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A Year's Worth of Real Estate Blog Ideas, 19
2007-09-20 21:55:00
  Part 19 in this list of real estate blog ideas covers everything from ­­­­­­­­& shy;­­­­­­­&s hy;­­­­the awesome gadgets you have lying around to planning a party for the new neighbors.  See how Real tors across the real estate blogosphere are giving content a unique spin with these 10 real estate blog ideas. 190 down, 175 ¼ real estate blog content ideas left to go! Read more »
More About: Ideas , Estate , Real Estate , Blog

BLOG services & pricing
2007-09-16 17:16:00
Real Estate Blog Pricing Setup: $999.99 Monthly Fee: $99.99 Description A professionally designed blog site will be developed and posted to the RSS Pieces Server as an extension of or replacement to an agency's or realtor's existing website. This blog site is intended to drive traffic and increase sales and internet visibility. The real estate blog site includes: Customized professional design Unlimited content pages Unlimited email address Multiple agent listing, bio, email and contact support Content Management System Unlimited MLS/IDX searches and listing pages with 1 Park Place (additional fees apply) Automated search engine optimization of content and listings Podcast/Vcast and Virtual Tour generation, publishing and hosting Zillow API integration Yahoo! Maps integration Yahoo! Neighborhood integration Mortgage calculators Local news and weather feeds Local attraction interactive mashup Competitive Market Analysis lead generation form E mail marketing RS...
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Real Estate Blog SEO Tip of the Week: Internal link relevance
2007-09-11 19:34:00
I guess the first question most people have is what the heck is an internal link on a real estate blog in the first place. So, here’s the short answer. Internal links on your blog are links from any page within the blog to any other page also within the blog. From a user standpoint, internal links help keep visitors on your site by suggesting other relevant pages within the site. You stand a better chance of converting a first time visitor to a regular reader if they read more than one article on your site in a single visit, so internal links are very helpful to users. However, internal links are also valued by search engines like Google. According to SEOmoz’ Search Ranking Factors Thesis, link popularity within a site’s internal link structure is of exceptional importance to search engine’s algorithms.  Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Blog Marketing , Link

How to rate a real estate blog against your competition
2007-09-03 00:55:00
Just in case you ever wondered how to go about the process of figuring out if your totally awesome real estate blog or website kicks your competitor’s butt, there is one free online tool that stands heads and shoulders above the rest. Now, to give you a little background on Website Grader, it was recently named one of PC Magazine’s 100 Top Undiscovered Websites.  This tool gives you just about everything you need to know about how well your blog is SEOed and how it ranks for your common keywords against another Realtors. It will become an invaluable tool for the Realtor looking to constantly spank other local real estate blogs in your area. Website Grader www.websitegrader.com By Kyle Monson Want to find out how effective your blog or Web site is at snaring all-important search traffic and inbound links? Submit your URL (and your competitors' URLs) to Website Grader, which gives you some basic feedback ...
More About: A Real Estate , Estate , Real Estate , Competition , Blog

Generate leads from testimonials on your real estate blog in 5 simple steps
2007-08-28 00:09:00
Any good Realtor knows that word of mouth marketing through testimonials is by far the best, easiest and cheapest way to grow your business. So, how to do you leverage those precious little words from your most valued former clients into new business?  Your real estate blog or website is the perfect opportunity for you to spin those testimonials into gold, but so often I see the hapless Realtor shuttle these words of wisdom off to a Testimonials Page that is rarely, if ever, read.  Check out this fool proof method to using your past clients references to build new business in 5 simple steps. Read also: 5 Tips for Knockout Testimonials Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Leads

Heading Tags and Search Engine Optimization
2007-08-20 20:22:00
  What is A Heading Tag? Heading tags are used to describe the structure on a page, simplify page navigation for readers and to ultimately do what it is supposed to do, allow search engines to crawl your site to find relevant keywords to be shown properly in search results.  Heading tags range from <H1> to <H6>, when using an <H1> tag this "simplifies the highest level of hierarchy in a post", the lower the number, the less important it is to search engines.  These tags should be used wisely and not be manipulated, they support the pages overall keyword theme.  Let's take a look at what heading tags look like: Read more »
More About: Search Engine Optimization , Search , Search Engine , Optimization , Tags

Real Estate Blogs and Reciprocal Linking Penalties: Does Google hate your L
2007-08-18 15:09:00
Google very well may be hatin’ on your real estate blog link love. If you and your Realtor friends from across the country exchange links regularly in a blogroll or a links page, you very well may get your site penalized by Big Daddy G. Just look at the curious case of John Sabia, a Fort Lauderdale real estate agent who admittedly was manipulating rankings with reciprocal linking and was struck down in a blaze of search engine glory by Google’s reciprocal linking penalty. While John has successfully completed his reformation from a gray hat SEO, reciprocal linking, rank manipulating engine bully to a white hat SEO angel of a webmaster, according to SEOmoz expert, Rand Fishkin, he is likely to spend up to 5 months climbing out of Google’s penalty box. Ouch. Read more »
More About: Google , Estate , Real Estate , Blogs , Hate

Using porn to sell houses: autopsy of a real estate blog that blows (litera
2007-08-17 01:57:00
For those of you that think the following post is harsh. I apologize, however, I feel that if I can save one Realtor or Mortgage Broker from this type of black hat SEO, a ban from Google or, worse yet, unknowingly committing a crime, I will suffer the few readers I may lose by posting this. NOTE: NSFW means Not Safe for Work, so you can assume explicit images or language. I would not normally put photos or language like this on our site, however I think all Realtors should be aware of the consequences of installing an open forum with no moderation or spam filters. Interested in driving huge search traffic to your real estate blog? Create an open forum with no moderation or spam filters and just watch your indexed pages in Google climb, then sit back and wait until your traffic numbers climb into the stratosphere. Just look at how this Realtor added an open forum and has over 2500 indexed pages in Google.  Amazing, right? They also probably have a ton of...
More About: A Real Estate , Estate , Real Estate , Houses , Blog

What are search engine friendly urls and permalinks for real estate blogs?
2007-08-14 16:07:00
Interview with Search Engine Optimization Expert, Matt McGee For those of you that don't know the name Matt McGee yet, he became a regular on the SEO speaking circuit in 2006, with speaking gigs at the Search Engine Strategies conferences in San Jose and Chicago. He's a columnist for Search Engine Land, a contributing writer at Search Engine Guide, and a moderator on the Small Business Brief forum. He posts regularly on various industry blogs and forums (often under the nickname “pleeker”). He's actually so famous that he's been interviewed by the Wall Street Journal, Search Engine Watch, and a variety of other outlets.  So, when it came to explaining what makes an SEF url/permalink, I thought why not ask an expert to give his deep thoughts on the matter.  Another reason I felt Matt would be a perfect subject for this piece is that his wife is a Real Estate Agent, so he is extremely connected to SEO in the real estate space.  So, without further ado......
More About: Real Estate , Blogs

The Ten Commandments of Blogging and Commenting
2007-08-03 13:22:00
I’ve seen a lot of bad behavior lately in the blogosphere, so I want to remind everyone how to behave properly and play nicely. I’m not going to name names or point fingers, but if you’re guilty, you’ll know it. Unless, of course, your conscience is either broken or on vacation. In that case, you should probably just move along to the next site that you visit daily, because clearly, I cannot help you! For more commandments geared towards commenting, I recommend that you check out Brown Baron’s Ten Commandments of Blog Commenting . In the meantime, here's my set of rules for getting along in blogland:   Read more »
More About: Blogging , Blogg

A year?s worth of real estate blog ideas, 18
2007-08-02 21:22:00
Part 18 in this list of real estate blog ideas covers everything from ­­­­­­­­& shy;­­­­­­­&s hy;­­­­Equity Acceleration programs to being a blogging buddy.  See how Real tors across the real estate blogosphere are giving content a unique spin with these 10 real estate blog ideas. 180 down, 185 ¼ real estate blog content ideas left to go!   Read more »
More About: Ideas , Estate , Real Estate , Blog

Real Estate Blog Term of the Week - Trackbacks
2007-08-01 20:44:00
Think of this as the Blog -tionary. Each week, I’ll give you a new term so you can broaden your horizons and enhance your vocabulary.   You’ll need a larger vocabulary anyway, to go with your fabulous new grammar skills. Plus, now you’ll be able to talk tech at your next family function, and truly earn yourself the title of “My Cousin the Computer Geek”. This week’s term: Trackbacks   Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Week , Real

How to generate leads from your real estate blog: we have proof
2007-07-26 13:41:00
Ever wonder how you generate leads from your real estate blog or your website for that matter? Well, it ain’t rocket science, it’s simple strategy involving quality blog design that leads visitors right to your most useful content, tools and lead generators coupled with quality content that will interest search engines and provide useful information to consumers.  What can you reasonably expect in terms of lead generation from your real estate blog? Laurie Manny’s 5 month old blog, www.longbeachrealestatehome.com,  generates qualified leads daily. Why? Because she writes content people want to read, SEOs content so it is easily found by search engines, sits at the top of search engines for all her major keywords and uses tools that not only capture leads effectively but are useful to real estate consumers. Laurie’s average daily lead generation from her blog is between 1-5 leads per day. Why? Because she uses the proper lead capt...
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Leads , Proof

RealTyger: the other other real estate desktop and social network
2007-07-24 17:12:00
About six months ago, I teased readers with the idea of what we’ve been building for RealESpace, a high powered social network and a real estate desktop through which you can manage your entire online presence and your back office. Well, we’re finally ready to unveil this super secret project we call RealTyger at Inman in San Francisco this August. The official launch is scheduled for September 1,2007, but we figured Inman should get the very first peek at our system. What is RealTyger? RealTyger, first and foremost, is a cache of online real estate tools designed to completely manage your online presence from SEO and listings to lead generation and drip campaigns. It also offers the kinds of tool options that have thus far been missing in the industry like wholesale mortgage widgets and single point of entry listing management.  On the flip side, RealTyger is also a free blogging service/social network for elite real estate professionals to co...
More About: Social , Estate , Desktop , Real Estate , Network

How to Write Flagship Content for Your Real Estate Blog
2007-07-23 17:46:00
How do you make your real estate blog a must read, a must revisit and/or a must subscribe to visitors on their very trip to your site? Simple, you have Flagship/Cornerstone content available to them from the very moment they arrive. Basically, just like the anchor store in your local mall, you need to have a few pieces of content that stand leaps and bounds above the rest in terms of search engine juice, usefulness, and overall emotional engagement. This content needs to be easily accessible from every page of your site so you can draw readers deeper into your real estate blog and share your most useful information readily. What is Flagship/Cornerstone Content ? Flagship/Cornerstone content should actually make a readers life better, richer, easier, faster… Something that they search for in Google to find you by or something that directly benefits them. According to CopyBlog ger, Cornerstone content is “something that is basic, essential, indispensable...
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Write

A year?s worth of real estate blog ideas, 17
2007-07-18 21:22:00
Part 17 in this list of real estate blog ideas covers everything from writing a local bug guide to asking St. Joseph to help sell your house.  See how Real tors across the real estate blogosphere are giving content a unique spin with these 10 real estate blog ideas. 170 down, 195 ¼ real estate blog content ideas left to go! Read more »
More About: Ideas , Estate , Real Estate , Blog

Real Estate Blog Term of the Week - Backlinks
2007-07-16 20:18:00
Think of this as the Blog -tionary. Each week, I’ll give you a new term so you can broaden your horizons and enhance your vocabulary.   You’ll need a larger vocabulary anyway, to go with your fabulous new grammar skills. Plus, now you’ll be able to talk tech at your next family function, and truly earn yourself the title of “My Cousin the Computer Geek”.  This week’s term: Backlinks   Broken down, backlinks are links to your site from other sites. The links I used here are backlinks. I used them to reference information that I thought was pretty nifty, and when you click on them, they help the other sites in the search engines. How nice of me!  You have to have a good solid strategy for building links from other sites back to yours or else you can pretty much kiss climbing the SERPs “bye bye.” Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Week

Real estate Blog SEO Tip of the week: Keyword Use in Domain
2007-07-14 20:55:00
A recent panel of experts debated Search Ranking Factors on SEOmoz and determined that search engines hold the inclusion of keywords or terms in the registered domain name, i.e. capecoralrealestate.com as important. So, be sure to include keywords in your domain name. Search engines love keyword rich domains.   Keyword s specific to real estate are: your farm area, home, homes, home sales, house, condo, real estate, realty, rent, rentals, estates, etc. You can buy your name as a domain, but using it for your primary site isn’t useful from an SEO standpoint.   If you want a URL with your name in it use it as a redirect to a site with more SEO pizzazz so you can leapfrog out of the Google Sandbox and the domain itself is easier for the general public to remember. Since I don’t expect you to take my word on any matter, here is some research material on the subject of keyword use in domain names authored by “real” experts: Read also: ...
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Domain , Blog

A year?s worth of real estate blog ideas, 16
2007-07-12 18:04:00
Part 16 in this list of real estate blog ideas covers everything from awful staging to Open House etiquette.  See how Real tors across the real estate blogosphere are giving content a unique spin with these 10 real estate blog ideas. 160 down, 205 ¼ real estate blog content ideas left to go!   Read more »
More About: Ideas , Estate , Real Estate , Blog

What Makes a Great Realtor? Our Story of Buying a New Cape Coral Home
2007-07-12 03:01:00
I must preface this post that while I may be in the real estate blogging industry, I am just a lowly consumer when it comes to buying and selling real estate. In fact, I am not a Realtor, I do not work in real estate and I am just barely capable of figuring out my mortgage. However, over the past few months, my husband, John and I have been looking for a new place to hang out hats in Cape Coral , FL. For those of you that do not know Cape Coral, FL. It is a BUYERS market: home values have slumped considerably, inventory has climbed and sales have come to a crawl. So, we looked and looked, mostly online, because, well, we are big old geeks and didn’t want to waste a Realtor’s time until we found something we LOVED.  Read more »
More About: Buying , Story , Home , Great

Chillin? With Joe, Rudy and the Blog Tour RV
2007-07-11 16:47:00
  Yesterday was an exciting day here at RSS Pieces.    We finally got to meet the much-anticipated Joe and Rudy of Sellsius when they stopped in as part of their Blog Tour USA. We laughed, we cried, we had other strange emotions, and all in all, it was a pretty unproductive day! But we did have fun, and we met two really cool guys. Here’s how the events unfolded: Read more »
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Is Writing Quality Real Estate Blog Content Like Pulling Teeth?
2007-07-07 21:53:00
The term “quality content” is so over used in the real estate blogosphere that I think we have actually become desensitized to exactly what it is. Quality content for the real estate consumer or potential consumer is more about providing them with useful, entertaining and relevant information than penning post after post of market reports. Remember, these are real people reading what you have to say, so you have to make it interesting while at the same time useful to both the human visitor and the search engine crawler. So, let’s break down the components of quality content and how your real estate blog can use them to build readership and leads. Read more »
More About: Writing , Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Content

Increase Daily Traffic to YOUR Real Estate Blog
2007-07-05 17:27:00
Often I get the question from clients "How do I increase my traffic on my real estate blog?" Well, there are many ways to do this, and the latest tool I have tried is MyBlog Log. This is a social networking site that was created by two guys that live here in Florida. It’s a great way to market your blog while making new contacts. Although there are many other sites out there such as Digg, Reddit, Technorati and deLicio.us, MyBlogLog offers some pretty cool features.   Read more »
More About: Daily , Estate , Real Estate , Traffic

Happy Fourth of July!
2007-07-04 16:46:00
Today in 1776 John Hancock became the first person to sign the Declaration of Independence, making July 4th our nationally celebrated Independence Day. The first Independence Day celebration actually occurred on July 8, 1776 in Philadelphia. The Declaration was read aloud, crowds cheered, city bells rang, and bands took to the streets. In 1941, Independence Day was officially declared a legal holiday. Modern-day Independence Day celebrations include fireworks, family picnics and a general show of patriotism.  From all of us at RSS Pieces, have a safe and wonderful Fourth of July !  And don't hurt yourself with the illegal fireworks you're setting off in the backyard.
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Is the Blogroll on Your Real Estate Blog Damaging Your Street Cred?
2007-07-03 15:41:00
Contrary to popular belief, blogrolls are not good. It might seem like a nice gesture to give props to your blog-buddies on your site, but you’re only hurting yourself where it really counts. Yes, building relationships is important to maintaining an image for yourself, but you really need to make your mark on the search engines.  And the search engines don’t like your blogroll. Read more »
More About: Blogroll , Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Street

A year?s worth of real estate blog ideas, 15
2007-06-29 17:06:00
Part 15 in this list of real estate blog ideas covers everything from bank auctions to Real Estate tips for the newlyweds.  See how Realtors across the real estate blogosphere are giving content a unique spin with these 10 real estate blog ideas. 150 down, 215 ¼ real estate blog content ideas left to go! Read more »
More About: Ideas , Real Estate , Blog

Real Estate Blog Term of the Week - Permalinks
2007-06-27 17:20:00
Think of this as the Blog -tionary. Each week, I’ll give you a new term so you can broaden your horizons and enhance your vocabulary.   You’ll need a larger vocabulary anyway, to go with your fabulous new grammar skills. Plus, now you’ll be able to talk tech at your next family function, and truly earn yourself the title of “My Cousin the Computer Geek”. This week’s term: Permalink Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Week , Real

Real Estate Blog SEO Tip of the Week: Keyword Use in Body Text and Overall
2007-06-27 00:59:00
Keywords, those pesky little terms that visitors use to search you out in Google by, are critical to your real estate blog. But, the key to selecting quality keywords is not just to include those terms in your meta tags you’d like to be searched by, but to also include those terms in the body of your real estate blog posts as well. According to SEO experts over at SEOmoz, Keyword Relevance to Body Text (the topical relevance of text on the page compared to targeted keywords) is highly important to search engines. They consider that factor greatly when trying to determine how well your real estate blog will show in their indexes for common search terms included in your meta tags. Read also: SEOmoz’s Search Ranking Factors V2 Read more »
More About: Estate , Real Estate , Blog , Keyword

Are you Looking Down the Long End of a Cybersquatting Law Suit?
2007-06-24 19:47:00
Ever buy a competitor’s domain or one extremely similar to it or even a misspelled version, then redirect that site to your own? If so, you very well may be looking at a law suit. Because I see it happen quite a bit in the real estate blogosphere, I thought I’d do a little research and explain the low down on cybersquatting so you can evaluate whether you are squatting on someone else’s property or if someone is trespassing on yours. Read more »
More About: Long , Cybersquatting , Look , Suit , Squat

Sunday Fun: American Idol Sweetheart, Baby V, Takes on RSS Pieces
2007-06-24 14:39:00
For those of you that may not know too much about RSS Pieces and our parent company, Fueled Software, we actually do quite a bit outside of the real estate blogging space. With more than 120 blogging clients from industries as varied as real estate, engineering, banking, ecommerce and entertainment, we know a thing or two about how to make blogging work for anyone or any company. Up to this point, we’ve never really felt the need to “out” our higher profile clients publically on this blog.  However, that all changed when Melodic Records walked through our door with none other than Baby V (AKA Vonzell Solomon) of American Idol , Season 4. Read more »
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