Even though your Online Brand Management needs to start with a domain that is owned and operated by you, this section will focus on various networks you are able to create content on. In the previous post, I mentioned there are numerous social networks that are geared for the real estate industry. I highlight three attributes you should look at when judging a social network. Let’s start with:
- Whois: Whois data can be found anywhere. This data will show you the who, when, and where of a domain. You can see who owns it, when the domain was created, and where it is located.
- PR: Page Rank is a Google component that shows the popularity of a domain based on the number of inbound links to that domain. The logic behind PR is the site must be popular because people are linking to it. PR is affected by the number of inbound links as well as the quality of the sites themselves. Some say PR doesn’t matter much anymore and they are partly correct. When looking at PR, take it with a grain of salt and use it as a simple indicator of authority based on the number of inbound links.
- nofollow: Nofollow is a linking attribute used to control the “link juice” or “link authority” that is associated with Google’s PR. Some websites will implement “nofollow” tags on their outbound links so the authority attributed to those links isn’t passed to the sites that are being linked to. The networks that use this attribute are doing so to discourage spamming. There are certain SEO tools available that let you see which sites are using the “no follow”.
A few networks I have experience in are:
- ActiveRain
- whois: created September 5, 2003
- PR: 6
- nofollow: not used
- Wannanetwork
- whois: created May 2, 2006
- PR: 4
- nofollow: not used
- Condo.com
- whois: created January 13, 1995
- PR: 4
- nofollow: used
A few other networks I haven’t had much experience in yet are:
- Outside.in
- whois: created February 16, 2005
- PR: 5
- nofollow: not used
- Realtown.com
- whois: created December 3, 1998
- PR: 5
- nofollow: not used
- CityBlogUSA
- whois: created June 30, 2006
- PR: 3
- nofollow: not used
Each one of the social networks offers you the ability to create very tailored information. In a future post, I will devote some time explaining where an agent should target their content.This can work to your benefit if you plan correctly. You might start thinking “I don’t possibly have enough time to write content for each of those sites”. That’s why you start with the foundation of your strategy and build out over time. You start with:
- Building your own website
- Your site is the cornerstone of your Online Brand Management
- A blog that is connected to your site
- This will be the area of your site that will be updated very frequently
- The structure of your blog should be of high importance
- Then you start creating your supporting content (social networks)
- The social networks will be where you write supporting content for your site blog
- This is where you will contribute in the form of comments to other agent’s content
Your focus has two components. At the end of the day, the first mission is to create equity in your domain. Your second mission is to create supporting content that shows up in outside sources that will also appear when potential clients search for your brand name.
Your next step is to pick one or two social networks that make sense to you. Don’t worry about going out and creating a bunch of different profiles in different areas (yet). Slow and steady will win the race. As time goes on and you begin to get comfortable creating and posting content, you can expand your portfolio of social networks.
The next part of Online Brand Management will focus on content creation for your domain as well as your main blog.