This post comes to us from BrokerageU:

I'm sure you've all seen a blog on just about every single website you go to nowadays. Sports sites, fashion sites, and yes even real estate websites now feature a blog page.

The question is why?

Once you understand the purpose and strategy behind successful blogging, it will make the time spent writing them seem SO much more worth it!

Before we even begin to talk about a strategy, we need to clarify what a "good" blog post is made of.

Here are our guidelines:

• Make sure your content is unique! We will go a little deeper into this topic in a minute.
• Your title should be descriptive of your topic. For extra punch, try to work in the area name you focus on into your title.
• Try to have at least one main photo for each post that you write.
• Think about length. We think the 250-600 word range is a great place to start.
• Mention the primary property type and the area you work in at least 3 times throughout your post. Example: "When planning a remodel of your Charleston Home..."

• Do you have the rights to post this content? Think about any images, videos, links, quotes, etc. that you are placing within your post.
• Set a goal to publish at least 1 post per week / 4 posts per month.
• Once a post is published, make sure to place a link of this new content on all of your applicable social networks.

Now, before we can go any further we must come back to the Unique Content that we mentioned above. Unique means that this content is 100% written by you (or a hired writer) and specific to one website and one website only. Yes, this does mean that if you are an agent who owns 10 different websites, publishing the same content on all of them would cause a huge negative impact on all 10 sites. Multiple websites can be a wonderful asset to have and the best way to build them up is through... you guessed it, UNIQUE CONTENT.

This also means that it will greatly harm your website if you are copying content from any other sources (Wikipedia, etc.); even if you have the legal right to feature that information. If you are paying for a blogging service or purchasing blogs, beware of where else this content is being used online. Canned Content is often made of mass produced blogs (even if they do change a few words) and then sold to a multitude of REALTORS®. Make sure to ask your content provider all of the above questions to make sure their content is worth the price.

f you don't have the time to blog and you are looking for a writing service, we highly recommend a company called SquaredR. They have a team of journalists who will research your areas and interests and think about all of these guidelines so that you don't have to!

More advanced?

If you take all of the above steps into consideration, you will be at a great starting place. In addition, if you want the impact of your blogs to go even further try these extra tips and tricks:

• Make sure you have a Google+ profile set up to claim your work. Setting up a profile is simple and it allows the search engine to verify you as an author of your written content- great stuff!
• Add IDX listing feeds to the end of every post. Doing this takes only seconds and can hugely impact the number of pages that your site will index.
• When are your posts going live? The ideal time for a blog post to be published is Monday or Tuesday 1:00 pm EST / 10:00 am PST.
• Do you have options for people to share your posts on their social network or sign up for email updates of new activity? Doing this can greatly impact your reach.

To view the original article, visit the BrokerageU blog.