Three of the Biggest Mistakes Real Estate Pros Make on Social Media [REPOST]
Summary: The #DigitzedMLO knows that their brand is linked to their digital footprint. What we don’t talk about often enough are the ways we goof it up. Here are three of the biggest mistakes real estate pros make on social media: 1) The expensive rant, 2) Karma imbalance and 3) Giving up the farm.
1) The Expensive Rant.
Here’s the first social media mistake: the expensive rant. I know, it is challenging to keep your mouth shut. We are paid to talk, to connect, to network, and to have an opinion. Political posts are killing more than one career right now. You have an opinion, you have a glass of wine, and you know the exact counterpoint to change the mind of your fellow high school alum. Well take a pause and breathe. If you need to take a stand, do it carefully, do it deliberately and do it in alignment with your target demographic.
People buy from fellow humans they like. Ranters aren’t likable. Even if someone shares your belief, your value is diminished and your digital handshake is threatened. Ranting is the equivalent of showing up to a listing with an open bottle of wine and a stain on your shirt.
The other digital handshake “gotcha” is complaining. It actually damages your mental health. It is expensive because it isn’t solving any problems. When you complain on social media you are telling your prospects and business partners you are a victim, and you won’t be able to solve their problems.
ProTip: There is a great psychographic tool floating around that attempts to predict who you are just by your FB likes. Give it a shot, if it identifies you heavily to one side, your clients will too. Is that how you are going to close your next deal? After working on this for a bit, I finally got the tool to incorrectly predict my political affiliation. Boom!
2) The Karma Imbalance:
I love it when a Loan Officer posts “Remember, I can help you and your family or friends buy or refinance a home.” I always click through and check their profile when I see it. More often than not, I see 13 posts over the last year. One “Merry Christmas” and 12 asking for business. The frequency of your posts and your level engagement impact the algorithms that determine who sees your posts.
Another symptom of the same disease is the Realtor that only promotes their listings. Their FB feed looks like a disjointed MLS that glorifies three random homes. Not only does this strategy guarantee that FB won’t show people your posts, but in doing so, it also can hurt your digital handshake.
Social is about giving and engaging. Make sure you deliver value and chat with people to avoid this social media mistake. The algorithms love cat pictures and comments.
ProTip: Pick a ratio of value add to advertising and audit yourself. There isn’t a magic number, but 10:1 or 20:1 seem to make sense. It depends on how often you post and how much engagement you can drive to your personal posts.
3) Giving Up The Farm
Here’s the final social media mistake digitized MLO’s make: giving up the farm. An MLO I was chatting with said he had a killer Facebook campaign that delivered 200 leads a month. I was intrigued, because I couldn’t find his Facebook business page, but he was adamant his social strategy was killing it. After a bit of discovery, I realized he was buying FB leads from another platform. This is a GREAT strategy, but make sure you are clear about what is actually going on: you are buying leads, just like buying from Zillow or Realtor.com. This does little to build your personal business, it doesn’t improve your digital handshake, and it is a lead purchase.
So, make sure you don’t give up all the hard work that comes along with a social advertising campaign by doing it on another platform. Or, rather, put the activity into the right bucket: lead purchase.
ProTip: By all means pay for help, but make sure you are paying to build your platform, not someone else’s. Find a vendor that will use your Instagram and Facebook accounts.
Take a social inventory and make sure you eliminate rants, mind your Karma and control your own destiny! Oh, and have some fun while you are at it.
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