Guest Post: Phone it in: Blogs as SEO tools

When Jessica Swesey invited me to contribute to this blog, one of her comments to me was something along the lines of, "you sure do have a lot of blogs." It's true. In 30 months of blogging, I created blogs for all sorts of stuff. Politics, cars, our family's vacation home HOA, and more than a dozen others. While lenderama lives on, pretty much all of the rest have fallen to the wayside... except one.

The Denver Modern Homes blog was designed for only one reader, me. I like modern homes. I find myself cruising the MLS in search of them. Every once in a while, I find one worth posting about. But even then, I pretty much just say I like it, and then link to the real estate agent's Web site. Basically, I'm doing the equivalent of posting listings. In addition to my lack of effort in the posts I write, I also rarely update this blog -- 38 posts in 22 months. Sometimes more than a month goes by between postings. I do not maintain any sort of blogroll, I'm pretty sure I never claimed it in Technorati, nor did I commit much time in promoting it other than linking it in my signature on a few related Internet forums...

When it comes to the blog's level of design, I used one of the free templates from blogger.com. It's got sort of a modern feel to it, good enough. I will say that I did exert some minimal effort into the design by pasting a collage of modern home pics (my own) into the header. I also added some links to my other mariah.com sites, and a few RSS tools. I have maybe three hours into the design of this blog, at a cost of zero to me.

I'm bringing all of this up because of a conversation I had with a real estate agent last week. He said he really wanted to start a blog, but didn’t have the time. Well, I put less time into Denver Modern Homes every month than I do standing in line at Chipotle. I would never recommend this level of disregard for one's primary blog, but let's look at the results.

Google Denver Modern Homes, or Modern Homes in Denver, or Modern Denver, or even Modern Homes. How many real estate agents, specializing in modern homes, would like this kind of placement in these queries? On top of the good SEO, I get a couple hundred visitors a month. I've also conversed by e-mail with about a dozen readers who have asked for referrals, or had questions about these homes. On top of all of that, real estate agents contact me to get their homes placed on the blog. As a mortgage guy, having real estate agents knock on your door is a nice change of pace. I've even closed a few loans as a direct result of this site. All from a blog where my level of effort equates to someone who could of "phoned it in," so to speak.

Why has such a neglected blog been so successful? I think it's because in 38 posts, every one of them is on target. Every one of them fills a void in Google's eternal search for relevant content. I've said before that the the secret to being highly ranked in Google is to simply be the most relevant source on the topics you wish to be ranked on. It's unlikely you'll ever be well ranked for terms like "real estate" or "mortgage," but so what? The goal of any one real estate marketer should be to dominate the relatively tiny market niche that they know best. Because so few in that niche have any idea how to market online, even a minimal effort blog like Denver Modern Homes can be a player.

--Todd Carpenter - lenderama

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