The following is an interview with Karen Goodman, a real estate agent in St Louis whose taken to blogging. Her site is RealEstateInfoStl.com
1) How long have you been blogging? What got you started?
Last July I switched real estate brokers from one that provided me with all of my clients to a traditional real estate brokerage. With the change, I knew it would be necessary for me to start marketing my services to build my business. I wanted to do more than simply send out announcements to my sphere of influence, and I had no desire to knock on doors of FSBO sellers trying to convince them to work with me. From the start, I knew I would need to set up a website. I honestly had no idea what a blog was and how it could be used to market my services. I had heard the term thrown around on TV newscasts, but had never read one.
My website provider, Point 2, includes a blog that is integrated into the website. As I learned more about blogs, I knew that it was a perfect fit for me. I’ve always enjoyed writing, and helping people learn about their options is important to me. I knew that writing a blog would be a perfect opportunity to provide information to my clients and potential clients, and to show them how I do business. I launched my website in November, and wrote my first blog post a couple of weeks later.
2) Do you get many leads from what you write?
I don’t have any hard numbers on how many of my clients have come from the blog yet. I do know that several clients have commented that they spent some time on my website and blog before they decided to use me, and that they were impressed with what they found there. Three of my recent home buyers found me after seeing an online ad for one of my listings, then clicking through to my website and spending some time there. All of them were relocating to St. Louis, and relied on the internet to help them choose an agent.
3) What do you try to focus on? Do you write for business, or do you write because it's enjoyable?
My blog is definitely a business blog, and I’m writing it to build my real estate business. My goal is to provide a resource for my clients and for potential clients. I’m trying to reach the people I meet through my other marketing efforts and those referred to me from friends and former clients. I want to have a place that these people can read up on real estate issues and learn about how I do business. I hope that if they are on the fence about making a decision on who to use for a buyer’s agent, they’ll read my posts and decide to give me a shot.
For now, I’m not really trying to capture all the search engine traffic. As much as I’d love to have tons of people reading my blog, I know that my focus on real estate issues and St. Louis market conditions will have limited appeal. But I will admit that it is fun to check out the search terms that people are using to find my site, and to discover that I’m number one on Yahoo’s search for ‘st louis homes for sale’.
Oh, and I do love writing. I’ve never really had an outlet before for my writing so it’s been a lot of fun.
4) What lessons have you learned from blogging?
The biggest impact blogging has had is that I am much more aware of local market conditions. You just can’t write to a real estate blog unless you are on top of what is happening in the market. I’ve spent a lot of time looking at data and trends. Most agents go on their instincts, and instincts are good, but it isn’t the same as having data to confirm your impressions. I even wrote a post about how blogging has made me a better agent.
And, I am working on being less wordy. I tend to get a bit long winded.
5) Any local blogs that you read that you would share with our readers?
I read a lot of national real estate blogs, but do have a few local blogs that are in my reader.
St. Louis Daily Photo Blog - (probably my favorite)
Lofts in the ‘Lou -
St. Louis Real Estate Investment & Development -
St. Louis Business Journal -
Undercurrent -
And of course, http://www.brandstorming.com.
6) Why should someone looking for a real estate agent use Karen Goodman instead of another agent?
There are a lot of great real estate agents out there, and I’m not going to say that I’m better than all of them. One thing that sets me apart from many agents is my belief that I should approach every client as if they were family. Sometimes that means telling a client that they could do better and they should keep looking, even if it means I don’t make a sale now and end up showing them another 50 houses. Sometimes it means encouraging a buyer to terminate a contract when we find a serious problem on the building inspection. Other times it means that I need to gently help a client understand that they are being unrealistic in the pricing of their home for sale.
My clients get an agent that is not only knowledgeable about market conditions and how to prevent contract problems, but also one that really wants their best interests to prevail. Regardless of whether they are spending $100,000 or $1 million, or if they are selling in an upscale community or a small condo, I’ll treat each client as if I was helping my best friend.
7) What is the single biggest mistake home sellers make?
So many home sellers think that they can try for an aggressive price for a while, and they can drop their price later if need be. That might work in a seller’s market, but not in today’s market. The problem with that approach is that the vast majority of agent MLS listing hits occur in the first week on the market. In fact, the highest number of hits occur on day 0…the day it hits the market. Once an agent writes off a house as being overpriced, they rarely come back to take another look. A seller that starts out overpriced will end up missing the best shot at getting an offer that is reasonable. When they later drop their price, they’ll get a few agents to come back for another look. But any offers that come in will almost always be lowball offers. In the end, they’ll be worse off than if they had just started off with a fair price.
