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Blogging is relatively new to the real estate community. For this reason, blogging should be carefully thought over. Great content and effective blog tools are important for reaching the target market and achieving the objectives of the business.
1. Search Engine Marketing-Simply stated, blogs are search engine magnets. It is not that search engine seek out blogs specifically; they don't know the difference between a blog and a more traditional website. However, blogs will give you an increased presence on major search engines such as Google and Yahoo!. The search engines are drawn to your blog because blogs contain the kinds of data that search engines look for.
2. Direct communications. We live in an age when people don't want to be talked at; they want to be spoken with. Blogs provide a way for you to speak directly and honestly with prospects and customers and provide a means through which they can talk to you. Blogging is less about sending a controlled, contrived sales message and much more about engaging in honest, open communication
3. Brand Building. Blogs can become a major new channel through which you draw attention to your brand. Blogs let you tell the story of your brand over and over again, allowing your customers to become both familiar and comfortable with it. Blogs allow you to create a competitive advantage.
4. Competitive differentiation. Blogs give the readers insight into who you are, what your business is all about, and what makes you a more worthy candidate than your competitor. They enable you to tell your story of your business, the way you like it to be told.
5. Positioning yourself as the expert. Blogs give you a platform for articulating your viewpoints, demonstrating your knowledge, and evidencing your expertise on matters pertaining to your industry or community. Through blogs, you can express your wisdom and impress readers and make them trust you.
6. Relationship Marketing. It has always been our belief that people don't want to do business with businesses; they want to do business with people, preferably people they know. Blogs allow you to build lasting personal relationships with customers.
7. Exploiting the niches.Blogs are very niche driven tools. They are well suited to creating your own market. 8. Media and public relations. If getting media attention is important to you (and it should be), blogs are excellent tools to help you achieve that end.
9. Lead generation. While blogs are not lead-generation systems in the strictest sense, you will find them providing you with a consistent flow of leads at almost no cost.
10. Intranet and project management. Large brokerages and associations with large memberships can appreciate the need for an easy-to-use internal communications and content management system. Blogs fit the bill quite well. This may be one of the least known and underutilized areas of blogs.
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