WebHomeUSABlog

Zillonoia 2, Zillonoids Hijack The Blog Carnival of Real Estate

The Blog Carnival of Real Estate #19 was published today, 11/20/06.  Zillow and the Zillow Blog sponsor the Blog Carnival.  Like most other members of The New Real Estate or Real Estate 2.0, Zillow is into openness. They even allow themselves to be trashed on their own sponsored Blog Carnival by Zillonoids and other competition phobic Realtors:

Zillow is not worth discussing any more. I agree ... we know that Zillow and their brethren AVMs - Cyberhomes, Reply!, eppraisal - are insufficient property valuation vehicles... we don't need to see any more examples or demonstrations.

Welcome to the new sport of "Zillow-Baiting".  But will trashing Zillow bring more traffic to your blog or to their site?  Remember, Trashers, you and Real Estate 1.0 are about "Location, Location, Location".  Zillow and Real Estate 2.0 are about, "Traffic, Traffic, Traffic".

Ever wonder why NAR didn't sponsor the Blog Carnival?  Where was the NAR, Realtor.com and other purveyors of The Old Real Estate, Real Estate 1.0, when we could have used a blog carnival?  Have you checked out the "blog" of our fearless leader, NAR President, Tom Stevens.  Does his blog enable track backs, comments or emails?  Guess. 

Zillow, started in 02/06, and the Zillow Blog soon after, are open to suggestions and outside input. They even try to dialog and reason with the unreasonable. Zillow even gives their trashers an Internet forum.

In my first CRS course the instructor gave us the quote, "Great ideas are first violently opposed by simple minds."  Zillow doesn't sell houses. Zillow sells ads.  Zillow makes money the new fashioned way, Like Google.  Get over it, Realtors.  Go sell houses.  Go fight the Banks, the DOJ, the FTC, the Discount Brokers, the IDX Websites and the Search Engines. 

Realtors, Brokers and Agents, will someday be the biggest advertisers on Zillow; but most of us don't know that yet.  Zillow and Google have to get the Local Search piece down,then Real Estate will be the entree into the even more profitable Local Search Ad Space. 

Zillow had a blog before the NAR, Move.com, and Realtor.com. Zillow sponsored the Blog Carnival of Real Estate.  Zillow did it for us and for free.  When was the last time the NAR, Move Inc., or Realtor.com did anything for you for free?

The NAR, 1.2 million strong, hopes to stifle competition with the new Democrat Congress by permanently banning banks from Real Estate.  Banks are in Life Insurance and Investments and I haven't heard of competition killing either of those industries.

Our organization can only use our buggy whips to beat off the Banks, the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, the Search Engines and Discount Brokers for so long.  It's hard to hit your competition when you have your head stuck "where the sun don't shine".

Zillow is the Poster Child for Real Estate 2.0.  Zillow will do more for Realtors in Real Estate 2.0 than the NAR, Move Inc., or Realtor.com will ever do for Realtors.  Zillow listens.  Ever try to contact the NAR?  Did you vote for "our" new President?

Will the NAR lead us into Real Estate 2.0?  Or will Zillow, Google or some other User-Friendly Search Engine lead us?  Guess who's got my vote.

As a Realtor I say: "Zillow, I'm truly sorry."

Zillow, forgive us, for we know not what we do.

Happy Searching.

WebHomeUSAblog; The Blog of Real Estate Search Marketing

The Eleven Commandments Of Highly Effective Real Estate Bloggers

The Eleven Commandments of Highly Effective Real Estate Bloggers:

1. Sub-Niche Strategy: You are already in a niche, Real Estate Blogging, now you need a sub-niche, an area of Real Estate, ie: Condos, First time buyers, FSBO's, NYC Real Estate, Real Estate Marketing, Home Search, Home Search Advertising, etc.  The more targeted your traffic, the more targeted your ads, and eventually the higher the ad revenue.  A good analytics program can tell you so much about who is coming to your site, what search words they used, where they're coming from and where they're going to.  Know Thy Audience.
2. Trusted Advisor/Expertise Strategy: You've found your place (your sub-niche). Now find your voice. Speak in one voice. If you haven't written to deadlines, or on a regular basis, you may find it hard to find the consistant voice your audience reads, recognizes and respects.  A big part of finding your audience is just that, finding your audience.  You'll write best about something your passionate about.  It's been recommended to me to spend 1/2 of the time on my blog reading other blogs.  Don't reinvent the wheel; just improve it; then put your own best spin on it.  At WebHomeUSA, Everybody's HomePage, we've taken the old saw, "KISS", "Keep It Simple Stupid" to new levels: "Keep It Clear and Simple Stupid" or "KIC-ASS"; and "Keep It Clear, Unique, Relevant and Simple Stupid" or "KIC-UR-ASS".
3. Posting Strategy: Regularly and Frequently (Post Early and Often): Newspapers are dailies, magazines are weeklies or monthlies, TV shows are on at 8PM Thursdays (Thursday is "Must See TV").  Once you have your place and your voice, you need your cadence, your beat and your rhythm.  Frequency is good, but Regularity is better; in Blog Posts too.  Your audience needs to know what to expect and when to expect it.  Typepad's Premium level even has a tool to publish your post at a future date.  With apologies to Mel Brooks and many other Jewish Comedians, "It's good to be Regular."
4. Post Headline Strategy: Each post needs its own permanent URL, or permalink.  (Many blog services, like Typepad, provide this automatically).  The post's heading becomes part of its permalink and page title.  The heading should be an action headline, like newspaper headlines. Headlines catch attention.  Don't even call a heading a heading anymore. Call it a "Headline".  Words have power.  Remember the old marketing guideline, AIDA: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.  Remember: Keyword-Heavy Headlines, too.
5. Link Strategy (External): Last week's Blog Carnival IX had a big lesson for me; I call the lesson: "The Missing Link".  The Carnival host forgot to make my post's permalink live.  From Monday 'til Wednesday, when the link did go live, I lost 2/3's of my traffic. (Most of my traffic comes from the first several days of the Blog Carnival.)  When you proof-read you need to proof-link too.  The Link has been called the greatest advance in communication of the last half century, greater even than the computer.  Link early and often.  Deep link whenever possible to the exact page of the reference.
6. Site Navigation Strategy (Internal Link Strategy): Make sure your Homepage and all your archives link on every page.  (Link early and often on your site too.)  Have you ever left a site because it was difficult to navigate?  If it's hard for them to find, it's always easier for them to leave.  I've heard it said: "If I can't find it in 2 clicks I'm gone."
7. Data Base Strategy: Content Is King.  Your blog should be a trusted database and essential reference site.  You want your audience to visit as often and to stay as long as possible.  You want to become virtually their virtual trusted and their virtual trusted adviser.  Your site shouldn't be just a collection of posts, but a readily accessible resource in your sub-niche.
8. Keyword Strategy: Google has defined Search.  Google Search is keyword-relevancy search.  If you want to be found on Google you need to play the Google Search Optimization Game (SEO, Search Engine Optimization).  Your posts like your Headlines need to be keyword dense.  A keyword-dense strategy can go too far.  Google and the other search engines can exclude you for "keyword cramming", but this is not just a liberal use of keywords.
9. Tag Strategy: I've separated this out from Keyword Strategy because this is what make Blogs great.  If you didn't know, Technorati is eating Google's lunch in the Blog Search category.  Basic keyword "relevancy" had little value for "recency".  Technorati Blog Search is very much about "recency".  In the Blogesphere it's very much about what have you written about me lately.  Technorati even has the category of "Most Recent Posts" about a tag.  In Google and the other Search Engine's efforts to keep up with the Technorati in the Blog Space, the Search Engines have added a "Recency" value to the algorithms giving Blogs a foot up on other Website.  (Why else would ZillowBlog.com have a Page Rank of 6, while it's parent site, Zillow.com, has a Page Rank of only 5?  ZillowBlog.com's home page changes almost daily changes.)  A Tag Strategy would be to add an RSS feed of ZillowBlog's most recent blog posts to Zillow.com's Home Page. Recency is why, "Search Engines Love Blogs."
10. Image Strategy: In a course I took, Blogging Boot Camp, by Windsor Media Enterprises, the goal for a blog post was "Three links and an image."  Striking images liven up your pages and get your site the "A" in "AIDA": Attract Attention.  Google has an Image Search Engine, and again you want it easy for Google and the other visual search engines to index your illustrations and make it easier to find you.
11. Dialog Strategy: As a child, my orthopedist had a sign in his office: The Eleventh Commandment: Thou Shalt not get thy cast wet.  The Eleventh Commandment for Bloggers is the essential of why Blogs are special.  It's all about the dialog.  Blogs are Websites where it's easy to post, easy to comment and easy to establish a dialog with your friends and all the friends you haven't met yet.  Don't be like Tom Stevens, NAR's President, with his blog I call "The UnBlog."  His blog makes him "The Blogger In Chief" of Realtors, but he hasn't enabled comments, trackbacks or provided any other way to dialog with him.  The biggest complaint about Realtors is that they never get back to you.  When you cultivate your audience, you cultivate what your advertisers will pay for.  This Blog Carnival is a great place to make friends and influence bloggers.  Link to other posts and sites and they'll return the favor.  If we continue to do this maybe the "Link" will become the greatest advance in communication since the printing press.

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