Lydia Taylor April 22nd, 2008
I love good content, especially about the latest real estate trends. But the only problem is, it sure is hard to find it! I enjoy writing about real estate, but it takes such a long time and I find that for my own writing, any more than one quality post or two a week can be a real struggle.
Time to get creative…How do I…. 1) find good real estate posts on the web quickly and easily for my own education & enjoyment, and 2) come up with more content that may be of interest to my readers?
Easy - engage the hordes of RE bloggers to work together with me to find it! But how?
…That was my thought process when I came up with the Palmetto State Challenge. Named after my resident state of South Carolina, I’ve decided to issue a challenge to all my fellow Real Estate Bloggers around the world.
The Challenge is simple - send me a link to your favorite real estate related stories, news, videos, you name it. If it’s pretty good, I’ll link it up here. And if it’s outstanding - that one diamond in a sea of rubies, pearls, & chunks of coal - it will be named the Winner of the Palmetto State Challenge. Due to the mountains of entries I expect to receive, that Winner will be found using a special algorithm developed by me, Matt Cutts, and the Google Pigeons. (Ok, I lied about the Matt Cutts part, but the pigeons are there- I swear.)
This is not just a one shot deal, either. I want to do an all new Palmetto State Challenge each week!
The Palmetto State Challenge is intended to reward the best new content by great Real Estate Bloggers.
Since that winning post deserves a little something special - after all, how many thousands of stories about real estate are written each week? - I’ve come up with a little something extra for the winner: A Winner of the Palmetto State Challenge logo they can display with pride on their website; and also a permanent link to the post in a Page of Honor - listing all the previous winners of the Palmetto State Challenge. That way your content can be found and enjoyed for generations… Well, at least until the server power worldwide blinks out on Earthday 2026. Pretty neat, huh?
All contests take a bit to get going, so please send me your submissions for the first round by 12pm EST Friday, May 2nd. The very first Winner of the Palmetto State Challenge (and any runners up) will be announced on the following Wednesday May 7th, 8am EST. Deadlines and Winner announcements will be posted on the same schedule weekly thereafter.
NOW WHAT WOULD A CONTEST BE WITHOUT SOME STUPID RULES:
- You can submit entries using my contact form here at the Blog, or send an email to lydia taylor AT north of the savannah DOT com with no spaces. It would be really helpful if you put ‘Palmetto Challenge’ in the subject line, as that’s a pretty busy inbox!
- Entries must be less than a month old.
- Entries must be somehow related to the topic of real estate. I’m not interested in basketweaving, thank you very much. Unless the basket holds a contract for a million dollar home inside.
- Only one entry per blog, please! Pick the best post, don’t just submit every article.
- You can nominate your own posts or anyone else’s. In fact, I’ll probably pay more attention to submissions from someone other than the author.
- No duplicate content. If you ripped off someone else’s post and I find out about it, not only will you get a nice dedicated post expressing my opinions about you in excruciating detail, you can forget about ever trying to win.
- Blog entries can be posted anywhere - Active Rain, Real Estate Webmasters, Tomato Blogs, via your hacked up site using homegrown HTML published via satellite dish from your underground bunker - I’m not limiting this to any part of the ‘Real Estate Net’ in anyway. Just send me a link. Collaboration is good for everyone.
- You don’t have to live in South Carolina to enter, or win, but it might just help!
- I just might, ever so often, appear to decide the winner in a strictly partial, happy-go-lucky, devil-may-care manner that only I can divine and which probably will make no sense at all to potential runners up. Hey, I’m a Realtor here, not Simon Cowell! I may make mistakes!
- One thing you can count on, names mean nothing to me. Good writing will reward you. Big names, RE celebs, new Realtor in a one-horse town with no stoplights…I don’t care who you are. Everyone is on the same field.
- Don’t forget to have fun, forge new relationships, and learn new things!!
If you are wondering about why the Peach State lost out to South Carolina (it is the Augusta Georgia Real Estate Blog after all) I’ve got you covered. Just wait for the Peach of the Web Award. It’s coming. Someday. Soon. Maybe.
