[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN2I1pWXjXI[/youtube]

This video by CommonCraft does a great job of explaining how blogs have empowered everyone to create and publish their own “news” online. As a real estate agent, you may want to have several blogs: One about each neighborhood where you are an expert, for instance, and another one that just displays things that interest you. Really. Some of us spend ridiculous amounts of time creating newsletters to send to our sphere — let’s step it up!

The secret is that blogs are much easier to produce and to promote than that little newsletter. Our friends and family really are interested in our thoughts about random things as well as personal updates. That’s why they are our friends. And they will link to your blog and you should link to theirs. (A list of links to blogs you like is frequently called a “Blogroll.”)

The other great thing about personal blogs for real estate agents is that they give people who are considering working with you a candid look at who you really are. You already impressed them in some way — at least enough that they went looking for information about YOU. So give them what they want: an inside look (from a safe distance) of who you are when you’re not “workin’ it.”

My marketing hero, Seth Godin said it brilliantly: Turn “strangers into friends and friends into customers.”

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