Real estate weblogging is a journey, not a destination . . .
By: Greg Swann,
Phoenix Real Estate,
Post Archive,
RSS FeedPosted: Friday, September 15th, 2006, 6:48 pm MST
Category: Blogging,Enduring Interest,Marketing,Real Estate,Weblogging 101
This is from email I had earlier this week:
Jim Cronin from The Real Estate Tomato and I were just talking about real estate blogging being what real estate websites will begin to morph into. He sent me to your blog and I was wondering if that has been productive for you as a lead generator.
For the first point, I’m with Jim wall-to-wall. In every second of my spare time, I am preparing to repurpose all of our content to weblogs or weblog-like pages. Last weekend my son Cameron reformulated our content engines to make them site-independent (and therefore appearance-independent), and I want him to take a second pass at everything to build content that will look like an Ubertor site to people but will search like friendly old HTML 3.0 to Google. There are other weblog-like things we’re doing at the transaction-management level. It would be reasonable to say that in due course weblogging will be the defining metaphor of our internet presence.
For the second point — has weblogging been a productive lead generator? — I don’t know. A fuller answer is more complicated than that, but the whole issue is trumped by an even larger point: I don’t care.
I want to approach business as a vendor in the same way I approach it as a customer. In other words, I don’t want people treating me as a lead, as a link in their food chain. As soon as I start to feel like a salesman’s prey, I get creeped out. I don’t have to feel that way for very long to get gone. On the other hand, if I feel that you are looking out for my interests, offering me the sage counsel I have sought — and perhaps the advice I hadn’t known to ask for — then we have a sound basis for going ahead with a transaction.
There’s a lot of mercenary weblogging advice out there right now, and much of it strikes me as being doubly-dysfunctional. Yes, weblogging has huge SEO advantages, but if you go out of your way to write SEO-attractive copy, you will have created a reader-repellent weblog. You will score high on searches and no one will ever come back without a Googlenudge. If, instead, you write with the reader and not Google in mind, you can build an audience of people who respect what you have to say even if they don’t always agree with you.
Is the purpose of doing that do generate leads? No. Is the purpose bread cast upon the waters? Even that seems too mercenary to me. Inside my own skin, I think that the purpose of excellence is excellence. Out in the world, I believe that if you do right by people, they’ll do right by you. But the reciprocity of the thing doesn’t matter, what matters is doing the right thing, and doing it as well as I can do it. Everything after that is a secondary consequence, entirely welcome but not fundamentally necessary.
The complicated answer is this: People touch our web pages so many times, over the course of days or weeks, that I can’t say for sure if the weblog has been the procuring cause, as it were, of someone filling out one of our forms or emailing or phoning me directly. I know that many of our long-time clients enjoy the weblog, because they have told me so. It’s plausible to me that some people who have found us through our weblog may become clients — or refer people to us — in the future. Even so, all of that would be nothing more than a secondary consequence, a happy accident.
What I’m saying is this: Real estate weblogging is not about leads, it’s about a conversation that builds relationships. If some of those relationships turn into business — that’s a bonus. But if you approach weblogging as a net for capturing prospects, you will fail. People will see your weblog as just another splog — a spam-blog — even if it is a hand-crafted splog. In the long run, it could be worse for your business than doing nothing.
But if you approach weblogging as what you can give, what you can share, what you can learn, what you can teach, what you can delight in and what you can aspire to — if you approach it as a customer and not as yet another vendor — you’ll find all the riches money can never buy. If you happen to make a buck or two in the process, so much the better. But if you make yourself a better person, and make the world around you a better place, the money will find its way to you on its own…
Our story so far: If you’re studying Real Estate Weblogging 101 from home, be sure to peruse these mission-critical posts:
- Apprehending Realtor 2.0: Seven essential skills of the 21st century real estate agent…
- Real estate weblogging is a journey, not a destination…
- Think globally, blog locally: If you want local leads from your real estate weblog, pursue local interests…
- Podcast: Local results in real estate weblogging will come from making local connections, not SEO results
- Feed guarding: Protecting your weblog content from theft — or worse fates…
- Weblogging as if it really mattered: How to write with integrity and passion
- What is the difference between a weblogger and the press?
- Webloggers and the press, Part II: Oversight and S.W.A.G.
- Perfectibility in weblogging: Revising yourself to genius
- Can yet another easy-blogging local-content solution beat community-building local real estate weblogs?
- Hi. I’m Teri…And I’m aghast.
- Got Voice? And other questions for which I have no answers.
- In Case You Just Tuned In
- Neighborhood-level real estate weblogging: Traffic is not about traffic, traffic is about conversions
- Scale your locally-focused real estate weblog down to the size of a good time. Why? Because there’s no place like home…
- How to make Google your weblog’s best friend…
- Resource recourse: For the budding real estate weblogger, opportunities for self-improvement are everywhere — and every where is right here
- Want to make sure you can defend yourself from internet bad guys? Aim for the body, not the head…
- TheBrickRanch.com: As warm and fuzzy as an Easter Bunny
- Advances, none remarkable.
- Profitable real estate weblogging: Burning the midnight oil to make family out of your farm
- An insanely great hyper-local real estate weblogging strategy: Be the community
- Real Estate Weblogging 101: Our story so far
- Exploding Heads
- Dancing on bridges: Understanding great real estate webloggers
Technorati Tags: blogging, real estate, real estate marketing
Related posts:21 comments
21 Comments so far
Would it be rude of me to forward this to a friend who is obsessed with jamming key words into her blog? The pearls of wisdom get lost in the clutter.
Isn’t a bad blog worse than no blog at all? The ‘sell’ in a blog is a long,long conversation, not a whack over the head with seo-friendly copy.
> Would it be rude of me to forward this to a friend who is obsessed with jamming key words into her blog?
Be my guest.
[...] Greg responds to a fellow Realtor’s question in regards to blogging and lead generation: [...]
Greg may thump me on the head for saying this, anticipating that it may look too self serving to inlookers, but I’m going to comment anyway. And since we have a policy of freely allowing comment, restricting comments only if they really are spam or so filled with profaninty that we wouldn’t want our mothers to see it, I know that when I put this in a comment it will get posted even if Greg would rather it not. But I want to say that I am so proud of this man, and this article speaks volumes about why I am. We may not have any of the trappings commonly associated with wealth, but we have a wealth of joy created by always striving to do our best. Fall out from doing your best should be that the best comes back to you. And I’m the kinda sort who likes justice. But for Greg it really is simply about doing your best, always, even without looking for that favorable fall-out. And so, I’m marking this as an article of enduring interest.
Greg Swann has written a brilliant, poetic, truthful and wonderous post, that should be required reading for all real estate agents, and salespeople of all flavors.
http://www.nelalive.net/nelalive/2006/09/required_readin.html
Add this Arizonan to Greg Swann’s camp followers. As the rookie agent in an old retirement community’s brokerage, I’m on the cutting edge of e-realty but still struggling to find the right formulae for marketing (my ho-hum website doesn’t interest me much). My fellow residents are typically much older than I and don’t like being patronized. They just want the facts but well-stated. The Blog, as envisioned by Greg, is just the right medium I think, marketing motives to the contrary, notwithstanding. Thank you, Gregg.
Mark “The Poet Realtor” in Mesa.
Interesting post, Greg. I’ve not agreed with you on multiple subjects but do admit to bending my brain around the idea of the blog as a public good as opposed to another marketing avenue. The challenge comes in the business side of life, where ROI is an all-to-harsh fact of life.
I too prefer building relationships over completing one-time transactions, but the reality of an existence where money is a factor leads me to perform in both capacities.
Greg, you have certainly made my day. I’ve been attempting to blog for quite awhile now, first with http://LongIslandsBestHomes.blogspot.com and more recently with http://BloggingLongIsland.wordpress.com . I also have an Ubertor website. My problem has always been the conventional wisdom colliding with my own instincts.
Everything I do on the web is consumer centric. I want them to find what they’re looking for and hopefully come back for more. It has worked for almost ten years with my web sites but I have had no clear indication where my blog(s), blogging should take me. You’ve defined it for me. The truth is I don’t care. I’m doing what I’ve always done and my gut instinct was to continue down this road.
Thank you so much for the light to guide my path.
[...] Greg Swann over at Blood Hound Realty in Phoenix writes about his experiences blogging and if he thinks his blog is a lead generator. He also mentions that he and his son are working to “build content that will look like an Ubertor site“. His opinion of blogging sounds like it is what we preach in our training and coaching sessions. Blog, blog, blog, but write the blog for your readers and the search engines will come. It is ok to do a mild “touch up” for the search engines but it should be written for your readers. I think the true importance of having a blog is to add a human side to your website. Your average real estate site is pretty basic, listings, biography and contact information. Having a blog allows you to personalize your website. Have a look at Greg’s blog… without knowing him or having ever met him you get a great idea of who he is, what he thinks and why he does what he does. [...]
[...] This is not a derivative post of Greg’s recent post – it’s just a coincidence. But I did like this: — has weblogging been a productive lead generator? — I don’t know. A fuller answer is more complicated than that, but the whole issue is trumped by an even larger point: I don’t care. [...]
Thanks for the inspiration, Greg. md
Bless you all. Thank you.
Regarding this:
> The Blog, as envisioned by Greg, is just the right medium
The circumstance you describe might be ideal for a community weblog. Open it up to anyone willing to register, Let them start as contributors, so you don’t have any kiddie porn or fair housing violations, then work with people to become editors. I find the phpBB style of forum inherently off-putting, but the post and comments format of a weblog could work very well.
Why Blogging works
/images/33632-31387/thisisme1.jpg” height=”106″ width=”87″>Why blogging works… it’s often discussed – Greg Swann’s treatise best describes the inspirational intent, the mission of blog as service and contribution to your world. Jim Cronin prov…
Links for those who are now considering entering the Blogosphere
/images/33632-31387/einstein.jpg”>As mentioned before, I’m now persuading my network of real estate professionals to consider developing blogs for their business. I promised more than a few of those contacts that I would provide a basic introduction …
[...] The Emperor’s New Suit Content is NOT King. It’s time we overthrew this long reigning blog ruler. Sic semper tyrannis. Before the loyalists start sharpening the guillotine, let me explain. IMHO, there is no King to a successful blog, nor should there be. For one thing, success is measured in different ways. Success could mean a certain number of readers (whatever that is) or comments or new clients or Adsense money or simply recognition in the blogosphere. There is a big difference in each of these measures of success. In addition, personal satisfaction is its own blogging reward, even if no one is listening (right now or ever) and you don’t care to please or measure success. Maybe you’ll have posthumous blog success. Kafka did. No wait, he didn’t blog. Anyway… [...]
Reading this today is really timely for me. I just linked your entry to a blog I wrote in response to my broker telling me the “problem with my blog was I had no call to action”. I knew he was all wet and doesn’t understand blogging and also know him well enough (we’ve been business partners for year)to know it wasn’t meant as a criticism but as a help. The “call to action” is not my way. I believe in equipping people to make informed choices. Even when I was an EBA I informed my customers at their first meeting that they could get exclusive representation through a listing company IF they asked for it and were willing not to see that company’s listings. It’s an informed choice that way, and if I lose because of giving information, I have still won!
This is so inspirational. I am an infant “blogger”….just got my “training wheels” site from Ubertor and can’t wait to find my voice. Entering the blogging world feels like its Christmas and I have just recieved a wonderful gift…. but it is under 1000 sheets of facinating wrapping paper. Reading your blog was a particularly heart warming one.
Thank you!
[...] I wrote a long time ago that nobody wants to be treated like a lead. Add to that this note: No one, ever, wants to be treated like an idiot, like a child, like a retard. The actual form of the video, qua philosophy, is post-modernism — stolen from here. And like Bob Dylan’s pomo masquerade of a performance, the idea was to include the insiders by excluding the “squares” who just wouldn’t see how funny it is to give a pomo masquerade of a performance. The difference is, Dylan was selling his bunk to the insiders, where the RE.net’s objective is to appeal for business to the “squares” it just went out of its way to insult. [...]
In retrospect, you really knew the true purpose of blogging even two years ago! Very insightful and great advice.
> In retrospect, you really knew the true purpose of blogging even two years ago!
I love it that you spend so much time quarrying these older posts. There’s a lot of valuable stuff in our archives, and I hope lots of people are following your lead.
Yes, I do alot of reading till the wee hours of the morning…trying to make up for lost time. I have an endless thirst for learning and there is so much right here! Many thanks to you and all the amazing contributors here.