titles", those words immediately acknowledges your question.The "compelling" component is simply keeping the title short enough, so as not to give away too much. That mystery makes people want to investigate.Finding the right keywords and phrasesThis is mostly a matter of using Google's keyword tool, punching in a word or two, and seeing what shows up.When I wrote this article, I entered "blog titles". The results showed me phrases containing those two words, as well related phrases. I simply sorted them by most popular, and then examined the top 10-15 to find patterns.Ideally, you could do everything I outlined above, on every new blog article you write, and maximize your Google referrals.

Real Estate Blogging Ideas

When asking yourself the question, "What should a real estate agent blog about?", here are some ideas...1. Newspaper reactions - Go through the local newspaper (use their online edition), and react to its articles. Write a new blog article telling your readers about a news item you read in the paper, and you can even post a quote from the item, and then provide your response or interpretation.Look for articles that are real estate related, or, find a way a put a real estate spin on an otherwise unrelated article. Do a search for "real estate" on Google News, and look for blogging ideas.2. MLS Updates - Each month gather data from whatever MLS you're linked up with, and publish statistics from the previous month. Show the number of new listings, properties sold, average price, average square foot, price per square foot.3. Strange stuff - Everyone loves to read stories about the strange, odd, and funny. Assuming you're someone who spends some time reading real estate news, and visiting real estate forums, I'm sure you come across funny or weird real estate news. Stuff like this gets people to e-mail your URL to their friends.4. Tips - Tips for sellers and buyers are always good, but the problem with most tips is that they're too short, or not specific enough. Identify one tip, for example the smell of a house when you first walk in, and go in-depth on it, devoting 3-5 paragraphs. 5. Your Properties - It's certainly good to blog each new property you've listed. When blogging a property, use a different title for each one. For example, use the neighborhood as the title, "Wilshire Square Home For Sale". This will create more keyword variation for search engine indexing.6. What's new with you - Write about what you've been doing lately, but try to put a real estate spin on it. You want to keep mentioning "real estate" or "homes" in each blog post to help reinforce your authority as a real estate blog with Google.7. React to other real estate blogs - Maintain a list of real estate blogs and visit them regularly. When you read something that interests you, react to it by writing an article on your blog. Then, include a link to that other blog article. When finished, write to that other blogger, let him/her know that you mentioned them. 50% of the time, they will voluntarily link back, even if you didn't ask for a link.