Yesterday, Rich Schiffer said the following in one of his posts:
"What can be done to motivate new members to actively contribute to the AR community and grow their business through quality blogs?"
That's certainly an excellent point -
I've been participating on ActiveRain since October of 2006 and yes, I know this topic has been brought up before! BUT - all of us need to do our best to make Newbies welcome and productive. This IS a networking site and the more people that know you and your ideas, the more successful you will be in the Business world.
Laura Monroe said it very well: "Every member is a potential client, a referral or better yet, a friend."
I could post tons of links to articles that are designed to help you Newbies out - but there is an easier way!
Just check out the Newbie Group that was started by Karen Hurst. It's one of the most popular Groups with 657 Members and 1395 Posts. Want some help? Read as many of those posts as you can!
Here are a few other tips :
- Just jump right in- you may be new to blogging, but start writing as soon as you can and you WILL find your voice.
- Don't be 'afraid' of the older Members - Are some of us a little loud-mouthed? ABSOLUTELY! (Not me of course, LOL). But as a Newbie you're bound to get needled a little bit, but it's like an initiation - don't take it too seriously! Some of the Members that gave me a hard time when I joined have turned out to be great people AND a big help.
- Don't stress about the POINTS! -I know, it's easy to say that when you have a lot of them. But if you are active and you post, comment and add to ActiveRain you'll be very surprised at how quickly they add up.
- Show a little humility! I don't think any of the more successful Members have any self-confidence problems! However, when you're new don't try to make yourself sound like the best thing that ever existed in the Real Estate world. Confident is great - cocky will just get you ignored.
- Stay ACTIVE! If you just joined to post a picture and your phone #, no - you're not going to get any contacts or business from your 'effort' because you really haven't done anything! Post as regularly as you can and always remember to reply to the comments that you get. Even if it's just to say 'thank you' make sure to show your appreciation of other Members' input.
- Trust the fact that if you are active, business will come from it. Not immediately, but it will happen.
I could go on for the rest of the morning, but I do need to get some work done!
As a reminder of how quickly ActiveRain is growing, check out Matt Heaton's post from 11/26/06: ActiveRain Turns 6 Months Old Today. It took 6 months to get 9718 Members - now, just over 3 months later there are 18845 Members - something must be working......
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Oh, it's working!
As of today, April 26, 2007, the Newbie Group has 1388 Members ... AND
Almost 1 year later - April 25, 2008 the Newbie Group has 5011 Members
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Lastly:
- Newbies - what questions can we help you with AND -
- Members - what other advice would you like to give?
Posted by
Thanks Marc...this post made me feel a little less (just a little) worried about posting. Very good advice.