Hi All,
Well, I have finally arrived at the fourth and final post in my Project Blogger Round-Up Series, and it is going to be a long one. Part One can be found here. Part Two can be found here. And, Part Three can be found here.
In part three, I talked about what went on from about the second week in the contest to the end of May. This was an extremely busy and at times extremely baffling time. I was trying to listen to the suggestions from the various judges and to implement those that made sense for me. The only thing that was truly consistent among all the judges where my work was concerned, was the fact that they liked the look of my site, that it was easy to navigate, and that I was a good writer. Fortunately, based upon what I have learned in my journey through the land of blog, these facts should stand me in good stead now and in the future.
As I began the month of June I was starting to feel a little less overwhelmed and a little more in control. This was certainly a welcome change. I was also starting to feel that this was not such a fools errand and that I was not totally insane for thinking that this was something that I could and should try to do. Having received several genuine, bona-fide clients in May certainly helped my moral and my confidence. It has been gratifying to be able to look at the results of all of my efforts and see that my faith was not misplaced, my energy has not been wasted and that blogging really works for me.
June also brought several more learning opportunities and revelations. I learned, quite by accident how to see if you have subscribers here on Active Rain. You can not find out the actual number of people who have chosen to subscribe to your blog, but you can find out Where You Rank Within Your State, who the Most Subscribed To For The Week are, who the Most Subscribed To For The Month are, and ultimately who are the Top 100 Most Subscibed To In Total On Active Rain.
To find this information click the "Blogs" tab on the top of the page, then on the right hand side you will see the links for the Most Subscribed For The Month and for the Most Subscribed For The Week. If you scroll down to the bottom of the Most Subscribed For The Month list you will see a link entitled More Bloggers. That link will show you the top 100 most subscribed bloggers overall on Active Rain. Clicking the "All" link at the top of the list of top bloggers by state will get you there as well.
I was quite surprised when I first discovered the list to see that I was in the top 100. At the time I found it, I was 98th on the list and have been very, very pleased to see that I have continued to rise in the ranks, and as of this writing, I am currently sitting at 59th overall and 9th in California. When you consider that there are 38,305 members of AR (as of right this moment) and that there are 5816 members in California alone that is something to be justifiably proud off and also something that I am extremely grateful for.
I actually value my subscription numbers and read rates more than I do any other point total, because they represent you, my readers and you are all far more valuable to me as people and friends than any points, however they are earned, ever could be. My subscription rate shows me and anyone else who views it, in a very real and concrete way that what I write is consistently being read and hopefully enjoyed by a whole bunch of people. That is a real Peoples Choice Vote and, if you ask me, that shows the AR audience's preference better than anything else could.
Ines and Julie are both on the top 100 list as well. Ines is currently sitting at 22 and Julie is at 57. At the moment, we are, and consistently have been the only three apprentices that are even on the top 100 list and I congratulate them both for their achievement as well.
June was also the month that saw the 1st Anniversary for Active Rain and the official California Gathering held in Long Beach on June 9th. This was a truly amazing experience. For the first time I came face to face with some of the people who I have been reading here and who have been reading me. I greeted so many wonderful people that night, I don't say met, because most were already friends as we had been communicating with each other for heading on three months by that point.
Seeing my dear friends Kelly Kilpatrick, Laurie Manny, and Kaye Thomas again was, as always a joy. Meeting Jeff Turner and his lovely wife Rocky a pleasure, seeing TLW thre was a surprise (as I thought she was taller :-) and finally meeting Mary Pope Handy who is just as sweet, kind, warm and gentle in person as she is in print was truly a moment to be treasured.
On Route66Living.com I was seeing more and more local traffic find the site on a regular basis. I was hearing from more community members when I was out and about that they had seen my site and that they liked it. I also did a couple of pieces that were intended to help promote some local businesses that I had discovered and that I personally liked.
I won't write about a business if I don't personally use, like and recommend them. I have chosen to focus on what's right with my community and to leave more editorial pieces to those that do them better. So if I talk about something or someone on Route66Living.com it is because I believe in them and am willing to stand behind my beliefs.
I opened the month with the publication of the partner piece to "How NOT To Buy A Home In A Buyer's Market" entitled "How NOT To Sell A Home In A Buyer's Market". This article met with similar acclaim and has been republished, with my permission, linked to and reprinted for hard copy distribution as well. I really enjoy writing pieces like these as they are not only informative but also fun for me to construct and fun for folks to read.
Over on AR I addressed "fluff blogging" and how I use it with this article entitled "Fluffy Writing - Why I Like It And Why It's Good". I actually pride myself on being able to write pieces that on the surface may seem very much like what could be deemed by some as fluff but in reality rarely are. The way I see it, if what you have to say is presented in a dry or boring manner, then it really won't matter how important the topic is, or how well you might cover it as it simply won't get read. I truly believe the point and goal of blogging for business is to build a relationship by being read by others consistently.
One of the most important Pearls of Wisdom that I gathered from both Dustin Luther's seminar and also from Paul Chaney's book Realty Blogging was that the true value of blogging lies within its very nature as a source for hyper-local content. This extremely tight focus may draw fewer "hits" but they will be of more value and better quality than those that are more general in nature. Writing about something that affects all of California in a general way is of value, but not of as much value as writing about something that affects only Claremont, or may only affect a portion of Claremont. So, even though I may find an article that I think is interesting, if the reach is too broad, or the topic too general and if I can not tie it back to Claremont I tend to bypass the article.
I do cover day trips that I have taken throughout Southern California on Route66Living.com and have written about communities that are a "fur piece from these here parts" but my reasoning behind that is to show how centrally located my community is and how with a couple hours drive in any direction you can find yourself a whole world away.
As the month progressed there were more and more opportunities being presented to me that were directly attributable to my blogging activity. I was asked by my local board to write an article for our monthly newspaper on blogging. "To Blog Or Not To Blog... Do You Understand The Question"was the result. I was asked to join the Tech Committee at the board as well. I was also asked to prepare a class to be given at my office for those interested in blogging.
The class will be held on July 25 from 11:30 AM to 1 PM at my office in La Verne, California, and is open to anyone who would like to attend. There is of course no cost and lunch will be served. You don't have to be a Keller Williams agent or even a Real Estate agent at all to come. If anyone would like to attend the class, the only thing that I would need is to be contacted as soon a possible so that I can reserve a seat. We have a limited amount of space available so feel free to drop me a line if you are interested.
When I was not working on my own blogs, I was spending a considerable amount of time helping other folks on an individual basis learn how to use Active Rain.
I also did a little tilting at windmills. And, in doing so, I shared a little more about who I am, how I live my life and, by extension, how I do business as well. I also wrote my 99th and 101st posts respectively.
Another modification that arrived at Route66Living.comwas the addition of a Community Event's Calender. I asked for a calender that would show people in a quick at-a-glance format, what was going on in Claremont and when. Drew, as always responded almost immediately with the addition of yet another wonderful and free Wordpress plugin.
The calender pluginallows you to add information to any date and then it highlights the date to show that there is something special going on then. You can have multiple events slated for a single day or even overlapping in time and you are not limited (as far as I have seen) by the length of your post for each event. One thing to be aware of is that if you designate a post as a Community Event, regardless of where else you may want put it, Community Event designation will reign supreme and the post will only show up there. So, you may want to post it separately if you want the info to appear as a regular post and not just as a calender notation.
While all this was going on for the first time I discovered that really I needed to really defend myself from a personal attack. Kevin Tomlinson was the perpetrator, my response was "Confession Is Good For The Soul" Or Thank You Kevin, It's Time I Came Clean", and it was all done in fun.
June rolled into July and I hit a bit of a wall. After crafting over 100 posts here and 50 or so different ones on Route66Living.com in barely three months I was a bit tired. One of the other decisions that I made early on in this endeavor was that I would not double post. So what was crafted for Active Rain remains on Active Rain and what is built for Route66Living.com tends to stay only there as well.
I did try my hand at doing a couple of "read it here to lead you there" posts but I just really didn't feel good about that. I have no problem with asking folks to go visit my site as in... "Hey folks, please go visit my site Route66Living.com". And I have no problem plugging the fact that there is good stuff to be found there as in... "Hey folks, please go visit my site Route66Living.com, there's good stuff to be found there". But I tend to agree with ARDELL that to overuse the "start it here but you have to go there to finish it" approach just feels a little link-baity to me.
And I know that personally, when I discover that someone routinely does this type of thing I tend to avoid reading their blog at all. If they happen to have written a title that grabs me I will usually just go straight to their site to see the story. But I also tend to have the attention span of a gnat on crack, so if I know ,that going in to the story, I will have to play link-hopscotch I probably won't do it. I don't like feeling like I am being played and that is what tends to happen to me when I feel like I fell for the same trick once again. I don't like the feeling and I don't think most people do so I try to avoid giving it to them.
July hit the ground not just running but actually flying by. One minute I glanced at the calender and saw that it was weeks away and now I sit in my living room trying to absorb the fact that it is half over. July brought with it many things... The final official coaching session with Drew Meyers where heturned the reins entirely over to me and me alone. The very last tweak on the sidebar for Route66Living.com which created the ability to search Realtor.com or Zillow for listings, a mini vacation for My Mel and me and finally the conclusion of the Project Blogger contest.
It is indeed difficult to summarize something that is still an ongoing concern. But, I shall give it a try... With regard to my own performance during the competition, I must say that overall I am very pleased. There is nothing that I would change and nothing that I feel I would want to retract. I am very pleased with the growth of Route66Living.com and also with my Active Rain blog's growth as well.
As for the future, I promised that I would share my plans and goals so here they are:
I plan to continue building Route66Living.com into THE premiere site for information for my community and to work toward consistent and prominent search engine placement.
I plan to begin having guest writers from time to time who will be able to offer diversity of thought and an additional base of knowledge to draw from. I have a couple of different lenders and a Real Estate Lawyer who are queuing up even as we speak.
I will also be taking the advice of some of the judges and writing more like I do here on AR on my personal site. I actually interpret that to mean be funnier over there. The very nature of competition means that while you definitely bring your "A" game to all that you do, it is inevitable that, especially in something of this nature, you need to tailor it to your reader and in this case that would be a judge. And with judges changing weekly, and with no two looking at or for the same things, sometimes a more conservative approach seems best.
The greatest difficulty that I encountered throughout this process was not being able to draw a bead on what to focus on. I shan't beat the dead horse, but it truly is difficult and quite disheartening to be told that "content is king" and that you should "just write" and then to see yourself get punished for writing well.
I have not been alone here and this has been a tremendous learning experience for us all. I actually think that my greatest lessons are truly the ones that were unintentionally taught. The inconsistency of the judging criteria taught me:
Follow your passion, do what feels right for you.
Listen to your heart and make sure that what ever you put down here spent some time there before it sees the light of day.
Choose one voice to listen to as many will vie for your attention but not all things are right for all people.
And finally, trying to please too many masters will leave you pleasing none at all.
Long ago, or so it seems, I found a place called Active Rain... I hesitantly opened the door and peered inside. Instead of a blank stare or a stern rebuff I was greeted with open arms and given the chance of a lifetime.
On my very first hour here, before I had ever heard of Project Blogger, I wrote these words at the conclusion of my first ever blog:
"As I thought back to the people I saw around the room I wondered how many of them would see the opportunity that lay before us for what it is, a chance to be part of the settling of a virtual frontier town. Sure, some folks will test the waters, and some will wade in to their knees before abandoning the pursuit for the safety of the shore. But there were a few out there who would catch the vision and see it for what it is, or for what it can be. A chance to help forge an alliance with others in our profession, to share our passion about this business, and about the privilege of being allowed to be an instrumental part of one of the most important acts in persons financial life. I hope to count myself among them, diving in head-first just to see if I can swim."
Now after 15 weeks in Active Rain and 14 weeks in Project Blogger, I think it is safe to say that swim I can and swim I have.
Thank you all for every kind word, every thoughtful gesture and all of your support. I was truly blessed on that day in March when I arrived here and there has not been a moment since that time when I have ever forgotten it.
Take care all, help lots of people and have a wonderful day!
Tisza
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