We all know the promotion is important, although one does not want to come across as salesy or pushy.
The same is true of our blogs. We want folks to know about them and the valuable content they offer, but shoving them down someone's throat is not likely to be accepted kindly.
As I learned yesterday at REBarCampOC (although I sorta knew this), publishing your post is about 30% of the work. (that's a quote from notable RE.net dude, Jim Marks, founder and President of Virtual Results ). The rest comes afterwards. That is, promoting your blog so consumers can take advantage of it if they like.
Certainly a big part of getting noticed, and as was said yesterday - if you aren't in Google you don't exist - is the work you do around SEO (search engine optimization). This post is not about that, but do a search on AR for SEO or check out the SEO Channel for a wealth of articles to help you, whether you know anything about SEO or not.
Getting the word out there isn't magic...
So here are a few thoughts on how you can promote you blog. And please feel free to share your ideas - we can also benefits from the collective brain trust here on AR.
1. BUSINESS CARD - Use that blank space on the back to list your blogs
2. EMAIL SIGNATURES - whether you have one or multiple ones, for specialized groups of clients, include links to your blog(s). Make sure these are easily found (and that the links work)
3. EMAIL COMMUNICATION - I list this separately because there may be times, when directly communicating with a particular buyer or seller, that you want to refer them to your blog, or specific articles, because of the information they are seeking.
4. WEBSITE - either include links at appropriate places on pages in your website and/or put a widget on the homepage like I have.
5. BUY URLs for your AR blog and any outside blogs and use those as above
6. POSTCARDS, NEWSLETTERS and OTHER MAILINGS - include your blogs where appropriate and relevant.
And here are some more...
7. CRAIGLIST postings for listings - great to include here, PLUS the link to your single website or blog is you use one (I use Wordpress to create a blog for each listing)
8. SOCIAL MEDIA WEBSITES - they all allow you to include one or more links, so take advantage of this where appropriate
9. MARKETING MATERIALS - including your pre-listing, relocation, seller and buyer packets
10. WORD OF MOUTH - talking about your blog in a conversation with prospects or clients makes sense, once you have some sort of relationship and it can add value to the discussion for them
11. HANDOUTS for open houses
12. ADVERTISING - may not be suitable depending on the ad and the medium but worth keeping in mind.
13. DIRECTORIES - there are a ton of on-line directories for registering your blogs, most are free I believe. Here is the weblogs compendium of directories; here's the Search Engine Journal list of web directories; and here's an offering for your real estate marketing toolkit: 45 blog directories from Rebecca Levinson on ActiveRain. The list goes on an on, with some repetition.
Just a few thoughts to get you started or to expand your promotions. Feel free to share your own ideas so we can all benefit.
UPDATE - and one more I use but forgot - I have several t-shirts with my blogs (1 per shirt) that I wear to the gym, and occasionally the beach. Ya never know.
;)
;)
Jeff is right of course ... but I'm still learning how to blog. I need to become a good writer first, before I start pointing people in the direction of my blog.
I'm also not very good at patting myself on the back, which some of these things tend to be, but I do believe that if you can do it, you absolutely should. If you don't think you're great, who will? :)