Blogging should be in the now and not in the future for your real estate business. Blogging is a great way to reach out to potential clients by giving them free information and earning their trust. Trust is a key element when choosing a real estate agent, especially when trying to get repeat business. So when an individual is in the process of choosing a real estate agent, are they going to simply trust a picture of you with your listings in a local newspaper or magazine? How about seeing your face and business name on a billboard or sign? Hopefully the individual will do some research before making a quick decision on who can bring them the best service. Now if an individual has been reading your website, or finds it for the first time, your blog can contain a wealth of information and a great way to build credibility.
Think like a consumer
Before you hand over your hard earned money to just any real estate agent, you need to be able to trust them, see their credentials, how reliable they are as well as helpful. You can care less how bad the market is right now and how bad they need your business, you want the right house for you and your family. With a real estate blog you can do a lot of things and all on your own without the need for a web master to upload your content to the website. And with professional real estate templates such as the Agent Lite, you can be your own web master. Yes, Agent Lite is that easy as seen in this detailed review.
A typical real estate website will contain the following pages:
- Home
- About The Agent or Broker
- Search Properties
- Featured Properties
- Local Area Information (between 1-10 pages)
- Weather Information
- Contact
Now the only pages that really ever get updated are the listing pages, since homes are being added or removed all the time. Other then that, the rest of the site remains static with no new information being added. First off the search engines love new content and second as a potential new client might want to read more of what you could be offering. Updated information is one piece of the puzzle to having a good website that will help drive traffic to it.
Show That You Care
With a real estate blog you are not limited to only talking about what is happening in the real estate world. You can branch out and talk about other topics that would be beneficial to a home owner or future buyer. Before I mentioned the words credibility and trust when people are looking for a real estate agent. To earn both from a consumer, you need to show them you truly care. Be genuine and truthful in what you write about and always respond to any questions or comments a person may have.
Teach Them Something
People will show more trust in you when you teach them things. A real estate blog is a perfect platform to teach readers about anything related to their home and city they live in.
On your real estate blog you could talk about the following:
- Doing home repairs on your own (tutorials on how to fix things)
- Monthly or yearly home maintenance tips
- Lawn care maintenance or gardening
- Upgrades you can do to increase the value of your home
- Local area news and opinions
- Private community information (great way to market homes in those areas)
With just this short list and some brainstorming, you could come up with enough topics to write about for several years. All of the information adds value to your website and shows to the readers as a real estate agent you truly do care. You could advertise your site locally and pick up a lot of readers who are interested in reading what your next home repair or upgrade suggestion will be. Those local readers will also be telling their friends and family, that is when word of mouth kicks in for both you and your real estate website. Over time you will have shown the readers you do care since you are giving out all of this great information. The credibility will show by what you write and how you respond to comments and people will be more prone to trust over a simple newspaper ad or billboard.
What Are You Waiting For?
The internet and your potential customers will not wait, the consumer searching the internet wants to find information as fast as possible. Many popular real estate agent platforms have the ability to incorporate a blog right into your website. I suggest looking into doing that now if do not already have one setup.