A Call to Action - Blogging is a Bona Fide Force

Last week on Transparent,  I sounded the call to action to Realtors about blogging - there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that blogs can soon potentially lock up Google's top page for local search keywords, i.e. "Your city real estate", based on blogs' powerful search ranking qualities. There are only 10 spots on that top page, and once they are taken, it will be tough for a new blog with little "Google juice" to displace a blog occupying one of the top ten. Those top ten Google spots per locale will in effect work like the "Yellow Pages" listings of the future, except they are organic and free.

And Realtors, there's more potential advertising space that have constraints. If you start a blog, you want your readers to subscribe and read your blog via a feedreader like Google Reader, Bloglines or Netvibes. Feedreaders were built for organized "economical" reading so a reader doesn't have sift through everything... by definition these feedreaders have limited space or they wouldn't be economical. Bookmarks, RSS and other tagging systems like del.icio.us are also space constrained.  Athol Kay left a recent comment that reflects the rapidly expanding real estate blogosphere:

 Finally, there's limited space on the blogrolls that other blogs use to promote your site.

Conclusion: Blogging as a real estate marketing paradigm now can't be ignored without consequence... and I'm guessing 90% of America's Realtors have no clue about the impending loss of this online "ad space". Real estate blogging has a proven first mover advantage in the race to occupy Google top page listings, feedreader slots and blogroll links. And as Athol confirms, critical mass of too many blogs is rapidly approaching... blogs that start up in 2008 will be facing a much greater uphill battle as literally thousands of blogs launch.this year (note Active Rain already has 20,000 members who will soon realize blogging's power).

Caution: a few real estate bloggers have commented on how competitive blogging might become as more blogs come online. Today on Transparent, I've addressed how new bloggers should understand that supporting the community and encouraging open communication, especially with fellow bloggers who may even be competitor agents, is the best way to develop their blog property. And it's up to the old timers to show them how.

Pat Kitano, Transparent Real Estate

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