By Todd Carpenter, Director of Digital Engagement, National Association of REALTORS®
Facebook recently overhauled their page insights tools to help page administrators better measure engagement on their business pages. The new tools let users measure how viral a post is, the number of people talking about a page, and the cumulative total reach of a page — in other words, a bunch of stuff most real estate pros really don’t need to know.
A lot of importance has been placed on engagement. Opening and maintaining lines of communication with clients is tried and true, so of course this makes sense. But ask yourself — do I want my clients to:
- Like me on Facebook?
- Follow me back on Twitter?
- Comment on my blog?
- Buy a house?
When measuring a return on your investment, be sure to count the stuff that helps you attain your goals. If having more friends on Facebook is the goal, so be it. But most agents are trying to sell houses. Their engagement strategy should be to build real, lasting relationships with people who are likely to refer them business. Facebook likes, Twitter retweets, or the number of times someone clicked on a QR code may not reflect anything more than a shallow layer of casual and even lazy engagement on the part of their sphere of influence. Measure the stuff that really matters.
By Todd Carpenter, Director of Digital Engagement, National Association of REALTORS®
Does anyone remember the first time you heard the term “FICO Score?” You know, that number, determined by some fancy computer algorithm, that determines how likely you are to pay back a loan on time? What was the first thing that came to mind after FICO was explained to you? Come on, be honest. It was, “I wonder what *my* FICO score is.”
Why do I bring this up? Well, there’s a new fancy computer algorithm out there called Klout that’s starting to grab the attention of many online agents. Here’s their elevator pitch: “The Klout Score is the measurement of your overall online influence. The scores range from 1 to 100 with higher scores representing a wider and stronger sphere of influence. Klout uses over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter to measure True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.”
I know what you’re thinking right now. It’s okay. Go ahead and check your own. What was it? Mine is a 60. That sort of sounds like failing to me, but it’s apparently well above average. I admit that the idea of being able to assign an influence score to an online profile is an idea I find interesting, and I occasionally find myself checking my own score. But as much as I like the idea, paying too much attention to this number or using it to identify people you should network with is really not a good idea. Continue reading »
By Todd Carpenter, Director of Digital Engagement, National Association of REALTORS®
I’m a big fan of selective transparency. The concept of showcasing what makes you great and sparing your followers the boring, the mediocre, and the downright ugly stuff is especially important when networking online. One of the biggest challenges real estate agents face while online is drawing the line between personal and professional: what to say, and where to say it.
Many use different networks for different reasons. LinkedIn for work, Twitter for play. Facebook has rolled out a suite of tools that help their members segregate communications. But the launch of Google+ is game-changing in that segregation of communications is backed into the “friend/follow” process. To connect with other Google+ users, you add them to various circles. This one-minute video explains it well: Continue reading »
By Todd Carpenter, Social Media Manager, National Association of REALTORS®
Industry leader Russell Shaw recently asked if you would prefer to be referred to as a used-home salesman. Russell knows that if you look at being a REALTOR® in the long run, then you shouldn’t be selling houses. You should be selling relationships.
Joe Ferrara understands this as well. Joe offers various services to the real estate industry and is best known in the RE.net for co-founding the Sellsius Real Estate blog. In building his Internet presence, Joe doesn’t spend all his time focused on SEO, or branding, or syndication of his content through Twitter feeds and Facebook pages. Joe concentrates on building relationships.
The most powerful example of this I can think of was the Blog Tour USA project. This cross-country tour of the United States in an RV brought together bloggers from across the country. It united social media-savvy agents nationwide, when many hadn’t even met others in their own local markets. It directly led to me meeting people like Mariana Wagner, Kristal Kraft, and Jason Berman for the first time.
That one event led to Jason and I working together on REBlogWorld. That then led to my considerable involvement in RE BarCamp. That eventually led me to apply for my position at NAR.
Thank you, Joe. Without your desire to build relationships, I wouldn’t be writing on a REALTOR® Magazine blog today.
I can’t possibly repay such a favor with this post, but I hope it will help, because Joe is ill and could use some help right now. I’m asking you to help because Joe deserves it. Relationships are everything. No, relationships are the only thing. Please help.
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