Social Media And You.

Social media value. What's the ROI of social media? Who really knows. What's the ROI of your mother?There's a lot of things you can't put numbers on, especially in the early stages. Yet we are in the people business and individuals are now talking on the web in a way we've never seen before. 

 As Realtors most of us have been taught to push our message, agenda, phone numbers and websites. The new economy is all about listening. We have all been in business and yet have never had a listening platform. For the last 100 years, the only way business had to communicate was by talking and pushing.

In 2010 over 50% of all new homeowners were 30 years or less. How do you think we are going to talk to them? Are they're going to get pumped up for bus ads when they're looking down at their iPhone? Social currency will be the dividing line between selling our properties and not.

We've all been in the push business, yet now it's shifting to pull. Some may say we tried social media and it didn't work. My guess is you pushed. You said come to my open house. Look at this great listing. You were talking not listening. You weren't giving to your community. You were using the skill sets that it takes to give a presentation not those used to talk with a friend. 

People don't think social media is practical. Some say we are not in a type of business where social media works. The simple truth is we are in the people business, and individuals have never been more attainable than today. The reason I answer a Facebook post is because I want to. The cost is much lower than the way I used to have relationships. You know taking people out to breakfast or lunch yet only interacting with them once a year. We can still do that and I'm not saying there is anything wrong with doing that. What I am saying is a relationship can be nurtured and will grow more by utilizing social media. When things get tight, people retreat and they go to tried and true yet I encourage you to don't go back to what got you in the bad place to begin with. Go in a different direction.
 

Please understand I'm 49 years old and didn't have a computer until I was 25 years old. It's not an age thing. From the beginning of time until 1980, there was so much content. Now every week, that much is produced. What that means to us, it's going to be difficult to break through all the noise and chatter. The only thing that's going to break through is caring about the end user.