As a professional bio writer, I often get asked "how do I write a bio when I don't have direct experience in the business?"

Don't sweat it! I can tell you that your realtor bio is not necessarily JUST about your industry experience. More than anything, readers want to know that you:

1) know the local market; 2) understand the client's needs; 3) are going to work hard for them.

And you can satisfy each of these criteria even if you are brand new to the real estate business.

Let's take each of these client concerns and see what you can write in your professional bio that will wow them.

1. You know the local market.

OK, so maybe you don't have 20 years experience as a realtor in the community. But you live in the community, right?

So talk about what your connection to the community: the hidden gems you treasure, the groups you're involved with, or the networks you belong to.

Whereas an experienced realtor might write about their twenty years experience as a real estate agent, a brand new realtor can write:

Jane has lived in Townville for X years and just loves it. She knows all the neighbourhoods inside-out, and can help you select the best one for your family's needs.

OR

As a lifelong resident of Mayberry, Andy can put his insider knowledge to work to find a special property in your neighbourhood of choice.

You're showing that you know the local market, and the client won't care how many years of experience you have.

2. You understand the client's needs.

What do people really want when they are buying or selling real estate? They want an agent who will help them meet their needs. These needs might include understanding exactly what they mean by "cozy home", having a particular type of business style, or using the latest marketing tools.

So how do you express this in your realtor bio? You might say something like:

Andy also uses the latest Internet marketing tools to expose your property to the widest possible range of qualified buyers.

3. You are going to work hard for them.

When thinking about how to write a bio, remember that the bottom line for clients is "are you the right real estate agent for me?" Often this translates into "Do I like you?"

So don't forget about the personal qualities that qualify you for the job. People reading your real estate bio will feel confident knowing that you are pleasant, professional, hard-working, enthusiastic and organized.

Here's one way to write this in your professional bio:

Why choose Jane as your real estate agent? For one thing, she really listens to you and will work tirelessly on your behalf.

Trust me, it makes all the difference when trying to sell yourself to show who you are and why you are enthusiastic about the topic.

You don't need decades of experience and a wall of awards to write a winning real estate bio. Just show that you know the local market, understand the client's needs, and are going to work hard for them. Then you'll have a great professional bio that will be a strong part of your marketing materials.

About the author: Barbra Sundquist is an experienced technical writer and business coach who provides fill-in-the-blank templates for how to write a bio. Visit HowToWriteBio.com to get your free copy of "84 Sentence Starters for Writing A Bio".

Blogging is no longer just the pastime of teenage girls looking to broadcast their daily drama for public consumption. Nowadays, blogs are created by people of all ages for a number of reasons. For some, blogging is a platform from which they can express their opinions and interests to the world. Others start a blog with the hopes of it becoming a source of income through advertisements and the like. For businesses, blogs are a new way to connect with people in order to market products and services.

Consider the following statistics:

• 57 million Americans read blogs
• 12 million American adults maintain their own blog
• Over 120,000 new blogs are created daily
• 89% of companies feel blogs will be more important than ever within the next 5 years
• 22 of the 100 most popular sites in the world are blogs

Regardless of the motivation to create a blog, it is clear that blogs are on the verge of taking over the web as we know it. Unlike static websites, good blogs constantly updated provide valuable information to their audiences on a regular basis. Blogs have the ability to elicit conversations between post author and reader, creating lasting relationships along the way. For this reason, many well-known corporations like Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, and GM now have blogs. They understand the value of relating to their audience on a more personal level-your visitors will become your readers, your readers will become your leads, and those leads will turn into sales for your company. This holds especially true for real estate professionals. Through a blog, you can become a trusted and respected source of information on real estate in your farm area. By providing valuable insight into the business of real estate, your readers will come to see you as knowledgeable and experienced which will then cause them to choose you over your competition when it comes time for them to buy or sell their home. You will also gain notoriety with your colleagues which can turn into a source of income through referrals. This makes blogging a powerful tool in building your personal brand and real estate business.

You don't just want to appeal to people-you want to appeal to the search engines as well. Here are some interesting facts concerning the usage of search engines like Yahoo!, Google, and MSN in the U.S.:

• 75% of Americans use search engines on a regular basis
• 56% of Americans use search engines daily
• 40% of searches are for local businesses and services
• 54% of Americans use the internet instead of the phone book to find local services

Do you want to be found when people in your area are looking for real estate? Any sane business person would want to get a piece of the internet action. Good placement in the search engines is how you are going to obtain traffic to your site. Blogs are very attractive to the search engines because of the constant addition of content that occurs on a blog. Every time you add new information to your blog, the search engines are alerted that you have added something new and they come and visit your site. The more content you add, the more your site gets visited and if you are creating quality content, you will see your blog move to the top of the search engines faster than a website ever possibly could. Adding new content to your blog consistently takes dedication and time but attaining high placement in the search engines will unlock earning potential beyond your imagination.

If you want to create an online presence that will create visibility and leads for your business, a blog is the way to go. Websites are becoming a thing of the past so don't wait another day to start a blog for your real estate business. Check out our Real Estate Blog Builder for an easy, quick, and affordable solution for your real estate blog needs.

Because I love TMZ and The Superficial and because I just thought it would be fun to have an occasional real estate technology gossip piece - so, here are a couple of SEO related real estate rumors making their ways across the blogosphere.

Is Trulia cloaking pages?

Trulia Caught Cloaking Red Handed

Eric Bramlett catches Trulia in what appears by all accounts to be a serious case of cloaking.  Cloaking is an age old shady technique that based on user agent (i.e. GoogleBot, YahooSlurp, (robots) IE, Firefox (people)) serves one set of content to the search engine and another set of content to people visiting the site through regular browsers.  In this case, Eric shows how Trulia is using a redirect and cloaking to direct Google to Trulia's own Seattle Real Estate landing pages when it crawls Seattle Weekly's real estate section. This could be one of the possible cataysts to Trulia's recent jump on the engines in many major markets.  Basically, Trulia is boosting pageviews through partner sites and the techniques they are using while not necessarily evil it may be against Google's TOS.

Conspiracy Theories on Trulia's SEO

Is trulia cloaking? Interesting Sphin story

YouTube Video of Trulia Cloaking

Trulia.com Uses Hidden Text

Trulia's Web-ranking strategies catch heat | Inman News

Read also: White Hat, Gray Hat and Black Hat SEO Explained

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Hey, real estate agents should be too busy to blog. It's a fact. So, sometimes you need quick, easy and effective posts that take minimal time and brain power. So, here are examples of simple posts that will quickly become cornerstone pieces on your blog.

Please note, most of these revolve around you knowing your way around the MLS and listings. Why? Because every successful real estate blogger knows, the bread and butter of their blog are posts about listings.

Read also: The First 30 Days of Blogging

1. A monthly top 10 listings post.

This is a very simple post. Each month, you probably walk through upwards of 20 homes and view even more on the MLS with clients. So, make a list of your favorite picks for various types of buyers.

Examples:

• Top 10 Denver CO Homes for first time home buyers
• Top 10 Salt Lake City real estate investments
• Top 5 Fort Lauderdale Foreclosures

How to implement this post:

• Use MLS data like listing info, address, description, photos (if copyrights do not prohibit you) etc.
• Make your own brief analysis of what makes each home a best buy or good investment (be specific - people like specifics)

Read also:Top 5 Easy and Effective Listing Posts You Can Write for Your Real Estate Blog

2. Use a listing that has sat on the MLS for months to show what prevents a home from selling

Hey, you've been in the house or you have seen it on the MLS. You know the house. The one where the front yard hasn't been tended to or the home is never in showing condition or the MLS info plain old stinks. Or worse yet, the home is just grossly overpriced. Take an explicit example from the MLS of a home that has sat on the market for months and explain all the problems with it and why it isn't selling.

Examples:

• Why this 3 bedroom DC Condo won't sell and how you can make sure yours does
• Why great San Diego Homes like these go unsold
• Why good Portland homes can't sell and bad ones do

How to implement this post:

• Find one home that has sat on the market for a while that you can clearly identify why it has not sold. It is preferable to pick a home that you have been inside.
• Use MLS data like listing info, address, description, photos (if copyrights do not prohibit you) or take your own photos etc.
• What is preventing the home from selling and list things that the Realtor or Seller could do to help this home get sold.

Read also: Formula for a Successful Blog Post

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Landing Page Optimization is an essential component of good web design. It is the process of improving a visitor's perception of a website by optimizing its content and appearance in order to make the pages more appealing to the target audiences, as measured by target goals such as conversion rate. What does that really mean? Basically, it means you need to make individual pages on your blog or website so simple and compelling that visitors WANT to contact you. And, isn't that what we all want... people to contact you through your website?

So, how do you optimize the layout, calls to actions and content of your real estate agent blog or website to get more conversion?

1. Identify mission critical parts of your website and their true economic value

Your only answer should be "my conversion forms." As a Realtor, your conversion forms should be one or more of the following:

• Contact form
• Search for properties registration form
• CMA/House Value form
• Market report form
• Special Offer/Newsletter form

These forms are the most important pages on your site because they are where conversion from visitor to contact takes place. Therefore, each of these forms has to be clearly identified, visible on each and every page of your real estate blog and incite people to want to click them.

Read also: Let's Talk Landing Page Optimization by SEOmoz

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