Sir Francis Bacon popularized the phrase, “Knowledge is Power.” In the information age, this is more true than ever before. Information precedes knowledge. In the biblical sense, knowledge implied intimacy. A grasp or an ‘intimacy’ with information is what yields true knowledge. Knowledge is power in the marketplace. Knowledge is the power to advance beyond your peers and competitors.
There are numerous gems for your business that follow. Some are obvious, some are subtle. If you skim this list you may miss the gem you needed for your business. Take some time with each of the personalities mentioned and you will be the winner for it.
It is no surprise that when you present top feature writers with tons of expertise – aka the power of knowledge – that industry pros flock to those pages on the www.MHMSM.com website. In fact, Google Analystics tells us that the articles by our featured writers are the top read on our main site.
In many places, holidays means parades. As we head into the 4th of July holiday weekend, I will do the first of a short series of blog posts on top industry pros featured on www.MHMSM.com. This ‘parade of manufactured housing and modular/factory built home pros’ will show you graphically how Google treats them in a search.
What this ‘parade of manufactured housing pros’ will reveal in part is the power of combining these top talents on one online trade journal website. The SEO or Search Engine Optimization this underscores is not just important to them, but to you. Why? Because they wouldn’t rank high if they weren’t being read! Because they are being read – and read here on www.MHMSM.com – it means to you that these are pros you should be reading! It also means that those who consider writing in the future have the motivation to share their expertise with you here.
Let’s do this alphabetically, starting with Joe Adams. Joe is doing a series with us called a Journey in Successful Marketing. If you are marketing homes, development or a community, you should be reading this series! If you deal with those who do, you should be recommending to them this series!
Joe Adams has been a keynote and presenter at many Manufactured Housing Institute or MHI events. Adams heads up the MHEI or Manufactured Housing Educational Institute. With his own busy consulting practice, it is truly a privilege for our readers to be able to access this level of talent online free on our website. For those who want to take their marketing to the next level, a call to Joe should be on your agenda.
You’ll notice that even though MHMSM.com has only been online for some 9 months, we are already page 1 on a search for ‘Joe Adams manufactured housing.’ This means that our IT Manager Bob Stovall is earning his pay and that readers like you are coming in great numbers. Those are keys to this type of high placement.
George F. Allen is certainly one of the best known personalities in the Manufactured Housing world, notably among land lease community operators. I’ve heard that George has been online even prior to Al Gore’s claim for inventing the internet. What that means is that it isn’t easy to get page 1 with someone of Allen’s stature with a new website. That said, we are pleased to reveal that the search phrase used puts Allen higher on our page than any other website. Even if you drop the F from his name, we are still page 1 on a Google search!
We are pleased that George is one of the members of our Advisory Council here at www.MHMSM.com He has been part of more than one story by our Industry in Focus Reports by Eric Miller, as well as in many other blogs and articles.
Linda Beem with Capital First Realty isn’t one of the best known people in the Manufactured Home Industry. One of the things we are proud of is that we feature ‘new’ people to the national scene – good talents like Linda Beem’s – here at www.MHMSM.com. Because of that, you get access to articles by this lady who personally closed over 360 contracts (read, sales) plus additional leases in 6 years at Sunset Village Manufactured Housing Community in Glenview, IL. When you realize that she also did some leases on top of that, manager’s should be thinking – I want my team to read her articles! Sales and leasing pros should think, I want to learn what this lady knows!
Amy Bliss is well known at a leader at the Wisconsin Housing Alliance (WHA) and as the head of Tomorrow’s Home Foundation. Amy’s fine articles on our pages actually make her search come up higher than the two organization’s sites she works with.
Now it is fair to ask, why are these and the other industry pros we are showing you ranked so high on our website?
Part of the answer is in the chart above. During the 31 days in May 2010, we finished with 24,680 visitors. That number makes us the largest industry news and views site.
This screen capture above of our MHMarketingSalesManagement.com site stats demonstrates we have already passed that May total, with one day left to go. When almost 26,000 people log onto the same site from professionals in the same industry, that tells you something good is going on here! And a big part of that ‘something’ good are our featured writers, plus our other News and Views you can Use.
When you think about the fact that almost 900 people are coming or ‘meeting’ here daily, imagine 900 Industry people in one room! Wouldn’t it be amazing if a factory built housing retail center or Manufactured Home Community had that many people visit in a day! In the course of 3 days, that would be some 2700 ‘attendees,’ how many 3 day manufactured housing conferences have you attended that had that many people show up? Point made, moving on!
Rachael Biermann and Beth Monicatti Blank of All Seasons Communications have graced our pages and informed our readers in more ways than one! This gives an example of the search results for those fine professionals.
Chad Carr comes from a proud family tradition connected with the Manufactured Housing industry. That means he has been online for years. Again, what makes this interesting in part is because of visits from people like you, Chad’s ranking on this website is very high on a Google search, higher than the getrain.com website. This means you should be reading Chad’s articles and calling him when you have a need for services like his, because other people are doing it!
Tim Connor was one of our original feature writers and also is one of our most prolific contributors! I can see why Tim has published 83 books, and having attended a number of Tim’s live presentations, I can see why he is in demand as a speaker! When you’ve delivered 4000+ live presentations in 23 countries, there has to be a reason why people read his blog, call Connor, and knowing my friend Tim well, I can tell you it is great, thought provoking content!
The last link on the screen capture above for the Tim Connor search shows the value of showing up and being covered at the same meeting.
Tim’s and my presence and a follow up report about a Wisconsin Housing Alliance function got both of us mentioned in WikiName. This is an example of the value of sharing a platform, be it virtual or real. The more great writers we have, the more attention is attracted to each one. Literally, everyone involved wins, because the pie grows.
Which reminds me of a pair of our writers, who ‘reached out’ to hundreds of past and present clients as well as prospective ones, with links to their articles on our website. What happened to their SEO and readership? It went up, of course!
But what is really amazing is when authors or professionals share the links of other writers. I heard from one gent, that when featured writer A sent the link of writer B, the man naturally read both A & B’s articles!
Sue Frost has done and extensive series of articles for us on land-home financing. As a result, our readers have many resources from her experience and she has all of the top links for the search results shown on MHMSM.com!
I nicked named Mike DuPure “The Rocker Man!” He not only plays guitar and sings, but he Rocks the House with sales, sales and more sales! It has been some months since Mike’s last article with us, but most of his key word results are still on our pages. I share this example for a number of reasons, including the Linkedin result being #1 for Mike. I recall encouraging my friend – as I have many others – to get on Linkedin and connect with me. He’s got a top spot on Linkedin on today’s keyword search! As a manufactured housing sales and management pro, that’s not a bad place to be found, just like it is a good idea to be visible on www.MHMarketingSalesManagement.com.
Z aka the Lifestylist ™ aka Suzanne Felber is one of those wonderful ladies who is passionate about pre-fab and manufactured housing and who has been very thoughtful in sharing her news and views with our readers at MHMSM.com!
Z’s done reports for us on the Tunica and Tulsa manufactured housing shows this year. Great write ups, well thought of replies from our readers! I should use this opportunity to remind YOU and your associates that the INdustry Voices Guest Blog is for YOU. The
INdustry Voices Guest Blog is a place where INdustry pros can sound of, like a guest editorial to USA Today or an Op-Ed column in the Washington Post.
Attorney Nadeen Green’s articles on the law and fair housing are a hit on our pages! We are always delighted to see her articles come in, as are our readers. There are lots of lessons for professionals in the search results above. What lessons do you see?
Besides the obvious one that it is good to be reading Nadeen’s insights on MHMSM.com… :-)
Danny Ghorbani has been on the Manufactured Housing scene for something like 2 decades. As the head of the Manufactured Housing Association for Regulatory Reform or MHARR for short, Danny is a newsmaker and reports from MHARR and MHI alike are showcased on our pages every day.
The results above remind us again about the value of the INdustry Voices Guest Blog as well as the importance of reading what Danny, Mark Weiss and MHARR have to say about issues that face the industry we all love!
Doug Gorman, along with Ken Rishel and Chrissy Jackson, round out the growing number of members of our Advisory Council here at MHMSM.com. Doug has been a respected and award winning personality in the INdustry for decades! It is a pleasure to have someone of his dedication and caliber on our pages and advising us! How many rival his volunteerism to the INundstry?
Doug has written for the INdustry Voices Guest Blog includng a report on the Great Southwest Home Show in Tulsa, OK. He also did a very popular “A Cup of Cocoa with Doug Gorman” and a well read ‘INdustry TRENDS 2010” report.
Jamie Hammons Georgia Manufactured Housing AssociationDo you remember having A Cup of Coffee with Jamie Hammons of George Manufactured Housing Association fame! Well Google remembers! Jamie’s top results are still on our pages. We’d love to see Jamie come back and write some more when his schedule permits and to also and more state associations get involved on MHMSM.com. When the two national associations are routinely found on our pages, it is a good bet that the state associations should all be here too.
A Cup of Coffee with Eddie Hicks wasn’t enough, so we’ve done interviews, a brand new podcast with Eric Miller and a INdustry Trends 2010 report with Eddie, to name but a few! Perhaps those are reasons why he rates so high on Google with us? More important, is the fact that he rates high WITH YOU! INdustry Pros like YOU read Eddie Hicks’ expertise here!
If you have a community to finance to refinance or are wanting to develop, have questions about industry image, chattel lending or more, check out the new podcast Eddie did with Eric. It is bound to be a popular download this 4th of July and beyond!
Chrissy Jackson, the notable land lease and manufactured housing community management coach and consultant, joined us recently and already many of her articles are page 1 on Google.com! If you have an old ‘mobile home park’ that you want to see turn into a manufactured housing community, check out Chrissy’s series!
Greg Katanick of ManufacturedHomeSource.com fame wrote for us early on in the launch of MHMSM.com 3 of the top 7 search results for him are still on our trade journal’s website. Katanick, who is an SEO pro, can tell you all about the reasons why our site – and his! – get great positioning on Google!
Susan Knowles has shared her companies press releases and has written for MHMSM.com previously, so it is no surprise that her and the company she represents, Connexion Technologies, are found on our pages. 2 of the top 4 links for Susan and her firm are on the MHMarketingSalesManagement.com website.
We will cut off the alphabet with K tonight, because L. A. ‘Tony’ Kovach has had a long day, with another 4 AM start time, and it will be after 11:30 PM when this blog post is finished. But a few quick points about the above. First, it may surprise some that my top result isn’t on my own page…or is it? A closer look reveals that the 4 out of the 5 results are on one of my websites. I’ve got tons of Google search results on line, in part because of using multiple websites to enhance exposure.
Many of my INdustry and other articles have been reprinted on other people’s websites, that’s cool too.
When you are talking about countless websites online, it simply pays to do all that you can to enhance your exposure! As many of the searches above prove, people with their own websites may be surprised to see that they rank higher on our MHMSM.com site than their own! Savvy searchers wanting background information will often specifically go to sites that aren’t directly connected to that individual or their company.
We started off with a parade of INdustry personalities, and we will continue that parade perhaps this 4th of July weekend, along with some other Independence holiday treats!
We also started off talking about the fact that Knowledge is Power. Readers ARE Leaders! Those Industry pros like you who read – or now listen and learn on our podcasts – will over time produce better results than those who don’t. Combined with the right attitude, that is almost guaranteed. Why?
Because Knowledge is Power. Information proceeds Knowledge. And you can’t find more up to date information about the manufactured and factory built housing world in any other single industry publication that here at MHMSM.com. Over 25,000 professionals who have come here though June 29, 2010 can’t be wrong.
Take that to the bank!##
