ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: 5 Minutes Or Less
- 07/14/20 06:55 AM
5 minutes doesn't seem like a lot of time does it?
But 5 minutes or less can make big differences in how our customers perceive us and how we can get more done. You don't work two careers and be an unofficial zookeeper without learning a few things about productivity.
Prime example: It's almost time for new tires for one of our cars. Run flats for the SUV aren't cheap, so I'll shop around a bit, but it's not an overly complicated task. There just aren't that many tires that fit. At this point, you can go on Amazon and have them delivered … (9 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Press Release Blogging
- 05/26/20 11:57 AM
I love a good evergreen blog post. We have subdivision specific posts that quite a few years later still routinely bring us calls and clients. We have communities that we've done repeat business in and our ONLY source of business for those communities has been blog posts and IDX search pages on our Wordpress site. They get found and they lead to calls.
But I'm not going to write an evergreen post every day, and maybe not even every week. Why not? To be frank, sometimes I just don't have the motivation or time to knock out another subdivision post in the … (12 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Are You Untouchable?
- 05/19/20 04:15 PM
No, I'm not talking about Eliot Ness and his squad of agents.
Too often I find real estate agents are Untouchable, and not in a good way. If I (or even worse, a consumer) wanted to reach out to you to...oh I don't know...give you a referral?...there's no obvious way to reach you. Multiple clicks MAY get me to what I need, but face it, if you're in a market that hosts 1000's of agents, how hard is anyone going to work to find your contact info? The short answer? They're not. Neeeeeexxxxxxt!
So when you're working in the Rain, or on … (15 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Fully Exposed
- 05/12/20 02:37 PM
"You are about to enter another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind. You are about to enter the Internet." (okay, just a SLIGHT deviation from the original).
Now picture this, you're standing in the busiest place in your city. No social distancing required, plenty of people you know and plenty more you don't.
EVERYONE can see you.
EVERYONE can hear you.
Now expand the scene. It's not just your city that can see you, but everyone with an Internet connection can potentially see and hear you. Your blog, your Facebook, any social media outlet has that potentail to … (28 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: No Matter What You Think About Blogging, You're Right!
- 05/05/20 04:14 PM
Blogging is great for business!!!
Blogging is a complete waste of time! ActiveRain doesn't rank the way it used to and this has just become a time suck for me.
Whatever your opinion about blogging and ActiveRain, you're right!
You decide that blogging here doesn't work, it won't (FOR YOU).
It's true, you can't just put any post up like it's 2010 and rank page 1 within a few hours.
We're probably not going to have 7 of 10 long tail spots on Page 1.
A LOT has changed since the early days of ActiveRain.
There is a LOT more competition. ANYONE with a handful of dollars … (30 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Sending Your Audience Packing
- 04/28/20 01:53 PM
Someone I know on Facebook is a master with a camera and travels frequently. I don't get to travel as much as I'd like, so if someone posts some great travel photos, you've got my attention.
There's a BUT coming, but I'll save it for later.
There are gurus in our business that have some great messages.
There's another BUT coming, but I'll save that for later too.
There are some bloggers I enjoy, each with their own take on things.
And yet, another BUT.
BUT just like most things in life, there's a trade-off we agree to make.
I'm taking a limited commodity, TIME, and trading it … (17 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Is Your Niche Vulnerable?
- 04/18/20 05:41 PM
Niche blogging can be VERY powerful stuff.
Choose a good niche and execute your strategy and you can be THE agent people find and hire.
It's the difference between being a "generic" agent and someone perceived as a must-have specialist.
But, niches come with risks.
When you're identifying a niche there are some key factors to consider:
1. Is there a barrier to competition? If EVERY agent can easily do what you do, it's going to come down to which agent(s) is best at executing their marketing to get in front of consumers.
2. Is the niche something you ENJOY working? Me personally, I have ZERO desire … (22 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Black Dot Blogging
- 04/14/20 02:32 PM
Thanks to shelter-in-place requirements and a bit of a slow-down in the local real estate market, I've had some extra time to address some home projects. Among them is replacing a sillcock (outdoor faucet) with stripped hose connection threads.
The project is fairly easy thanks to an unfinished basement and a threaded connection to the water supply line. No soldering required, mostly just a matter of unscrewing the old sillcock and connecting the new one. The supplier of the sillcock did one little thing that made the job even easier. They marked the pipe with a black dot next to the threaded … (26 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Why Are You Here?
- 04/07/20 03:37 PM
Michael Jacobs gave me cause this weekend to revisit a post from 2011. What I saw was a snapshot into a different version of ActiveRain than exists for me now. Much more social, more conversation in the comment threads, and a post I'd written just for fun, not for business.
My purpose for being here has evolved over the years, much more business generating posts and far fewer just for fun type posts similar to that one.
What I also noticed is there were a lot of faces in the comment thread that have been absent for many, many moons from this community.
What I … (29 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: 10 Guidelines For Blogging
- 03/31/20 04:48 PM
One of the most difficult things about blogging (especially when you're first starting) is coming up with ideas for what to blog about. The sources are all around you. Vacations, consumer questions, other bloggers, a good picture you took. Once you have an idea (or 100), you might want to run them through some filters before deciding to hit PUBLISH.
How do you decide whether or not DELETE may be the best use for an idea?
Here are some general guidelines & filters you can use:
1. Who is your intended audience? Other agents or the public? Will the topic engage a sufficient number … (10 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Semper Gumby!!
- 03/24/20 01:30 PM
Back in my Navy days we had a saying: "Semper Gumby!". Perhaps a play on the Marine Corps saying of "Semper Fi" (which was short for Semper Fidelis), "Always Faithful".
So you can probably put two and two together to get that Semper is Latin for Always.
And unless you're of a certain age you might have no clue about Gumby, either in the original cartoon form or the Eddie Murphy version from SNL (I'm typing and realizing just HOW LONG AGO ALL OF THIS WAS!!).
Bottom line, Gumby was a very flexible guy, thus "Semper Gumby/Always Flexible!" makes a lot of sense for … (19 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: They're ActiveRain Members, To A Certain Degree
- 03/17/20 03:28 PM
ActiveRain is meant to be a social community.
If you think it's about SEO for your posts, well perhaps it used to be, but that's back in the day when ActiveRain management was willing to commit the resources to optimize the site. For the last several years, it's been fairly obvious that ActiveRain has a lot more competition for real estate ranking (think ZTR among others), so management basically "punted" on the whole SEO thing. SEO costs money and if you take a look around you know the bulk of the active people are working on a free account.
So with that … (32 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: What Are Your Reputations?
- 03/10/20 03:59 PM
You might think, "Hey, shouldn't you have asked "what IS your reputation?""
Well actually, no.
In a perfect world, we have one unified reputation. Good or bad, we are who we are.
But...
We have multiple places and audiences to form our reputations.
With my blog I have the opportunity to convince consumers with interest in Cincinnati patio homes that we REALLY know the niche. Then when they contact us I either make or break that reputation with the knowledge I bring to the table.
With my blog, questions asked and answered and commenting, I also have the opportunity to form a reputation with Rainers who may … (21 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: What's New In The Neighborhood?
- 03/03/20 03:36 PM
Keeping up with everything that goes on in my market can be a challenge.
I've got focused knowledge in certain communities, a broad knowledge about the overall market, and some really specific knowledge when it comes to our low maintenance living niche.
I've got sources that help me stay up to date.
If you haven't gotten to know a few key builder's reps in your area, you're missing a prime opportunity to get some inside knowledge that can prove VERY beneficial.
Where and when are the next communities going to be built?
They're rolling out a new model or two?
They're running a promo next month of … (16 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: What Story Do You Want To Tell?
- 02/25/20 04:07 PM
Blogging provides immense freedom.
While it's true that there are some topics we feel prudent to avoid, that slice of the blogging pie is VERY small.
Now when you hear "storytelling" you might think "once upon a time". Fiction and fairy tales and fables. But we don't need to limit storytelling to just the wild imagination, but can apply just as well to the factual parts of our lives.
Tell the right story in your marketing remarks for your latest listing and you just might attract more buyers than you ever expected. The right combination of great photos and great words create that positive … (9 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Market Reports Are For You AND The Consumer
- 02/18/20 07:29 AM
I've been a regular writer of market reports for years. The first of every month starts off with an overall Warren County snapshot (just a quick hit on the pulse of the market), followed by deep dives into various communities in my immediate county that we track.
We DO NOT write market reports about EVERY city in our county. Some cities aren't in our ideal market and lesson learned is don't blog about places and types of housing you do not want to work. Blogging works and you WILL get calls about foreclosures and rentals and $40,000 homes. Those aren't the most … (20 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Toning Out
- 02/11/20 12:09 PM
No, that's not a typo in the title.
We've all heard the saying about the written word being a flat medium.
You can't see my face, sense my body language, hear the up or down inflections in my voice.
It's much harder to detect I'm just messing with you, seriously torqued, or just being frank (and FRANKly some folks just can't handle direct).
So as a reader, you have a choice with every post and every comment.
What was the writer's intent?
And here's where the reader has to be careful.
What's next?
Provide the benefit of the doubt?
Or light the flamethrower and torch the earth?
Your amusing might … (22 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Does Your Performance Match Your Claims?
- 01/27/20 02:40 PM
A few years back my wife and I needed some housepainting done. The work included both exterior trim and interior work. Not the biggest job in the world but not the smallest. A friend highly recommended a painter and we hired him.
Ultimately the work got done, but the performance and attitude just didn't match up with the 5 star recommendation. The painter didn't make our list of contractors to recommend.
Flash forward a few years and buyer clients from out of town wanted some recommendations for painting their new patio home. We did some research and found two highly reviewed and recommended … (34 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: Why You May Be Wasting Your Time In The Rain
- 01/21/20 07:54 PM
Here in the Rain most people fall into one of two primary camps:
1. I'm here for business
2. I'm here to have fun
Now if you're fully in the 2nd camp, you can just skip out now because gaining business isn't your focus.
For the rest of you, if you're here there are some behaviors & activities to avoid if you want to gain business by gaining referrals or from home buyers and sellers, in no particular order:
Don't get distracted by points. Points don't pay the bills, clients do. The consumer will NEVER find the ActiveRain Leaderboard, and if they by some miracle stumbled … (25 comments)
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ask an ambassador: Ask An Ambassador: You're Surrounded!!
- 01/12/20 08:00 PM
I've been blogging for a few moon cycles and for many bloggers it can be a struggle to find ideas, so I'm going to give you an insider "secret" to blogging:
YOU ARE SURROUNDED BY IDEAS!
The challenge? To realize it and recognize the ideas as they present themselves.
The more attuned you are, the easier it gets.
Don't worry that someone else has already blogged about a topic. So what! They have a different audience, a different prespective, and a different way of writing. Do it your way!
I'm drafting this on Sunday, so let me take you through the blogging opportunities a typical Sunday … (14 comments)
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