Social Media for Real Estate Professionals

Are you a dependable estate professional looking to integrate social media into your traditional marketing plan? Are you already active online and looking for ways to streamline your social media efforts? Here are some tips to help you get the job done!

Don’t create social media profiles without having a obvious plan of attack! You have to decide which social media sites you’ll use (and why you’re using them), what explain you’ll post on each, the frequency of your updates, and how you’ll promote each of them. Sound overwhelming? With impartial a few simple steps you can have your social media under control.

Step #1: Choose Your Purpose

Step #2: Choose Your Networks

Step #3: Determine Your Content and Frequency

Step #4: Implement Your Plan

Step #5: Promote Your Profiles

Step #1: Decide Your Purpose

What is your marketing objective? You should assume social marketing to be a small facet of your overall marketing plan, so your objectives should coincide with your direct marketing and other offline efforts. Before you choose a network you have to know what your purpose is because each social network lends itself to a particular use. Do you want to…

- Have a way to educate prospective buyers and sellers?

- Connect with new people outside of your sphere?

- Withhold in contact with your sphere and past clients?

- Connect with local steady estate professionals in your area?

Write out your goals for working in social media, and continue to the next step.

Step #2: Determine Your Network

As I mentioned earlier, each social networking status lends itself to a particular purpose, and we want to you the best medium to convey your message. Here is a list of the most popular networks and how they can be used in the realm of real estate (of course the ways to use these networks are endless, so feel free to add your own ideas!).

Facebook: distinguished for staying in contact with your sphere and previous clients long-term

Myspace: same as Facebook, but with a slightly younger focus (reflect gen x and gen y-ers)

Twitter: good for short updates with your sphere and meeting new people

LinkedIn: excellent for connecting with other real estate/business professionals so you can promote each other. Also good for keeping in touch with past clients for testimonials and recommendations.

Blog: perfect for educating prospects about real estate processes and news (i.e. converting looky-loos into confident prospects). A blog is an superb way to region yourself as an expert in your field and an important part of your community.

Website: This is a given and should offer a wealth of information about you, your specialties, service areas, your listings, and the buying/selling process. Think of your site as the engine that runs your online presence.

Study your marketing objectives carefully and then choose the networks that are appropriate for you. You can always change your choices later and build your online presence as you go along.

Step #3: Determine Your Philosophize and Frequency

Now that you have a list of your networks you can write down what content you want to submit to each one. The content you choose will depend on the information your audience needs/wants, your personal interests, and the amount of time you have available. You will want to make sure your mutter is interconnected. See the example below:

Twitter – Daily LinkedIn – Biweekly Blog – weekly

Blog posts Specials and promos Market news

Market updates Local groups RE education articles

Community events Refer to blog Community events

In this example I’ve chosen LinkedIn, Twitter, and a Blog to convert prospects, meet local professionals, and meet new people. Key features of my plan include tweeting every time I write a new blog post and posting office promos on LinkedIn for my mortgage brokers, appraisers, inspectors, and other local professionals to fragment with their clientele. Make a list of topics you can write about and update this list often.

Step #4: Implementation

Now comes the hard part, actually taking the time to write the speak. Luckily there is a lot of free material available to get you started. For starters you can link to any content that is already on the web as long as you site the author. There are also resources available from the NAR site and your residence association. In the end you just have to be aware of what’s happening in your market so you can attach the pen to the paper and open writing.

Step #5: Promote!

This step is often overlooked, but it won’t do you any good to join different social networking sites and not let anyone know. You can promote your social media profiles by:

- Writing blog topics (these are searchable by search engines and will help SEO)

- Tweeting about your new profiles

- Adding buttons to your email signature

- Posting badges and widgets on your profiles

- Updating your business cards

With these simple steps you should be able to capture control of your social media marketing and start tracking your success.