The Real Estate Tomato

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On nearly every call with a real estate blogger looking for advice, I end up having them consider both of the following. Everything else is at best tertiary to these concerns and can probably be satisfied by simply keeping these primary items in mind. 1. Why Are Your Visitors On Your Website? What brought them there, and what are they expecting? Did they do a search on Google and find an article that you wrote? Did they click from a link in your email signature? Was it a Tweet? a Facebook status update? a YouTube video? Did you tell them to go there? Did someone or something else? You need to consider the reason and the context of every actual and potential visit. This understanding will help you determine the 2 most important things about your online marketing strategy. a. Am I reaching my Target Audience? b. Are my visitors...

A year and a half ago I wrote a blog article called the Starbucks Mistake. The article was based on a Talk that I used to give regularly during the e-marketing seminars which I organized before I got into blogging. My blogging style, voice, format and content have noticeably developed since The Starbucks Mistake. I thought it would be fun to make-over the original article to illustrate the changes my blogging has gone through as well as how effective certain formatting techniques can be. Because of the attention that I am drawing to this ancient article, I can't resist making a few changes to the content... call it "freshening it up a bit". But for the most part, I am looking to leave the original text alone and focus on improving its presentation, organization, and optimization. (Disclaimer – Things may have changed on the Starbucks marketing front since I originally...

Today’s article is the final installment of a series called “Why Real Estate Blogging Makes You A Better Realtor” that has been inspired by conversations I have had with the hundreds of real estate blogging clients we train and ourselves learn from. The idea is that the act of blogging as a Realtor actually has the unintended, yet beneficial consequence of improving your skills as a Realtor in addition to improving the perception of you by your current, past and future clients. Click for Part 1 Click for Part 2 This final installment is focused on how there are certain disciplines required of a successful blog, and how the development of these disciplines will improve your personal skills and the perception of these traits by your audience. Dedication Blogging is a Marathon, not a Sprint. This point becomes all that much more clear the more you look around the real...

Category Organization Will Give Your Real Estate Blog A Long And Successful Life. Throw down 50 cents and pick up your local daily. You are willing to invest in the pile of paper because you have an expectation of the value that it contains. The format for most major city newspapers is predictable: (Any combination of the following) Front Page News World News Local News Sports Business Lifestyle Classified with some Comics, Crossword, Horoscope and Television thrown in. And on weekends, sprinkle in some of the following: Real Estate Travel Cars Tech Food Subscription is earned when readers recognize the value of your format and want to be afforded it regularly. Improve your chances at subscription by having the discipline to develop clear and predictable divisions in your blog. Whatever you choose to maintain as your focus, whether it be Home Buying Advice, Local Events, Market Statistics etc., try to...

...And Why Blogger Bling Is A Waste Of Your Time. I play golf. And that's just it, I play. It is not a business for me, save for the friendly wager I encourage. Yet, for Tiger Woods it's business, it always has been. His goal since he was 3 years old is to be known as the best golfer that ever played the game. As he sets his sights on shattering the (once thought of as unattainable) career watermarks of Jack Nicholas, he, not so quietly, earns mega-millions yearly. His approach has been governed by three elements: Clear Goals, Unwavering Focus, and Hard Work. Without these elements, all the natural talent in the world wouldn't have earned him the title he is bound to earn. So, when Tiger and I go out on a hypothetical golf course and play 18, I know that it is the skills he has honed...

Any blog, not just a real estate blog, has the beautiful distinction that it is comprised of many separate entities represented by each published post. The blog, when organized properly, is the ultimate content management system and SEO tool all wrapped into one. It is truly as if each article that is published is a little website of its own, under the umbrella of the main domain. Each published article has: 1. The Permalink: A unique, keyword laden and link popular URL: The main URL for your site may be http://realestatetomato.typepad.com, but the URL of the article you publish looks more like this: Example: http://realestatetomato.typepad.com/2007/01/29/your_blog_is_an_army.html You notice the main URL with the addition of the date, and the words that make up the article's title - this is commonly referred to in WordPress as the "slug". The Beauty: Each article can be linked to independently of the main site The...