Most in my office roll their eyes (or worse) when I mention the Internet, to the point that I have reversed course and mockingly tell everyone the web is a myth anything the subject of electronic prospecting comes up.
Some, however, believe there’s more to what we are doing on the Internet than some form of electronic voodoo. For them, I’ve developed a one-hour entry-level course on blogging that will make its debut Tuesday after our regular weekly sales meeting. A similar course will be coming to First American Title early in 2008.
Obvious questions include why I would feel the need to help the competition. Except the folks I’m meeting with don’t really constitute competition. I don’t mean that to sound as egotistical as it likely does, but you’re not going to learn enough in a one-hour primer to seriously challenge what I’m doing.
At the same time, for those who actually apply what I explain (which would be a first as based on the utter lack of response to the 2006 “web presence” classes I also taught in my office), the sky’s the limit.
Blogs, when done well (notice I won’t say right because I don’t believe there’s a right way … though I oddly enough believe there’s a wrong way. Makes sense only to me, perhaps), are remarkably sticky. They have value on the search engines. And they can give you a cache in your neighborhood almost no amount of postcards can match.
Best of all you don’t need to be a great writer. Those who can write tend to do so at length (and often overly at length, like me.) Those who can’t write as well focus on shorter posts with graphics and links. It’s not rocket science. It’s not all-consuming (though many of us find we spend more time on the blogs than we ever imagined.)
Most of all it’s not voodoo. It’s a concerted, focused marketing tool that can assist in areas from branding to prospecting to recruiting (for the brokers in the crowd.)
A dozen people are signed up for the initial go-around. If I can convert even one to the new world of real estate, I’ll consider the day a success.
