"As you sow, so shall ye reap."
What I'm going to share as my best farming technique might not be considered as traditional in the real estate farming world but it was by far my most effective technique. I gleaned 75% of my business from this technique.
I retired in 2011, but I will share that my best farming technique was to plant perennials. Perennials are those plants that bloom and produce year after year without being replanted.
Wenatchee, Washington is known as the Apple Capital of the World. We know about the perrennial production of an orchard that you plant once and thrives, with careful nurturing, for decades.
My "perennial" plants were my blogs. A blog is something you create once and nurture it from day to day and year to year. It never dies like an "annual" plant does and the more you nurture it (write fresh content), the more fertile and productive it will be.
My best farming technique was.... BLOGGING
I had three crops...
My "perennial" crops were:
My primary Wenatchee real estate blog
My Wenatchee condo blog
My Wenatchee rental blog
I blogged nearly every day. Writing fresh content in a blog is equivalent to fertilizing and watering a plant.
Some of the more traditional (non-perennial) farming techniques in real estate would be:
Working The Sphere
Doing Open Houses
Door knocking
Direct mail
Taking out ads in the paper or magazines
Online advertising
Networking events
Sponsor events
... a plethora of other techniques
The key to any kind of farming is consistency. I could be consistent with writing in my blog. I was not consistent with any other farming method, so I focused on the blogging. Due to my long term consistency, my Google rankings were amazing.
As I said earlier, 75% of my business came from my blogs and website, which were linked together. The balance of my business came from repeat business, referrals, friends, family, and a few other people that found me in unknown ways.
Blogging was my favorite and most effective farming technique.
This blog post was written as a submission to the ActiveRain Challenge - My Best Farming Technique (Sponsored by SmartZip). If you would like to share one of your favorite farming techniques (and earn up to 10K ActiveRain points as well as a chance to win a free ticket to a Ben Kinney Training event) head over to the blog post announcing the challenge.
Remember:
Information is FREE. Knowledge, Experience & Integrity Are Priceless
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