What is RSS?

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndicate” and the best way to understand it is to think of it as very simple and portable version of a blog’s content. While their blog’s website has a design and can only be seen at theirwebsite.com, the blog’s RSS feed is portable and can be read (in it’s text form) from anywhere. When a blogger releases a new post, the RSS version is created automatically and can be viewed from a variety of places (like Google Reader).

Finding RSS Feeds

Virtually every blog has an RSS feed built in, even all ActiveRain blogs have RSS feeds. To find the feed, look for the icon (like the ones below, but usually orange) or the words RSS and click the link. The url in the address bar is that feed’s address. For example:

How Do I Use Google Reader

Visit http://google.com/reader. If you currently have a Google/Gmail account you can login with those details, otherwise create a Google account. From there, you can begin to add RSS feeds (see above) that Google Reader will track for you. To add a feed, simply click the “Add Subscription” link on the left side inside of Google Reader and paste the feed url (i.e. feed://blog.realspacetours.com/feed/).

Great, But How Does This Help My Real Estate Business?

The benefits of using something like Google Reader are three-fold:

First, it saves enormous amounts of time. Instead of bookmarking and visiting 50, 100, 500 blogs, all the entries show up on one page where you can skim through to find the articles that are of interest to you.

Second, following many blogs ensures that you will never miss anything. If it happened, you can be sure someone has blogged about it. Forget the newspaper, 100 quality blogs will give you a perfect snapshot of the world, local and real estate news you’re looking for.

Lastly, I want to share one of my techniques that can have a substantial impact on your online marketing efforts. If you’ve been following my blog you know how big I am on interacting with your community, blogs are the number one way to do this. Here’s how: most blogs will allow comments on the posts, on which you can leave your name (branding) and website (web traffic). By using Google Reader to skim for relevant posts, leaving a valuable comment with your name (i.e. “John, I completely agree that……and I think that……”) you are exponentially increasing the reach of your brand. Just think: if you’re leaving 10 comments per day on blog posts that are related to your market, and each post receives 500 visits on average, that’s an extra 5,000 targeted people every day that will be seeing you and your brand. Needless to say, blog comments are powerful.

If you’d like a feed to get started you can add the Blog.RealSpaceTours feed at: feed://blog.realspacetours.com/feed/

Still have questions on RSS? Feel free to ask in the comments below:

Tip #1: Pick Your Battles

The most obvious tip is that you cannot be everywhere at once. Not only would this scatter your effectiveness, it would take far too much time. In my last post I mentioned how important it is to be everywhere you can, you shouldn’t leave out any networks or platforms. However, that doesn’t mean you need to spend hours every day on all of these sites. The best strategy is to choose 2-3 places that you feel would be most effective and focus your resources there. For the other 10+ accounts you have, spend a minimal amount of time on them just to stay active. 

Tip #2: Keep Things Simple

It’s easy to get bogged down in the detailed features of Facebook or the advanced settings of MyBlogLog but at the end of the day, who cares! Spending countless hours reading help files and learning features that will never be used is often a waste of time. A basic knowledge of each platform is all that’s required to be successful with it. Your presence is important on these sites, not how well versed you are in it’s details. When you’re using a platform, try to condense it down to one core concept of why it is useful to you and use it for that reason only. This will save time that would have otherwise been wasted on things that offer little value. 

Tip #3: Cross Promote

In tip #1 I mentioned that it would be smart to focus on 2-3 networks and have just some activity on the rest. The main reason for this is because you can leverage those dominate networks to grow the others. For example, if you have 2,000 Myspace friends, send a bulletin on Myspace about your Facebook profile and you’ve just made hundreds of instant Facebook friends. This is where the value is created. When you have credibility on one platform it can help grow the others, try not to make the mistake of thinking that each site is out there on it’s own, they all work together; they all work for you. 

Tip #4: Create Weekly Marketing Goals 

We all know that it’s easy to get lost if we don’t have goals. The best way to ensure we’re not wasting time with marketing is to set clear goals on a weekly basis. I would recommend this: Open a blank text editor and write out all of the websites, platforms and locations where you would like to be noticed. Then determine what you should accomplish on each of these every week. It may be 20 posts on a local message board, 2,500 points on Activerain, 20 new friends on Facebook – whatever you feel is important for your business and your brand. Then, split the list throughout the week and start crossing things off. This 30 minute exercise will ensure that the time you do have available to spend on marketing is as efficient as possible. 

Tip #5: Set Boundaries and Stick to Them

The best way to get things done effectively is to not do things that are ineffective! If you have a clear plan with goals (see tip #4) make sure you follow it. If you’ve reached your goal in one area or spend too much time on one site, move on. Start another task that needs more attention. With clear cut boundaries you won’t go overboard in one area: set your goals, reach your goals, move on. And even more importantly, don’t let your marketing overrun the things that really matter, like spending time with your family, that should be #1. 

These are 5 areas that can have an instant impact on your effectiveness. I would encourage you to save this post, pick just one thing to work on right now. And once you’ve mastered that, start implementing the others into your daily strategy as well. 

Lastly, I want to point out that it does take time, it does take energy. There’s no easy path to a successful marketing campaign (if there was, everyone would do it and then it wouldn’t work anymore, right?). This post can give ideas to make your marketing more effective, but ultimately your success will depend on your work ethic and the effort you put into marketing your own brand.