Our mission: To Boldly go where no Real Estate Company has gone before... An agent generated hyper local real estate blog.
We will officially launch the EWM Blog tomorrow and Wednesday. After reading Lenn Harley's post and many other similar posts and comments, it would seem that our mission here is likely to fail as most bloggers out there would tell you that the majority of real estate agents will not blog. It wasn't that long ago that I heard "Agents will never use email" and somehow we managed to get past that and some of the other technological challenges. So let me go back a few months and tell you about how we have prepared for the launch.
1. We hired Jim Cronin, Real Estate Tomato and his team to design our blog. We mirrored the Active Rain platform so posts can be public or private. The private blog will become our main communication source for the company- no more group emails or memos. The private blog is embedded in our intranet site making a hybrid site. The public log is similarly embedded in our main website. In both cases, the decision to combine the resources seemed to make sense. Internally, when someone logs into our intranet site to do a contract or submit an ad - the blog feed should serve as a reminder that subtly says "Have you blogged today?". Also, with all of our managers and staff blogging about what's going on a great archive of resources begins to emerge. We have been backloading things like training schedules, videos, how to's etc. On our main business site, it will be hard to tell where the site ends and the blog begins. Featured posts will make it to the front page - this is a big incentive for our big producers who are most anxious to dominate that page because of the traffic it gets. The blog content will also build more viewers because the site will have a continuous feed of fresh content.
2. Hedging the content bet. We have 750 agents plus 100 or so staff - so content should not be an issue. Even a relatively small amount of participation will result in a decent amount of content. I appreciate that blogging purists may see much of what many agents will write is crap - but I would beg to disagree. This is not a high brow site with intellectual ruminations (except mine of course). Local user generated content is more informational and less thought provoking. But just in case, I have made some outside deals with community newspapers, other real estate bloggers and some "authored" content just to make sure the quality level is high.
3. Creating a buzz. This is where the Star Trek stuff comes into play. We will be rolling out the blog over a 5 week period - in a contest format with a Star Trek theme. In each of the 5 weeks, we will discuss and teach 1 topic to build specific content. For example, week 1 is to blog listings. Ines Hegedus-Garcia has graciously agreed to judge the first week of entries. No, Ines does not work for our company, she is technically a competitor, but I don't see it that way. She writes good stuff, sets a standard for any agent ,and blogging should cross company lines. At the end of the day - we are all in this together, aren't we? Ines, and a few other local real estate bloggers will be contributors on our site. I have also been emailing the entire company as a lead in. Everyday some great posts to understand what blogging is all about.
4. Using PR to build the audience. We are fortunate to have a great PR firm who has been lining up interviews and articles about the blog. They will slowly be released over the term of the contest and immediately following to build some readership. We have designed a series of print ads that will run in our traditional media sources to direct readership on things like open houses, market stats, etc.
5. Share the load. I began early with our management team to get them to go in and do posts as they will carry much of the day to day burden of getting the agents to blog. I will spend a considerable amount of my time going from office to office - but everyone on the staff needs to promote the benefits of blogging.
So there you have it - the log to date. Tomorrow I will don my Spock ears and introduce Jim Cronin and his team to launch the blog.
Other thoughts on the company blog... and a cute "theme" youTube video on Star Trek and Real Estate
Beth, was that "Wrap" or "warp" about your listings...fast forward sales!!!
But anyways Bravo!!!! I knew from the day Maggie introduced you, that you would do something big here. This is HUGE!!! I will be watching and learning. I wish you great success with this roll out. Sounds like you are creating the BUZZ... now you have to keep it buzzing!!! I can't wait to see your site.
Bob - thanks for your compliments and good wishes. Maybe we can rap our listings and wrap them inthe web site to sell them at warp speed- what doyouthink?
Sounds like you have a good plan and have put a lot of thought and preparation into it. I will definitely check it out. I look forward to seeing how it does.
Great info and a wonderful cartoon. Communication is what we can do best. Staying in touch with our clients and customers has never been more important, and now it's fun! Texting, crackberry e-mails, I-Ming, talking and now blogging. It's a whole new information highway. I still answer the phone, but e-mailing back and forth is what the public wants. Thanks also for putting scanners in our offices. Nobody wants me to fax anything anymore: e-mailing documents is better, clearer and quicker. Looking forward to Wednesday.
I have a client who is a dentist and he has been blogging for his business for over a year and stated that it has been a great source of information for him, one that you can't put a price to. I hope that we will do the same for the EWM Blog and share a wealth of information. Zoila and I will see you tomorrow!
Beth - all I can say is BRAVO!! (although it's not a word that is in my vocabulary). You know I love your ideas and what you are doing for your company and for your agents is definitely "out of the box thinking". I think what I like the best is your involvement in this whole project. I look forward to judging your first week and thank you for the opportunity - and by not being part of EWM, you know my opinion will not be biased.
Ready - set - launch - EWM is all systems go and ready!! Our commander "Spock-Beth w/ears" is ready to launch! The video was hillarious - where do you find this stuff! I'm catching up, you may be surprised! JoAnn
Beth, please air the ears out so you can wear them again on Wednesday. =) I think everything about this is pure genius...right down to the featured spots for that first page. Can you say su-eeeet? And Ines Judging the first week? That's the icing on the cake! I'm so proud to be affiliated with such a forward-thinking brokerage.
Maggie - and to think I didn't know for blogging a mere 4 months ago. I am so glad you are with us and can be a huge part of this. No favoritism on the part of Ines - I think you may have to be disqualified from the contest - maybe I can throw in a few features for good measure ;)
uh-oh. I was waiting for the sound of the proverbial shoe going thump. Booo hooo. But I understand. Neither you nor I would hear the end of it. And I know Ines is above board always so there's no question as to her integrity. Forget the featureds. I'll earn those on my own. How about 2 iPods for the kids instead? LOL And to think that at this very moment you are in the thick of things with the kick-off. I can't wait!
Mike and Bob - I am so impressed that you guys checked back in. I have been overwhelmed! But it is going very well. I will post tonight. Thanks for asking - you can take a peak at blog.ewm.com. Today's mission is to work on tweaking the site with the Tomato and his team.
Nice...I found your Realestategenome site last night looking for this one.
I would suggest standardizing your tagging process. Looks like you will have listings come up in a multitude of tags (ie Realestate news). Your category list will be longer than the blog if you don't have standards in place. Being this is a new medium for your whole company, I am sure there are other hurdles that you will experience. (I am interested in hearing that too)
But other than that...I am looking forward to hearing nothing but good news about your roll out.
Beth - we've just got to come back and tell you how much we like the video again, and how much we appreciate you taking the time to comment on us.
We just added a few things you might enjoy: Our Bolero Button under mybloglog in the sidebar. It may be the only one of those anywhere. We also did a recap post of two things we did about us that might be fun to look at while listening to Bolero. These are about our child interviewing The Who and my brother and I meeting an NFL quarterback in our living room when we lived in Paris when we were kids.
You've got number one fans too. And it's all very cool.
Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
3. Creating a buzz. This is where the Star Trek stuff comes into play. We will be rolling out the blog over a 5 week period - in a contest format with a Star Trek theme. In each of the 5 weeks, we will discuss and teach 1 topic to build specific content. For example, week 1 is to blog listings. 
;)
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Thanks for making me laugh this Monday morning with the video! :D