I often get into discussions with agents who get frustrated with their blog site because they can’t think of anything to say. Actually there’s a lot that you can say and have fun with it as well. I have a video overview that you can see to get a feel for what this seminar is all about:

20 Types of Dynamic Blog Posts

Just follow any of these 20 dynamic blogging post tips and have fun with your blog site.

Quick. Who is the largest bookseller in the world? If you said Amazon, you’re right. But the key point is why. The largest bookseller for decades has been Barnes & Noble (established in 1873). Yet Amazon was only established in 1994 in Jeff Bezos’ garage. Why the huge surge in sales by Amazon? We call it the “Long Tail Theory”, based upon the book of the same name by Chris Anderson.

Wikipedia puts the explanation of the “long tail theory” this way: “The Long Tail or long tail refers to the statistical property that a larger share of population rests within the tail of a probability distribution than observed under a ‘normal’ distribution. This has gained popularity in recent times as a retailing concept describing the niche strategy of selling a large number of unique items in relatively small quantities – usually in addition to selling fewer popular items in large quantities.

In other words, because of store space, Barnes & Noble could only sell the more competitive or popular books. Amazon however realized that by using the Internet as a warehouse, they could pull from the most obscure books, thus giving them more sales.

How does this effect real estate agents and their website rankings? Consider the fact that you live in Denver, and you want to be found by the search engines under “Denver real estate” or “Denver homes”. The odds of this happening today are 23.8 million to 1 or 30 million to 1 respectively. However if you instead focus on the “minor” keyword phrases that are requested, you can much more easily get found on the 1st page of Google. For example “Denver luxury condos” is 1.92 million to 1 and “homes for sale in metropolitan Denver” is only 165 thousand to 1. While these numbers still may seem out of reach, we find with our firm anything within 3 million is easy to catch within a few months.

Now it’s getting personal, as well it should be.  I’m referring to your real estate education.  For the longest time, boards, associations, real estate companies, and franchises would hold “sage on the stage” training for large groups of attendees.  While I laud these efforts and feel that there is nothing that can beat being able to have a one-on-one communication with the speaker, education is changing.  It’s getting more personal.

With the advent of the webinar, literally hundreds of new topics and sessions are available on a monthly basis and at very affordable rates.  The other advantage of the webinar is that of convenience.  It can be taken from home, from the office, or wherever you are.  Another advantage is that they are typically recorded, so you can retake the session over and over again.  Actually, the webinar has many different uses, such as:

1. As a “trailer” or video to assist the potential attendee to know who the speaker is and what will be taught
2. As the education itself for a particular topic for many people
3. As a coaching device for a more intimate group of people who can ask questions of the coach
4. As an instructional tool to show and explain how something is done on the computer such as using Facebook, blogging, etc., where the viewer and “coach” both see the same screen.
5. As a recording device.  Sometimes you just want to get a message across or record a problem that you’re having on your computer.  If you have access to webinar software, you can record your message or the problem that you’re having and send the file off to tech support to give them a better idea of what is wrong.  By the same token, you can do this in reverse, where tech support invites you into the webinar and you then take control to show the problem.

With video editing software, music, voice-overs, and special effects can now be incorporated into the “show”.  Much of this type of software such as Microsoft’s Windows Movie Maker comes free with the operating system.  Other software programs of this nature are either free or inexpensive on the Internet.  I like to use inexpensive Vegas Movie Studio to edit everything from webinars to professional videos.  While it takes a little practice, the ability to “layer” video, sound, voice-over, transitions, and text are only limited by your imagination.

Finally, you don’t have to wait for the topic of your choice to come to your town or office to be presented.  Go to the REALTOR® Learning Library’s Webinar Center at the following address: http://tr.im/Ashy.

Yep, now it’s getting personal.  You can now personalize your education to what you want, when you want it.

Not too long ago I got a call from a very large franchise real estate company with a concern that I hear too often, “Our own agents are ‘stealing’ all our leads on the Internet.  What do we do?”  As is typical with large real estate companies and franchises, they are trying to be all things to all people.  They cover such wide metropolitan areas, and, in many cases, they cross state boundaries, that they get crowded out by their agents who are more nimble and use more targeted approaches to getting found.

The Target Concept

The Target Concept is simple: stop shooting one arrow at the target, hoping to hit the bullseye, rather, shoot as many arrows as you can at the target and try to get as many groupings as close to the bullseye as possible.  In other words, don’t try to get found by those tremendously competitive keyword phrases like “Denver real estate,” but by several minor keyword phrases that you can get on the first page of the search engines.

This is one of the few industries where the “worker” can actually take advantage of the boss by being smarter and more nimble.  Try searches in your area for “Location real estate” and see how many of the major players are on the first page.  I’ll bet there are a bunch.  Now, try more targeted keyword phrases like “Location luxury homes for sale,” “short sale Location condos,” or “Location foreclosure properties.”  You’ll find very few of the major players here, because they can’t cover it all.

Make Your Title STOP IT!

Did you know that there are many common words that the major search engines don’t even index because they are so common?  I’m talking about more than words like “a”, “the”, and “my”.  I’m also talking about numbers and words like “therefore”, “somewhat”, “Microsoft”, etc.

Why is this important to know?  Because, “It’s in your title, Stupid”

Your title is one of the most important parts of your website.  When you putgood keyword phrases into your title, they get picked up by those that are typing in a search term in any random order.  In other words, your title of “My Denver Real Estate and Luxury Homes For Sale” fits perfectly with at least 30 different search phrases including “All home sales in the Denver real estate area.”  Even though the words “all”, “in”, “the”, and “area” are not even in the title, they are “stop words” and not seen by the search engines.  Further, the words “home” and “sales” can be interchanged with their plural/singular counterparts.

Target Your Prospect Searches

So, how do you know what your best keyword search terms are?  Well, it would be helpful to know what your prospects are typing into the major search engines, and, of course, the largest search engine is Google.  Google is highly invested in knowing how many people are searching what phrases.  Best of all, they share this information with the public.  This tool, called Google Adwords Keyword Tool is free and will concoct all sort of various keyword search just by putting in simple searches like “Denver real estate.”

Focus on these effective targeted keyword phrases, and you will be taking out those big, old, beasty lions in no time!

1. Lines and Linework

These terms refer to borders, frames, and rules, and do not refer to pen-and-ink or pencil sketches. Yes, I am talking about actual lines here. Horizontal or vertical, thick or thin, regular or irregular, they help define and delimit spaces around various elements on your pages. Good linework increases both the readability and “directionality” (see #5, below) of the design as a whole.

2. Shape

Most people don’t think about this, but any enclosed area, form, or contour in your design is a shape. Shapes in most layouts are square or rectangular, but nothing says they must be, and circles are useful, too. You can also use images to create other, regular or irregular, shapes. In addition to shapes, I’ll include here “white space”, or the lack of shapes. White space can be just as effective as lovely graphics and shapes.

3. Texture

One thing that custom sites have over the typical template design website is the addition of texture. Texture imparts a “surface” feeling, and is tactile in printed matter, so choosing the paper stock — matte, weave, coated, etc. — is a design decision, too. Textures on layouts meant for broadcast or the Internet are visual only, but still key. Most textures do not add to the drag of drawing the website, as most textures are implemented in “chunks”, or in pieces that are fitted together.

4. Color/Branding

Color and branding go hand in hand. You need to know what your colors and thus your brand is ahead of time, before starting on your website. Color is probably the element that most designers are at least acutely aware of, if not schooled in. However, color is not a requirement in many designs, and some art educators suggest creating a design without any color first. The artist, in this view, should then add only as much color as needed to enhance or complete the design. Another school of thought holds that color should be one of the first elements determined. Experience and experimentation will help every artist develop a good color sense and strategy.

5. Direction

Effectively designed layouts, in magazines or on your computer screen, usually have a sense of motion. A good design will lead the reader’s eyes through the design deliberately, using color changes, shapes, linework, and copy placement direct viewers’ attention to what the designer wants them to see.

Here’s a good test for your website, as well as others’. Open up your website and close your eyes while it is loading. Now, open your eyes and pay attention to a couple things.

• Where did you eyes go first
• Where did they go second, third, fourth, etc.
• At which places did they not look

You’ll need to be very practiced in this as your eyes will tend to race over the website. You should only concentrate on 4 or 5 main focus points. More than this will dilute your effectiveness.

Finally, pay attention to what your competition is doing and improve upon their design. It’s amazing how many good ideas you can get from your competition, and your sites will not even look similar if you are changing up your design elements.

How many of you have dismissed Facebook because you think that it’s just a time-wasting social swamp? Well, actually, Facebook has some of the most powerful business tools that you can imagine, if you know how to use them correctly. As a real estate speaker and dealing with real estate SEO on a daily basis, I can tell you that I have some powerful secrets to share for how to make your Facebook more “business friendly”.

Take a look at this introduction:

View more about “Building a Facebook Business” at www.webstarget.com/webinars