Can you people please stop Facebook real estate postings?
No posts about you wanting to help people find a home or what your latest and greatest overpriced listing is helps you. In fact, all you do is blend in or even look bad because that’s all you do. Your post with your 1977 over-photoshopped picture and the wording that says that you are in a certain market does not make people call you. Advertising is about being persuasive, not just throwing out generic blah.
I am sure you spend good money to learn basis social media skills from people who are as creative as a beige rug but guess what? They got it wrong. Facebook is turning into Wastebook. What did people do before this?
Think about the other side of the fence. What do the readers want to read? What do you want to see when you log in? It probably bothers you that the X-Max Superduper agent team from the Southern Hollie area posts their new listing with nauseating adjectives and a postlet link followed by the next post that tells you what kind of ice cream they are having a Baskin and Robbins.
Who cares?
How about an engaging chat about what can really help a consumer other than “call me about the $8000 tax credit.” Let them know that a new store is opening nearby, help them understand what is in a contract that they may be signing that could help help, tell them about the history of snakes in the neighborhood (that one’s for you, Sean).
In other words, let people learn from you, not just hear you talk.
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Consumerism, Geo-mapping columnist
Marketing columnist
Agreed
Tell us how you really feel
and I too agree!
It’s not just facebook, but all social media Realtors use. I think the biggest problems is anyone that signs up for these sites doesn’t take the time to study them and figure out if they’re of use and how to use them.
The problem is that those realtors use FB ONLY for marketing/real estate. I use my FaceBook page to keep in contact with my clients, and the same way everyone else does – my real estate information is only a small part of what I post. If every post I see from you is marketing, it won’t be long before I hide you.
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It seems that we are all in agreement.
How sad.
I really would like to hear from those that are using it to promote and why.
Come on, don’t be shy!
Is it possible the ones using facebook incorrectly are also ones not signed up for agentgenius?
Kind of goes with what I mentioned earlier regarding social media. Sometimes people don’t take the time to read about the site to learn what they can get out of it.
Agree 100%
Im so sick and tired of spam. Sadly there 5 or less realtors who commented on here make up a small part that actually agree. All too many realtors are spamming the online world. It will come back and bite them later on. Business post 2009 is content and caring driven. These realtors will lose social equity and will allow for the true people to shine.
Sean
“In other words, let people learn from you, not just hear you talk.”
Enough said.
I try to mix a little of everything on my page.
Thanks for the post.
Posting listings is not what people want to see on FB or any other social sites, they can easily find company and realtor websites, search portals and now even Google to find listings. All these spammer will achieve by sharing spammy content is to have the very people they are trying to market to un-follow or un-friend or simply hide the posts.
People, let’s engage in conversation, share knowledge, thoughts and ideas instead.
Thanks for your post.
I agree. I stopped posting my listings on FB. It’s boring and I don’t believe anyone really cares. What I like about you Fred is you tell it like it is!
What is this $8,000 Tax Credit you speak of? Sorry, it sounded funny in my head, now, not so much.
I’m with you sorta, spam is spam, BUT, where I would bounce to the right is, it depends on how it’s done.
I think if a listing was posted straight up with a link and picture it’s boring. If it’s done repeatedly, it’s annoying and counter productive. If it’s done well, with a clever comment or intro, or there really is something unique and the listing post is shared sparingly, then it’s ok.
As you’ve shared a great way to let people know what you do, is to share information they can use or benefit from. I think it’s smart to let people know that you’re successful, posting an occasional listing or Open House is fine in my book, but you have to be clever and entertaining and conversational and most of all, skip the “call to action”, which turns any sharing and conversation into Spam. (imho)
In conclusion, I think you’re right, done poorly it hurts all your efforts. More importantly, any and all of your activity on Facebook and other sites should be done with forethought and an over-arching strategy. Ready-Fire-Aim is lame and hurts more than it helps.
I appreciate your flare for the direct. Amen.
I agree with Linda – If you’re boring or acting like an idiot, people will just un-friend / follow or hide you.
It might be OK to occasionally update your FB wall with a link to a blog post you’ve written, are proud of and want others to be aware of. But, if you make a habit of spamming your social networking streams with too much noise, people will eventually determine that you don’t value their time or attention.
Regarding listings – Real Estate designated FB Business Pages tied to a branded property / neighborhood twitter feed could be used to market listings as a means of getting in front of other sellers or a specific target audience of buyers within a niche.
I’ve seen some of the nice custom Real Estate FB business pages that Mike Mueller has designed, which appear to be more SEO / SEM focused.
It should be simple common sense that if your business is built on “social networking” activities, then you’ll have to make a conscious effort to be relevant, timely and engaging.
That’s too much work for me, so I don’t bother much with the relationship building components of social media.
However, there are several social tech tools and strategies that will allow you to leverage high traffic conversations for the purpose of reaching a larger audience with a specific message, without having to be everyone’s friend on FB or Twitter.
For example, commenting on this post allows us all to connect and participate in a high level discussion that may have legs if other people reference this link in their social streams, blog posts or emails.
Either way, this is a great discussion and I look forward to watching it evolve.
mm
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But, Fred, I’ve got this really great listing that all my Realtor Facebook friends need to see. Especially if they’re in California or Alabama or South Dakota or Costa Rica.
Nik Nik did a piece similar to this on My Tech Opinion and I’ll mention the same thing here that I did there. Yeah — posting listings on Facebook is a pain but it’s not so much that I think I’m going to sell a listing on Facebook. It’s for the Seller during the listing presentation. “Mr. and Ms. Seller, I am a hip and cool Realtor on the cutting edge of real estate marketing which includes putting your house in front of 350,000,000 Facebook users.” I don’t want to be a liar, so I put it up there once.
Realtor.com, Zillow, Trulia, etc. ad nauseum don’t do nearly as much for selling my listings as the good ol’ MLS and another Realtor in their role as a buyer’s agent. But Sellers don’t know that. We have to create activity to make them think we’re worth the big bucks and part of that is the newest, latest grooviest thing – social media. And, who knows? Maybe, just maybe, one of my 621 Facebook friends (of which 90% are other Realtors I’ve never heard of) or one of my 1566 Twitter followers (ditto on the Realtor ratio) will see it and create a sale. Kinda like a postcard or a ad in a home magazine.
Ken,
Bring up a good point. I wonder how many realtors have friends on facebook that they dont even know or get to know. I make sure to engage with all new friends via facebook that i have not met in person to get to know them.
Because Im not looking to be a number in their friend list.
Im here to engage
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Ken M,
What’s an ad in a home magazine?
But what about the people who just LIKE to talk to hear the sound of their voice?? If THEY don’t care if anyone is listening to them, then why should we care if anyone is listening to them? Chances are they don’t even know they are on FacePage, or MyBook, or FaceSpace or whatever other newfangled internet thingy we are talking about …
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SpaceBook?… MyFace?
All that aside … I do not think there is a “right” or “wrong” way to “use” social media “tools”.
Use these tools however works best for you and your goals…. right?
I DO agree with the message in your post, and ideally, we all want to build the perfect-relationship-storm on these SM sites, but that is a different formula for each person.
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There’s a really simple fix for all of this and that’s to use real estate networks to orgy on and leave facebook and the lot to friends and family.
Deep thoughts,
Jack Handy
Benn,
What if your one of those? Your friends and family are your real estate clients (past, present and future) and real-estate is your life style?
PS. “Children need encouragement. If a kid gets an answer right, tell him it was a lucky guess. That way he develops a good, lucky feeling.” ~ Deep Thoughts, Jack Handy
PS. Thanks for the 1-Click recommendation. Looking forward to laughter.
Cheers.
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I’m not really the one that’s complaining, I’m more talking about peeps that want a less professional experience on fb might aughta stay personal in whom they follow- pretty simple really.
The bottom line is I’ll unfollow those the compromise my experience, and I suspect anyone that goes above and beyond to violate the space will pretty much end up friendless anyway, and why not? They really werent there for frendship anyway, isn’t that the meat of it all? Opportunist versus casual user?
Should have been “you’re” not “your”. Ugg
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Maybe, maybe not. While I’m still in the conceptual stages of my facebook “strategy” but one thing I know is this – spam works. I know it works because the spammy realtors and agents are still in business.
Consumers – the market – hold some responsibility too.
If a consumer searches for “realtor in Charlottesville”, sees the top 3 results, two of which are spammy facebook realtors, emails those three and the spammer returns the email the fastest … and then the buyer uses that realtor …
That realtor has demonstated SEO skills but no real estate skills … if the consumer encourages this behavior, shouldn’t they accept some blame as well?
I’m all for quality, but I think the message is tried and true – quality counts, but spam (all too frequently) works.
I couldn’t agree more!!! Markets are conversations. And people only converse if they’re interested.
Here’s what I think people should be doing on FB…LISTEN, and comment on what matters to those in your friend list. Build relationships. Do you really think people are going to your FB site to see your listings? Get a grip…
I posted a listing on my Facebook fan page a few days ago and got two leads right away. My profile is all personal, my fan page is pretty much all business as per the Terms of Use.
If my friends want to know what’s going on in local real estate they can become a fan.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with posting listings on Facebook. I don’t spam them out all the time. I spam more on what crazy thing my two year old said or did.
Fred….Completely agree with your point of view about Realtor spam on FB. A little filtering is a great way to improve your FB experience.
Facebook in and of itself is about spam, see Farmville, Mafia Wars, etc. If you think that adding information about a new listing is causing people to shut down the FB accounts then you’re mistaken in my opinion. I
There’s nothing wrong with letting folks know what you do for a living. If we get a new listing, then I simply make a photo album with information and I post it to my profile. That’s it. I don’t hit everyone with daily updates. I know they don’t care. However, I’ve seen plenty of work not come my way from old friends because I’ve been too passive. I agree content is key, but don’t be shy to let people know that you’re there to help.