social media isn’t about technology.  it’s about connections, conversations and developing relationships.  technology is only the tool that gets you there.  and even then, it’s very little technology.  it’s the same amount of technology that enables you to surf the web and send email messages.  so if you can shop on amazon.com or email your friends the latest jokes circulating the web, you’ve got the requisite technology skills to participate in social media.

so stop hiding behind the “me and technology don’t mix” excuse.  social media represents a fundamental shift in how consumers interact with their friends, their peers, their service providers.  it’s not technology. it’s engagement.  and if you don’t engage, you’re crazy.

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still, i do have some recalcitrant brokers and agents that find reasons they can’t or shouldn’t or won’t participate.  some of these justifications are based on incomplete information, others are nothing more than veiled attempts at hiding their fear of the unknown.  all of which can be dispelled, debunked and demystified with a little education, time and practice.

blah, blah, blah

so over the course of the next 10 posts, i’m going to share the top excuses people give for not participating in social media, and how these can be overcome simply and with little effort.  i’ll take each excuse (face it, that’s what they are), and, with the help of some of my friends in the social media world, i’ll show you why these excuses don’t hold water, and why people that use them need to move past the pretext and into social media.

so stay tuned.  it’ll be fun.  and it’ll be crazy.

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Steve Beger Photography via Flickr, CC license

there was a recent interview i read of a social media consultant’s take on status update tools that syndicate or “autoblast” your status to numerous social networks.  you know the tools – ping, hootsuite and so on.  this individual suggested that people avoid these tools entirely.  well, as i’ve said in the past, there is no right or wrong answer when it comes to social media, and each of us has our opinions and thoughts on what works and what doesn’t.  well, here’s my opinion.

everyone’s got one

and my opinion is neither right nor wrong.  it’s simply my opinion.  just like the person cited in the interview.  his opinion.  to be fair, the individual made a point later in his comments that suggested that these tools are ok to be used to update a couple network sites, but shouldn’t be used to update every network you’re on.  i agree with that.

but i don’t agree that these services shouldn’t be used occasionally to post your status updates on more than a couple sites.  i can’t be everywhere at once, but i do want to inform my other networks about what’s happening from time to time. so i routinely post with tweetdeck, su.pr and other syndication tools.  but i do so in moderation.

one big difference

if i do post using these tools, i still visit the social networking sites i’ve posted the status update on to see if i get any response.   i know a lot of people that post from elsewhere and never visit the sites they post to.   how will they ever know anyone responded to their post?  sure, they’ve got email notifications (unless they changed their default settings), but everyone gets busy and may forget to respond to those low priority emails.  after a few instances of this, people stop responding to posts made from elsewhere.  if they know you’ll never visit and engage, what’s the point of commenting?

crazy.

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contrived?  somewhat.  only the names have been changed to protect the ignor… er, innocent.  this scenario is playing out across the country as consumers find voice in blog sites, youtube videos and rating sites.  they’re taking matters into their own hands when they can’t get resolution, becoming digital town criers – warning anyone who will listen to stay away.  this means there’s no longer any place to hide for those offering unscrupulous business practices or poor service.  they’ll be ratted out eventually.

but what of the excellent companies and agents that have bent over backwards to provide a resolution to a consumer that has unreasonable expectations or demands?  are they going to be held hostage for fear of an internet smear campaign?

or take the scenario of the consumer that doesn’t complain to the agent or management, instead deciding she’s going to tell the world of her dissatisfaction with both the agent and the company.  she secures the domain name thiscompanysux.com and proceeds to post a blistering diatribe of why anyone in their right mind should avoid doing business with this firm and the agent.

there’s a lot of talk goin’ on out there.  better listen.

as sites like yelp, digg, outrageous agents and others take off and gain visibility with consumers, rating sites will proliferate to meet the demand of consumers that want to be heard. and since consumers are more likely to tell others when their experience has been less than satisfactory, this means that dissatisfied consumers will have more places to talk. which is why we need to listen.

listening in on the conversations on the web sounds daunting and much harder than it actually is.  you can use such simple (and free) tools as google alerts (www.google.com/alerts) and addictomatic (http://addictomatic.com), set up keyword searches through tweetdeck (www.tweetdeck.com) and twendz (www.twendz.com), or extensive search tools for a fee such as trackur (www.trackur.com), radian6 (www.radian6.com) and wool.labs’ webdig (http://woollabs.com).

regardless of what you use, you need to start listening to the conversations.

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1. ignore social media – there are still a large number of folks that don’t see the need to engage in social media in any form – facebook, linkedin, activerain, blogging, youtube or twitter.  they still don’t see the need, don’t understand it, or are afraid of it.  my advice?  get over your fear, learn about it, read the success stories.  but get on it.  not 6 months from now.  get on it now.
2. spend too much time on social media – i’ve seen a number of people get caught up in the new gadgetry, gizmos and whizbang tools that come along.  they spend so much time – figuring the new technology out, playing with it, tweaking it – that they forget what their core purpose is in business.  it’s something i succumbed to years ago when i was still selling.  i was working on creating the perfect contact management program for my business.  i spent so much time building the perfect mousetrap, i lost sight of the primary objective – catching mice.  don’t spend all day on facebook.  don’t tweet all night on twitter.  don’t spend 3 hours per day on your blog.  use these tools to engage consumers and prospects.  then go out and meet these people face to face.  do business.
3. use social media to sell – so many people see these tools as another method to advertise their wares.  they jump on facebook and start posting advertorials in their status updates about how great their service is or posting a new property listing.  and that’s all they post.  they spam their twitter followers with advertising messages.  you know what?  if you’re not going to provide me with some value or tell me something interesting that’s going on in your world, i don’t want to hear about your listing.  and if you continue to do so, i’m gonna kick you out of my network.  i love sioux falls, south dakota, but i’m not moving there.  so stop advertising your listings to me.

don’t let any of these mindsets kill your business.  you’d be crazy to.

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if you’re relatively new to social networking, let me offer one word of advice: don’t talk business all the time.  ok, that’s more like six words of advice, but it bears repeating: don’t talk business all the time.  there.  now you’ve got twelve words of advice.

what i’m talking about here is the status updates so prominently featured in all social networks – facebook, linkedin, plaxo, ecademy, twitter, etc.  you know them by various questions – “what are you doing?” or “what are you working on now?”  invitations prompting you to tell your network what’s going on in your life at that moment.  handy little snippets of information to help your connections keep up with you.

some take the status update literally, offering up every nuance of their day, such as “having pancakes with my 9 year old,” or “going for my 3rd cup of starbucks this morning.”  not that there’s anything wrong with that.  just as long as these types of updates are done in moderation and with a modicum of taste.  believe me, when you start telling me about your dog’s bm’s, i’m gonna have to pass and say tmi.

others take the status update opportunity as an open invitation to smother you with marketing messages.  in the real estate industry, i see this all the time, and especially on facebook.  realtors who throw every listing into their status updates, hoping to expose their property to a buyer lurking in their network.  these same realtors place every price reduction, open house, buyer tour and offer they’re presenting in the feed, thinking that their network wants to hear about it.  well, newsflash kids.  they don’t.

would you subscribe to comcast if they only showed commercials?

the reason i accepted your friend request on facebook or decided to follow you on twitter was that i wanted to get to know more about you, the person.  heck, even connecting with you on linkedin i had hoped to learn something more than the product or service you were selling.  i was looking for some value in our connection.  instead, you give me spam.

you see, i’ll take a promotional plug every once in awhile, but if you’re going to pollute my stream with advertising constantly, why would i want to stay connected / continue following / be your friend?  i mean, would you pay comcast a monthly subscription if their programming only offered commercials?  didn’t think so.

stop social network pollution

if you’re currently using your status updates, wall posts and tweets to talk business incessantly, stop it.  stop it now.  do it before i unfollow / unfriend / disconnect you from my network.  and if you run across someone within your networks that’s bombarding you with marketing, send them a nice note encouraging them to provide those messages a little less frequently. and if they continue spamming you after your friendly warning, nuke em.

if you don’t, they’ll make you crazy.

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oh yeah?

it all started with a comment from one well intentioned realtor to an agent that had been posting listings on facebook without using the state required information for real estate advertising (brokerage name, etc.). the well intentioned realtor pointed out, nicely, that the posting agent should consider adding that information so as not to run afoul of the authorities. the response back from the posting agent was less than polite, spurring other agents to jump in and respond in agreement with said well intentioned realtor. after some discussion (public, no less, on each party’s wall), the final response from the posting agent to one of the commenters amounted to a very public insult, likely a violation of a standard of practice from the realtor’s code of ethics.

if you can’t say something nice about someone…

my mother always told me, “if you can’t say something nice about someone, at least wait until they leave the room.” well, social networking sites like facebook are big rooms, and even though we may think we’re talking directly to someone there, we need to remember that other ears may be listening. conversations or posts placed on walls and through status updates are very public, and can be used against us if we’re not careful about what we say. to air a personal beef in such a public forum not only tarnishes the image of the person hurling epithets, but brings the rest of us down to that level, lumping us all into the back-biting, opportunist, i’d-step-over-your-body-to-close-a-sale image that many in the public have for our profession.

leave me outta this

i’d just as soon not be categorized into that group, thank you very much, so for those of you engaged in this type of “smackdown engagement,” please stop showing your lunacy and childish behaviour in public.  take your disagreements and petty arguments offline.  pick up the phone and yell at someone in private if you must, just don’t malign the rest of us with your antics.  we’ve already got enough of an uphill battle to convince the consumer we’re not crazy.

and sometimes that’s not an easy task.

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alphabet soup

but it would appear we’re headed overboard in our pursuit of designations in the real estate industry. some agents have taken to fold-out cards to accomodate all their designations, and there are new designations being marketed each month to an insatiable market of letter hungry real estate practitioners. when is enough enough?

‘splain please

i know.  sounds funny coming from a guy that’s got enough letters behind his name to ensure a win at scrabble, but seriously – do we really need all those designations?  sure, the education’s worthwhile, but after you’ve got 3 or 4 under your belt, is it necessary to promote the other 3 or 4?  who’s going to care?  or even know what they mean?

i’ve had my crs designation for 15 years now, and although the council of residential specialists does the best job at promoting their designation to the general public, i still find myself explaining to clients what those 3 letters behind my name mean.  now add abr, crb, gri and e-pro, and you can see how i’m spending even more time explaining what those letters mean.  still, i find value in the designations and the education i received in achieving them, but i’m not too wild about taking more courses just to get some more letters behind my name.  in fact, i’m currently working on other designation courses, but will likely choose not to promote those designations for fear of needing aforementioned fold-out card.

i don’t know. is it just me, or is this crazy?

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but when you’re closing transactions that require 6 pounds of paper to fulfill every party’s legal and business requirements in order to make the file “complete,” doesn’t it seem like we’re missing something?  the focus to this point in nar’s green programs has been primarily on green building, sustainable living, energy-saving appliances and reducing the carbon footprint of buyer, seller and realtor (don’t drive buyers all over town without qualifying properties).  it would seem to me that we should be highlighting the tremendous waste and inefficiency of our transactions first, reducing the number of trees we grind into pulp from three to less than one for the paperwork required for each closing.

how far does this go?

i used to teach classes to realtors in california on how to work with first time home buyers.  one of the early sections of the course dealt with the angst first time purchasers felt with the process and the paperwork.  to illustrate how daunting it seemed to the uninitiated, i taped, end-to-end, each of the required documents (only those required to write the purchase contract with the realtor, not the required documents from title, lender, etc.), and unrolled the result down the center of the classroom.  it unfurled about 25 feet.

it was a great learning tool to illustrate the number of documents required to initiate the purchase.  it didn’t take into account the fact that these forms were produced in triplicate (if not more!), and didn’t address how many of these documents would be faxed and copied for distribution to other parties, increasing the amount of paper needed to ensure a successful (closed) transaction.  looking back, i think if i would’ve added the lender’s docs and title company’s forms to that roll, i would’ve had a paper trail that would’ve encircled the building!  now that would’ve scared some first time buyers, and it likely would’ve caused some of those newly licensed realtors to reconsider their new vocation.

in a recent transaction, i had to print each document out in hard copy, fax it into the transaction management system provided by my office (does anyone else think this is wrong?), then forward it on to the listing agent.  she in turn emailed a copy to her client, who then had to print it out, sign it, scan it and return it to her agent.  the listing agent would then forward back to me, and both of us would print the document out and place it in a file folder.  if you lost count, that’s four documents reproduced from one.  multiply that by several necessary forms, many with multiple pages, and you can see how a transaction file can go from a thin folder to the size of the denver phone book in short order.

now, to be fair, shame on us for being enablers.  but when it’s acceptable practice, and the offices, agents, title companies and lenders are not equipped to perform in the digital age, the transaction will flow like water – taking the path of least resistance.  in this case, pulping three trees into paper.

a novel concept

why not implement some new ideas that might get us moving more quickly into a more environmentally friendly transaction?  borrowing a page from the compliance market, let’s implement a similar program to the carbon offset approach, in which companies (and now individuals in the voluntary market) can mitigate their own greenhouse gas emissions by purchasing offsets.  it’s kind of like, “i know i’m going to be bad, so let me pay for being bad.”  not that we’ll change our “bad” behavior, but we’ll have our penance.  and salvage our conscience.

an even easier plan would be to provide a disincentive for paper use to all parties involved in a transaction.  for every pound of paper produced, the closing company will assess each of the offending parties for their overindulgence in paper.  realtor – three pounds of paperwork will cost you $300.  title company – your hit is $600.  problem solved.

now we’ll have to get the state’s department of weights and measurements involved.  i smell a new tax.  crazy.

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Flickr image by Sparticus007

vacationing muse returns

after wading through 46 comments posted to the blog from escort companies in kiev, i’m ready to throw some blog spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks.  and no, i didn’t abandon the blog – i was waiting for just the right moment for my muse to reappear and whisper in my ear.

that whispering became an ear-splitting shriek in recent weeks as i’ve talked with brokers from around the country and come to the realization that our industry could be headed for more trouble.  the reason?  the use of social media by agents and the complete disregard or lack of education in how to use these tools properly.

it’s all fun and games until somebody puts an eye out

i’m stoked more real estate professionals are jumping on board the social media bandwagon. they’re starting to recognize how blogs and social networks can impact their business positively by enlarging their marketing influence, reducing their advertising expenses and providing communication with their spheres.  but i’m also nervous that many of them are treating these new tools as if there were new (or no) rules, and not considering how some of the things they say and do in the social spaces can actually harm them.  and their companies.

which “o” are you?

what’s more surprising and more frightening is that brokers and managers have not stepped up to address the possible risks involved with their agents’ use of social media.  i’m seeing posts on facebook that clearly violate most states’ advertising requirements, and tweets that would cause ambulance chasing attorneys to salivate over the chance to sue an agent and company over their breach of fiduciary duty.  not to mention all the possible violations of article 12 of the realtor code of ethics. it’s crazy to say the least.

but what i can’t figure out is why we in management are not doing anything about it. is it because we’re overwhelmed?  the market is tough, deals are harder to come by and make stick, and we’ve got got to nurture and support our agents as they struggle through a difficult market.  surely we’ve got more important things to attend to than to worry about monitoring an agents blog?

or does the problem lie in the fact that we’re oblivious to what’s going on out there? not tuned in to the fact that thousands of agents are rushing to the social media party because it’s the happenin’ place?  sure, we’ve heard of facebook, myspace, twitter and the like – it’s all over the media.  but aren’t these sites for people who have too much time on their hands?  sharing inappropriate photos and talking about what they had for breakfast?  who’d use these networks for business?

the other, more dangerous possibility is that we’re aware of these risks, but we’re choosing to ignore them.  placing our head in the sand like the proverbial ostrich (yeah, i know – they don’t really do this, but it’s a metaphor).  hoping social media goes away, or that our agents will ignore these diversions.  unfortunately, neither is going to happen.  social networking and blogging are not fads, and are not going to go away.  and our sales associates are not going to ignore them, when millions of consumers are using these sites to connect and communicate.  not to mention that agents recognize these sites are a great way to market and prospect.  for free.  not bad in this market

time to face the music

regardless of the reasoning or cause (which “o” are you?), we in management are going to have to accept that these tools can be used effectively for our business, as long as we’ve set some ground rules.  so, if you’ve identified which “o” you are, here are some simple steps to get working on those ground rules:

• overwhelmed – get help.  pure and simple.  this business isn’t going to get any easier, and my experience has shown that it gets more challenging every year.  gear up.
• oblivious – get educated.  the world is changing ever so rapidly around us, and if we’re not in tune with those changes, we won’t be able to adapt.  and if evolution has taught us anything, it’s that those that can’t adapt become extinct.
• ostrich – pull your head out of…um…the sand. thinking social media will go away if we ignore it is on par with thinking computerized mls information was a fad.

call me crazy, but that’s the way i see it.

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