BiggerPockets Founder's Blog

Sunday, November 15, 2009

BiggerPockets Bits

• If you've got a Facebook account and have connected to your BiggerPockets account, you've been able to post your new blog posts, forum threads, bulletins, and property listings direct to FB for a few weeks now. You can now post your status here on BP, and it will automatically be shared on FB!

  
  All you need to do it make sure you connect, and you can elect to turn on or off the various sharing features by editing your settings through the SETTINGS & PRIVACY link in the dashboard and then clicking the Facebook tab.

• Learn why greeting new BiggerPockets members is good for business.

   

• Denver Investors, Professionals, etc: Join us for the BiggerPockets Denver: November Get Together 11/19/09 downtown . . . for more information, click here OR RSVP here.

Articles and Forums of the week:

BiggerPockets Help: http://www.biggerpockets.com/help
Donate: http://www.biggerpockets.com/donate.html
Advertise: http://www.biggerpockets.com/advertise.html
Press: http://www.biggerpockets.com/press.html
Manage Your Account: http://www.biggerpockets.com/dashboard

I was just talking with a member who asked how to get more out of using BiggerPockets to build his business, and I made a suggestion that I wanted to share with the rest of you.  Of course, engaging with others is one of the mainstays of successful social networkers.  If you combine that with the need of new people to feel welcome in a community, you've got the perfect formula for success!

Greet New BiggerPockets Members to Quickly Build Your Name and Reputation

This simple activity, repeated a few times a day or week, will help drastically increase your visibility, particularly amongst new members. You will begin to be known as someone who is particularly helpful to others, and if you play your cards right, you'll be one of the first people that others think of when they are looking for someone/something.

Here's all you need to do:

• Stop by the New Member Introductions forum and scan for people who'se posts have few or no replies.
• READ the introduction post and respond to any questions or requests for help.  Let these folks know that they are welcome in the community and that you're happy to do what you can to assist them (and mean it), and then do just that.  Ask them to reveal more about themselves and take a real interest in their background, goals, etc. Of course, visiting their profile to learn more about them before responding is always helpful.
• Follow those threads that you respond to, and be sure to follow up when the initial poster jumps back on the thread.

You'll see that you quickly gain new colleagues (send colleague requests to those people who interest you), and friends here on BiggerPockets.  You'll also see that you become one of those people's go-to colleagues on the site.  This is tactic that works . . . you just need to commit to doing it (and it only takes a few minutes to welcome several newbies).

When deals and other opportunities come up, you'll be there in their memory.

Of course, beyond just helping yourself, you'll be building good karma here on BiggerPockets, and some influence to go with it!

We added yet another minor improvement tonight to BiggerPockets, and those of you with Facebook accounts should be happy!

If you've got a Facebook account and have connected to your BiggerPockets account, you've been able to post your new blog posts, forum threads, bulletins, and property listings direct to FB for a few weeks now.  You can now post your status here on BP, and it will automatically be shared on FB!

All you need to do it make sure you connect, and you can elect to turn on or off the various sharing features by editing your settings through the SETTINGS & PRIVACY link in the dashboard and then clicking the Facebook tab.

Enjoy!

BTW - We've also implemented various minor fixes around the site, including some formatting issues on member blogs, a few forum issues, and other things you will never need to worry about.

We've got more BIGGER and BETTER upgrades coming to the site soon!

Thanks for the continued support and suggestions for improvement.

Josh

We continue to get new press mentions here at BiggerPockets, and I wanted to share the latest with all of you:

I was interviewed early this morning for the KGO Morning News with anchors Ed Baxter and Jennifer Jones (ABC News Radio - San Francisco) regarding the increase in rental vacancies around the country (highest rate in 23 years).  We talked about how tenants now have more negotiating power with their landlords, various incentives being offered to attract those renters, and more.

If you haven't had the opportunity already, please do have a listen by clicking the link below.  The audio file is 1 hour long and you'll just need to fast forward to the 45 minute mark to catch my segment.

LISTEN TO THE INTERVIEW HERE

Thanks for the continued support from our members, visitors, and of course, the press.

Josh

Earlier today we had a get together in Los Angeles for BiggerPockets members and had a great time chatting about real estate, politics, the economy - you name it!  Of course, we got to enjoy some great burgers at the In-N-Out Burger, and followed that up with a drink at El Torito (Sherman Oaks).

It was great finally getting to meet many of the fellas in real life (IRL), and I hope that you'll all use BiggerPockets to do your own real-life networking as well.

 Photo from left to right: Richard Landeros, Matty M., Will Barnard, Joshua Dorkin, Tim Wieneke, Eddie Ziv

I just got a request to close the account of a member here on BiggerPockets.  While this doesn't happen very often, when it does, there is always a common theme.  In EVERY case, the person was unsatisfied in some way with the results of their networking.  The same goes for today.  This person had three posts on the site, all of which were solicitations in a group, seeking buyers for property.  Otherwise, they were not active on the forums, blogs, or any other place on the site. qc8b4679yx

The reason they were unsatisfied is that they expected the site to magically produce for them connections without doing the work. The did nothing to build relationships, and did nothing to be seen and known by the community at large.

We can't do the work for you.  If you want to succeed at social networking for real estate, you MUST pay attention to the following information:

You Will Never Succeed in Social Networking if you Don't Build Relationships!

Almost nine out of ten people who are unhappy with the results of their efforts on our social network do nothing but solicit deals.  The other one out of ten simply create a profile and expect people to come flocking to them.

Social Networking Requires You to Be Active and Visible.  Here are some tips:

• You will not make friends by joining a social network and immediately solicit business. 
• You will not do deals by joining a social network and immediately solicit business.
• You MUST interact and give people the opportunity to get to know you before soliciting business!  There are many ways to do that here on BP - forums, blogs, bulletins, etc.
• People will NOT just seek you out unless you are visible.  To be visible, you MUST create a complete profile.  You MUST also become part of the VISIBLE conversation happening on the site. 
• The most important key to success is to focus on establishing relationships! For more, read "Are You Wasting Your Time with Social Networking for Real Estate?"

I've talked about all of this on many occassions.  I think people have the false impression that people will just flock to you once you create a profile somewhere online.  There is nothing farther from the truth.  Being successful on a social network requires time and effort.  Those people who are generally the most successful on any network are those people who are focused; those who are a part of the visible ether. 

So . . . if you want to fail at social networking, create a profile and disapear.  You'll have no one to blame for your failure but yourself.

We're going to try and put together a series of screencasts to help demonstrate how to use the various site features of BiggerPockets. Here's the first of many to come:

How to Use the BiggerPockets Help / Knowledgebase / FAQ

Instead of fumbling around the site, trying to figure something out, why not use the built in help feature?

Help Us By Writing a Testimonial for BiggerPockets!

To share a testimonial, simply go to the dashboard and click on the Write a Testimonial link on the left of the page. You'll see a box drop down where you can write about the site. You will be restricted to 180 characters, so please be concise.

Just let others know what you think about BP, how it has helped you or your business, or anything else you have to say that will let others know about your great experiences on the site. We'll then get notified of the message and can then approve it for inclusion. Once included, the testimonial will be added to the site with a link back to your profile, so people can see that there was an actual user behind the message.

I'm looking forward to hearing what you all think, and sharing it with the world.

If you haven't had the chance to check out the blog, it is regularly mentioned as one of the tops in real estate.  In addition, our articles are syndicated by such sources as Reuters, Google News, the Palm Beach Post, and many others.

Looking to Grow Even More!

There are a few things we're looking for to help get our blog to where we need to be, and we're asking all of our members for your help!

1 - When you read an article that you like, dislike, agree with, have questions about, etc. please leave your feedback in the comments.  Our contributors thrive on the feedback of their peers, and by engaging with them, you help them better understand their audience.

2 - When you read an article that you like/love, help us promote it by sharing it with your friends and others online.  There are a few great ways to do that.  Using Email, posting to social networks like Twitter, Facebook, etc, or sharing through social bookmarking sites like Digg, Reddit, Propeller, Tipd, etc.  All of our posts have a SHARE THIS link at the bottom, which will allow you to easily post to any of these services.

3 - New contributors.  Read below for more . . .

We're in need of contributors in the following areas:

1 - Lending and Mortgages – are you a traditional, commercial, or hard money lender? We're looking for folks in the lending business who can write about lending, rates, loans, etc.

2 - Real Estate News – we are looking for people who are enthusiastic about news involving real estate, housing, the economy, etc. If you love the news and want to write about what is happening, let us know.

3 - Real Estate Technology – we're looking for contributors who love real estate and technology.  If you're able to talk intelligably about tech tools, websites, etc., we want to talk to you.

 This is a great opportunity to get yourself seen by a vast audience, and to be part of something incredible - it is also a great way to build up your reputation.  If you want to join the team, contact us here.

We've made a minor improvement to the forums that we wanted to share with you:

See Who Voted on a Forum Post - Members can now see who voted on any given post by hovering their mouse over the vote button at the top right of any individual post.  A list of members will show up detailing those people who have voted. 

We're planning on making it easy to track the votes of any given member and should have that deployed in the next few days.