Not everyone can sit in front of a blank page and churn out 1,000 words in a few hours. Heck, even those that can may not want to, due to other professional obligations. Blogging is a great way to develop a niche and drive traffic to your real estate site. But it can also be a source of great frustration and effort.
Luckily, blogging is not the only option. In this article, we’ll cover 15 alternatives to blogging that can boost traffic to your real estate site. Check out our list below, and pick out some content creation strategies that match your skill set.
WHY DO I NEED TO CREATE CONTENT ON MY SITE?
As a real estate agent, you need to attract and keep leads on your site. Unfortunately, they don’t normally come on their own. Creating content allows you to demonstrate your knowledge and value as a real estate agent, package it, and broadcast it across the web.
Each post or page you make on your site has the chance to appear in a Google search, be shared on social media, or be linked to in another post. All of these actions drive traffic to your site. But they only occur if you create content.
CAN’T I JUST POST TO SOCIAL MEDIA?
Social media should compliment any great content creation strategy, but it is not a strategy in itself. The problem is the platform. On social media, you can create content, but because you don’t own the platform there are limits to what you can gain from it. Instead, you should use social media as a vessel to your own platform. To drive traffic to your site, you need a link that originates to your site. Then you may expand its reach by posting it to social media. Anyone who clicks on your link will leave the social media platform and enter yours, where you can maximize your chances of converting a sale.
LUKE’S TIP:
15 ALTERNATIVES TO BLOGGING FOR REAL ESTATE
POST PHOTOS
Real estate is visual. Between the homes, landscapes, decorations, and designs, there is a lot of great content baked into the industry. Some people browse this content just for fun. If you have access to some nice photos, or enjoy taking them, post them to your site in a collage or photo story.
CREATE VIDEOS
Video lends itself really well to real estate too. You see a lot of sites with home tours and drone flights. Some real estate agents provide advice and market updates from their car between client meetings. If you like producing videos there’s a lot you can do in the real estate industry.
MAKE PODCASTS
A lot of real estate agents are social and outgoing. They enjoy talking to people and making personal connections. If this is you, you may consider giving podcasting a go. Podcasting is a strange beast. You need to connect with your audience, but your audience is not with you. If you are pretty good at the social demands of real estate, you may find you are good at podcasting too.
DESIGN CHARTS AND INFOGRAPHICS
Some real estate agents produce content exclusively about the real estate market at large. After all, there is a wealth of information and statistics available that can help you and your clients make smart real estate decisions. If you are able to present this information in clear, easily consumed graphics, you’ll have a strong content niche.
CURATE CONTENT
On the modern Internet, you don’t even need to create content to create content. If you think you’ve got an eye for useful blogs, social media, and articles produced by others, curate it into a regular post on your real estate website or newsletter. There’s so much out there now, you can add value simply by sorting through it.
LIVE STREAM
Live streaming is wonderfully cheap, it does not take much time to produce, it fosters real-time engagement, and it can be repurposed into other content. All of these characteristics are massively important for a busy real estate agent. If you have events that may interest others give it a go.
INTERVIEW PEOPLE
Really, it does not take much to create new content. With one other person and a cellphone with an audio recorder, you already have enough to create an interview show. With some editing, you can even chop up a 20 minute conversation into 3 or four posts.
HOST A CHAT Q&A
Real estate agents are professionals in the housing market. This means they have specialized knowledge that is useful to others. Creating content can be as simple as sharing some of this knowledge with others. You can do this live with a Q&A via chat or in a “mailbag” format in which you respond to some of the most common questions you get by email.
BEEF UP YOUR PORTFOLIO
One of the best sources for new content is a success story. So add some of your best work to your portfolio and share it. This will attract viewers to your site and provide social proof of your abilities.
POST CASE STUDIES
People may also be able to learn from deals where you had trouble. If you are able to repackage these experiences into case studies with a clear lesson, you will have valuable new content for attracting leads.
CREATE MEMES
Sometimes new content is nothing more than a photo, video, or gif that encapsulates a specific emotion better than anything else. Real estate can be a fertile ground for memes with all its ups and downs. So if you see something that reflects how you are feeling at that moment, repurposes it with a comment and post it to your site.
DRAW WEB COMICS
Some of us have artistic talents. Why not put them to use in a way that can benefit your business? Web comics don’t need to be the next Mona Lisa. Simple images with a clever message are more than enough.
TELL JOKES
A good laugh is always appreciated. And there is plenty to laugh about in real estate. If you can turn a phrase, try cracking a few on your real estate website.
CREATE RIDDLES
Most people enjoy games and riddles. Some continue to buy the newspaper solely for the crossword. You can tap into this by creating and posting quizzes or riddles to your real estate website.
HIRE SOMEONE
At a fault, you can always hire someone to write your blog for you.
So now you have 15 new content creation ideas for your real estate website that don’t involve blogging. For more resources on creating content for your real estate website, check out What Should I Write About On My Real Estate Blog? and 10 Sources of Royalty Free Images For Your Real Estate Website.
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