Pump that Google Juice with AR and RTV

How hard is it to actually rise in rank for virtual tour services within your state, county and/or city.  Not very.  We have been signed up for a not quite a year with Active Rain as a rainmaker but it is only these past couple of months that we are actually starting to make a difference in our rankings within active rain.

What are we doing?

      1.    I read the RTV daily blog mail and look at other successful persons blogs and see the subjects they write about and the comments.  And by the way, if it is of interest to me, I leave a comment - not just "I Agree" or "Great Blog"  I write about 3 sentences confirming my opinion of their blog or of the topic.  This takes me all of 15 minutes in the mornings or sometimes I do it late at night.  If I am very busy, I do several days worth at one time.  I probably read 2-3 blogs for each day's drop.

      2.    I post my tours and slide shows on the blog.  However, I don't do it to look like a listing and don't call it a listing.  I use the tours to emphasize a point.  i.e. Twilight shots and why they are important to on-line viewing, then the tour gets posted.  I then do a post with the slide show and might use hi-def photos as the subject of the post - i.e. why the extra effort creates a more inviting look to the viewer.  To write about 100-200 words about the tour or slide show takes me 15-20 minutes at the most to post both as separate entries.

      3.    If someone i know has an active rain blog and then sends me a link to their blog, (which I get often from friends i have met across the country through RTV, Photobiz and Real Estate meetings, i reblog it under my name - a great feature and provides a boost without a lot of effort.  i also blast my active rain blog posts.

      4.    Every once in a while i will blog about a great service such as THE VIDEO CONNECTOR and Tara Reed.  I talk about how it can help the real estate agents with video content etc or I might blog about Texting services from Text2Look.

      5.    I try to actually blog once or twice a month to create original exciting fun content with plenty of links and key words that will lead google searchers back to my site.

      6.    I also have a wordpress blog and a RTV dealersite blog.  I forward my active rain blog to these sites automatically for content.  I only do original content once in a while on these sites.

So how much time do I actually spend and what is our ranking?

      I spend 1 hour per week with Active Rain total - I have been keeping track in a diary of my time on projects to help discover how to utilize my time better.

      Ranking:   Out of 7000 active rain accounts in Arizona we are #868.

                           Within Arizona in Maricopa County in 5200 accounts we are #671

                           Within Maricopa County in Scottsdale out of 1100 accounts we are #141 We are almost in the 10% of active rain bloggers in Arizona and with very little effort just consistency.

What is the benefit - everything that active rain touches rises to the top ten on the first page of google for us!!!

Hope this helps all my fellow RTV dealers blog a little more here in the RTV blog and on Active Rain.

Suzanne Feinberg
www.PowerVision4Realestate.com
Scottsdale Virtual Tours
Order a virtual tour: 480-284-8177.