ActiveRain Tutorials: September 2009

Syndicate Your ActiveRain Blogs with RSS

What is syndication and why should you "Syndicate Your ActiveRain Blogs?"  Driving traffic and exposure to your Blog is the primary reason.  RSS - Really Simple Syndication is a great way to connect your ActiveRain Blog to other Blogs and websites.  Members on ActiveRain have an RSS feed button located on the sidebar of their Blog.  Click on it to see your options and how it can be used to expand your reach to a larger audience via other sites and locations on the web.

Adding an RSS feed to your ActiveRain Blog on your ActiveRain Blog is nice, but no where near the value and benefit of having an RSS feed in other locations. Do you have a website?  Do you use an email signature?  Are you utilizing online marketing?  Take advantage of this tiny little tool so you can get BIG results.  That's why it's here.  If you're not familiar with RSS Feeds, Readers, and tools etc., here's a really good post that will give you more details and an explanation.

RSS is a great way to syndicate your Blog posts and get them out there and in front of a larger potential audience. Using RSS feeds is also a great way to have information and great content delivered back to you without having to go out and look for it. This will save you valuable time browsing the web for content and information that you might be interested in. 

Personally, I use Google Reader for all my RSS feeds to the sites I like to get updates and new information from.  This allows me the ability to scroll through hundreds of articles from various sites and blogs easily and conveniently without having to go to each site and see what's newly published. You can also share certain posts and articles with others that you follow, and they can share with you. 

If you're looking for some ways to get back-links and Web Traffic, I just watched THIS VIDEO that explains how to do this using FeedAgg.com. You can see how many other RE professionals have done this already by Clicking Here. You can search their site for various Real Estate type RSS feeds that have already been added to the site. Why not add yours while you're there.  It's just one more way to syndicate your ActiveRain Blog.

Teaching your clients how to subscribe to your Blog via RSS is a valuable tool, both for them, and for you.

DON'T FORGET TO DO THIS WITH THE RSS FROM YOUR ACTIVERAIN OUTSIDE BLOGS TOO.

Today I am excited to announce some exciting news for our new members on ActiveRain.  I was recently asked by Jon and Bob to assist on our newer members in optimizing their blog so that it will show up in the top of search engines results as well as train them on how all the various features of ActiveRain work.

Introducing One on One Blog Training

Starting today, new members can schedule a one on one blog training session with me.  One of the biggest fears that new members face is writing that first initial blog post.  Many are afraid that what they write will not be good enough or that they will mess things up by writing a bad post.  Beginners end up scaring themselves from ever actually writing that first initial post and end up never realizing the benefits of ActiveRain. Trust me when I say, I can relate.  I was so nervous when I started here and my first few posts were terrible.  (If you don't believe me, read my second post on ActiveRain, it was the worst I have ever written!) But, as I continued on, things changed and the success stories started to pile up for me just like many of our other members.

Overcoming The Fear to Blog

That is where I come in.  As a member of the network for over a year and a half and also the author of over 500 posts, I have learned how to write effective blogs. The past 6 months have been spent writing step by step tutorials on how all of the different features of ActiveRain work and how to use them to enhance your blog.  You can see those posts on my outside blog. During that time, I have learned first hand the many  features of The ActiveRain Network.

What Will I Learn in Our One to One Training Session?

During your One on One Training session we will cover:

How to Optimize Your ActiveRain Profile.
How to Insert Photos into your Blog
How to Insert Hyperlinks.
Setting up Your Outside Blog.
How to write effective blog posts for consumers & search engines.
How to use your blog to connect with your community.
Topics to write about on your blog.

Each session will last anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour.  If you are a new member that has not started your blogging career because you have not been sure where to start, this course is for you!  Or, if you have been blogging for a while as a free member, this is an excellent opportunity to try out all the great features of ActiveRain as well as get some excellent training on how to maximize your blogging efforts.

Because ActiveRain feels so strongly in the power of the network, they are offering a special promotional rate for non-rainmakers to sign up as a rainmaker for the first month for only $5.00.  In addition to that $5.00, you will also receive the training session from me.

******ATTENTION RAINMAKERS*****

I Just Talked to Steven about the Webinars he is hosting for our members that are already Rainmakers and this is what he said the classes cover:

"Each class will cover seo blogging to dominate google search results, setting up the outside blogs,and how to write a blog including adding links,pictures,making a picture a link, embedding maps, widgets, and video's, AR syndication, RSS, blog settings and blog customization, hit router, referral network, as well as any questions they may have!"

So for all of you current rainmakers, check out the Calendar for upcoming classes & Register NOW!

If you are currently not a Rainmaker, simply fill out this form below and I will contact you directly to schedule your session.

One of the most common objections I receive when consulting someone on social media, is "Jeremy, I work in an area that is made up of an older generation.  They aren't into twitter and Facebook and all this Internet stuff.  So, I don't know if writing a blog would be a big benefit to me."  So, I asked a few more questions about the demographics and came to the conclusion that it appeared the average age range she was referring to was somewhere between late forties into late sixties. 

So this morning I started to do some research to see what type of age groups are making up social media and if older generations are participating or if they are non-existent.  The first place I started was here on ActiveRain.  I remembered the wonderful article by Art Kruschka titled: The View from the 84th Floor (which btw, Happy Birthday Art!) in which he wrote about celebrating his 84th birthday on Monday!  Art has been a very active member here on ActiveRain.  In fact, since starting here in March 2008 at the young age of 82, Art has published 566 blog posts!

Next, I decided I would visit both my Facebook business page & also ActiveRain's to see what the age breakdown looked like.  Here are the results:

This first graph is from my personal Facebook business page.  You will notice that only 35% of my group is under the age of 35.  While 35% of my fans are over the age of 45!  Also, I have twice as many fans over the age of 55 than I do between 18-24.  That stat really shocked me!

This graph is for fans of ActiveRain's fan page on Facebook.  The numbers here were even more astounding.  Fans under the age of 35 only make up 18% while there are just as many fans over the age of 55.  Fans over the age of 45 make up almost half of the members. 82% of the fans are over the age of 35!

After viewing these two graphs it leads me to believe that while many believe that Facebook is just for teenagers and college kids it appears that the majority of users are those over 45 years old by a long shot.  With that being said, I started to doubt the validity in the statement that the older generations are not on the Internet and definitely not involved with social media.

Are you still thinking this might be the case?  If so, let me share one more thing that should solidify my results that social media and Internet marketing isn't just for kids. 

Ivy Bean just celebrated her 104th birthday the beginning of this month and has become an instant celebrity.  Where you might ask?  Well on twitter of course!  I just followed her on twitter and became her 46,000 follower!  At first when I heard about her being on twitter, I thought it was some promotional stunt that someone was trying to just collect followers.  But when I investigated things I found out that it was legit.  Take a minute to watch this awesome video from Ivy.

So I ask if this statement is true?  Older generations are not reading blogs or using other social media platform.  I will let you be the judge of that.  My personal opinion is that it is the exact opposite, more and more are signing up for these different social media platforms every day.

It seems that everywhere you turn lately you are hearing buzz words like Social Media, Web 2.0, and the latest buzz word, "New Media."  You hear experts debate the best way to use twitter and facebook to increase your business.  Tweets from celebrities like Oprah & Shaq are posted all over the news and discussed by millions.  All of this buzz and hype have people seeking more information on how to use these two services to generate business.

But, one of the other types of social media and in my opinion the most effective avenue is being pushed to the wayside.  The amount of hype that you hear about writing blogs and using one for business seems to becoming a dying breed and lost art form.  That being said, I decided that it was time for me to do some research to see if blogs really were losing steam and becoming an ineffective means or if the "gurus" were just omitting an important component to any social media strategy.

The first thing I wanted to see is what is driving traffic to ActiveRain. Are search engines still what brings people to your site, or are they finding your sites through other social media means like Facebook & twitter. Over 75% of the traffic Came from search engines.  On the other hand, the two social media giants, Facebook and Twitter are only accountable for 1.65% of web traffic.  Seeing this, was a major shock to me.  I thought for sure that both would be in the top 10 and probably bring somewhere from 12-15% of our traffic. In retrospect, if you remember my post about the importance of labeling images, we learned at that time that 3.65% of our traffic comes from image searches.  That is more than double two social media giants!

Since it seems like social media is not great for directing traffic, I next decided I would see how a blog ranks in comparison to regular websites.  Whenever I ask someone if they use a blog on a regular basis, the top objection/reason they say is "they already have a web site that gives them an Internet presence.

I started doing some typical searches that a consumer would do to see which show up higher in the rankings.  My first keyword I did a search for was Austin Relocation Package.  The #1 result out of over 600,000 for that term was a blog by member Jason Crouch that he wrote in March 2008.  What was even more interesting was that Jason's website, only ranked #6.

Next, I decided to do a search for a community that Virginia Hepp, another member markets on both her blog and also on her website called Copper Bluffs in Mesquite Nevada. The Results were astounding!  Virginia's ActiveRain, Localism, and Outside Blog captured places 1-6 while her personal website showed up in the results at #8.  If you don't believe me, take a look at this search for Copper Bluffs Mesquite Nevada Real Estate. 

As I continued to do searches, this seemed to be the recurring theme.  Blogs consistently outranked personal websites on just about any and every search term I used.  This leads me to the conclusion that if someone is just using a website and has no active blog that they are updating on a regular basis that they are missing out a major chunk of potential business.

The third test that I used was to check activity from and whether it has decreased over the past few months as Twitter and Facebook have grown.  

A few months ago I wrote a post titled: 40,000 Visitors To Your Rainmaker Account in Just 25 Days!  This post shows how over a one month period of time I wrote 25 posts that garnered well over 40,000 visitors to my blog.  I also went on to share in that post how the best performance I ever had on my regular website was just over 3,000 hits.  My blog had more than 13 times the amount of traffic!  Since this was written several months ago, I decided that I would run the numbers again to see if my blog is decreasing in traffic since other social media sources are gaining such popularity.

For the last 25 posts, the total number of visits is 47,881 in comparison to the 40,699.  This averages out to a 6% increase or almost 300 more clicks per post.  This would lead me to believe that instead of my blog losing traction to other social media realms, it is actually gaining popularity over the past 5 months and becoming a stronger tool in social media arsenal.

So in closing I ask this question to you, Are blogs a technology of the past and something you should not focus on any more?  From the research I have done, I do not believe that statement to be true.  In fact, I believe the opposite.  Your blog is something that needs to be the main component to your social media strategy that you should focus on. What do you think?

In case you missed it earlier today, ActiveRain introduced the ability to now upload an HD profile picture in which you can crop & edit right on the network.  If you missed the announcement, take a minute to read all about it on Brad's post: It's time to update your photo- In HD.  To me, this is such a wonderful feature because for some reason, it seems the pictures of me where I am actually smiling and have my eyes open always have someone else in the photograph. (I should win an award for the worst person ever to be photographed.)  Now, I can use some of those pictures & crop out the surrounding people without needing to use photo editing software.

The video below will show you just how easy it is to use this feature.  I uploaded a new photo of myself, edited & saved it in less than 2 minutes.  Remember though, when choosing your new profile photo, make sure it is at least 600 x 600 pixels wide or you will receive an error message.  As always, if you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact me for help!

ActiveRain Success Stories - What Your Blog CAN Do For You

Today I was talking on the phone with a New ActiveRain member ready to become a RainMaker, but wanted to know some of the successes and benefits that other members here had experienced from being here.  I shared the "Success Stories" link located on the AR Homepage.  Then, as I started looking for some Blog posts to share with her, I discovered that there are literally hundreds, even thousands of these success stories scattered all through-out the community. 

After spending a couple hours scouring the network, I was able to come up with some really good examples of how other members are using AR to promote their business, connect with others, generate referrals, capitalize on our SEO, get picked up by the news media, grow their business, and in many cases, make hundreds of thousands of dollars just from their ActiveRain Blogs. 

I joined ActiveRain, and here's what happened...

"I have roughly $2 million in contracts and potential business at the moment which is exclusively from people who found my AR posts" - Jason Crouch

"I just received my 43 referral from the rain" - Larry Bettag

"ActiveRain has put over $122,000 into my pocket, spread over 17 different buyers and sellers" - Donna Harris

"ActiveRain Does Not Rain! It Pours! $1,300,000 Closing Because of the Power of Active Rain!" - Katerina Gasset

"Just in the last 2 months, I have closed on 6 transactions just from blogging" - Jeff Belonger

"I have already placed three homes on the market, in the last 30 days, that were direct results of ActiveRain..." - Bryant Tutas

"At this point I am reaping the rewards of ActiveRain. Thank you Active Rain, it does work!" - Tinker Hulse

"What's Better than a Referral Form from ActiveRain?" - Kathleen "Kate" Elim

"Active Rain has put me on the map. I receive at least THREE calls each week.."." - Donald Bradbury

"This is a testimony to how ActiveRain has impacted our Business" - Mariana Wagner

"NBC picked up my blog... How do I EVEN BEGIN to thank ActiveRain" - Craig Schiller

"How Blogging Put Me On the Evening News" - Janet Guilbault

"I have been contemplating my "Rainmaker" status for a month or two" - Will Goodson

"So does blogging on Activerain bring business?" YES, YES, YES!" - Missy Caulk

"Brad Andersohn and Bob Stewart may actually know what they're talking about" - Suesan Jenifer Therriault

There are so many great stories and testimonials from our members.  It seems as though a new success story or "Victory" post goes up nearly everyday.  These stories and testimonials should be persuasive enough to get you following successful members, subscribing to their Blogs, witnessing their successes, and following in their footsteps as rainmakers to create and build your own success stories here.

If you have a success story you've written about, we'd love for you to share it.  Just leave me a link to your post.  Hearing what other members have done here is great, but experiencing these successes for yourself is the REAL convincing factor, and WILL BE your motivation to Blog.  YOUR unique stories will be YOUR greatest reward.  Reading these, and seeing how and what these members did will hopefully help confirm your decision to be here as a successful RainMaker in YOUR area and community. 

Here's to your success and the rewards you obtain from your efforts here in the "rain!"  :-)

I get asked often how I created my custom header for both my ActiveRain Blog and also my Outside Blog.  The process of creating one is actually pretty simple to do.  Instead of doing a tutorial with screen shots, I thought it might be easier to see how I created my header & uploaded it in a video format.  So, I made a generic header for my blogs today & taped it as I made them.

The entire process from beginning to end only took me about 5 minutes.  I actually spent more time locating the photograph I wanted to use & enhancing that.  So, if you are unsure about how to design your own header, watch these two videos below and you will be on your way to creating a great looking new header for your blog in no time!

This first video walks you through the process of actually designing the header.  It shows you how to re-size, crop, and also add text to your photograph.  I used a free online photo editing software called picnik.com to create mine.  If you have photo editing software that you are familiar with, you can use that & have the same results by following the steps.

Now that we have created an awesome looking header, it is now time to insert it onto both our ActiveRain profile & also our Outside Blog.  This video will walk you through uploading the picture to both places.

As always, if you run into any problems, do not hesitate to contact me.  Now go off & add Jazz Up Your ActiveRain & Outside Blog with a Custom Header!

The number 1 question that I get asked each week by new members is how to insert photos into your blog and move them around.  I would guess this question comes up anywhere from 3-5 times each week.  Adding photographs to your ordinary blocks of text in a blog post can take your boring posts to another level. 

However, many are confused on how to insert photos, or use the different components of ActiveRain's photo editor, so I am going to break this down into several components. 

The first part I am going to show you is how to insert photos either from your computers Hard Drive, or from a link to the photo on a web hosting service like Flickr. (Remember to read the TOS of the web hosting site before uploading photographs for commercial use.)

The one advantage to loading your picture to a web hosting site first is that it gives you another link in your blog that helps to build your SEO & Google juice by linking from the photo site to your blog.  You will notice that since I uploaded the picture of the Lilly Pads from my photo account, I have the ability to go back & place a link on it as well back to the photo album.  Since the picture on the left came straight from my hard drive, there isn't a way to link back to another area.  The other nice thing by linking this photograph is that if someone wants to see it much larger, they can click on the picture and will be directed straight to where the photo is available in full size. 

This first video will just show the 2 different ways to insert a picture onto your blog. I broke this tutorial into two parts to keep the videos from becoming too long. When you are actually inserting the picture into your blog, you would do both processes of both tutorials before clicking the update button.

This second video shows you how to align the photo in your post, re-size it & also place some white-space around your picture so that the words of your post do not run into your picture.

Here are a few final reminders for inserting photos onto your blog:

• Do not use any photo that is not yours without written permission from the owner.  Using a photo without permission can result in an instant lawsuit and cost you thousands of dollars!
  
• Remember the importance of labeling your photos!
• Keep your photos on your ActiveRain blog under 550 pixels in width.  Any wider than that and you can run into major layout issues on your Outside Blog.
• Turn off Pop-Up Blockers. The number #1 issue that people run into when trying to insert a picture is that they have a pop-up blocker that is prohibiting them from loading a photo.  Sometimes even after changing the settings they run into issues.  If this is the case, hold in the CTRL button on your keyboard when clicking the links and it should allow the boxes to load properly.
• Give Credit to the Photographer.   Some places have a creative commons license which allows you to use another persons photo, but you must give them credit for taking the picture. 

The photos I used for this demonstration were taken from my Flickr Set that were taken on my recent trip to Atlanta & our journey to the Atlanta Botanical Garden.

I hope this tutorial answers any questions you may have on how to insert an image into your blog.  If you have any other, do not hesitate to contact me.

I get asked several times a week by members on how to insert links into blog posts.  So, I decided it was time to do a blog post about how to do this.  Watch the short video below as I walk you through the process of adding links & unlinking on your ActiveRain blog.

As always, do not forget to label your link! It takes only a second but can really increase the power of your blog exponentially!

If you are having trouble viewing this video, click the button to watch in HD & you can view this tutorial in full screen mode.