Social Networking sites

Do you Twitter, or some other SN? And have you found it successful?

so in the run up to launching my next business I have begun looking into this explosion of SN sites. In the past few weeks I have joined Twitter, Facebook, BrokerAgentSocial.com LinkedIn, ActiveRain and lastly a real estate blog. And than you have to download all the apps so I can access them via my smartphone. And to be honest, while i see some potential for networking, at this point I feel like my head is going to explode.

missed where to check to add a poll

DeeJayH said:

missed where to check to add a poll

Click to expand...

Epic Fail.



I use Facebook

but it is a Satan machine.

The only one I use on a regular basis is Facebook. I have a MySpace page, but I hardly ever use it. Twitter seems retarded and I've never used it at all.

DeeJayH said:

Do you Twitter, or some other SN? And have you found it successful?

so in the run up to launching my next business I have begun looking into this explosion of SN sites. In the past few weeks I have joined Twitter, Facebook, BrokerAgentSocial.com LinkedIn, ActiveRain and lastly a real estate blog. And than you have to download all the apps so I can access them via my smartphone. And to be honest, while i see some potential for networking, at this point I feel like my head is going to explode.

Click to expand...

I don't know any successful real estate agents who spend their prospecting time on social networking sites.

Grateful Heart said:

I don't know any successful real estate agents who spend their prospecting time on social networking sites.

Click to expand...

hard to respond since i do not know where you are from
but in florida alot of our business is transplants, national and international, in particular retirees
secondly I am on these websites to promote my website for realtors, not buyers/sellers

Kandahar said:

The only one I use on a regular basis is Facebook. I have a MySpace page, but I hardly ever use it. Twitter seems retarded and I've never used it at all.

Click to expand...

i still dont get it either, but there are thousands of realtors on it, and if i get but 1%, i will make $10,000+ per month

They are all so horribly self indulgent."Look at me with friends" i dont spend my nights out taking photos and i dont smile on cue.

Arch Enemy said:

Epic Fail.



I use Facebook

but it is a Satan machine.

Click to expand...

How so ?
I've come to the conclusion that most of these things are a waste of time.
Few really read them, they just write and wrun..... much as I do....:rofl

activerain has already delivered a UK investment club to me to invest in depressed florida real estate
facebook has put me in touch with dozens of childhood friends some of whom are realtors and could help me spread the word on my business
broker agent social is the facebook of realtors, so i see possibilities there
facebook seems to allow pages for your business. so i am creating that and hope to markte it to the Realtors of the community for efficient targeted marketing

DeeJayH said:

activerain has already delivered a UK investment club to me to invest in depressed florida real estate
facebook has put me in touch with dozens of childhood friends some of whom are realtors and could help me spread the word on my business
broker agent social is the facebook of realtors, so i see possibilities there
facebook seems to allow pages for your business. so i am creating that and hope to markte it to the Realtors of the community for efficient targeted marketing

Click to expand...

I'm not ding facebook for those reasons. For me it is just to get in touch with old friends.

do you think i am thrilled at finding the girl who made me push her baby carriage around the block during pre-school years. it is embarassing. but i am hoping she will be m y N. Carolina sales resp once i sellll her ion the idea

DeeJayH said:

hard to respond since i do not know where you are from
but in florida alot of our business is transplants, national and international, in particular retirees
secondly I am on these websites to promote my website for realtors, not buyers/sellers

Click to expand...

Well I don't know what the product or service you're offering might be. I have a facebook page for close family/friends/co-coworkers only. Somehow I still get several 'friend' requests each week by other Realtors or real estate oriented interests. These all go straight to my wastebasket.

My business email is full of spam from real estate oriented interests. Lenders. Lead generation web sites. Again... all these go straight into the trash.

DeeJayH said:

do you think i am thrilled at finding the girl who made me push her baby carriage around the block during pre-school years. it is embarassing. but i am hoping she will be m y N. Carolina sales resp once i sellll her ion the idea

Click to expand...

Facebook has been good for me getting in touch with the diaspora of old friends. Yes I made a couple of contacts but the point was to get in touch with old friends. Like today at my uncle's ranch there were some old friends I hadn't seen in years and I'm talking 20 or so years. What comes of it who knows there is nothing expected except continued friendships.

Grateful Heart said:

My business email is full of spam from real estate oriented interests. Lenders. Lead generation web sites. Again... all these go straight into the trash.

Click to expand...

I get people hacking my website all the time. I don't even think it is worth it any more.

Never used any of them, but I have a, somewhat, working knowledge of what they are about, since most of my clients have them. I can't think of a good reason to start with any of these sites.

I have used them all for various marketing tactics. Here are my thoughts on the three major ones.

Facebook
Great for getting a network of fans in the 20-50 year old range in a conversation led atmosphere. This is a great site to give more detailed information about your business to a broader audience. If used properly it can produce good leads via friend associations. If you do any type of announcements, promotions, surveys, or market research, this is the group to target. Creating a fan page or business profile is quick and easy. Create one just to have one for searching purposes, even if you don't do much with it. You could come back to it a month or so later and see you have a number of new fans and potential leads. You could create a new 'note' for each of your listings. This would broadcast it around your network.

Twitter
This is a great tool if your goal is to be seen as an authority on a specific topic. Want to make comments about latest news, trends or fads in your industry? This is the place to do it. Updates are quick and short so you don't have to worry about blogging a 1000 character article. Just be sure to update semi-frequently (twice a day or so). If you update too much you could come off as spam or turn into white noise but if you update to little people may forget who you are. Most of your leads will come from referrals of followers, not followers themselves. So keep that in mind when posting. You want your followers to be so impressed with you that they will share your insights and twitter feed or contact info with others.

Myspace
Only focus on Myspace if your target audience is under 20 or if your starting a music group.

Linkedin
I highly recommend Linkedin for professional building. This is an amazing networking site to meet other professionals in your area and to become socially involved with industry authority groups.

DeeJayH said:

hard to respond since i do not know where you are from
but in florida alot of our business is transplants, national and international, in particular retirees
secondly I am on these websites to promote my website for realtors, not buyers/sellers

Click to expand...

How funny, my aunt- who is a real estate agent, was just talking yesterday about how her Facebook is helping attract young couples looking to buy houses and how she uses it for her business.

Anywayz, I use Myspace and I love it. I can connect with all my family that live far away and be able to keep in touch better, because I am horrible about sending letters. However they're all trying now to push me to switch to Facebook for some reason. Maybe one of these days I'll go and find out why Facebook is -supposedly- better.

My father is an executive at Lennox Int. and was telling me recently that the company is "exploring Twitter in a larger attempt to expand their networking capabilities" or something like that.

Its apparently a big business tool now. I had no idea, I mean I can't see me using Twitter since the site's major feature is incorporated into my Facebook account anyway.

Cilogy said:

My father is an executive at Lennox Int. and was telling me recently that the company is "exploring Twitter in a larger attempt to expand their networking capabilities" or something like that.

Its apparently a big business tool now. I had no idea, I mean I can't see me using Twitter since the site's major feature is incorporated into my Facebook account anyway.

Click to expand...

It's a great tool for companies to use with updating clients. Many tech companies that make constant updates to services or systems use Twitter live feed updates with the fact that most BlackBerries can connect directly with TinyTwitter or TwitterBerry and that you can directly connect to Twitter through Business portals.

You can also tweet a call out and link to pages on your website such as discussions, reviews, products/services, etc.. Give a little teaser and a link to get the click.

thank you all for the positive and negatives. Dont get me wrong, I am not hoping to make millions off of a twitter or post on Facebook. But it does seem to be a way to specifically target realtors, cost free, to promote a latest greatest website for their business. There is a reason everybody only has a 1-3% conversion rate in marketing. I am hoping to improve it by directly targeting those of in teh business. Another angle we are considering is discounted rates for beta testers. Pretty sure everything is stable. Took the assistance of the Servers Tech Support and Mr. Softee. but after 11 months, we are ready to roll out