Real Estate Weblogging 101: A how-to book-in-weblog-form for would-be real estate webloggers

by Greg Swann

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

In commemoration of the Southwest Real Estate Blogging Conference, BloodhoundBlog today launches Real Estate Weblogging 101, a book-in-weblog-form about weblogging for real estate professionals.

The book is built as a WordPress weblog because it seemed foolish to me to write about a deep-linking medium without deep linking. Even so, I believe this is the first time WordPress has been used to publish a book. It seems plausible to me that dead trees are a dead letter, so this won’t be the last book “printed” in an on-line content management system.

In large measure, content for Real Estate Weblogging 101 comes from BloodhoundBlog posts written over the course of the last year by Greg Swann, Teri Lussier, Kris Berg, Brian Brady and Allen Butler. Because the book is written using the “Pages” feature of WordPress, it is built with revisability and extensibility in mind. We anticipate adding appropriate articles to the book as they become available.

From an introductory article to the book:

This is a book about real estate weblogging, but it seems absurd to write about weblogging in the form of a book. The Dan Rathers of the world will finally admit that the old media are obsolete on the day after the last paper-boy dies of old age. The internet is a linked world, and to write about an internet phenomenon without linking is absurd. And the internet is an infinitely revisable world, so to give up the power of instant, infinite revisions seems foolish. Unless you print it out at home, you can’t take this book with you to the beach. But what you can do is pursue all of the supporting links until your understanding of real estate weblogging approaches perfection — where perfection is understood to be a blindingly moving target.

The wonderful thing about a book in the form of a weblog is that you can help make it better, too. Just as Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs helped Dan Rather discover this strange new world — no matter how much he might rather didn’t — you can set me right when you find me in error — and I hope you find me in better temper. Where a paper book is static and dead, if you find that something is incorrect or unclear, you can assert yourself in a comment and the defects can be amended. In this respect a book-as-a-weblog is more like successive releases of software. But the software resides on my file server, not your hard disk, so upgrades can happen at any time, with the latest ‘rev’ always waiting here for you.

Even better, you can contribute to this book. Much of the text comes from posts I wrote during the first year of the existence of BloodhoundBlog, but, where my own talents are unequal to the task at hand, I have turned to other webloggers. You can join that company, if you like. If you have an article about some aspect of real estate weblogging that you think belongs in this book, send it to me. To insert new pages into a printed book, in the infinitesimal space between recto and verso, is impossible. But this book is built to welcome new ideas, new techniques, new attitudes and approaches. It is truly organic — born to live by growing.

Subject to undiscovered typos and last minute-additions, the book is finished. Feel free to visit the site. If you should discover a typo — or if you have an article you would like to submit — let me know.

Many of the people reading this post don’t need the help Real Estate Weblogging 101 provides, but many others need that help but don’t know where to find it. You can give future real estate webloggers a leg up by putting this button

on your weblog or web site. Here’s what you need to do: Copy and paste this text into your page:

<p align="center"><a href="http://realestateweblogging101.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://realestateweblogging101.com/RealEstateWeblogging101.gif" align="center" border="0"></a></p>

I think we are setting two important milestones today: We’ve built a practical guide to help would-be real estate webloggers get themselves started. And we have pioneered a new book-publishing medium. Give the site a look and see what you think.

 
Initial blog reactions to Real Estate Weblogging 101:

• As you might imagine, BloodhoundBlog had its say.
• Arizona Mortgage Guru weighs in.
• Problogger Tom Royce of The Real Estate Bloggers has his say.
• REMBEX founder Todd Carpenter speak up from lenderama.
• Jim Duncan of Real Central VA tracks stats.
• Realtor Genius thinks the price is right.
• The Phoenix Real Estate Guy shines by the light of the Arizona sun.
• Brian Brady comes in from Active Rain.
• Dan Green brings the blog at BringTheBlog.
• Mike Price checks in from Mike’s Corner.
• Realtor Wives sews on our button.
• Joel Burslem at Inman Blog takes us to the Summer of Blog.
• Kevin Boer at Three Ocean Realty speaks up.
• Cherl Johnson at NELA Live was hyperlocal before it was cool.
• Realty Thoughts links in.
• ImmobilienPortale drops in from Germany.
• The Carnival of Real Estate joins in.
• The R Team has a project of its own in the works.

Technorati Tags: blogging, real estate, real estate marketing