I try to try out everything before I tell you about it.  Twitter is one of those things.  Twitter is what's known as a "micro-blog" or a "presence indicator" in the industry.  In short, it's a way to tell the people who are following you what you are doing.  But here's the rub, it's only as good as you are at doing it. 

I've been on Twitter (whereiskelle) for months now.  And I think I've updated it maybe 15 times.  Not a very good track record.  I just don't remember to do it.  And I have my Twitter set to follow others, but I had to turn off the cell phone text feature because my friends Tweet (what it's called when you update your activities in Twitter) a lot.  So I was constantly getting text messages about stuff that, quite frankly, I just didn't care about. 

Clearly, I'm the wrong generation for this.  I prefer face to face conversations to text messages. I prefer a phone call to IMing.  (Actually, I don't IM at all - I find it to be a tremendous time waster.)  I prefer not to get texts to my phone that don't relate to me.  And yet.

Relevance To Real Estate
I can see how a well-run Twitter account could be really useful for an agent in terms of having clients realize what we do in a day.  It could also be useful after-the-fact for helping us identify how we can be more effective. 

How To Twitter for Real Estate
The first thing you need to realize when you sign up for a Twitter account and start Tweeting is that your clients WILL watch.  That means that you have to keep your eye on the prize.  Don't be Tweeting about the hot chick you just saw walk by or some cool new online game you just found.  That's not exactly the impression you want to give to your clients.  Instead, Twitter can be a tool to let people in behind the scenes to see exactly how much we do in a day.

Tweet Each Time You Switch Activities
For years trainers have been trying to get agents to pay attention to the activities they do each day and to stay on target with them.  Each time you pick up the phone while in the middle of doing something else, you lose focus and therefore, you lose time.  If you have to Tweet each time you do that, then you'll start to really notice.  Plus, it will show clients how busy you are.

Don't Just Tweet To Impress
Can you imagine how impressed clients will be when they see what you do in a day?  Sure!  But don't stop there.  You have to reinforce that you take time off too.  You can use Twitter as a way of telling clients when you're working late and when you're off duty.  They can check in at any time, day or night, and see if you're available.  And when your last Tweet says "off for the day", they shouldn't call (or text or IM or anything else).

Use It Or Lose It
But, here's the caveat.  You have to use it.  If you don't update regularly, your clients won't read it.  Now, you can update it by text message or IM if you like, so that makes it a little easier.  But, quite frankly, I'm not sure if it's worth it.  It's a lot of work to keep that going. For me, the work was in remembering it was there.  But if you're of the group of people who likes to keep people in the loop and who doesn't mind telling the world what's going on every half hour or so, then I'd say you could certainly use it effectively in this business.

Kelle Sparta is the author of The Consultative Real Estate Agent - Building Relationships that Create Loyal Clients, Get More Referrals, and Increase Your Sales, as well as being a speaker and trainer specializing in the real estate industry. Kelle is the founder of Sparta Success Systems, a real estate training company that provides tools, products, and training to empower agents and brokers to create lives and businesses they can love. For more information, visit her website at http://www.spartasuccess.com/. © 2008, Kelle Sparta.