Using Social Media to Develop New Business
The Zoom call of October 25 was presented by Nick Vandekar, who offered his insights and successes in using social media to develop new business and in particular in new areas.
Being a transplanted Britisher, and new to real estate when he did relocate, it was important for him to develop his social media skills in order to generate the business he wanted. It is also high on his priorities as he is getting married and had bought a house that is outside his current market area.
As he offered, many are familiar with social media and have the doubts as to how important it may be to our business, or lack the confidence to make it an active part of our marketing.
As he started, he noted that the majority of people don't post regularly on social media due to time constraints, also, consistency, content, knowledge and platforms.
The prime social media sites are noted to the left. Having a presence on these sites could be important to one's business provided one knows how to manage the site and put-up relevant content.
Facebook is one of the largest and the more active sites as users log on 6-8 times a day. Having a business page and using contacts or friends to help promote one's business can he be helpful.
Twitter generates over 600,000,000 tweets a day and as it has such activity, it can be a very useful tool.
YouTube gets more search inquires a day than Google because of the videos that offer how to advise.
LinkedIn is predominately a business page.
A well-designed web site and blogging can be important to link all the sites together. Newer blogs have blogs as a part of their set-up. Of course, ActiveRain is a well-established platform for blogging. The content placed on the platform can generate the exposure we desire.
Nick uses his MLS statistics to offer market reports. He also recommends posting listings, testimonials, localism posts, etc.
Consistency is key and a regular schedule for posting on the sites should be set up as well.
He suggested setting up a Facebook handle that would better identify oneself. Once a handle has been established it should be promoted on all correspondence so that people will see it and know how they can connect with you. The handle could be different than one's name.
Posting blogs on LinkedIn gets quality SEO for businesses.
YouTube, as it's owned by Google, is an excellent site for business and it can be linked back to other social media sites. Posting listing videos, testimonials can greatly help one's business.
Nick told of posting new construction and a particular development on YouTube. While hosting an open house, he was called by a woman that had just attended an open house at a new construction site and once she left the site, started to search for additional information. She was on YouTube when she came across the promotional video Nick had done. She called Nick to ask him if he would be her agent on a purchase of a home in that particular development as he was independent of the site yet demonstrated knowledge of the site.
Websites: Websites are designed to create an online presence for our business and should be easy to navigate and in addition to being updated with some consistency, should also be mobile friendly.
Nick detailed an example of the linking of a post that would get great SEO and generate the type of interest we would want for our business.
When we post a listing or a new blog, we may start by placing it on our website, and cross link it to Facebook and then cross reference it to Twitter and LinkedIn and then if there's a video place it on YouTube. This gets the traffic back to the website and across the sites to be found on the internet.
He discussed making a listing presentation and having done an exemplary job felt he was sure to get the listing. He was called by that client to thank him for his presentation but that they were giving the house to an agent that was going to tweet the house, or put it on Twitter.
If we create the presence, he offered for ourselves, then a typical listing presentation might include a sheet, or at least a mention with the details of what we intend to do for that client to get their home exposed on social media.
It could really have us stand out from the competition and allow us to seal the deal.
It was a well-attended call and was appreciated by those in attendance.
Using Social Media to Develop New Business
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