How To Write A Blog Post For Your Real Estate Website

As a real estate agent you are probably aware of the importance of publishing regular content on your website, such as new blog posts. Understanding the importance of blog posts is the first step. Now, it’s about writing the actual blog posts the right way to make sure you will reap the benefits of it. So how do you do this? As not everyone may be comfortable or familiar with copywriting, we’ve created this step-by-step guide to help you write your blog posts.

What exactly is a blog post?

We’ve been talking about blog posts a lot, but what exactly is a blog post? The definition of a blog post is quite broad, as there is not one particular type of article that classifies as a ‘blog post’: a blog post is any article, news piece or guide that’s published in the blog section of a website. Typically, a blog posts covers a specific topic or question, and is educational in nature. A blog post generally ranges from around 500 to 2000+ words.

Blog posts are a great way to update your website with content that does not belong on specific pages. It allows you to publish insights, thoughts and stories on your website without the need of creating a whole new page. Most importantly, it helps you drive more traffic to your website.

For a full breakdown of the benefits of having a blog on your real estate website, make sure you read our recent post here.

What makes a good blog post?

There is no definite answer as to what makes a good blog post – some audiences may prefer short, concise posts in formal language, whereas others may prefer longer posts with more of a backstory and informal language. There is however one universal aspect that applies to every good blog post: a good blog post is interesting to read and provides educational content to audience members.

A good blog post needs to be both interesting and educational, and provide your audience with answers to questions they have or challenges they’re experiencing.

You should include actionable steps for your audience to solve their issue, and use examples to keep your audience engaged and interested in what you have to say.

How to write a blog post: 10 Steps

Now we know what a blog post is and what makes a good one, it’s time to tackle the big question: how to write a blog post? Here are the 10 steps you should follow.

1. Understand your audience

Before you start writing, it’s important to know who will be reading your posts and what kind of content they are looking for. Ideally, the majority of your posts will be directed at sellers. Depending on your target audience, you may specify this even more: are you writing for experienced property investors, or perhaps for first-time buyers and sellers?

Understanding your audience is key. This will help you identify your topics and tailor your content to their challenges and questions.

2. Identify the topic of your new post

Now you know who your target audience is, you need to identify the topic of your new blog post. What will you be writing about?

If you’re writing a blog post directed at people who are thinking about selling their home, you may want to include tips on how to increase the value of their home, signs it’s time to sell, current market updates, and so on.

If this is your very first blog post, a general recommendation is to not to start with a ‘How To’ article – try to build some credibility first. Instead, you could use a listicle (5 reasons why, 3 signs..), a news article, a market update or anything else relevant to your audience.

If you need some inspiration for blog post topics, make sure you read our 17 Blog Post Ideas post article here.

3. Write your title

Once you’ve decided what you’ll be writing about, start with the title. Starting with the title of your blog post is important as it gives you direction and helps you write relevant content without going off-topic.

Your title will give you a clear structure for your content as it’s descriptive and tells your audience what they will find in the blog post (e.g. ‘5 ways to..’).

The title you come up with in this step will be a working title – you can always adjust and perfect it after you’ve written your content. This is something we will do in one of our last steps.

4. Start with your intro

The introduction of your blog posts is one of the most important parts – this is where you need to capture your reader’s attention and convince them the blog post is worth reading.

Within the first few sentences, you need to grab the reader’s attention. You can do this via sharing an interesting fact or statistic, a story, a joke, or by being empathetic.

After you’ve grabbed their attention, tell them what the purpose of the blog post is. What will you be writing about, and how does it solve the reader’s problem? By clearly describing this you will provide the reader with a reason to continue reading.

5. Create an outline for your content

Before you dive into writing the actual content, create an outline first. Write your headings (or at least a working version) and decide the structure of your blog posts.

Once you have your headings, clarify for yourself what you will cover in each section. Write a quick description and use bullet points for a breakdown of the content to keep it organised and clear.

Creating an outline is essential when writing a blog post as it helps you focus and gives a clear structure to the document. Don’t just start writing content and see where it goes – it’s very likely you will go off-topic or your blog post won’t make much sense to readers. A well-structured post is an important aspect of keeping your readers engaged.

6. Write your blog post

Now you have your outline and you know exactly what you will be covering, it’s time to start writing! Because of the outline you created in the last step, this will be quite straightforward – you’ll just have to fill in the blanks.

Write the content for each section, using the bullet points and descriptions from the last step. Switch between longer and shorter sentences, and try to use easy-to-understand language. Stay on topic as much as possible, and don’t make your post any longer than needed.

7. Add images

Adding images is an important part of creating an interesting and engaging blog post. Some posts need more imagery than others – it’s important to assess where an image would add extra value to the post, rather than just adding random ‘filler’ images.

When you add imagery, make sure the images relate to the post, such as examples of something you just talked about.

TIP: Adding a descriptive alternative text to your images is beneficial for SEO purposes.

8. Insert a CTA

If you got your readers to the end of the post – congrats! That means you captured their attention the whole post and they were interested enough to read the full content.

So – let’s think about this for a minute. You’ve driven a person to your website, you’ve interested them with your content, got them to engage and read the full post, and they’re still on your website, about to end the session.

If you just end the content of your blog, the majority of these people will leave your website and go back to Facebook, their emails, or wherever they initially came from. This is why you should always include a clear CTA (Call To Action) at the end of your blog post. Always.

This is the perfect opportunity to convert the reader and drive them to a certain action. They’re on your website, and they’re interested in what you have to say. This does not necessarily have to be a contact button or free appraisal form – it can be something simpler.

What your exact CTA should be depends on the blog post itself. For some posts, it may be suitable to indeed add that free appraisal form. For others, you may want to include a CTA to subscribe to your email list, or perhaps offer a free E-book with further content related to the blog post (in exchange for an email address, so you collect their details).

9. Proofread and edit your post

Once you’ve written your blog post and inserted your CTA, give it a rest. Wait a few hours or ideally at least a day to come back to your blog post to proofread.

By waiting some time before proofreading and making final edits, you give yourself the opportunity to come back with fresh eyes.

Fix any typos, spelling and grammar mistakes and perhaps shift some things around or restructure some sentences. Optimise and finalise your content for publishing.

10. Optimise for SEO & schedule to publish!

We’re almost there! The last step is to optimise your post for SEO purposes, and schedule for publishing.

Start a new blog post in your CMS (your website builder) if you haven’t already done so, and paste the content. Once you’ve set this all up, it’s time to add your meta title and description. This includes the information you provide to search engines such as Google. Keep it concise, include your focus keywords and make sure the title and description match your content.

TIP: Writing effective metadata is one of the easiest places to start when it comes to improving your site’s rankings in Google through SEO. If you’d like to learn more about how to do this, make sure you subscribe to our mailing list and keep an eye out for any new blog posts: we’ll be discussing this in more detail soon!