BloodhoundBlog is addressed to real estate professionals. We won’t reject anyone who wants to come and play, but we made a conscious decision very early on that we would be talking to Realtors, lenders, investors and other professionals, with a special emphasis on real estate webloggers. In that respect, we’re probably a pretty bad example for real estate webloggers to follow. We write about things that are of interest to you, but they aren’t likely to be interesting to ordinary people.<\/p>\n
We’re leading into a discussion of last week’s ActiveRain fiasco, so here are two items that I think are very important to real estate webloggers — meaning webloggers who are not writing for the benefit of real estate professionals.<\/p>\n
First, the MyBlogLog recent readers widget<\/a> is not your friend. It visually convinces you that you are writing for the amusement of your real estate weblogging buddies, when in fact you should be writing for your target market, the people who can put money in your pocket.<\/p>\n Second, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) should not be your primary traffic-building strategy. Search engines will bring you unique visitors, which can be useful for advertising monetization business models. But search engine traffic comes with a truly gargantuan bounce rate: They land, they see that what they hit wasn’t what they wanted and they’re gone. Search engines can<\/i> bring you visitors who will come and stay, some of whom might do business with you. But other traffic generating strategies — better targeted and much more viral — will make you a lot more money in the long run. I know I’m shouting down a well<\/a> because everyone wants to believe SEO is a magic bullet, but facts are facts.<\/p>\n What does this have to do with ActiveRain? The sweet folks at ActiveRain have managed to convince themselves that talking about inside baseball to their good-time buddies will result in SEO traffic that will turn into money for them. This might actually be true, but it seems certain to me that, erg for erg, their energies could have been much better spent. ActiveRain argues that its search results prove it <\/a>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" BloodhoundBlog is addressed to real estate professionals. We won’t reject anyone who wants to come and play, but we made a conscious decision very early on that we would be talking to Realtors, lenders, investors and other professionals, with a special emphasis on real estate webloggers. In that respect, we’re probably a pretty bad example […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,3,6,5,23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1989","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-blog-carnivals","7":"category-blogging","8":"category-marketing","9":"category-real-estate","10":"category-the-odysseus-medal","12":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":935,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/935\/just-incredible-incredibleagentcom-steals-images-and-content-from-prominent-real-estate-webloggers-to-sell-free-weblogs\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":0},"title":"Just incredible: IncredibleAgent.com steals images and content from prominent real estate webloggers to sell “free” weblogs","author":"Greg Swann","date":"January 23, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Wanna hear something incredible? Odysseus the TV Spokesmodel Bloodhound, unbeknownst to anyone, has been serving as the Spokesmodel for an internet vendor's site. Involuntarily. Without compensation. Without permission. Forgive me for the following enormous image: Who doesn't love those eyes staring out at you, looking for you through the mail\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2018,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2018\/recognizing-greatness-by-means-of-outrageous-insult\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":1},"title":"Recognizing greatness by means of outrageous insult…","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 9, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Let's play a little game of practical morality. Imagine that you're the Mozart of real estate webloggers, the Jimi Freakin' Hendrix of the RE.net. Winner of the Carnival of Real Estate more than any other writer, winner of the Odysseus Medal, three-time nominee in a field of twenty nominated posts\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1756,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/1756\/vale-carne-vale-recasting-the-odysseus-medal-as-a-carnival-of-real-estate-weblogging-excellence\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":2},"title":"Vale, carne vale: Recasting The Odysseus Medal as a carnival of real estate weblogging excellence","author":"Greg Swann","date":"August 6, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm pretty fed up with the Carnival of Real Estate. It is what it is, and there have been times over the past year when it has blown tender kisses toward the sublime. But much too often it has chosen to rut around in the mud, and, in any case,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blog Carnivals"","block_context":{"text":"Blog Carnivals","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blog-carnivals\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":858,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/858\/uptown-hound-bloodhoundblog-to-contribute-to-inman-blog\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":3},"title":"Uptown hound: BloodhoundBlog to contribute to Inman Blog . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"January 5, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Jessica Swesey at Inman Blog has invited webloggers from six real estate weblogs to contribute posts to Inman's real estate blog. Our initial post is a summary of my thoughts on MGM-Mirage's Project City center in Las Vegas. Going forward, I will be highlighting other great posts from BloodhoundBlog's star-studded\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":358,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/358\/radio-daze-phoenix-area-real-estate-webloggers-make-a-five-theater-assault-on-the-market\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":4},"title":"Radio daze: Phoenix-area real estate webloggers make a five theater assault on the market . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 20, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Three Phoenix-area webloggers, Jay Thompson, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy, John Wake of Arizona Real Estate Notebook, and Greg Swann of BloodhoundBlog, helped turn a radio show into a five-media event: The radio broadcast itself, listener call-in questions, live weblogging with listener call-in and write-in questions, an on-line podcast and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7670,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/7670\/o-the-ignominy-now-real-estate-webloggers-will-have-to-learn-how-to-sell-real-estate-to-make-a-living\/","url_meta":{"origin":1989,"position":5},"title":"O, the ignominy! Now real estate webloggers will have to learn how to sell real estate to make a living…","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"FT: No more free lunch. FWIW, while I detest all laws, I think this is a nice example of the law doing more harm than good. These new rules won't kill the corruption, they'll just push it underground. 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