All Entries Tagged With: "partnerships"
How Real Estate Blogging Should Be Done In A Down Economy
Real estate and mortgage companies are running scared, stopping their blogs, and cutting back on expenses. I understand. Things got rough out there, didn’t it? But why are you cutting your marketing budget when this is when you should be marketing your business the heaviest?
Did you know you can cut your marketing budget and still keep blogging daily? It’s true. And all you have to do is take a few partners.
Let’s say that you’re used to paying $400 per month for blogging (if you are then you probably have the wrong blog service provider). You’d think that by cutting that $400 expense out of your budget you’ll be saving money. In actuality, it will probably cost you money. How many of your phone calls come from people who read your blog? Have you asked? Chances are, if you are getting calls from your efforts online then your blog is playing a part in that. Why stop blogging?
Instead of cutting the expense out of your budget altogether, try partnering with complimentary businesses. You use a title company, right? Don’t you have a preferred mortgage lender? How about furniture rental companies? Moving companies? Real estate attorneys?
Think about all the relationships you have with complimentary services. Ask those companies if they’d be interested in partnering with you on a blog. If you took three partners (say, a title company, a mortgage broker, and a furniture rental company) and shared the expense for your blog then you’d only be paying $100 per month for the same service.
There are a couple of ways a blog partnership can benefit you as a real estate agent or broker. You can establish a mortgage and real estate blog, or something similar, and divide your posts up evenly between you and your partners, but that’s only partially effective. A second way to handle the blog partnership opportunity is to ask your partners to sponsor your blog. You promise then a banner ad on your blog in a highly visible location and one post per week with in-text links to their website to help them promote their service.
By taking sponsors this way you can stay in control of your blog and help out your business partners by having them pay you for their sponsorship, which you then turn and use to pay for your ghostwriting service. But don’t cut your blog out of your real estate marketing plan completely.
Blog Partnerships: How To Have A Ghostwritten Blog For Less $$
In a downward moving economy like today’s companies begin to look for ways to scale back on the budget. It’s a shame because one of the first things to go is marketing and there is no more important a time to market your business than when business is slow or declining. If you find yourself in the situation where you have to cut your marketing budget and you think your blog is going to be one of the things that you cut, let me tell you three reasons why you don’t want to do that:
- Search engine marketing – A blog is one of the most powerful search engine marketing tools you can have. One blog is far more effective than five static websites with no blog promotion. Yes, it’s a monthly expense, but it also keeps you in the forefront of search queries and without a blog your static site will just slide into oblivion.
- Branding – A blog is not only a good search marketing tool. It’s also a great branding tool. There is no other tool on the planet that can do as much to brand your company for less money than a blog.
- Credibility and Authority – A blog also gives you greater authority – with the search engines and with your human visitors. It’s a shame you might consider throwing that away for a few measly dollars each month.
But, hey, a budget’s a budget, right? We understand that. We really do. That’s why I have a suggestion for you. Instead of cutting your blog out of your budget altogether, why not take in a couple or three partners? By sharing the expense of the blog you can also share the benefits and your blog still will get posted to every day. It costs less than one dedicated blog, but it will still provide you with most of the benefits of a daily blog. Each blog post can be optimized for and link to either you or your partners and all of you can have sidebar links on your blog. It’s a win-win for all.
If I were to go the partnership route on a blog I would make sure of two things:
- No. 1, don’t partner with your competition. Instead, choose complimentary services and products that can benefit by sharing the marketing expense.
- Get your agreement in writing. Plain and simple. All parties should understand the nature of your contract.
Another way to go about the partnership plan for your blog is for you to take care of all expenses and seek sponsors. Ask your sponsors to pay a few dollars (RE: $10, $15, $25, or even $50 or $100) per month for the privilege of placing a banner on your blog and an occasional promotional post. I’ve done this on my blogs and it works like a charm. You don’t have to stop blogging altogether.
