This picture accurately describes what I have been feeling for the past few days after the 2nd Virtual Real Estate BarCamp on January 4th, 2010. It is vital to create a plan of action after an event like that or else the force of the information will just knock you over and you won't take any action at all.
I will display the variety of classes and reveal just how hard it was to decide on which sessions to attend. Thankfully, all webinars were recorded and we will soon have the opportunity as free registrants to have access to them. The future plan is to have Virtual Real Estate BarCamps quarterly so the next one will be scheduled some time in April of this year.
I will list the classes that I attended, share some golden nuggets of wisdom that stood out to me, and specify my 3 focus goals from this event.
Flickr - The Last Truly Social, Social Network
I really underestimated this class. I really just thought Flickr was only a photo sharing site. I didn't realize there is much more going on with groups and interaction with people. I have a Flickr icon on my blog but I hadn't activated the flickr icon, until now. I was inspired to open a Flickr account with some great ideas for photo uploads to my future account.
Twitter Essentials For 2010
I really loved the energy of Nicole & Reggie Nicolay! Their presentation was full of zest, passion, zeal and most importantly great Twitter ideas. My favorite tips from them were "Have a Tweet Plan" & "Give Your Content Legs" which means utilizing the RT (retweet) plugin on your blog which will allow your blog posts to be shared multiple times on Twitter.
Dominate Your Real Estate Market With Facebook
Ross Hair shared the power of creating Facebook groups and fan pages. Facebook groups allows you to email everyone in your group, however fan pages has a different spin on it. He didn't get into this aspect, but I will share with you that Facebook fan pages allows your content to be displayed in the newsfeed of your fans. If your friends comment or like anything on your fan page, all of your network will be able to view their action which can cause others to join your fan page. Facebook fan pages are also indexed on Google which allows more Google juice for you and groups are not indexed on search engines. He prefers groups but I prefer Facebook fan pages.
The Value of Adding Posterous To Your Tool Belt
It was interesting to learn about posterous, a new way of blogging by sending emails to post@posterous.com of text posts, photos, videos, MP3's and files. To me, it doesn't replace blogging in itself. I believe it's another avenue to share content with a new audience. Brad Carroll from Dakno shared an incredible tip about creating a custom domain name instead of naomitrower.posterous.com as this creates more Google juice for posterous. He suggests creating a sub-domain of your existing domain name so all of the SEO will go towards your site.
7 Strategies For Connecting With Agents
This class was specifically for mortgage professionals and I really enjoyed Mark Madsen's presentation. He shared about establishing relationships with realtors that have blogs in your area by promoting their articles, tweeting about them on Twitter and posting their articles to your Facebook fan page. It's a great way to build relationships. Be sure to be an active part of the realtor's regular blog community and not a one time commenter.
Leverage The Power of Social Media in Real Estate
My friend, Jonathan Rivera shared about having your blog being the central focus of your marketing activity and having all of your social media sites pointing back to your blog, the main hub. This is the exact topic of my upcoming Social Media Marketing ebook with my major focus on Facebook, Twitter, Wordpress blogging and Active Rain. I already have LinkedIn, Posterous, & Flickr set in my mind for my next ebook.
Innovative Community Engagement Strategies
I had the opportunity to attend the LA Twitter conference with Pat Kitano so I was excited to hear that he was presenting at #vrebc. He really focused on having a hyperlocal focus in your community. I really love his idea of having a Breaking News Twitter account for your city. In fact, I LOVE my city so much that I started SCVBreakingNews and Pat is going to consult with me with a few more stellar ideas. Now you can understand why I felt like this after this incredible event:
So instead of stressing out over my to do list, I decided to choose 3 areas to focus on this year:
- Create a Flickr Account
- Create SCVBreaking News Twitter Account
- Create a Posterous Account
Stay tuned for the next Virtual Real Estate BarCamp event while I get ready for Mortgage Revolution!
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