Active Bob has challenged all of us to detail how we use our blog to reach potential prospects or existing clients. When I saw that challenge, my ears perked up, and my typing fingers became nimble, because I have been doing that for some time -- in several different ways. I have discussed this topic with my grandson, Mason, and we have decided to share some of our King of the House marketing tips.

First step: I write AR posts about topics that, I hope, will be of interest to Bellingham and Whatcom county home buyers and realtors. When I write those posts, I insert key words that will be found by search engines.  A significant amount of my business comes from people who google and find my articles. When they see my information, they read it and often decide that I seem to know what I am talking about and that makes the phone ring at King of the House.

If you would like an example of my efforts at SEO, here is an on-the-spot search. If you click on the various hits on this first page of google, you will find that six of those hits take you to my firm in one way or another.

Google search -- Bellingham WA home inspector on Oct 26, 2009

This google soup is free. I have not paid a dime for this, other than I do have a website. This power came from Active Rain and localism. I am prolific at writing and many roads lead back to me. So, when google is trying to find a big fish in the pond, their search guru thinks I must be that guy with gills. That allows me prominence in the google universe in my market. I have had people ask if I know how strong I am in google. Duhhhhhhh, that is not by accident. Step one helps me attract customers who never heard of me before.

Second step: I write blog posts that I know will simplify report writing. I realized, years back, that clients are impressed when their inspector sends them to a link and, low and behold, the inspector wrote the article himself. Suddenly that inspector is not just an inspector but a published author, an authority in the field. So, in this case, step two, I am reaching, and enhancing credibility with,  present clients. Below is an example of this method from a recent report. The link at the bottom will take you to a blog I wrote for just this inspection problem.

32) The water heater is installed over finished living space and it has a pan but no drain installed. While the probability of this becoming an issue increases proportionally with the age of a water heater, should the tank develop a leak, a pan and drain route water outdoors so it is less likely that interior areas will be damaged. In your situation, the tank being in a condo, it is improbable that a drain to the outside could be installed. For additional information on other viable options, for your situation, please visit:

http://activerain.com/blogsview/1225399/when-second-best-is-as-good-as-it-gets

Third step: One of my roles, as adjunct faculty at Bellingham Technical College, is to alert people to the existence of the BTC state approved home inspection training program. I use Active Rain to do this. I write stories about the curriculum, the courses, etc. In fact, as part of Bob's last challenge, I did a series on BTC. It covered details about our course, facts about other courses offered at the college, the history of the college and even included a map of the campus. The link to the map I send out a lot. When we have speakers coming in to visit, or students driving in from out of town, I will send the link.  Nobody gets lost when they receive the map first. You can click on the BTC logo below to see the series post that includes the map of the campus.

If you wonder how effective that dissemination of information is, state-wide, let's do another google search. Active Rain power, which adds juice to my other posts, allows BTC to have six of the hits, page one of google -- Google search, October 26, 2009.

Active Rain gives you the power. You have to figure out how to use it but once you understand blogging and know how to label your posts, you can have real clout in your market. If I write a blog post, google will find it, and it will be first page google, usually within 20 minutes of the time that I write it. I never dreamed that I could achieve the internet presence that I have today, and I never would have gotten there, had I not found, and then dedicated time to, Active Rain.

I hope that this meets Bob's challenge.

Thanks for stopping by,

Steven L. Smith