The Real Estate Marketing Insider‘s Tobias Nergarden continued his weekly “Top 3” series with a list of three traits that help make an effective, high-traffic blog. The list was prompted by an analysis of twenty real estate blogs that are updated regularly.

One of the best methods for real estate sales marketing in an internet-driven market is to create an engaging, easy-to-read blog. Blogs are often neglected and dismissed by realtors as a waste of time and mental energy, but the statistics show otherwise. Small businesses that keep regularly-updated blogs receive 50 percent or more hits on their websites than businesses that don’t. And as Joe Heath of Reality Biz News pointed out this week, those hits can become real home sales and commissions in a hurry. This week, Heath published a list of 20 real estate blogs that are regularly updated and easy to read, as a model for realtors who want to start or improve their own blogs.

Heath’s list is a great starting point, but for realtors who want to take a blog from good to great and increase their traffic, REMI has put together a set of three traits that these highly effective blogs have in common:

• Regularly updated. This is a no-brainer. People will only return to a website or a blog to see content they haven’t already seen. As REMI has said before, the content does not have to be linked to real estate all of the time.

Easy to Locate. This is a multi-part task involving a clear blog name comprising both the target market’s city and some variant on “home” or “real estate”. This can include a short, easily-remembered URL, and ideally, individual posts tagged and search-engine optimized, that can appear on simple searches for “real estate.”

A simple, attractive format. Most free blog hosts like WordPress or Tumblr have ready-made blog formats specifically designed so that they’re easy to read and have an attractive color scheme that doesn’t hurt the eyes. If it’s not broken, don’t fix it – choose a ready-made template and worry about making the content the centerpiece of the blog.

The Real Estate Marketing Insider publishes a “Top 3” feature that focuses on traits of successful, high-traffic real estate blogs. REMI recommends that blogs be updated regularly, be easy to find online, and have a presentation format that is simple and non-distracting.

About the Real Estate Marketing Insider:
The Real Estate Marketing Insider brings the real estate industry breaking news, insider information, and analysis. Based in La Jolla, Calif., the online journal caters to real estate professionals and clients alike.