Consumer obsession with the word certified is even noticed in other areas as well. I guess that is why the word certified is so heavily used in advertising of everything… including Microsoft Certified… 
Anyway, it can’t be denied… and I for one am not about to fight consumer market trend. I just go with the wave.
The word* certified* and the city the consumer is looking in (and combinations thereof) are the searches being done.
The term “certified” is on the low end of the totum-poll compared to “phoenix home inspector” without the word certified. In searches.
NACHI has a website for every city in teh U.S. and Canada (350,000) of them!
They are used primarily for search engine optimization purposes for our NACHI members. Pick a state and I will list the sites for you here for fun. There is a gray background in the back which we are fixing but as I said they serve a particular purpose.
Anyway, the reason we built 350,000 sites, one for every city in N. America is because consumers type in cities. Pick a state.
Nick,
since your here could you tell me if my post #23 is correct or if I am missing something?
Dale, you are counting all the non-consumer (inspectors for example) searches in that data. Those hits don’t count as they are generated by people who are not about to hire an inspector. Anyone who ever got suckered into the InspectionNaziNews advertising scam figured that out.
Your missing the point!
“Phoenix Certified Home Inspector” is not as good as “Phoenix Home Inspector”
Regarding the number of times each of those keywords were used in searches!
What in gods name is that?
Todd, the answer is currently yes, just like a lawyer can become one without ever having his first client or stepping into a court room. Although I believe Steve and Gerry are about to add more requirements (a 3 day advanced course) which has an exam to get in! That’s right, I think they are talking about having a qualifying exam to take the course… so one would take the exam first, then the course. But all still being worked on. Till then the existing CMI requirements stand.
My site gets more hits from “Tucson Arizona home inspector(s)” or variations of that. Then it does with the word “Certified” used in addition to the above search terms.
That being said it comes up in the top 1-5 useing any of the above combinations including “Tucson Termite inspector” 
Searches by whom? Hits mean nothing (to inspectors) unless they are consumer hits. Unfortunately 1/2 of all hits to your website do not come from consumers looking to buy your services.
Getting hits is one art (an art that uses crayons). Getting consumer hits is another art altogether.
I’m not talking about any “Hits”, I’m telling you the keyword “certifed” is on the low end of the totum-poll, in the number of times the keyword was used by anyone!
Dale, I agree with that. Anyone is everyone.
Anyway, Here is a big shelf space hog: http://www.az-home-inspector.org
Thanks Todd…you know exactly what I’m talking about.
Nick,
The term certified is fine, but master is ridiculous
Nick, thank you for the reply.
In my oppinion under the current set up that kinda makes CMI a bit of a well, Marketing gimick to generate $.
If Joe Isuzu can call the late night 800 # and get his HI home study course for $399.00 and then pay $175.00 and be a CMI. That’s just sad and a complete waste of what could have been a meaningfull designation.:(
JMO
Todd:
I don’t doubt that the marketing aspect is one of the incentives for anyone to acquire any professional designation. When I was a REALTOR (a profession full of professional designations) I got my ABR designation for primarily marketing purposes.
I won’t deny that there exists a marketing incentive to earn any professional designation, but this fact does not take away from anything else… in other words… if one loses weight by biking every day… the biker still becomes more fit even if the biker’s main reason for biking was to get to work.
If that makes any sense. :roll:
By the way… the requirements for me to become an Accredited Buyers Rep (ABR) were not as hard as CMI. Not 150 hours of continuing education, not 100, not 50, not 40, no not even 30, but 14 hours.
I just went to Google adwords and found the number of times “phoenix certifed Home Inspector” was searched using those keywords since 2004
The answer was 50 impressions.
…
“home inspector arizona” 1,015 impressions.
“az home inspector” 1,350 impressions.
I agree that a CMI should have inspections under his/her belt. However, I don’t think that people are giving credit due to the education people receive from their education. I think someone can come out a very capable inspector from taking a decent amount of training (not sure if that is 150 hours), however I do think they ought to have to perform inspections to be considered a “master” at it.
If you look at the trades, an apprentice is someone that has training but no hands on correct? Then journeyman has about what? Five years hands on? Then if there is a Master journeyman or something past that, I assume it’s a Ten year of hands on type position.
I think that having several levels that people could work to achieve, rather than just jumping to Master, it would probably be more palatable for members.