“400 2nd Street. $400,000. OPEN HOUSE TODAY”

Just by changing the wording to..

“Going to my open house this the afternoon, 400 2nd Street, drop by if you want a chat”

To me the second comes across with the same message just maybe looks a little less spammy

It’s all about HOW you post your listings inside Facebook. There are a few agents who will remain nameless that blast out their listings to all the folks in their FB network via updates or messages, telling us to come to their open houses in Florida…when I live in Califonia. Even if I did live in Florida, I wouldn’t want to receive Open House mass messages on Facebook. Additionally, if all you are doing is posting listings on your profile inside Facebook, you obviously don’t understand the true nature of the network. Facebook is a networking tool…NOT a direct sales tool. We participate to build relationships and stay connected with our sphere.

And no I’m not a REALTOR, but I work with plenty of them…including my own parents. They too are feeling the pinch of the economy and wanted a new consistent way to reach out to their sphere and provide additional exposure for their listings. SO, they created a Fan Page under my guidance and have since posted many of their listings there. Their goal is to NOT pimp themselves out to a mass network of people that may or may not live in their market area, but to focus on their sphere and building relationships with other locals. They share relevant and helpful resources, local market trends, answer questions, AND share their listings…all from their fan page. Their network is appreciative of their help and knows where to go inside Facebook to look for relevant and local info AND listings.

In addition, I should mention that the nice folks over at CenterStageforRE have made their app available from either the profile or fan page. Additionally, smart agents like Nicole Borsey who uses the app, chooses to link out to her listings (which are displayed via Real Estate Shows). I think this is a great option for those who do not have a way to post their listings from their own domain. But if that were the case, CenterStage would allow for that option as well.

My overall concern with listings inside Facebook is that they are being shared in a spammy or inappropriate way, and often NOT in accordance with Facebook’s Terms of use. I was hoping that this article would stir up conversation within the real estate industry, get people talking about what works best and perhaps provide better guidelines so that agents do it “right”!

If I’m not defriending someone because they just posted the 100th pic of their kitty wearing a hat they just knitted for them, I’m not going to worry about them defriending me because I occasionally post a new listing!

The way I see it is that it may be a “selling point” to a potential seller during a listing presentation. This is especially true for Sellers who are not all that tech/social media savvy. Everyone and their mother has heard of Facebook and if I go into a listing presentation and say, “In addition to all the ‘regular’ real estate sites, I’ll expose your home to 350 million Facebook users!”

Can I share a secret? The local Multiple Listing Service has been my most powerful tool to sell my listings. Sure. Other agents get 1/2 my commission but I’m more than willing to share. Postlets, Realtor.com, etc. and so on including proprietary, agent branded, single property sites don’t seem to do it for me. Or maybe I just haven’t been able track it.

In any case, Sellers just get all giggly and googly when you tell them you can show their house to a gazillion potential buyers including those thinking about relocating from Sri Lanka.

I’ve been telling agents FOREVER not to plaster their listing on their Facebook profile and they just blow me off. REALLY, no one gives a $hit about your latest and greatest listing. How does that help anyone?

Here’s the way I see it:

Build a Facebook Business page as a funnel. In this page people opt in to get the info you are providing. Let’s be clear though >>>You shouldn’t be providing just your listings, you should be providing community info and make your page a resource for your farm area >>>THINK >>>Digital replacement for the “monthly newsletter.” If you do this right the viral power of Facebook will bring people to you.

Once you’ve got that built out you can start prospecting from your page for new customers. Once you’ve spotted them you can either offer them an opt-in for some more free info BANG >>>List building 101. From there you can email them and escalate. If they’re a really good prospect you can even move them into your Facebook friends (in a segmented list of course.)

Is that so hard to understand?

Love the post, I’ll be sharing it with my group so they can see I’m not the only one thinking this way.

No business from it to date, but I did have a couple of people I don’t personally know specifically ASK me if I had RE info on Facebook, and that was a shocker. And this week I got a real estate related inquiry there as well. I have not done a great job of putting links to this page on my other sites and blogs, so people are finding it on their own (another shocker).

I agree with Fran that advertising listings is a great idea (I’ll do it with my newest listing) since you can target it geographically and demographically.

Since Facebook is growing so fast (now 350 million users), it seems like those of us in real estate ought to be there since that’s where our family, friends, clients, neighbors and folks from school days gone by can be found. We definitely should be there. The only question is really “how should we be present on Facebook?” Listings? Neighborhoods? Statistics? Whatever we do, it needs to be balanced and interesting, and maybe most of all we need to stay within the bounds of the FB terms of service. Getting bounced off FB by only talking real estate on the personal profile could be really counter productive – so I’m a big fan of the fan page idea. Keep business in its place.

Your opinion is right on and makes a lot of sense.

That’s why we need you, thanks for the article and the laugh. Really.

I do post my listings, but I post them only once when they are new on the market, when there is an open house or a price reduction. And I do it as a status update the way Heather Elias does. Since I usually only take a listing or two per month, those posts are few & far between. The rest of the time I’m offering blog posts or market info on my Fan page, and sharing about my life in my profile page.

I think your advice also applies to Twitter.

I get so tired of agents who just post links to listings…over and over again. I guarantee that buyers are NOT searching on twitter for listings! I treat twitter the same way I handle listings on FB. I want to remind people what I do, ask them to pass on the info if they know anyone looking, and always link back to my site.

It’s one more way to get people that might be looking to see why they should be using my website if they are searching for homes!

@karenstl
http://www.facebook.com/archcityhomes