Back in the late 90s, it was a simple task to get traffic rolling to a web site, and some only needed a few key links aimed at their site to get the ball rolling. Google was just new then, and most depended on Yahoo.com as their main source of traffic. Even back then people were trying to trick the system, and get as much targeted traffic as possible by using link-farms, and search engine submitters that would resubmit the same website over and over every few days automatically.

Today to get your website noticed is a combination of science, art, great copywriting, and some dramatic flair all thrown together. Then on top of those just mentioned, becoming a lifelong student of what is called SEO is needed as well. This stands for search engine optimization, and there are many theories, and methods within the SEO realm to pull off similar results. Currently a combination of several avenues must be sought to achieve dominance in a certain niche or industry on the Internet.

Obtaining quality back links from high authority sites that are germane to your website is a big part of the puzzle, but it has to be combined with other platforms such as social bookmarking, and directory submissions, to truly become effective. If your website is about a local business that for example sells baseball cards in the city of Dallas Texas, then local SEO comes into play as well. This is all about being in the equivalent of as many high ranking online yellow page websites, and business directories as possible that are considered to be citation sites. This will facilitate the business in Dallas to rank higher for their particular industry or niche. Any company that depends on online traffic to make sales twenty-four hours a day will most likely have an SEO expert on staff, or have one contracted to help keep all of the available platforms for traffic alive and well constantly.

Guest blogging is a very effective way of garnering keyword focused back-links to highlight your web presence, and is usually free to you, except for the time you spend writing the blog post.

Commenting on other blogs is another way of gathering back links, but is a crapshoot, as many do-follow blogs will not always approve the comments that are left on these type postings.

Social Bookmarking is a temporary boost in linking, especially for new websites, or new url’s, but they are fleeting at best. Creating new, well researched content on your website will always out weigh the competition.

In the beginning ninety-nine percent of bloggers will not have the experience to draw in thousands of readers a day much less a month. If your blog is about car repair, then study other car repair blogs that out rank you on Google, Bing, and Yahoo. Become a student of your competitors, and best them with added information, more informative postings. People who do well at anything in life will be willing to go the extra mile for customers, blog subscribers, or anything else.

Problem solving is the number one way to hook subscribers, or readers to keep them coming back to your blog, as they will see you as an authority. One way to see that your blogging expertise is improving is not only by the heightened web traffic, but the comments that people will leave after they finish reading your latest post will reveal really how well you are engaging them. Be sure and respond to each comment that is written to you, except of course if the comment is spam, then it should be deleted.

Having a combination of needed, or problem solving data that is well researched, and entertaining at the same time should always be the goal. Keeping up on the industry or niche you are covering with your blog is very easy with a feature that Google offers. Just go to Google and search on the desired topic, and change the search over to blogs, at the bottom the screen it will ask you if you would like to create an email alert. By setting up several of these on topics that pertain to your blog, you will always have a wealth of ideas to write about. Personal injury attorneys do this for their blogs daily to talk about 18-wheeler accidents, and on the job injuries.

Google Plus (Google +) is the newest social networking site brought to us by the monster company Google. Google Plus, however, is a bit different from the other social networking sites to which we have become accustomed.

Although you may have had your share of social networking and social networking sites, Google Plus may be actually worth your while, especially when it comes to building your real estate business.

Here are some of the features of Google Plus that have the brains from Google saying they’ve “revolutionized” social networking:

• Sharing – Like other social networking sites, Google Plus has a feature that allows users to share articles on other sites. Called the “+1” button, users simply press it to store under your +1 tab.

• Circle – A Google Circle is essentially a group of your favorite people. Google Plus allows you to create as many circles as you’d like, which is a great feature. For example, you can have a circle for your friends, one for your family, and one for your real estate clients. We like this feature because you can choose with whom you want to share information. If you want to send a message to your real estate clients, for example, you can do so without sharing this information with your other circles. Plus, you can drop and drag people in and out of circles as you please.

• Hangouts – We think the Google Plus Hangouts feature is a great new tool available for Google Plus users. This feature allows users to use the group video chats. You can ask a friend to join your Google Plus group chat through Google Plus Hangouts and you can use a cool new feature called “camera switching” to change the view of the camera based on who is talking at any given time.

• Huddle – Huddle is a cool new feature for smart phone users. This feature, which is available for Android, iPhone, and other smart phones, allows mobile users to communicate, within their desired circles, through instant messaging.

• Sparks – Sparks allows users to identify subjects they want to share with others. People may also share information with each other on a global scale using “featured interests” sparks. If you want to keep your followers interested on the latest topics in the real estate field, you must try the Google Plus Sparks feature.

• Stream – Within Google Circles you can stream updates. In other words, if you have a circle of real estate clients, you can see updates from others in the same circle. You can filter your Google Plus to show only those posts from specific circles, thereby further narrowing your options.

• Mute – If you don’t want to view a conversation any longer, Google Plus allows you to mute the conversation. If someone adds a comment to a post you earlier commented on, the conversation can be brought back to the top of your stream.

• Integration – Google Plus can communicate with your other Google applications, thereby facilitating your real estate marketing efforts. Considering integrating your Google Plus with your Gmail, calendar, documents, etc.

It happens to everyone – you’re sitting at your computer with a blank screen in front of you and you feel like you’ve written about every topic related to real estate and your local market at least twice. Next time you hit a wall (hopefully not literally!) and can’t come up with something fresh to write about check out this list of ways to come up with topics for blog posts:

• Browse Q&A sites. Take a look at the online question and answer sites such as Yahoo Answers or AOL Answers and see what people want to know. Search for “real estate” and you’re likely to find several recently posed questions. If you end up doing a post that relates closely to the question you can even answer it on the Q&A site with a link to your post as suggested further reading.
• Read other industry blogs. Peruse the blogs of colleagues, competitors, and professionals in related industries. I’m not suggesting that you copy or steal their posts or topic ideas, but you’re likely to get inspired by reading what others have written. For example, a post directed towards first time home buyers might inspire you to write something for retirees looking at downsizing.
• Ask for ideas. Post something on Facebook, Twitter, or shoot an email out to family and friends. Ask if they have any real estate related questions, or if there are any topics they’d like to know more about.
• Look through the archives. Read through posts from a year or more ago. Are there any topics that could be revisited, updated, or expanded on?

Hopefully you’ll end up with more topics than you have time to write at the moment. Keep a running list of posts to work on later, and add to it as you have additional ideas.

A well-built back link portfolio must have links that are generated from guest blogging. Simply put, guest blogging can be your ticket to that rounded-out website back link portfolio. If you want to get into guest blogging, but you’re not sure where to start, how to do it, and where to find the best blogs on which to deliver your content, read on.

• Find your avenues – First things first: you must find relevant blogs on which to post your blogs. Ideally, these blogs should be directly related to your real estate business because search engines will look favorably upon your guest blogs. In other words, if you blog on sites that don’t have much (or anything) to do with real estate, the search engines will not find these to be very credible.

Don’t think, however, that the blogs on which you contribute must be directly linked to real estate. They can be indirectly linked to real estate and still be considered credible by the search engines. Plus, you may be able to reach customers you may not have otherwise reached. For example, consider blogging on a site for green building materials or home improvement ideas. Although these sites don’t sell real estate, they ultimately deal with homes, home building and perhaps home buying and selling. Get creative and consider all your options!

• Consider your options – Your guest blogging campaign should be started by searching a keyword or topic in Google plus the word “blog.” You would be surprised how many blogs you can stumble across by simply performing a simply keyword search. You can also perform more advanced search queries if you’d like, but I guarantee you there will be a multitude of relevant blogs pulled up by simply entering a few, key terms, words and/or phrases.

• Reach out to other bloggers – Once you have a comprehensive list of blogs, now is the time to test your outreach capabilities. Your best course of action is to build a relationship with the blogger or website owner by commenting or reaching out through social channels. You may also want to email them and express how much you enjoy their blog and appreciate the information they provide. Also let them know you have been sharing their information across a number of social networks like Twitter and Facebook.

Simply by establishing a relationship with a fellow blogger you can increase your chances of success when it comes time to ask them if they’d like you to guest blog.

• Establish an ongoing relationship – Don’t just post one blog and consider your guest blogging job done. Consider developing ongoing relationships with other bloggers and share your content (and theirs) through a variety of social channels. Develop quality guest blogging partners, so to speak, so you can both benefit from the power of guest blogging.

Writing and posting web content is a vital skill for web owners and marketers who want to get their website noticed. Why would you, as a web marketer, want to get noticed? Here are a few good reasons:

• Increase your real estate web sales and revenue

• Improve branding

• Increase contact lists and customer base

• Become a recognized expert in your real estate community

These are just a few of the benefits of a successful content marketing campaign. And with the results of a content marketing study performed by Technorati, it is no wonder that more businesses will be expanding their content marketing efforts in 2010 and beyond.
71% of businesses say their blogging efforts have increased their visibility within their industry.
56% of respondents said that their blog has helped established a leadership position in their industry.
And 6 in 10 businesses plan to expand their efforts and increase spending on content marketing in 2010.
With so much to gain for your content marketing efforts, here are six tips that can help improve your content marketing success.

1. Create a Plan
It is useless to simply post articles or other web content without a sound plan. Develop a content marketing plan that you will use for your web marketing efforts.

2. Write Sticky Headlines
Your headline or title is probably the most important part of your content. If you can convince a web user to read the rest of your article or other content based on an interesting headline, you are 90% successful.

3. Research Hot Keywords
What is happening right now? Write content that is a hot topic for web users. Look to places like Google News, or even research trending topics on Twitter, to get the most used keywords you can use in your next post.

4. Write for Story
Your web content should be rich in keywords, but also be written in a style that captures a reader’s attention. Use story techniques like character development, conflict, and dramatic conclusion to get readers engaged with your content.

5. Make it Worthwhile to the Reader
The reader will ask him or herself, “so what?” Give the reader a benefit for reading your content. Can you provide new ways to style hair? Save money shopping for clothing? Easy home improvement tips? Let the reader take a nugget of valuable knowledge away.

6. Be Consistent
Writing a great article or blog post is a great start in your SEO content marketing efforts. However, you must continue to provide great content again and again. Don’t stop with one or two good articles. Keep the flow going and be consistent in your content posting efforts

Guest blogging not only helps with your link building efforts, but it’s also a fantastic way to drive traffic to your website and help you to build a solid reputation in the field of real estate.

If you’ve snagged a few guest blogging opportunities, now is the time to wow them with great blogs. Here’s what to do:

• Remember it’s about your audience – Instead of using guest blogging as an opportunity to promote yourself, provide your readers with useful, worthwhile information. Sure, you want to mention yourself in the article and the services you provide, but the bulk of the article should consist of useful information the reader can take away from the article. Remember: a guest blog is not about advertising yourself, it’s about providing relevant information to the readers. Consider adding links to your website through your bio line, and ask the website or blog through which you are guest blogging if you can provide relevant links within the body of the article.

• Consider the benefits of both vertical and horizontal guest blogging – Vertical guest blogging is an obvious choice for blogging, as it means you are blogging for another website that focuses on real estate or related fields. Horizontal guest blogging, however, shouldn’t be forgotten, as it could present some interesting opportunities for your real estate business. Consider, for example, blogging on a home improvement blog or a green building blog.

• Remember that your website content directly enhances your professional reputation – If you post on a well-respected blog and create quality content for that blog, your professional reputation will always benefit.

• Don’t think about posting anything that’s less than 100 percent original – Simply put, your reputation as a guest blogger can be immediately destroyed if your content isn’t fresh, compelling and all yours.

• Only write about topics for which you are comfortable – Establishing yourself as a quality guest blogger is easier done if you concentrate on topics for which you have experience and an interest.

• Make sure the website for which you are guest blogging is legitimate – Before you submit your work to a website make sure the site is legitimate and credible.

• Submit fresh, original work when guest blogging – It may be tempting to regurgitate the information you’ve written on your personal blog, but it may spell trouble when it comes to duplicate content. In other words, search engines will not look favorably upon duplicate content, which could mess with your search engine rankings. Either completely rewrite the topic for which you want to write about or start from scratch and guest blog new information.

• Be prepared to offer the blogger for which you want to guest blog your credentials and a sample or two of your work. Be honest about what you want to accomplish and what you can provide the other blogger in terms of content. An open, honest relationship will allow you to be the most successful when it comes to your guest blogging efforts.

• Guest blog on realtyrankings.com and secure your position as an expert in the field of real estate! Put your experience and knowledge of the real estate industry to work for you by guest blogging on realtyrankings.com!

• Encourage more incoming links to your website

• Increase traffic from other relevant websites

• Help build awareness and a strong reputation for your business

• Make your website practical and useful for readers

• Improve your efforts to better visibility for target keyword phrases

If you want to create successful online articles that will result in effective marketing for your real estate business, you must:

• Create the most useful and compelling content for your website – Before you even think about writing articles and marketing them to other websites you need to worry about your own website. After you have written effective real estate articles, make them visible on your website in a number of areas. You can post them on your blog, but you should also post them throughout other pages on your website.

• Bring readers page to your main webpage through links – Provide links in the article that will allow readers to click back to the main webpage or to the proper page as they relate to the article. Whether you put your links within the body of the article or at the end of the article, the result will be the same: your readers will be guided to the correct area of your website. Don’t ever assume your readers will go where you want them to; instead, bring them there with just a click of a link.

• Encourage your readers to share your articles – Adding social sharing buttons on your articles to social networks such as Facebook and Twitter will allow your readers to share them with others, thereby improving your ranking and spreading the word about your real estate business. Social media is, without a doubt, the easiest way to get others to spread the word about your real estate business, so take advantage of this new form of media and use it to your advantage!

• Find relevant information for your articles by performing keyword searches through the major search engines – If you want to know what people are talking about, perform a few relevant keyword searches. Then you can simply write about the topics you find. This not only helps you create the most pertinent information for your website, but it also may help you by sending readers to your site when they search using the same keywords. It is important, however, to use the articles you find as inspiration only. In other words, never, ever plagiarize, as it immediately ruins your credibility.

• Hire a good writer if you don’t have the time – If you don’t have the time to write quality articles, or if you don’t feel as if you could produce quality content, you may want to hire this service out. A good writer who is skilled in the real estate field is almost always worth the money.

Simply put, excellent conversions rely heavily on killer content. If your web pages lack the content to generate conversions, then they aren’t doing their job.

If you want to build content that will certainly turn your visitors into clients, there are a few steps you’ll want to take:

• Keep your headlines simple – A glut of information in your headlines will get you nowhere fast. Let’s face it: readers are inherently lazy, and if you pile on too much information, readers are surely going to lose interest. When titling your web pages or articles, think short, catchy and interesting. Snag your readers’ attention in as few words as possible, and make sure you convey your message when doing so.

• Keep your readers’ attention – Too much nonsense on your web page will ultimately divert your readers’ attention from your copy. If you have flashing ads or colorful animations, you can bet you won’t succeed in holding their attention for any length of time.

• Go easy on the eyes – Make sure your web page copy is easily readable and flows smoothly. Copy that is interrupted by ads or photographs often results in poor conversion rates. Eliminate colorful backgrounds or small copy so that your words are easily read and understood by your readers.

• Create a call-to-action link (every time) – At the end of your copy, give your readers something to do. In other words, your readers just read your copy and enjoyed it enough to want to contact you. So, where do they turn? If you provide a call-to-action at the end of your copy, they don’t need to work at finding the information. Because, let’s face it: few readers will actually go through the trouble of locating your contact information if it’s not in front of their face.

• Use images sparingly (but with great care) – As stated above, it is important not to distract your readers with loads of unimportant graphics or images. However, positive images, used sparingly, can stimulate their senses and give your website interest and flair. When choosing images for your real estate website, think of pictures or photographs that portray a positive image.

• When developing your content, consider where people are in their process – For example, if you are speaking of the many ways in which buyers can prepare to purchase their first home, offer them additional information at the end of the article that provides them with a checklist for buying, or a phone number where they can request more information on buying their first home.

• Don’t every be overly satisfied with your content – By frequently offering your viewers new content you can best determine if your content is offering you the best conversions. Experiment with various types of content, and change up writing styles to see what really works best.

• Before signing up for Local Search Rank Checker, you can actually perform your own test drive to see if it’s something you would like. Doing so doesn’t require any registration or payment.

• To do the free “test drive,” simply enter your search terms, your domain name, your country, and the search engines you want to check on. It’s that simple!

• After entering your information, you can view the report, which include: your current position on each of the search engines you entered; your last position; and the type of result (organic, local, etc.)

• All reports received using this tool can be viewed either in CSV or PDF form. And each report can be saved onto your administrative console. From there, you can schedule an update on either a weekly or monthly basis. In short, you control then number of scheduled reports you want to receive.

• This tool shows your real estate website’s current ranking position using all of the search terms for each search engine you chose. Local Search Rank Checker also let you know if your ranking position has gone up, gone down or stayed the same from the time of your last report.

• You can check up to 100 search terms per ranking report, depending in the package you choose. Simply enter the keyword and the location.

• Local Search Rank Checker tracks four different types of search results, including local/places, organic, directory and secondary.

• This tool looks through the top 50 search results in all search engines and local search engines.

• We like that you can test this tool out five times before you have to register for a package. However, on top of that, once you register, you can sign up for a 30-day free trial.

• In addition to scheduling either a weekly or monthly ranking report, you can choose up to five email addresses to where you want the report sent.