When agents ask me about Search Engines and getting their websites to show up near the top my first response is twofold:
1) you need to get there, and
2) you need to blog to get there.
In most markets your personal property search website is one of 1000s with pretty much the same information on each template driven website. Differentiation is key to success and but the only way you can seen to be different is to be seen in the first place. That is the first and most crucial step that many agents who pour $1000s into marketing their website traditionally find elusive or very expensive. A blog can help you get seen by going after search engine users head on and then differentiate yourself once they get there.
Back to Basics: 5 Blogging tips for beginners:
1) Keep it simple with quality content
2) Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should
3) Too many gratuitous outbound links… bad
4) Update often
5) Encourage conversation
Keep it simple with quality content
Need I say more? Your content needs to be relevant to readers as at the end of the day, even if you have the best SEO and have people coming to your real estate blog; you have to have something interesting for them to read. Sure, put in Keywords, but someone has to read it so keep that in mind as you are creatively stuffing your posts with the best "[insert city/town name] real estate" and such keywords throughout your posts.
Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should
I love a YouTube video showing someone having some unfortunate event befall them as much as the next guy, but at the end of the day you have to keep in mind that the blog is representing you and your real estate business. Keep your posts on topic and sure, show some personality, but always keep in mind what the purpose of the blog is for; which should be to generate leads. Good blogs generate business, bad blogs don’t.
Too many gratuitous outbound links… bad
There is can always be too much of a good thing! Use this rule when linking to other sites from within your blog post:
• Is the link relevant to the theme of the post?
• Is the site I am blogging to a reputable site
• Will the link be helpful and provide more detail to complement the post?
• Is each paragraph more links than text?
Apart from getting very hard to read, too many links on a page especially your homepage can negatively affect your search rankings. Also keep in mind that every link could be sending someone away from your site. Make the link valuable enough and it increases the chances of them coming back. Without getting into the intricacies of interpreting the relative value of outbound links, I will say that if you keep your links to a reasonable level (one per paragraph of text and two max) and they are relevant you will do fine. After all you don’t want to spend ALL your time reading about SEO, you may want to sell some real estate eventually…
Update often
The goal here is to get subscribers, regular readers and attract new readers to your real estate blog. The more often you post about relevant topics the more opportunity you will have for people to link to your posts driving more clicks your way. Also, the more you update your blog the more often search engines will index it. This is one of the key benefits of blogging and it really can only be fully realized on a site that is updated at least a couple of times a week. I have to say here though, that content does matter and just because your site is getting more indexing attention, that doesn't always equate into better search results rankings.
Encourage conversation
Blogging is not a one-way medium, through comments your blog will become more valuable to you and your readers. A blog provides the opportunity to discuss your posts, explain you point of view further and interact with your readers. Remember to always make a point to respond to comments on your blog. I have seen that more you respond, the more people will comment. Here's a good post about encouraging people to comment on your blog.
Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.
That is very well said, regarding blogs and many other things.