Starting a Real Estate Blog: Remember These 4 Best Practices

Maybe you are just starting a blog? Or maybe you have had a blog and you feel like you need a fresh approach? Regardless, there are best practices that every real estate pro should remember when it comes to blogging.

Here are four tried and true blog principles that will always guide you in the right direction.

Know your purpose.

Before you define what the purpose of your blog will be, it’s important to define what the purpose of your blog will be to your business.

You want to be happy with what you’re paying for, right? If you don’t really know what you’re expecting from your blog, then you probably won’t be. I can tell you now that a blog will not magically generate dozens of leads for you overnight. However, it will help your business stay relevant.

Google’s algorithms are advanced, and regularly indexing websites based on the new content they are generating. This can be content that’s being created by other websites about a company, or new content a company itself is creating. Regardless, you need to be creating new content that’s being shared and discussed to stay relevant. While blogs can be monetized and used in other ways, in their simplest form a blog is a way to stay relevant and convey who you are as a brand. Remember that.

Once you figure out what purpose your blog is going to serve, it’s time to pick what your niche will be. What topics will you cover? How often will you post (realistically)? What service will you provide to your readers? How will your blog be different?

Have something special to say, and say it uniquely.

Have you ever Googled “staging”? Although we haven’t counted the number of articles online about it, the number is literally in the thousands. For the most part they all share the same “duh” information in a vanilla voice that brings nothing new to the table.

While it’s important to cover trending topics and things people are asking about online on your blog, it’s important to take your own spin on things. Have a point-of-view and have a voice.

Think about your agency’s specialties: What do you know better than anyone else? How can you use this unique point-of-view and expertise to serve others and create new content with new perspectives?

Keep the quality high, strategized and consistent.

Think quality over quantity. A blog that only generates two to four new, high-quality posts per month will do you more good than a blog that acts as a daily feed for listings.  While a blog is a great place to share major company accomplishments and record-breaking sales, it is not a place to post every new listing. Pick a monthly frequency for publishing your blogs, pick a day and time of day and stick to it.

Along with posting frequency, keep your branding consistent. The voice of your blog, the style it’s written in, the heading sizes, text colors, photo sizes etc. should be the same, or at least similar blog-to-blog. A follower should know what to expect from your content.

Make it work for your overall marketing strategy, not against it.

Your marketing strategy should work as a connected machine. Each part should help another part, simplifying and streamlining workflow; all while aiding messaging that is consistent across your marketing assets. Integrate your blog into the other parts of your marketing mix. Include your blog posts in your newsletters, use them as content for social media, promote them on LinkedIn, and correlate your blog topics to be similar to the topics you are guest posting and pitching to other media. Your overall message and voice should be consistent across all assets.