A Poke (in the eye) From Facebook

You know, they say it isn’t wise – when you visit the Wizard of Oz – to look too closely behind the curtain.  Might not like what you see.  In Australia we were recently treated to a quick look behind Facebook’s curtain and I have to tell you: the king ain’t wearing any clothes!

Seems a nice young couple had bought a house, got upside down, stopped paying their mortgage and were doing everything they could to avoid the process servers and foreclosure coming their way.  Not altogether different from the unfortunate antics of a great many folks over in our neck of the woods.  I doubt many of us condone their behavior, but I find it difficult to root for the mortgage company either.  Sort of like watching a tether ball game between your ex-wife and her attorney: I don’t really care who wins just so long as both sides take one or two in the kisser.  Aaaaanyway, the mortgage company finally won the game.  Want to know how?  They looked this couple up and served them legal documents on Facebook!  (Read the full story here.)

Better yet, the local Supreme Court in Australia ruled that this was an acceptable use of the social networking platform.  Are you surprised?  Shocked?  Maybe even a little outraged?  I should say so.  I’ll bet Facebook was none too happy either.  Imagine the chilling affect this development may have on their social network site.  Let’s listen in:

Facebook spokesman Barry Schnitt praised the ruling.

“We’re pleased to see the Australian court validate Facebook as a reliable, secure and private medium for communication,” he said.

“The ruling is also an interesting indication of the increasing role that Facebook is playing in people’s lives,” Schnitt added.  The company said it believed this was the first time it has been used to serve a foreclosure notice.

I can only guess at the pride they’ll feel when the first paternity suit is served.  Are you kidding me?  I read this and the first thing I did was look up hubris in the dictionary, just to make sure I was using that word correctly in my initial reaction.  Turns out my problem was redundancy.  Webster’s used to define hubris as: “excessive pride or self-confidence.”  Now it simply says: “see Facebook.”  Did he say “… an interesting indication of the increasing role that Facebook is playing in people’s lives?”  Is that anything like reveling in the expanded role the stock market is currently playing in people’s lives?

Sydney University of Technology law professor Michael Fraser:

“It does change the rules of the game because people thought of these as social sites; now they can be used to serve official court documents and it may change the way people establish a presence on the social networks and the way they use them.”

Do you think?  We are told by Rory Ryan, a Baylor Law School associate professor, that U.S. users do not have to worry about being served though the program yet.  Yet?  Oh really?  Have you ever seen the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in action?  I am here to tell you I have as many problems as the next guy – maybe more.  But do I want my dirty linens cleaned on Facebook?  Do you?

Filed under: BUYERS, INVESTORS, LENDERS, REALTORS, SELLERS, WORLD OF 2.0 , Facebook, Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing and Real Estate

Earlier this month I spoke at the Social Media Marketing National Conference in Orlando.  The conference itself was over twelve hours of real estate marketing ideas you can implement right now.  Each speaker was a recognized expert in their field and I left with my head spinning.  This post is part of a series in which I will share what I learned.

By now most of us have heard the term Social Media Marketing.  It is variously described as the future of prospecting, a revolutionary version of networking for a 2.0 world, the miracle of permission based marketing and – if I remember correctly – a cure for the common cold.  Do you ever feel as if there is some tremendous movement sweeping through the industry and no one has stopped to explain it?  You hear all the sizzle but what’s needed is for someone to actually throw a big, juicy steak on your plate.  Well I hope you’re hungry because Brian Brady worked the grill for hours at the Unchained Conference in Orlando and he did not disappoint.  Not only did he serve up the meat of the matter, he cut it into bite size pieces and made it easy to digest.

His very first statement set the tone for the rest of his presentation, but regular readers of mine will not be surprised by it: “Marketing is an Obsession.”  I couldn’t agree more, although I might add more: “Marketing is More Than an Obsession… It’s a Passion.”  He goes on to lay out the basis for marketing in a nutshell:

• New customers are the life-blood of a practice
• Farming new customers produces new customers
• The Internet allows us to automate our Unique Selling Proposition

Think about the power in that last point.  Automating your USP and reaching an exponentially larger audience with no extra effort or cost is a magical formula.

The Five Pillars of Social Media Marketing (with my notes)

1. DECLARATION OF IDENTITY – Here I am and I am and here’s what I do.  Don’t hide your light under a bushel.  There is no point to marketing if people don’t know how they can use you or why.
2. IDENTITY BY ASSOCIATION – You are judged by the company you keep.  This is true in all aspects of life but can be utilized advantageously on-line.  Make purposeful decisions about what groups you join and who you associate with; the perception of who you are can be greatly enhanced.
3. CONSUMER GENERATED CONVERSATION – By declaring your identity in well chosen places, you open yourself to contact by consumers.  Either directly, through forums or in question & answer format, the consumer will talk to you if you are listening.
4. PROVIDER GENERATED CONVERSATION – This is what you push out; the answer to the question, the story that relates a benefit, the information that is useful.  This is your opportunity to really shine.
5. OFF-LINE CONVERSATION – The secret!  This is the step missed by so many.  The first four pillars will enable you to acquire prospects, but this game is a contact sport.  The whole point of marketing is to cause the consumer to take action.  This reminds me of a little retail wisdom I heard from Home Depot’s founders.  They said “we didn’t spend all that money paying for advertising and buying products just to have the consumer walk away because the check-out line was too long.”  When someone walks up to your register with money in their hand… engage them!

Setting Traps on the Internet

You want to be where your potential clients can find you and engage you.  The easiest way to find that place is by asking previous clients where they go on the internet.  Once you know, show up and build a profile.  Your profile is pure marketing, by which I mean a golden opportunity to share your USP and not a place to hammer consumers with sales gimmicks.  Keep track of your profiles, revisit them from time to time and make sure they are all up to date and expressive.  Connect with everyone you know.  Be an active member of the community (both online and off).  Another idea Brian shared is to update your status bar on Facebook.  (What’s that?  You’re not on Facebook yet?  Your clients are…)  Also comment on other people’s status bar updates.  Again, be an active part of the community.

Goals

So what are the goals of social media marketing?  Brian points out the primary goal is get people to your landing page, your blog or website.  This is your office… your home.  Once there they can get to know you and transform from a cold call to a warm lead.  You would like them to subscribe to your Provider Generated Conversations.

• RSS feed is OK
• email subscription is better
• e-zine subscription is way-better

If you are doing it right and providing useful information to people you’ll get what’s called a full data dump.  In other words, the consumer will share all of their relevant information with you.  This allows you to start moving them into your community and practicing Mayoral Marketing.  Just don’t forget to continuously feed the community with good ideas.

The Ubiquitous Road

Ubiquitous yü-ˈbi-kwə-təs – from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary: existing or being everywhere at the same time : constantly encountered .  Here are a number of the best places to practice your social media marketing according to Brian:

• LinkedIn – go to the “answer questions” section and get involved
• Meetup – whatever your interest, it’s out there
• Facebook – average age is now over 35 years old
• Zillow – another opportunity to answer questions for potential clients
• My Space – younger and hipper than Facebook – source of the next generation of buyers
• YouTube – real estate’s use of video will be widespread in the coming years

In the end, Social Media Marketing is all about being in front of your prospects, consumers, clients and community on a regular basis.  It is the process of creating your own community of raving fans by being where they are, making sure they know who you are and giving them answers and information they can use.  Consumers have the power in the real estate business relationship.  They can choose to learn about you (or not learn about you) as they see fit.  They reject most forms of “push” marketing (cold calls, email spam, flyers on the door step, etc.) and are out there – in the various mediums just mentioned.  Imagine a potential client stumbling across your front doorstep… make sure your porchlight is on and your door is open.  Maybe even offer them a steak.

Filed under: REALTORS, SELLERS, WORLD OF 2.0 , Social Media Marketing

Unchained Internet Marketing Notes – Overview

Random Thoughts
A day and a half since I left Unchained Orlando, but my head is still spinning.  Maybe it was Orlando – the home of Disneyworld – that added to the surreal nature of the experience.  If you haven’t been there, Orlando is beautiful in a Disney kind of way: everything is clean and bright and just a little plasticized.  Maybe the buildings all use the same 7/8 scale that Disney uses, or maybe Unchained was just oversized… hard to say.

Over the next few days I am going to share a few of the gold nuggets I panned from the rapid flood of information that was one long, intense, ecstatic day at Unchained.  But not today.  Today I am still sifting and understanding.  Today I have only themes and simple data – points of interest that do not connect into a greater whole.  For new information to infiltrate and impact our daily activities it must be processed and that is where I find myself: clarifying the headers, organizing the outline and slowly expanding the void with pages and pages of ideas handed to me while I was there.  Bloodhound Unchained in 36 hours.  A blur of activity, a multitude of speakers – each sharing freely and every last one of them speaking much too quickly for my longhand chicken scratch – and laughing.  Laughing so much at times my sides hurt.

Dark Theme Emerges
The one theme I find over and over again is most assuredly not on Greg or Brian’s agenda, but the results speak for themselves.  Allow me a few words on most of the speakers and tell me if you see a thematic element:

• we opened with Greg Swann discussing the Greeks and the disciplined violence that was the Spartans
• you had Brian Brady sharing the dark secrets of being a Ninja in social media marketing
• Teri Lussier warned of a fatal addiction to the Tweet drug
• there was Kelley Koehler exhibiting the cool, detached efficiency of a hit man targeting Google
• Mitch Ribak covered 100mph marketing and proved that speed does kill the competition
• we were exposed to John Rowles’ killer app
• and finally, Eric Blackwell explained how to make the organically grown poison known as SEO

Is it just me, or was there a message here?  A call to arms, so to speak, that our competition did not (or could not) heed.

An Outsider’s View
These notes and those to follow are “an outsider’s view from inside the pound.”  Why?  Because I have a lot more in common with most of you reading this than I do with the speakers with whom I shared a stage.  Take a look at the people who spoke at this event: SEO experts, SMM inventers, Tech giants and Real Estate innovators.  This is the deep end of the RE.net pool and I try to stay out of it.  My area of specialty (such as it is) might be called the Passion of Marketing.  In that regard I try to be a very big fish in a relatively small pond.  I am what you might call a disciple of the Dan Kennedy school: take everything they will give, devour it, digest it, apply it and use it… boots on the ground and skins on the wall and all that.  I share all this so you know where I am coming from when I tell you to invest in yourself, invest in your business and invest in the next Unchained event.   The fee is ridiculously low.  (If I were running Unchained the cost would be higher by a factor of 8.)  Since I am not running it I will gladly pay what they ask.  But if you go, remember this secret:

Get Inside the Pound
Here you go, the secret to Unchained: find a way to spend time with the people behind this thing.  Go to lunch with them.  Offer to buy them dinner.  Stalk them in the hallways!  I had the great privilege of bunking with Greg Swann, Brian Brady, Eric Blackwell and Teri & Jaime Lussier.  It was like TWO Unchained events at the same time and gun to my head (there’s that violent imagery again) I couldn’t tell you which gave me more information.  If you have the opportunity to attend the next Unchained and they offer “Breakfast With (fill in your favorite speaker)”… take it!  Pay for it!  Just bring your pad and your appetite and I guarantee you will double your return.

Filed under: MARKETING, REALTORS, WORLD OF 2.0 , Social Media Marketing, Unchained