Marki Lemons presenting at the Marketing Forum during the REALTORS® Conference & Expo in Orlando Nov. 10, 2012.

Marki Lemons is a foodie. She loves trying new restaurants in her Chicago neighborhood. At every restaurant she tries, she takes a picture of her meal via Instagram and writes a review on Yelp.

This may not seem like it has much to do with her real estate business, but it actually has everything to do with it. Lemons practices “SoMoLo”—social, mobile, local marketing to connect with potential clients.

“They know what I eat, what I like, and, most of all, that I’m a community expert,” said Lemons, ABR, CRS, short sale trainer and sales associate with Keller Williams Realty in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago.

Lemons presented her tips for going SoMoLo during the REALTORS® Conference & Expo Marketing Forum  in Orlando Saturday. For her, it involves focusing on creating and sharing visual content. For example, she shares her foodie Instagram images on Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and foursquare, extending her social media marketing’s consistency and reach.

And don’t forget about Pinterest, she said. Food is one of the top categories on this visually-based social site to be shared or re-pinned, she said. Another idea for Pinterest is creating a marketing board on your page with photos of the agents in your office. This “Meet the Agents” board creates an opportunity for the pictures and bios of your agents to be re-pinned, Tweeted, or shared among a broader audience.

“Pinterest can drive a high amount of traffic to your Web site, even more than Facebook, Twitter, and Google,” Lemons said. The secret is utilizing the URL embedded within each photo pin. This will increase the engagement from your pins and direct followers to your Web site.

More than 20,000 images have been re-pinned over 10 million times, and more than 80 percent of photos are re-pinned on Pinterest. Continue reading »