Broker With a Blog

With all the talk about how sales associates should have a blog, no one seems to mention how important it may be for a broker or manager to have one.

We talked with Scott MacDonald, president of RE/MAX Gateway in Chantilly, Vir., about his blog — Scotty Mac's Blog. MacDonald has been writing the blog for seven years and covers topics for real estate professionals such as handling multiple offers, the impact of the sequestration on real estate and more.

"I have an ongoing video spot called Scott's Market Minute. Many times, I've been to new homebuilder model homes and agents will tell me they used my market facts in a listing presentation they just did. I love that, because if every agent is that educated about the market, it will help our industry."

Here's what else he had to say:

What blogging platform do you use?
I use a self-hosted WordPress blog. My provider is GoDaddy.

Who is your audience?
My audience is real estate professionals and consumer. While my blog isn't directed at consumers, it still reaches them with information about the industry and market.

What are your goals?
I want to inform both consumers and real estate professionals about what's happening in the market. I use it as a recruiting tool to show other real estate professionals that I know our local market and can speak intelligently about it. I also use the blog to motivate my agents. I talk about time management, priority setting, the importance of communications, as well as other topics.

Where do you get your ideas?
I mentor some agents in the office, so I get ideas through interactions with my agents. They will come to me with time management issues or need help with team members. I take those tips and turn them into blog posts.

Sometimes, ideas come through conversations with other brokers and managers. Other blog posts are about market conditions, appraisals, new homes, inventory levels, short sales and foreclosures. I am constantly listening for ideas. I will report on conferences I've attended, articles I've read, and more. For example, I just had a Q&A with Richard Voss of Fannie Mae. I asked him 10 questions and took a picture of us both. I'll turn that into a post.

I keep a running list of topic ideas in notes on my iPad.

What are your most popular posts?
People love my predictions. I have a top 10 predictions where I'll go over my predictions from last year and report on how I did; then list my market predictions for the coming year. People like numbers: Top 3 ideas, Top 10 predictions, etc.

How frequently do you post?
I write two posts a week. Sometimes they'll both be written, sometimes I'll create a video and post it. Generally, video ideas come spur of the moment. I may be on the phone and hear something I want to pass on, so my assistant will tape me, edit it and upload the video. I try to keep the written blogs to less than 500 words. I also try to find pictures to go with the blog posts, so each takes me about an hour to do.

How do you promote the blog posts?
We tag each blog post with relevant topics, then we cross promote on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

What are the main benefits?
The benefits are recognition amongst my peers. I enjoy helping others with their issues.

To view the original article, visit the REAL Trends blog.