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Within three months, his blog made it to the first page of Google when the phrase "Malibu real estate" was searched. Daily page views started to rise until he was averaging 300 a day. On days when a news aggregator picked up one of his posts, page views soared to as many as 8,000. But clicks aren't commission checks. The first phone call from someone reading the blog arrived within a year, and business soon followed. His most expensive listing or sale came last year from a Malibu resident. "She enjoyed reading my blog and wanted me to list her house at $14 million," Gardner said. The 14,000-square-foot Italian villa sits on 20 ocean-view acres. A Seattle-based blog reader recently gave Gardner the listing on her $8.5 million Malibu house. Another, Mark DiPaola, found an ocean-view home site in Malibu last year through Gardner. "When I started looking for an agent I went to Google and typed in 'Malibu Realtor,'" said DiPaola, the chief executive of CheckPoints, a mobile app that rewards shoppers. "The first or second time I saw the blog it was clear he knew the market."

Use the right blogging platform.

WordPress. It’s powerful, easy to learn and has plenty of SEO plugins that increase your chances of topping the search engine results.

Own your domain.

78% of Internet users conduct product research online.

In the past year, Web-based email usage dropped a staggering 59% among 12-17 year olds

78% of business people use their mobile device to check email. So that means pretty much everybody that can check email on a mobile device, does.

of all shares, 60% were of links to published content. Additionally, 36% of shares were of embedded content.

A measly 4%, which is made up of URLs for brands or corporate websites.

while email still leads the pack as the top sharing vehicle for content with 93% of internet users using it, it's not ahead in the race by much. Social networks trail slightly behind at 89%, and sharing through blogs is a close third at 82%.

90% of Marketers indicated that social media is important for their business. 2. Only one-third of social media marketers want to know how to monitor and measure the return of investment of social media. 3. 58% of marketers use social media for 6 hours or more each week. 4. 77% of marketers plan on increasing their use of YouTube and video marketing in 2011. 5. 70% of marketers want to learn more about Facebook. 6. 69% of marketers want to learn more about blogging. 7. The number-one advantage of social media marketing is generating more business exposure, as indicated by 88% of marketers.

Only 28% of businesses are outsourcing some portion of their social media marketing.9. 32% of the surveyed marketers said they have less than one year of experience with social media.

B2C companies were more likely (50%) than B2B (42%) to increase their use of online ads.

Email: 91% use email marketing; among them 78% say such efforts are moderately (46%) or very (32%) effective. Websites: 95% have websites; among them 75% say their sites are moderately (38%) or very (37%) effective. Online advertising: 69% use digital ads; among them 60% say those efforts are moderately (39%) or very (21%) effective. Social media: 73% use at least one social channel for business; among them 54% say such efforts are moderately (37%) or very (17%) effective. Blogs: 43% have a blog; among them 47% say their efforts are moderately (33%) or very (14%) effective.

80% have increased slightly or substantially their use of social tools in the previous 12 months.  

Moreover, 81% of those currently using social media expect to increase their efforts in the coming year.

Nearly 9 in 10 Americans have internet access.

More than half of Americans ages 12+ have a profile on one or more social networking sites.

Social networking use is growing most in the 35-44 age demographic.

1. 93% of adult US Internet users are on Facebook. (source: BlogHer, April 2011) 2. One out of every eight minutes online is spent on Facebook. (source: ComScore, February 2011) 3. The average Facebook user spends more than 11 hours per month on Facebook. (sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 2010 & Facebook Press Room, 2011) 4. Facebook is overtaking Google and Yahoo in total time spent online. (source: ComScore, August 2011) 5. Facebook has become the top choice for social sign-in. (source: Janrain, April 2011) 6. Facebook has become the preferred way to share content online, second only to email—for now. (source: Chadwick Martin Bailey, September 2010) 7. The average number of "likes" per post on a brand's Facebook page is 54. The average number of comments per post is 9. (source: Visibli, April 2011) 8. More than half of B2B marketers agree that Facebook is an effective marketing tool. (source: Outsell, December 2009) 9. More than half of small businesses agree that Facebook is beneficial to their business. (source: Ad-ology, November 2010) 10. More than 1/3 of marketers say Facebook is "critical" or "important" to their business. (source: HubSpot State of Inbound Marketing Report 2011) 11. The number of marketers who say Facebook is critical or important to their business has increased 83% in two years. (source: HubSpot State of Inbound Marketing Report 2011) 12. 67% of B2C and 41% of B2B companies that use Facebook for marketing have acquired a customer through this channel. (source: HubSpot State of Inbound Marketing Report 2011)

1. 33% of companies have a mobile marketing strategy.

2. 62% of marketers plan to have a mobile marketing strategy within the next 12 months.

3. 82% of companies plan to increase mobile marketing investment over the next 12 months.