Real Estate Marketing SEO Blog

How To Blog Comment For Profit

Yesterday I posted an article on affiliate marketing for real estate and mortgage pros. It was in response to a post on another RENet vendor website 4Realz.net

I had left a comment on Dustin Luther's post that was in opposition to posting affiliate ads all over one's brand.

Since the comment has been deleted I post it here:

I think this is a bad idea in so many ways I cannot count them all.
Let me begin by going back to the movement towards localism.
Why did that have to be?
Because many of the posts had nothing to do with the real estate in that agents town.
I remember seeing ( and still do at times) agents writing about SEO or Online Marketing. As a marketer and SEO vendor I find those posts interesting. However, it diminishes that authors brand. What are you an SEO or a Realtor?

 In the case of affiliate marketing it is very tempting to slap a moving company up on ones blog. Moving.com, Foreclosure.com, Forsalebyowner.com are some places that would make easy fits.

For a few sheckles you just diminished your message.
You would be much better served to offer this stuff on the back end of sequencing or an email campaign.

And in fact even better off to partner with local vendors to offer tips and strategies and commissions(textual, video, etc) as content for your front end and backend lead marketing.(I let you deal with the legalities one way or another as I have no idea how that would work)

In the end, why would you dilute your brand and message with other brands, stronger than yours stealing screen real estate?

I am not sure why Dustin deleted my comment post. Perhaps it was by mistake. However, presenting other's opinions are the point of comments. And in fact allowing for commentary that fly's opposite of yours is an opportunity to bolster your standing amongst your "tribe".

I discuss this in my next installment of free videos at the RealEstateGuerilla.com

Active Rain

Transparent Pat has written his Happy New Year post about Active Rain.

Active Rain is a multi user platform, nothing more, nothing less. Its success is its multiple users. Thousands I would guess. Its failure is because of its success.

Let me explain. The system rewards the conversation. The conversation is the back and forth that can happen from a blog responding to another blog thru commentary, trackback, or a blog post. Or all of the above.

AR rewards you for anything you post. The more you post the more exposure you get. So each post usually gets a ton of comments. Many are obvious attempts at what we in the off AR world would call "comment spamming". It makes for a very retarded conversation.It also makes for a very incestious community of self focused blogging as opposed to consumer focussed blogging.

This is not the only example of a multi-user blog, but AR was the first to come onto the scene (I say scene and not market because a market implies trade of usually dollars) market with its unique ranking system. And true to the predictions of the book "Positioning", being first to market usually wins.

Win what? is my concern. Move.com killed its buyout of AR. Did they figure out that free means no revenues? But I thought free is the new empowerment model that Web 2.0 is all about. I question that one all the time. Its hard to demand restitution from something you never paid for. Pat offers his advice that AR should offer unique blogs as a revenue model.

I agree, and it is wise to have your brand on your own URL as blogs at sites like AR can be used as brand extensions.

The Consumer Asks Why Do You Matter?

When I consult I teach that the web is becoming more and more about proof of your relevance in the marketplace.

click to see larger view

Active Rain has created a nice model to incentive agents to create content. These agents are only too happy to comply and create in many cases (not all), junk content. As the icon of agents online, I can only wonder what the consumer sees in the many posts like the screen capture illustrates. 

Notice when you pop up the graphic to your right, that the first post is far removed from anything real estate, and is more relevant to an IVillage discussion group. The bulk of comments on this graphic are for this first post. The only post that could be at all interesting to a consumer (other than a consumer looking to confirm the cultural view of a Realtor) is the last one. I snapped this graphic from the front page at Active Rain.

This is what the industry as represented here at AR is saying is their relevance to the single largest asset that the consumer/visitor owns. Can you understand why there is a demand for a Redfin in the marketplace?

Real Living: Real Marketing

This is the a follow up to my last post on the Real Living Real Estate franchise: Modalities in Mail

The article mentioned in DMNews gave a few glimpses to the sophistication of Real Living's approach to marketing.

Some of the more interesting facts are:

• Their marketing focus is on women 25-54
• They have instituted an in house on demand mail house
• The Real Living online and off line material uses Red and Orange, as opposed to the typical industry blues, and yellows.
• The Real Living marketing material use lifestyle images of women as opposed to still houses.
• Since 2002 they have expanded to 63 franchises in 20 states.
• So far this year they have printed 2.2 million mail pieces.
• They say they have implemented social networking on their site.

Continues.....

Content Content Content

The 3 most important words in real estate? Content Content Content.

At least on the web anyway.

The web was supposed to be the great equalizer. Today, it is becoming more and more expensive in money and time to compete.

Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

I found this news very intriguing. A builder of townhouses in Torrance is guaranteeing buyers that they will not lose money on their home purchases.

Vote For HouseBlogger!

We have been put up into the MarketingSherpa Readers Choice Blog and Podcast Award.

All you gotta do is vote for us. We are about half way down the row, under Marketing to a Specific Consumer Demographic.

The criteria that they ask you to vote by is:

• Personality  ;-)
• Usefulness & content value
• Usability & design
• Would you revisit?

Really, more important than anything be aware of some of the great blogs outside of the real estate industry. I find that usually following the pack in any industry is a sure way to "Suck Just a Little Bit Less" (there is actually a story behind this phrase that I will share soon. It was one of the major business lessons in my life). By studying other approaches, you often can find breakthroughs that you may have never considered.

Other Industries Teach Us

I have always used other industry data to help lead us in dominating in the real estate and mortgage industry which comprises most of our client websites. By looking at other markets we can take inferences that lead us to understand new opportunities and solidify hunches.

A new study conducted by Compete Inc. for Yahoo Search Marketing concluded that consumers reached with search are attractive for financial services companies since they are both wealthy and of strong credit quality.

Now, this isn't exactly your direct client, but they share some similarity for sure. The finance industry is pretty closely related to real estate sales, and especially Mortgage Brokering.

"A third of people who are searching on brand terms are looking to establish a new relationship or expand their existing relationship" with financial service providers, said Mike Bailey, managing director of financial services at Compete, Boston.

The study found that 31% of all searchers online are looking for loans.

Now what I find interesting is that however, 80 % of the prospects researching a bank are competitor's customers. 

"From a search marketer's perspective, when I establish a portfolio of terms to put a listing on, I want to make sure I have coverage across general terms, specific terms and brand terms to reach all of the consumers investigating the products that I'm marketing," said Justin Merickel, director of the finance category at Yahoo Search Marketing, Sunnyvale, CA.

This is exactly the approach that we at Spider Juice Technologies use to capture more brand and lead generation for our Realtor and Mortgage clients.

Another interesting phenomenon is that Credit card prospects find it more convenient to apply online -- 83 % via the Web, 5 % through the bank branch and the rest by telephone.

But of those consumers who research their checking, savings and loan options online, one-third to one-half of those who open accounts do so at in-person channels. For example, 56 percent of checking account openings resulting from search were consummated at a branch versus 43 percent online. For savings accounts it was 38 percent in a branch, 60 percent online and the rest on the phone. For loans, the branch's share was 36 percent, the Internet's 42 percent and the phone's 22 percent.

This follows one of our Search Marketing Truths: "People research online and buy offline" . This is why I have argued over and over again that your website must serve one master, that is to capture online searchers names and personal information. All the branding and loyalty building is done after the capture.

Thanks to DMNews.com for much of the information for this post.