Social Media Marketing and Tools for Investors and Realtors

I recently went to an event in Denver where realtors learned how to do social media marketing.  I was actually very impressed with the event.  It was Agent Re-Boot.  I am going to share with you what I learned at the event.

• Twitter-You should definitely have a twitter account for your business and you should schedule tweets multiple times of the day.  How do you get more twitter fans?  By finding people and following them.  As you start following people they will follow you back.  Always respond to messages and re-tweets.
• Facebook-Don’t constantly self promote.  You should share information on your social networks.  Examples of cool postings are taking photos of what you like about certain neighborhoods.  Post on the best parks for kids. Post your favorite Pizza Join.  Post great deals in your area.
  • Ads on Facebook are huge-you can target specific people and have ad’s pop up on the side of their facebook account.  For example if you are a realtor looking for buyers you can target first time homebuyers by marketing to newly engaged couples in a certain zip code.  You can target ads by people employed by a company.  So if you know of a company that is moving employee’s to your town, you can put in a ad for them.
  • LeadConversionApp.com is a great system that you can direct leads to your social media site.  You can direct them to a landing page with a video and people can enter their information to join your newsletter.

•  Your Website-The more links you have to your site the more you will show up in search results.  Your website is your biggest conversion tool.  So you need to give good content on your website and capture leads.

• Google Alerts-You should always monitor your brand and your name on Google.  You can set up an alert to get emailed to you once a day whenever your name is mentioned on the internet.  Go to Google.com/Alerts .
• Google Docs- This is the cloud for Google.  You can create documents on Google and save them on your google account to access anywhere.  If you need an assistant to work on the document with you, you can both work on the document together.
• Evernote- This is an app for your phone and I pad.  You can record notes and save them to evernote, snap photo’s and save them, and save PDF documents.  Your notes will be available everywhere. On your phone, computer and the web.
• Rapportive-This is a Gmail add on.  I love this application.  When I’m in my Gmail account on the right side of the screen you will see social media for the person that has emailed you.  If the person has a facebook account you can friend your contact right there on the spot without logging into facebook and trying to find them.  It does this for all social media sites.  This was very powerful for me.  I had an appointment with a seller and we were emailing each other.  I immediately added him as a friend on facebook and added him as a connection on LinkedIn.  You can also add a private note about the contact that only you can see.  For example “Lead-I’m interested in buying his house”.   http://rapportive.com/
• WiseStamp-This is also a cool feature for Gmail.  This application creates a signature stamp for your email that is customizable.  It makes it look very professional. There are many add on’s that you can customize.  I have all my social media buttons on my stamp.  When somebody clicks on it, they get directed to my social media site.  I can also have my latest tweet in my signature stamp.  http://www.wisestamp.com/
• Google Analytics-This tracks how many people are going to your website, what keywords they are using to find you, and where the traffic is coming from.
• Howtogomo.com – This is a website to see how your website looks on mobile devises.  If your website isn’t mobile friendly, they may get removed from searches done one mobile phones.
• Realtor.com – Realtors who are working with buyers.  Ask them if they use realtor.com on their mobile device or I pad.  If so ask if you can optimize their searches.  There is a gear in the settings section.  As a realtor you can put in your ID so all the leads regarding a listing would go to you and not the listing agent.
• Screencast-A screencast is a seminar on your computer.  You are recording your voice and your computer screen.  This is great for sharing information or making classes for people to view in the privacy of their own home.  You can use programs like Camtasia, Jing, or Tanida Demo Builder.
• Virtual Tours- Try to be in the virtual tour so people will recognize you.  Create an opening where you are in front of the camera.  Then highlight certain areas of the house.  Jump back in the camera and show off your favorite feature.  Make sure you have a good call to action ending.  Upload the video to your website and U tube.  Make sure you put a call to action and your contact info on U tube.  You can create video’s using Windows Movie Maker for free and Mac’s have a move maker as well.
• Video Testimonials-These are huge right now.  Every time you buy a house or close on a deal, get a testimonial video from your client.  Also take a photo with them.  Upload these to your website, your u tube page, as well as your social media.  You can also tag your client on facebook if they are your friend and it will show up on their facebook wall for all their friends to see.
• Yelp-Add your business’s to Yelp.  Did you know that the Siri app on the I phone uses info from Yelp.  I didn’t even know that.  The person teaching the class I went to spoke into Siri and asked: “Realtor Beverly Hill”.  Only 4 realtors showed up.  I couldn’t believe that.  So make sure you add your business’s to the Yelp.
• Spam Emails-If you are sick and tired of all the constant emails in your inbox you can go to unroll.me .  With this up and coming website you put in your email address and it pulls up every subscription you have.  You can select all the subscriptions you don’t wish to have anymore all at once.
• Instagram-This is a cool app that you can take photo’s with on your mobile device and then you can modify the picture to make them look cool. http://instagr.am/
• LowesRealtorBenefits.com-this is a great program for realtors to stay in contact with your clients after closing.  You can send out newsletters through their program as well as send your clients coupons with your photo and contact info.  This is free to Realtors®.
• Expensify App-This is an app on your mobile device that stores receipts.  Instead of keeping your receipts, you can take a photo of them and store them on this application.  Then you can share them with our bookkeeper. https://www.expensify.com/
• Pinterest-This is the hottest growing social media site right now.  The reason people love it is because it is a very visual site.  You can create a board on Pinterest to save images you like.  I’ve made a Pinterest account that is for my business.  I have saved education videos and images for my clients. http://pinterest.com/PinkBuysHouses/

 If you guys have anything you would like to share that’s working for you, please share.