I’m a research person. I love having lots and lots of research to back up my statements and decisions.

So, let’s first take a look at the blogosphere as a whole, how it began, how it grew and where it is going.

According to Dave Sirfry’s April 2007 report on the blogosphere, Technorati currently tracks 70 million weblogs. The report shows that 120,000 blogs are created each day with 1.4 blogs created every second.

Since October 2006, there a slight slowing in the growth of the blogosphere which was expected as its previous growth rates were staggering having grown 60 times what it was in 2004.

In 2006, the blogosphere saw 1.3 million postings per day or 15 posts per second, whereas in 2007 it grew to 17 posts per second. Interestingly, the percentage of blogs in the top 100 reached approximately 25% (22 blogs). Also, interesting is the consumer perception that blogs are just as good a news outlet as main stream media sites like the New York Times.

The breakdown: Continue reading this post

After many months of waiting, Max, the HomeGain Gorilla, agreed to meet and spend the day with me. The plan: to uncover the life of a spokes-gorilla and learn more about our friend Max (no monkey business).

I was able to catch Max in between press appearances. Max and I took the HomeGain Jet to an undisclosed location and began our day at the local Starbucks, where we casually discussed his HomeGain role, thoughts on blogging, agent tips for this market, etc.

I briefly mentioned that I’m looking to make the most of this market and have been considering options for moving up. Max gladly booted up his laptop and showed me how to utilize the tools on HomeGain to estimate my home’s value. We also contacted an agent and found a couple of great listings in my area. Max even accompanied me to an open house.

Anyway, here’s the skinny on Max: Continue reading this post

OK OK, only a retarded monkey would think SEO doesn’t matter. (Sorry to call out your mentally challenged peeps, Max).

But being on top of Google’s first page totally matters. In fact, I can prove it.

I write a lot about SEO, but what I don’t write about a lot are the results people get by using simple search engine optimization techniques. ROI on SEO is very easy to measure. You measure it in terms of positioning in Google for your prime terms and on the increase in traffic.

And, by virtue of those two simple things you WILL see more leads and if you are a good Realtor you will be able to convert those leads into dollars.

Read also: How to select the best possible keywords for real estate blogs

Remedial Learning: Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via “natural” (“organic” or “algorithmic“) search results for targeted keywords. Continue reading this post

Dear Matt,

I currently pay for driving visits to my web site (with the BuyerLink program), but have a limited budget. Are there any free ways I can get more visits to my web site in addition to what I do with HomeGain?

- Sally Dalhgren, Minnesota (real estate agent)

Dear Sally,

What you’re referring to is Search Engine Optimization (SEO), the art of making your site more findable by the search engines (and therefore getting free traffic!).

While you could get a 4-year degree in SEO and still not know everything there it to know, one of the easiest things to do is improve your site HTML tags. Continue reading this post