Hello:
I'm a new agent and am working on my website. I'd like to start blogging, since it's "all the rage" and wanted to get the opinion of some of you more experienced realty gurus.
I'm an extremely open and honest person, too much sometimes. I'd like to be open about being new in the real estate business. I wanted to open my blog with my introduction, etc., and include both personal (not too personal), news, real estate news etc. in my blogs. Do you think that I should hide the fact that I am new to real estate. I am working closely (really assisting) a more experienced and very successful realtor, but I'd like to also establish MYSELF out there. Any advice is much appreciated.
Lisa

Hi Lisa,

Interesting question! If you can exude confidence and a sense of humor about your rookie-hood, it just might work for you! And, hopefully you won't be "new" for too long. Something to think about though, is that if your blogs are google-worthy, your newness might last way longer than you want - I mean, a year from now someone might find your blog and still think you're a green bean agent.

I did not want to portray myself as a "newb" for the same reason Jennifer just mentioned - in Google I could be a Newb for the next three years.

Good point Jennifer. I wonder if I could keep it to a minimum and even remove early posts once I'm no longer new. I guess I won't come right out and ANNOUNCE that "Here I am, a new agent, come hire me." But I also don't have to necessarily go out of my way to make myself look experienced, which would be dishonest in my opionion. I think, at least in person, I could come across as confident enough not to feel that I have to hide it. Right now, I'm not doing a lot of face-to-face with clients, mostly phone and email contact. My associate does the showing etc. until I'm doing well enough to go full time into RE.

I've been assisting another realtor for a couple of months now. Two of our deals fell through due to financing issues but we have one this week that's good to go and four for September already set to close. So, I guess I'm almost "not new" Yay!

You don't have to disclose that you're new, and you don't have to pretend you're something you are not.

Remember that the customers aren't really coming to your blog to read about YOU - they are coming to find out about real estate info in your market. The majority of your blogs should be about your area.

Do be careful about trying to be a "newspaper" - you may get lots of hits when you post community service announcements but you may not attract CUSTOMERS - just people who want to go to the parade, participate in the fundraiser, etc. You should mainly focus on real estate related issues as they pertain to your market area - with a bit of this and that thrown in to keep it interesting.

No rule says you have to say "i'm a rookie" or "i'm an expert..."

Initially I would think you might be better off to skip the amount of experience. After you have some experience (for example business related awards or achievement recognitions) that a prospective client or customer might find confidence building then you could start to include it.

Lisa,

I am in the same boat as you. I've been an agent for just over a year and starting to build my website. My thought has been a periodic series of "My First Time ..." articles without date references written as memories. I am learning from the experienced agents in our office that your first time may be years into your license as easily as months into it. Just don't do a follow up that completely changes the outcome.

Great advise everyone. I really appreciate it. I found writing my adoption journal/website was fun and easy. This one scares me a bit, maybe because I have my future riding on it (well, partly anyways). I want to blog about real estate as much as possible and DEFINITELY keep the focus off me and on the market and homes and such. There are several subdivisions I want to focus on, so I'd like to mention them in my blog often so that I move up in the search rankings. I'm very new to this and do not yet fully understand how the search engines work. For now, I'll just do my best and see what works and doesn't work to drive traffic to my site. Thanks again everyone.
Good luck TxFred! I hope you're doing well in your "newbieness"

Dont bring it up. Why would you? Its simple marketing 101.

I would not tell people you are new unless they ask - if you're doing everything right though, they won't ask you if you are new at all An earlier commenter has a very good point with a blog post showing up 1-3 years from now, giving people the wrong impression. Instead, maybe focus on your bio with past experience & how that makes you the person to work with.

[quote=Perky_REALTOR]

Remember that the customers aren't really coming to your blog to read about YOU - they are coming to find out about real estate info in your market. The majority of your blogs should be about your area.

[/quote]

I agree with Perky 100% here. The blog should ALWAYS be customer-centric. The biggest mistakes I think most agents make is that they make everything all about themselves, whether it's life stories on their websites or billboards on the side of the road. As someone who has worked with many agents over the years, and bought a ton of houses, I can honestly say that when I visit a real estate website, I only care about things relating to my search. I could care less how many awards the agent is bragging about having won or when they started dating their significant other. It couldn't be less relevant to my transaction. One other point, I've never hired the same agent twice, so dare to be different and stand out from the crowd!


John from Boston