Blogging Your Listings

It is hard enough to maintain one blog.   Why would anyone want to try and develop multiple blogs for their listings?  Below are the options and answers for this subject.  Please feel free to expand upon this topic with your comments.

Options

1.  Blogging your listings within your blog
    This is when you write an article in your blog that is about a specific listing.  The blog itself is not geared specifically towards the showcasing listings, but you figure you might as well drop them in there anyhow.  This is the easiest and cheesiest way to promote listings with a blog.  Easy because you don't have to create a separate entity just to post, and cheesy because your audience, although interested in your savvy, is not coming to your site regularly to check out a single, uninteresting listing.

2.  A new blog for each listing
    Each listing is a new blog itself.  Generally, a template is created in WordPress or TypePad (I prefer TypePad for this one) and is published separately of the one's primary blog. It is wise to purchase a separate domain name for each listing (www.123ElmStreet.com for example) and have it pointed to the address of the template blog.  Template blogs have addresses like this: http://yourblogsname.typepad.com/nameoflisting.  The branded address above makes the blog/listing more marketable.

3.  One blog for all your listings
    All listings are published to a blog about all your listings.  Think: SacramentoListingBlog.com.  Create categories for each listing: Price, location, beds, baths, style, status etc.  The blog is the ultimate CMS (Content Management System).  You can add and sort any number of items.  Visitors will recognize the categories and browse accordingly. Fantasic dump for all your 'solds' as well.  Keep in mind that all blog posts will have a Permalink address as well, to which you can direct a domain name (www.123ElmStreet.com) for independent marketing of the listing.  This will appease your sellers.

FAQ's

1.  Will it help in the Search Engines?
    Of course!  When using a blog that is properly set up to ping the search engines, the content that you publish can be treated like 'breaking news.'  This phenomenon will increase your reach in the search engines with every word you type.

2.  Will it impress the seller?
    It should... but I wouldn't bring it up if they have no idea what a blog is.

3.  Will it impress the buyer?
    If that's how they found the listing in the first place, of course.  Otherwise, no.

4.  Is it a lot of work?
    For the non savvy, it could be.  Adding a listing to a blog is no more than a bit of copy/paste and a little word processing/formatting.

5.  Is it worth it?
    If you consider broadened exposure in the search engines, a display of your emarketing savvy and another landing page for lead generation worth it, then yes.

6.  Will it help sell the listings?
    It will not hurt.  But the exposure it can generate for you, your services, your commitment and your consulting is priceless.

7.  What's involved?
    You need to be into blogging.  You need to have a professional blogging account like TypePad or WordPress.  It takes some practice before you start going live.

8.  How long will it take?
    No more than 20 minutes a listing, and increasingly less as you get comfortable.  Done.

9.  Duplicate content?
    If your listing information appears anywhere other than on dynamic result pages (IDX, MLS, Trulia, Realtor.com etc.) such as Craigslist, your company website, your personal website, etc. then you may have some duplicate content issues.   

10.  Copy and paste? 
    Postlets/MLS/Website/Emails: Change around the descriptions a bit and use the same html/content in multiple marketing efforts.

What do I recommend?
    I recommend that you either create a blog for all your listings or, you build an exclusive section on your business blog.  Mixing quality content with listing details is a bad idea.  It will distract and turn off your readers.  Blogging is about cultivating readership to incubate long-term leads.  Listings are take it or leave it content and should not be woven in among your pearls of wisdom.  So, if you must keep everything on one blog, organize the listings to appear seperately from the general articles.

Get Your Blog On!

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Comments

[Teresa Boardman]

I actually have been making mini blogs for my listings. Not all listings, some get a web site of there own. What I like about it is that I can include links to information about the area on the side bar and information about the property in the post. I would not consider grouping all of my listings on one blog. My sellers might not like having their homes marketed with others.

[Kevin Warmath]

Another slice on this idea is to blog all the listings in a specific neighborhood -- that way you become the expert, or at least you are hosting all the "expert opinion." The idea would be to regularly preview all the homes in a neighborhood, blog your impressions and invite others to comment. Talk about buyer feedback. I'm not sure quite yet what the profile of a candidate neighborhood is, but I think this idea has some legs. I'd rather do that than farm the neighborhood.

[Jim Cronin]

Teresa,

I made an addition to the "One blog for all your listings" section. By using the permalink of the listing post, one can set up a domain to point to it directly, and hence market it seperately. Sellers that comprehend the value of blogging the listing in the first place should have no issue with that.

Kevin,

That is an excellent idea: Say for example: www.EagleRanchExpert.com (or something). You can offer the newly listed and the recent solds as well, with commentaries and open comments... nice strategy. The possibilites seem endless.

[Daniel Rothamel]

I recently created my first individual blog for a listing (I used it as my URL for this comment).

I used a branded name. I then market the address on all my published material and in advertisements. It has only be up for two days, but it has had some visitors. I like the idea because I can put as much content on there as I want; and my seller loves it.

[Kevin]

I just started doing this as well. In preparation for a listing presentation for a high end property, I put together a mock-up of a blog, complete with pictures of the property, quotes (fictitious) from the owner, descriptions of past and future marketing events (obviously made up as well), and a few other things. The prospective client was very excited about the idea, especially since a very likely buyer in this area (Silicon Valley) would be a wealthy high-tech web-savvy blog-reading entrepreneur.

[rudolph d. bachraty III]

jim,

wonderful "how to" and "how to not" blog real estate listing tips! glad to see how many real estate agents out there are experimenting with placing their clients listings on listing specific blogs.

-rudy.sellsius°

[Michael Price]

I know this is going to be blatant self promotion, but it is an answer. Our video podcast feeds contain more than videos of listings, we also include the pertinent listing data as well. Once completed, we give our clients a line of code that they can include in a blog or web site that displays a real time feed of the listings. So, in addition to the wide RSS distribution we do on behalf of our clients, we also provide a simple way to "blog listings". If you look at my blog you'll see an example of how the feed works http://www.mlpodcast.com/blog, we rotate our clients through that spot on my blog to show how they can start blogging their listings with little effort at all. There's no reason why someone couldn't set up a seperate blog and then place the code in the blog, it would stay updated automatically, (as long as your a satisfied client of MLPodcast that is)

[Debi Braulik]

I just found this post. I have followed the advice and created a blog for my new listing. I have TypePad pro so I was able to create it in about a minute. The hardest part was finding the button to create a new blog. Now I am going to go upload pictures, etc. It is not in my farm area... North Tacoma... so I wonder how it will be viewed by those in my farm area. But oh well. Nothing ventured. Nothing gained. Thank you for the eye opener!

[Janis Gagliardi/PortOrangeJuice.com]

Glad I came across another how to for blogging listings. I just realized that my listing blogs were crowding out my more personal posts! I'll probably add a Listing category to my right sidebar and perhaps create subcategories for neighborhoods.