"Isn't the point of a blog to get the opinions of your peers?" Ummm..it depends actually. If you are writing to that audience then yes it would. If you were writing to an audience that is not your "peers" then no it's not. It's really that simple.

On our flagship editorial blog, Real Estate Radio USA..we welcome comments. On Our consumer oriented blog, The Fort Lauderdale Real Estate Blog, then we do not at all desire the opinion of other agents. We seek to SPECIFICALLY direct our information to the consumer. Not at all interested in having real estate agents comment.

Seems to be working quite well. RERUSA is a PR5 Blog with over 3,000 visitors per day and The Fort Lauderdale Real Estate Blog is a PR4 blog with over 1,800 visitors per day. We use each blog to push the other and we basically own all of the meaningful keywords in the Fort Lauderdale real estate market.

We have over 500 buyer sin our pipeline, the agent is closing deals left and right and not a single comment is allowed.

So your question, while interesting, doesn't neessarily apply. We blog to make money! That's the sole purpose of all of our 18 blogs. I don't need the writing practice. It's a business.

While others are waxing poetic, we're cashing checks..big ones, and have clients from across the globe contacting us on a daily basis.

That's the purpose for our blogs and was the way we drew it up on our business plan.

Karen...we hardly hide..kind of hard since so many know who we are...what do you mean..in this instance it's Brett from the B&B Crew...we NEVER hide...kind of known for actually not having any inclination to hide. No reason to wait....our contact info is in our profile...anyone can get a hold of us.

Karen..sorry to hear about your father...the commenters above who don't understand why comments may be disabled may not understand others business strategies.

When we designed the Fort Lauderdale Real Estate Blog it had one purpose and one purpose only...speak to consumers looking for homes and get them to contact us directly to PROVE that they were real buyers. A demanded call to action if you will..and it works.

People should not be so quick to denounce no comments without having full knowledge of SEO, SERPS, keyword saturation and marketing designed to draw hordes of consumers.

AR is fine for the watercooler talk amongst agents...but the real nectar is in owning the Serps in your local area and having thousands of potential prospects drawn to your site every day.

A lot of effort goes into our sites. Recently our agent has allowed us to evolve from radio into film and video production and the consumer is responding greatly.

We do things most agents would NEVER do. We spend a ton of money on marketing and production becasue it's about relative ROI. If one can't understand the turning off of comments, it's unlikely that they will understand our massive saturation approach to real estate.

We don't need to hear from agents nor would we EVER want a consumer to click off to another agent's website. That's ABSURD!! That would be like going into Macy's and Seeing an add from nordstroms..yet real estate agents do it all the time...THAT is what makes absolutely no sense.

When we write to the consumer. the last thing we want is some agent throwing in their two cents and distracting our message.

Turning comments off allows undiluted messaging. I could go on and on but suffice it to say if one doesn't know why comments are turned off...the rest of the story won't make any sense whatsoever.

Real Estate Radio was developed as an editorial review of the real estate industry and a focus on actually showing people how to make money in real estate.

Have a great evening..time to turn in now.

Brett.

Karen,

You do realize that every one of the commenters here has no idea about blogging for customers. I understand that blogging here on AR has a certain something all to its own so that you all can interact.

My response was directed at those who actually blog for business. None of the commenters here have any notable traffic or ranking. I checked the website of every commenter here and NONE have any measurable traffic.

So it seems we are talking about apples and oranges. Your discussion sems to be more geared to those here on AR who spend time hanging out on the watercooler. We blog specifically for business and profit. To do that you have to do things a certain way...which means you MUST know how to generate substantial, qualified traffic.

That does not seem to be the purpose nor experience of those commenting here.

Brett

Karen..it's very simple..but may require a bit of effort and money.

1. Get off of AR for customers. Use AR for interacting with agents but AR almost NEVER will get traction in the serps...yes in some markets it may..but for the one you're in it's not going to happen. Let me qualify that...it will never happen for those keywords that people are actually searching for.

2. You need to know what people are actually searching for. I know how many people are searching for specific terms BEFORE we write an article.

3. The consumer LOVES video. It conveys much more of a message.

4. Tell them what to look for and become the go to person in your market. Most agents don't have ANY meaningful presence online so it's actually pretty easy.

I notice you work the Coral Springs area...yet if anyone looks in Coral Springs online for homes...do you show up anywhere? If it ain't on the first page then the answer is no! Almost 70,000 people per month search for Coral Springs Homes online and NONE of them see you. I could write a post today and be in the top 10 in a week and be seeing traffic to my blog.

What have you written..maybe a couple hundred posts here on AR...and NONE of them show up prominently in the Serps...it's just not profitable to be writing here.

We started here, as many do...then you realize it's about results...people bandy about the term Google Juice over here so much it's a joke on the outside.

Of course you can show up in the Top 10 For some obscure term..who cares? I made a point of that a while back..a guy here on AR said he made the top 10 on google for a term named "dyersburg tn real estate"...NOBODY searches that...so we wrote a post showing him how easy it is to rank for that term and within a few days we were number 3 and stayed there for weeks. I think it's number 10 or 11 now..only because we had no desire to support the post with any linking campaign and it's still number 10 or 11.

5. Don't listen to anyone who can't walk the walk. Like I said...I went through EVERY commenters website here and why would you listen to thoise who aren't doing it right themselves? Seems pretty absurd doesn't it? Our blogs are right there for anyone to see...

I hear all the time..too much this and too much that...but I hear that from agents. The consumers love us!

Look at our consumer blog for Fort Lauderdale, look at Jay Thompson's blog in Phoenix, look at blogs that actually have traffic and sell real estate like Ines' blog ...I know for a fact that both Jay and Ines LOVe to help other agents and are always willing to help. (by the way..they both actually DO allow comments. I suspect it's becasue they have a big social network of realtors who helped them initially build traffic and a lot of agents look up top them..rightfully so...it has worked for them just as our strategy has worked for us)

By the way each of these agents have been so successful that they now compete with the big named franchise brokerages in their area despite opting for boutique brokerages.

Small is the new big!

The problem is you actually have to do what the successful bloggers tell you...or you can exist with horrible rankings and no traffic. You can't have it both ways. We have a style, Jay Thompson has a style and Ines has a style.

I see your style here as well and I actually think it's wasted on AR. No one will find your voice here. I just searched Coral Springs Real Estate and Coral Springs Homes and you don't show up anywhere.

While it might be nice to get the pat on the back and good post comments here...they don't butter the biscuit whatsoever.

I could go on and on but our Real Estate Radio USA blog is all about telling agents how to improve their business. And there are scores of very good blogs that show agents what to do...it's just that the majority of people here think they are blogging when in fact you are mainly talking to other agents who I don't think are going to be your buyers or sellers.

Karen...FYI...another bit of "advice" above from an agent with no ranking or traffic...are you seeing my point?

Karen Anne..it seems you are writing in response to my comments herein. I merely stat what is fact. We don't allow comments...we do however enable the CONSUMER to contact us..which they most assuredly do. We are not interested in commentary from real estate agents as it provides absolutely no value to our visitors.

Just because we don't allow comments does not mean that we don't have EXTENSIVE communication with our clients. It's really easy to see. Our rankings, ratings, saturation in the Serps..all bears this out with great veracity. Just because you don't agree..it doesn't make it untrue.

I really could care less how YOU choose to do business. It is of absolutely no consequence to me. I don't seek to earn favor from those here on AR. Why would i? Are you my buyer? Of course not.

In that regard, you keep doing what you're doing...and you'll keep getting what you're getting. The "God" like attitude of what you speak of is you not understanding simple fact and ignorance of data. But what more can one expect from someone who has no presence online and a website no one would find unless they tripped over it.

Yeah right...gotta call BS on that one! But if it makes you feel better than sobe it. Besides you got your 25 points! Cool!

sure

Karen...really weird...I had someone call you today and you said you never asked for a call...umm...huh?

If you have any questions..just go ahead and email me at bwilson at realestateradiousa.com