RealTown's RealTalk

I just saw a thread that talked about using a blog instead of a website. There are so many advantages to a website that blogs do not offer.

1. Structure of a website versus blogs. There are very few blogs that have intuitive structures for real estate. What that means is that there is navigation and a hierarchy for the site. You cannot easily manage a blog to grow into a large site without navigation.

2. Dynamic navigation - this is fundamental to the visitors experience and ease of use. Websites should allow the ability for drop down or fly out navigation, not endless scrolling to find links on the left or right hand side. A good website will be organized and allow you to work on drop downs or sub pages. Blogs will never give you that.

3. That is it, sounds simple, but we have worked with both custom blogs used as a website and websites along with blogs. The custom blogs were not easy for the clients to work with if they used it as a website. Client had to come back to us every time they wanted to add a sub-page off the navigation, this was frustrating for everyone.

4. Always use a blog that has your unique domain name attached to it. Not a domain.com/yourname. This is not good seo practice and will never belong to you.

I had wondered if there was going to be a valid reason to only use a blog as a website and after working with the best blogs in the industry and trying to make them also work as a website, I would never encourage a client to do this. You need a website first, and then add a blog if you are going to keep it current. Nothing worse than going to a site that has information posted from 6 months ago.

Cherie Young
Online Marketing Strategies
www.CherieYoung.com

You said that better than me Rich! You must embrace the technology that is important to our business. Good website, perhaps a blog, excellent IDX if possible, and content!

Have a great 4th of July.

Cherie Young
Online Marketing Strategies
www.CherieYoung.com

I like the ease of what a website can offer for you to work with, primarily the navigation. You don't have that with blogs unless someone has programmed a navigation for you and it takes advanced knowledge to create a dynamic navigation.

I see agents using a blog as their online presence, and yet to find one that didn't have as much stuff crammed on it as possible.

Cherie Young

Hi --

Hi Peter,

Great domain name www.ourbroker.com. The biggest consideration in using a blog versus a website with dynamic navigation is how you present multiple items in one category. Your normal agent will want something that is easy to manage. To do the type of work that you have done on your site does take web savvy and sometimes agents just don't have the time, or don't want to learn how to do this.

You have alot of great content on your blog, and looks like you have thought through the structure.

Cherie

Editor's Note
Peter Miller and OurBroker have been around a long time.... from the earliest days of AOL....way back to the time when people read their e-mail by candlelight ;-)John

Hi --

"You have alot of great content on your blog, and looks like you have thought through the structure."

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Editor's Note
About 5 years ago at InternetCrusade we began to say and promote the idea that, "a blog is the website you always wanted." Why? with Web 2.0 tools a blog platform has the  capability to let your undiscovered talent and passion flourish and grow...and without the need for a developer or programmer. There are however, many aspects of online behavior, and predictive marketing that are not available in off the shelf blog platforms, but for many, a blog can be an effective component of a comprehensive and integrated marketing strategy. A blog, in and of itself, is not a marketing strategy.Saul