What is Social Bookmarking and why should "Appraisal Bloggers" care? Good questions! It's been around for a long time but is just now coming to the attention of the blogosphere.
Social bookmarking is the process of setting up an account on one or many of the social bookmarking sites like Technorati, Del.icio.us, MySpace, Stumbleupon, Google Bookmarks, Yahoo My Web, Digg, Spurl and many others. These seem to be the most popular.
Setting up an account on any of these services is quite easy because they don't want your life story, usually just a user name and password. So - the first time you go to these sites it will take a bit longer but once your account is set up, it's a matter of clicking to the site and bookmarking your page.
What is Digg? Digg is a place for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web. Digg's Website says:
"From the biggest on-line destinations to the most obscure blog, Digg surfaces the best stuff as voted on by our users. You won’t find editors at Digg — we’re here to provide a place where people can collectively determine the value of content and we’re changing the way people consume information on-line."
How do they do that? Everything on Digg — from news to videos to images to Podcasts — is submitted by their community (that would be you). Once something is submitted, other people see it and Digg what they like best. If your submission rocks and receives enough Diggs, it is promoted to the front page for the millions of their visitors to see. (click here - How Digg works)
For example . . .If you liked this article, or one on black listing, market analysis, etc., you'd click the Digg hyper link at the bottom of the post and that would be registered as a vote that this was an article you found interesting and think should be shared with others.
Continue reading "Appraisal Scoop - Can you Digg it?! I knew that you could!" »
Who can forget the famous line from "The Jerk" where Steve Martin's character Navin R. Johnson first sees his name in the phone book?
"The new phone book's here! The new phone book's here! This is the kind of spontaneous publicity I need! My name in print! That really makes somebody! Things are going to start happening to me now."
That's how I felt when the AppraisalScoop.com blog made it onto the Top 100 Real Estate Blogs list from International Listings. Here's the setup for the list . . .
Despite the funk that the subprime crisis has brought down on Wall Street and financial institutions, this sector represents only one portion of an entire industry. Some financial analysts such as James DiGeorgia, 21st Century Investor publisher, advises investors to keep an eye on the real estate industry as an opportunity. And, savvy homeowners or those who seek to purchase houses as residences or as investments might be wise to stay on top of some of the best names in the industry. Who knows where real estate will go from here?
To find an answer, we’re treating you to the top 100 bloggers who focus on every real estate subtopic from appraisals to the title industry. You won’t find real estate listings in this article, although some blogs focus on individuals who work in real estate and others focus on consumers. Please note that the blog numbering is not meant to be a ranking–each real estate subtopic is simply listed in alphabetical order, with blogs then listed in alphabetical order within that topic.
Thanks to the power of "alphabetical listings" . . .The "Scoop" made it to the top of the list. Thanks to International Listings for including Appraisal Blogs!!
Does everyone reading AppraisalScoop.com back up their computer files? I believe most people do. NOW . . . How many bloggers backup their blog? To be honest, until recently, I didn't either. I've read other people's horrifying stories of how they lost their blog and went scrambling for help to retrieve all those precious thoughts and images!
Can you image if you'd been blogging for two years, and posted 500 posts, and one day it was GONE? Everybody's posts are different and unique so we need to backup our posts to ensure we don't lose our data if the web server crashes.
I found this FREE web service called BlogBackupOnline that's basically an Insurance Policy for Blogs!
http://www.blogbackuponline.com/ is a application that will backup your blog, including jpeg, gif files etc. Signup is simple, and after your registration, they will maintain your blog with daily incremental backups so there's no more sleepless nights.
Getting Started: You get started by filling out a simple registration form. An email will be sent to your email account verifying your status.
Full Backup: After completing the registration of your blog URL you're ready to do your first full backup. Times for this process will vary depending on quantity of posts and number of images. This first one may take a while? My http://www.AppraisalScoop.com blog has 520+ posts and about as many comments and (I didn't sit and WATCH) I'm pretty sure it was done in well under 30 minutes?
Daily Backups: After the first Full Back up, BlogBackupOnline will do the rest. Daily backups will continue automatically, saving any amendments, new posts or comments. Sooooo, at worst, you'd only lose one day's data.
Restoring Blogs: After you have fully backed up your blog it can be restored to the same blog location or you can send it to another blog platform. Current maximum storage is 50Mb and from what I see most blogs should be with this limit.
Switching Blog Platforms: BlogBackupOnline has 11 supported blogging services (Blogger, Friendster, LiveJournal, Movable Type, Multiply, Serendipity, Terapad, TypePad, Vox, Windows Live Space, or WordPress). The site is a great tool if you ever decide to move your blog from one platform to another. After you've backed up your blog, BlogBackupOnline can bring all of your old entries into the new service.
Now that my site's backed up I don't need to worry and can sleep easy at night, Can You? Not often you can get free insurance but using this free web application there's nothing to lose.
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Brian J. Davis, RAA - Brian Davis & Associates - Brian has over 23 years of appraisal experience in Central, IL and hosts the Appraisal Scoopblog and the WinTOTAL Users Group an email forum for appraisers.
Norrington: You are without doubt the worst pirate I've ever heard of.
Jack Sparrow: But you HAVE heard of me.
How did Jack become so well known in his own time? How is it that WE all know his name? Was Jack Sparrow one of the earliest practitioners of Viral Marketing?
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Viral marketing and viral advertising refer to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness, through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses. It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet. [1] Viral marketing is a marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message voluntarily.[2] Viral promotions may take the form of funny video clips, images, or even text messages.
Did you know that by reading this blog YOU may be part of a viral marketing effort? That's right! The Appraisal Scoop blog and its authors are all part of a "marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message voluntarily." We're not selling anything, but we are spreading our ideas and promoting ourselves in hopes that others will share those messages. The end result, like Jack Sparrow, people will HAVE heard of us!
Ann O'Rourke of Appraisal Today said to me many years ago: "If you do anything (marketing), you're doing more than 95% of the other appraisers." That was true then and it's true today.
What's YOUR "Marketing Plan"? If it's like most appraisers', it's "aggressively waiting by the telephone or fax machine waiting for it to ring!"
Over the next few days and weeks, I plan to take a look at many of the viral marketing options that appraisers have available today. The options will range from simple eMail forums and blogging to targeted newsletters, videos, and podcasting. I hope you'll follow this series and join in with YOUR "Success Stories!
Author: Brian J. Davis, RAA - Brian Davis & Associates - Brian has over 23 years of appraisal experience in Central, IL and hosts the Appraisal Scoop blog and the WinTOTAL Users Group an email forum for appraisers.
The Appraisal Scoop has just completed its first twelve month cycle and contrary to the housing cycle we're NOT declining! As "Ring Master" for the Appraisal Scoop blog I want to thank everyone that reads the Scoop on a daily basis, but particularly those that author so many of the "original" articles and opinions that you find here. Without their contributions, Appraisal Scoop could have become just another "Me Too" blog.
Take a quick peek at the chart below! Last July (2006) there were only 1,000 visitors to the blog and only a 1,500 pages were viewed. Contrast that with July, 2007! There were over 15,000 visitors that month and close to 35,000 pages were viewed!
If you enjoy the Appraisal Scoop, may I ask three things of you?
Author: Brian J. Davis, RAA - Brian Davis & Associates - Brian has over 23 years of appraisal experience in Central, IL and hosts the Appraisal Scoop blog and the WinTOTAL Users Group an email forum for appraisers.
Todd Carpenter, a mortgage professional with a decade of diverse experience in the mortgage industry, built lenderama to share his experiences with other mortgage and real estate professionals.
Thursday, Todd announced the launch of REMBEX.com - Real Estate & Mortgage Blogger's Exchange.
Until now, it's been difficult to find, filter, and digest relevant real estate blog content, when so many "Googled" blogs are either self-promotional or RSS article feeds from other sites.
What Todd has done, is compile 250 active, relevant blogs, plus all of the blog on the activerain.com network, and input them into a single Google Co-op search engine.
"This engine bridges the gap between searching each blog individually, and using a more global search engine like Technorati or Google Blog Search. Those bigger engines can be useful, but I've found that they don't differentiate between dedicated realty bloggers and anyone with a blog, that happens to mention real estate. The big search engines also tend to bring up results from sploggers or almost any site that uses RSS feeds."
To read more about the REMBEX.com search engine - click here
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Henry Harrison's blog is published by nationally recognized appraisal author and educator Henry S. Harrison based on the "Ask Henry" section of Real Estate Valuation Magazine Online.
"Over the past 30+ years, we've received and answered literally hundreds of 'Ask Henry' letters on a wide range of topics. The answers we've written are often interesting and informative, and useful for new and established appraisers alike. We hope you will enjoy this posting board and recommend it to your appraisal friends."
Click here to visit Mr. Harrison's Q&A Blog.
Keep web traffic coming back to your site. Many web site companies, including a la mode's Appraiser XSites, allow appraisers to show RSS Feeds. But . . .What is it? and what does it do for YOU!?
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. It allows other sites (Yahoo!® News, Inman®, The New York Times®, Appraisal Scoop) to publish news stories, blogs, podcasts, and video blogs to your site automatically, so you’ve always got highly targeted, current content.
Why is RSS important? It’s no secret that search engines reward sites with fresh, relevant content with a boost in search engine ranking. They also look for links between your site and other websites, especially sites that have similar content that's relevant to the industry, or local content.
RSS feeds will keep your visitors on your site longer, and will keep them coming back. Plus, if you have a specialty, you can choose a RSS feed that gives visitors the impression that you’re the unrivaled expert.
Click HERE to continue reading how to add an RSS feed to Appraisal Scoop!
Continue reading "Shameless Self-Promotion: Adding an Appraisal Scoop RSS Feed" »
Having a website back in the toddler days of Internet was cool. If you are a company and you had a website URL on your business card, that would win you brownie points….tons of brownie points, actually. Websites, those days, wasn’t even impressive, really. I mean, they were static and plain. Some of them had designs and colors that gave you a horrible eyesore too. Sad to say, I’ve seen many of such websites belonging to small to medium sized corporations.
However, as we move forward a couple of years later, in came flash. Having a flash website was really flashy and it impressed the socks off of people. That is, people who were willing to wait for the flash on the website to load. Back in those pre-broadband days, that’s quite a lot of waiting to do. You could go to the kitchen, get that spaghetti cooked, come back to the PC and the flash would STILL be loading. I kid you not.
But NOW, there’s business blog. Aaahhh….didn’t you ever notice that with blogs, we’re going back to the basics? We’re going back to being simple, nice, neat websites that are packed with information. And most importantly, a blog allows communication, feedback and interactivity. Actually, the blog is the best thing to happen to the Internet of recent years…simply because it brings us back to the very basics of Internet marketing. The focus is back to words and information.
Click below to read on . . .
Continue reading "Why Blogs are More Popular than Websites Now?" »
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