When you write about your partners, you boost your credibility on two fronts

Rick Grant, principal, Rick Grant & Associates

As published in Scotsman Guide's Residential Edition, May 2010.

Although you and your company should be posting to your blog more than once a week, it can be challenging to do so without seeming as though you're just reprinting your corporate brochures.

One easy way to do this is to write short blog posts about the other companies and professionals with whom you partner to get loans originated. Whether yours is a real estate agent, title agent or real estate attorney, giving them attention in your blog makes you look better connected in the community to borrowers at the same time it does your partners a favor.

The key is to write a post in a way that will enhance your relationship with your partner -- without confusing your prospects or sending them to someone else for a loan solution. Talk about these partners as top professionals with whom you have a relationship, without going into great detail.

The blog post will run about four paragraphs. The first paragraph will introduce the partner or company. The second will provide information about how long you've worked together and why you still do. In the third, detail the benefits your clients get from your relationship with this partner. Your final paragraph is the call to action, where you promise to introduce your customers to this partner if it's clear they have a need for the partner's services. Here's a look at each section:

• Introduction: One idea is to start by relaying your philosophy of working with the best people you can find. Talk about the collaboration and hard work of many professionals necessary to get a loan to the closing table. Then, you could introduce a partner on whom you depend to help clients get their perfect financing package.

• Partner details: Here, you want to talk about the person or company and how long you've worked together. It could be wise to refer to duties only in general terms. You could risk leading readers to believe they have to go elsewhere to get their loan.

• Benefits to the borrower: This is your most important section. Here, you write about how your partners are important and why by extension you're so smart for working with them in particular. It could be that they approach the business with the same attention to detail that you do or that they run a leading company in their space. Or maybe you have personal history with them and can relate a story about a joint success.  When it's done right, this part of the post can make your relationship stronger while painting you as the perfect professional to choose. Think of it as an introduction at a formal dinner: What would you say to introduce your partner in this situation? Write it here.

• Call to action: You want prospective borrowers to call you. Regardless of which professionals it takes to get the deal done, you are the person to have at the helm.

Finally, don't forget to write a good headline for your blog post. It might be wise to use your partner's name, along with a few words about what your partner does. This makes it easy for them to find the post online.

Rick Grant is the principal at Rick Grant & Associates, a marketing communications and public relations consultancy in Jim Thorpe, Pa. He is the former managing editor of Broker magazine and Mortgage Technology magazine and is the former editor of Real Estate Technology Insight. He also produced online content for Office.com. Grant writes for a number of trade publications and is an avid blogger. Reach him at rick@rickgrant.net or at (570) 325-2818.