Wow, this was was incredibly tough. I know that's cliché, but really it's true here. I had a tough time sorting out how to order the winners. The week seamed much weaker for some, while other teams have kept it consistent. I've seen at couple teams pull away from their strengths. It' is important to stay on top with what we're good at.
I apologize again for the delay on week 3. But Without further delay here are the results for week 4.
Vote for Week 4 here.
- Mary Pope-Handy
- Jackie Colson Miller
- Theresa Lussier
- Kelly Kilpatrick
- Tisza Major-Posner
Apprentice:
Theresa LussierCoach:
Greg Swann,
BloodHoundBlogBlogs:
TheBrickRanch.com,
Loose Screws 5/6 In Defense of Less
5/5 Money Well Spent: the Home Inspection
5/4 Celebrate the Huber Heights brick ranch.
5/4 What week is it? PB update (members)
5/3 The burning question on everyone’s mind: What’s an RSS Reader?
5/2 At last. A Huber Heights City School website worth looking at.
5/1 Just Because It Made Me Laugh
5/1 Frozen in the Project Blogoshpere (members)
TheBrickRanch.com is looking pretty good these days in terms of the over-all layout but there are some critiques I have to offer.
The image at the top of the blog is very large and takes up a lot of screen real estate. I'm not sure how relevant it is either, unless she's trying to make a reference to her coach's blog. I like that idea but really I'm not seeing that tied into The Brick Ranch very well. An image has got be relevant.
Through Theresa's blog I can sign up an associated blog. This is an interesting approach. I'm not sure how well this will be received by consumers but it's an attempt at something that I haven't seen elsewhere in the competition.
She's also launched a "show us your house" offer to viewers to her site. It's a call for readers to show her their digs. A great concept again who knows how well it would play out, but it's an interesting approach.
Reading Theresa's portrayal of 4578 Powell Road was interesting for me, because she took a home that I'd normally think was uninteresting and made it appealing.
Theresa offers interesting thoughts and opinions while keeping relevant to real estate. Over all she's got a good bit of local posts in the mix however she's somewhat lacking on keywords. While i don't think people should write for keywords, when they are relevant, I'd use them.
Everything occurs in a place. That place is relevant and interesting to the story. In “Money Well Spent” where did the inspection occur. This would add to the keywords and add to the story.
Overall I think Theresa is doing well, but taking the advice offered by her critic Frozen in the Project Blogoshpere, I'd say there's more to Theresa that could come through in her writing.
Apprentice: Jackie Colson Miller
Coach:Jim Cronin, The Real Estate Tomato
Blogs: RealEstateSizzle,The Real Estate Sizzle
5/2 Florida Property Tax Reform…Dead…For Now!
5/2 Tampa is Named in List of Hottest Job Markets
5/1 How to Juggle Your Real Estate Career, Your Kids and Your Personal Life
4/30 Encroachments…Getting a Little Too Close to Your Neighbor?
4/30 Florida Realtors…Contact Your Representative About Our Property Tax Reform
4/30 Best Question Winner This Week
4/30 Project Blogger...A Little Organization Please! Jonathan???
I opened up The Real Estate Sizzle and found that Firefox in OSX set my CPU 74% usage. When I blocked the images the browser's CPU usage went down to 14% so there's something going on there. Using OSX on Firefox I may not be the targeted demographic but I don't think a blog should do that to a reader.
“The 'Burning Issues In Real Estate...Tampa, Florida & Around The World.” “Where is Jackie Now?” The blog introduces us to Jackie as an International Specialist, however I'm not clear on what that is. Perhaps her target audience would already be aware. I'm just not clear on how the international ties in.
Don't get me wrong. I loved reading about Jackie's travels. But if she's going to have an international theme throughout the blog it might better serve her if it's going to be better defined and explained.
Her contact info is right there on blog this is good. While she talks about herself and her travels she also talks about local timely and topical issues this week this is very good for grounding her in a market.
I thought the Ask Jackie a Question link and The Question winner of the week were great ideas to get readers to interact with her.
Apprentice:Mary Pope-Handy
Coach:Frances Flynn Thorsen theRealtyGram
Blogs: LiveInLosGatos.com, Silicon Valley Real Estate Commentary
5/6 First Subdivision in Los Gatos
5/6 Peregrine Falcons NestCam
5/5 Parks and Poison Oak
5/5 Strategizing Topic Order
5/4 Blogging About Los Gatos, Continued
5/4 Especially Open
5/4 Slideshow of Beglatos Park in Los Gatos
5/3 CineCats Film Festival
5/3 Learning in the Rain
5/2 Blogging About Los Gatos
5/2 Main Street Bridge
5/1 Free Los Gatos Music Series Begins June 2nd
4/30 Market Conditions
Living in Los Gatos is doing great with Mary's contact info right there at the top of the page.
Mary's posts are good for talking about the town First Subdivision in Los Gatos is a great post for example.
Over-all Mary's posts are great. There's one important element that I feel is missing, and maybe this is just me, but I'm not sure I'm getting a strong sense of who she is through her posts. More work in that department could help her a lot.
Apprentice: Kelly Kilpatrick
Coach:Joel Burslem, Future of Real Estate Marketing
Blogs: Kelly's Creed, Rancho Santa Margarita Lifestyles
5/6 What To Expect When You Move to Rancho Santa Margarita
5/6 Rancho Santa Margarita Beach Club Lagoon Now Open!
5/5 Cinco de Mayo at Santa Margarita Water District
5/4 RSM Students Celebrate Anaheim Ducks 2-1 Victory with Wild Wing
5/3 RSM - May 3rd is National Day of Prayer
5/2 Fiesta de Agua - Santa Margarita Water District’s Water Awareness Day
5/1 Celinda’s Mexican Deli - RSM’s Most Authentic Mexican Food
4/30 More Troubles for 241 Toll Road Proponents
Rancho Santa Margarita Lifestyles is looking good. "Everything you need to know about RSM" is a bold but defining statement outlining the vision for the blog. It was a very good choice of words. Some criticisms?
Where's her number? I have no way of contacting Kelly outside of her contact form, this isn't the most user friendly approach.
At the top of each post there are a lot of tags, and then again at the bottom. I don't believe this number of tags helps her cause in terms of outreach and it really clutters the space in the blog. I believe it's better to refine and define your tags so the accurately target the ideas in a post.
I loved Celinda’s Mexican Deli. I loved this post because it was so much about Kelly, so much about the town, it covered something interesting, and taught me that just because a place has no one in it doesn't mean it's not good. The story then continues to her relationship with the place.
Apprentice:
Vali Wimberly Coach:
Teresa Boardman Blogs:
Denverfresh.com,
Vali's Blog 5/1 The lovely Lola.
5/1 Lola in Denver ~ LoHi hot spot.
There's a lot of good things about "Live In Denver." The graphics are clean and the colors flow well. It's easy to contact her as her information is readily available. Her one post for this week was good but really one post for a week of this competition isn't enough.
Apprentice:
Ines Hegedus-Garcia Coach:
Paul Chaney Blogging Systems Group Blogs:
Rick & Ines's Blog 5/6
US Troops receive Girl Scout Cookies 5/6
Marketing your blog - Google Juice part II5/4
Best Closing Gift Ever5/3
Marketing your blog - Google Juice part I5/1
Stiltsville - a Miami Landmark4/30
Blog Silence - Virginia TechRick & Ines's Blog is one of those that makes it easier to get a hold of the blogger. Of course, being on ActiveRain, they don't have the customization available to add images colors and fonts to their blog style.
Stiltsville is a great post but I think a blog of this nature requires the author to cite their sources. I think that Ines also would have benefited greatly from talking about her trip and the history of the area. She starts out this way but then we don't see that. Anytime you can let someone get to know you through your posts you are better off.
She did a better job of this in Best Closing Gift Ever great celebrating her interactions with clients was a great idea.
Apprentice:
London Whitted Coach:
Pat Kitano,
Transparent Real EstateBlogs:
The Future of Commercial Real Estate 4/30
Loan Man Hall of Fame
The Future of Commercial Real Estate looks fine as a blog. But London's info is only available via a link. I think it's better if it's shown more readily. London Writes really well, I just wish he'd write more. Also on the blog page there are links that go nowhere referencing commercial real estate from different regions. Having a "broken" blog like that is not a good idea.
Apprentice:
Kevin Tomlinson Coach:
Ardell DellaLoggia,
Searching Seattle Blog Blogs:
Miami Beach Real Estate
It looks like Kevin settled in behind the pack and drafted off of the leaders this week, I hope to see him use this reprieve from blogging to get fully rested and come out strong next week. (Being a west coaster that was my best attempt at Nascar style commentary.)
Apprentice:Julie Ferenzi
Coach:Jeff Turner Real Estate Shows
Blogs: Living In Plainfield Julie's Blog
5/6 More pictures please! (members)
5/4 Featured Neighborhood of the Week: Whisper Glen by Phoenix Developers
5/4 The Cicada’s are Coming!
5/3 How would you react? (members)
5/2 Plainfield Alert: Missing Plainfield Woman, 37 year old Lisa Stebic, mother of 2
5/1 First Time Home Buyers | What to Know
Living In Plainfield looks great. But again, where's the contact info? In Julies blog I've got to use a contact form. I loved "broadcast your community event" and "community links and phone numbers." They are great ways to try and encourage community involvement and interaction in your blog. I'd like to see if this idea plays out.
Julies best post this week in my eyes was "The Cicada’s are Coming!" I did feel however that a some of her posts got to sound a little bit like a sales pitch. That's a bit of a turn off. Kelly will want to adjust her post a little bit to reflect more of her interests.
Apprentice: Tisza Major-Posner
Coach:Drew Meyers, Zillow
Blogs: Route66iving.com, Tisza's Blog
5/6 You Know Your Blog Is Working When...
5/5 Choosing The Right Realtor & Why You Really Need One
5/5 Week Four, Realizations, Revelations and a Requiem...
5/4 Gazumping My White Elephant Because You Don't Like The Jalousie...
5/3 An Ordinary Day?
5/2 Active Claremont Get Involved!
5/2 Ready... Aim...
5/1 Nothing Really Happens In Claremont…
5/1 A Month of Sundays...
Something must be working with Route66living. Tisza was recoginzed for her blog by one of her city council members.
The photos at the top of the blog (well the car) threw me for a second, but put all together it makes sense and I like it. It ties in with the Route66 theme and getting to Claremont really well. I love the map that's included too, it' gives a good context to those less familiar with the road.
Choosing The Right Realtor ® comes off strongly as a sales pitch and gets away from Tisza's writing quite a bit. Isn't the word Realtor® she'd want to add an (R) or ®. I can't imagine it having any interest for me as reader, unless perhaps it came up from reader conversation.
I tried out the "find my homes value link" on the right side of the page and it was interesting. It yielded 0$ for one property that should have been around 1.2 and a value that was just fine for another property. The problem i have is that it takes up a lot of space, it's not clear that i'm not just going to have to submit my email and info i don't want to bother with, and it blended in with the links for me. I think she can keep it but it could work/look a little differently. Ultimately a link to the tool on her website might serve her better.
Tisza's divided herself up between her AR blog and her Route66 blog in a negative way, I feel. Essentially, i think that Tisza disappeared from Route66 and left a sales pitch in her place. Taken all together, she's got a good energy going that would really attract readers. Tisza please bring Tisza back to everything you do.
Apprentice:
Madison HildebrandCoach:
Dustin Luther,
RainCityGuideBlogs:
InsudeBu.com5/3
Upcoming Events4/30
The new Dr. Laura4/30
Malibu’s Weekend News
Madison had one interesting post on Laura Bush's visit to Malibu. The weekend news post should have included Madison's opinions and reflections , not just links. I don't know how to get a hold of Madison from the blog and there wasn't enough content this week for judging.
Thank you Inman News for co-sponsoring this contest! Please check out their Bloggers Connect Conference where the winners of Project Blogger will be announced.
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Caleb, I appreciate the time, energy, and the critique! Thanks.