Katie Lance’s 8 Tips For Starting A Real Estate Blog

By Molly on October 26th, 2011

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We’re blogging live today from Inman News’ Agent Reboot where Inman’s Social Media Director, Katie Lance, took the stage to offer her expert advice on blogging for real estate (on a side note, she took the stage to Beyonce’s girl power anthem “Run the World”). Below you will find her eight tips for blogging success.

1. Make your blog the center of your social media universe

Create quality content on your blog and then use that content to feed your other channels – Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc. This way, if one of those networks dies off, you still have your blog.

2. Pick one day a week to blog and stick to it

Feel like you can’t start a blog because you don’t have time? Commit to writing one post per week, say, every Wednesday, and keep to that commitment. Readers will begin to look forward to your weekly update and check that site that same day every week.

3. Create a content strategy

You can’t just push content out there, you have to have a plan. Do you want to be the source for local information, businesses and events? Do you want to answer frequently asked real estate questions? Decide and work toward that goal.

4. Don’t under estimate what people don’t know

You are not just selling houses, you are providing information. Become a place people can visit for necessary, expert information.

5. Write for your clients, not your peers

The audience for your blog are home buyers and sellers, not other agents. Your blog should be a source of lead generation.

6. Share what you know

Struggling to come up with blog post ideas? Review a local restaurant. Share a success story. Heck, share a failure story. Share how you got into real estate. Share upcoming, local, special events.

7. Embrace themes

Photo Friday? Tip Tuesday? Yes, go for it.

8. Keep an editorial calendar

One of the best ways to stay on top of your blogging is to create a content calendar. Keep a schedule of what you will write about and when. You can even schedule the posts to publish on their own. The calendar will help you keep track of ideas, special events and holidays. Basically, it’s a life saver

Katie closed her session with a few key takeaways. First, creating content increases your know, like and trust factor, which is critical for real estate. You do not need thousands of readers for your content, you just need the right readers, the readers who meet your target demographic. Her final question to the audience was “Is your brand being represented by a cookie cutter website? Yes? Invest time into a blog and tell YOUR story instead.”