Aaron Hoos

Storify.com is a social media tool that enables users to pull together snippets of social media from several sources (Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, and more). Users bring different social media together into one “Story” that can be published and shared.

This provides yet another point of differentiation for real estate professionals who want to establish their expertise in a particular town, city, neighborhood, or community. Storify.com can help real estate professionals to sell more homes by giving potential buyers an overview of what makes that particular community so special.

Once you’ve created a Story, you can publish it, share it across other social media, and embed it on your websites.

Check out the example Storify.com Story I created to demonstrate the potential: How real estate professionals can use Storify.com to sell more homes (opens in a new tab/window).

Storify.com is free to sign up for and use (and if you have a Twitter account, you don’t even need to create another account). You can create as many stories as you want. Why not create the following stories:

• Create a Story about the city or town you live in so you can link to it for your out-of-town buyers.
• Create several Stories about the community (or communities) you specialize in. Introduce potential buyers to the area — where all the schools and shopping malls are. Embed videos of a drive down a typical street so visitors to your Story can get a sense of what the area is like. Interview local business owners and residents about the area and post videos in your story.
• Create a Story about yourself, pulling snippets of social media where other people talk about you.
• Create Stories that are linked to target markets like first time home buyers, young families, growing families, empty nesters, retirees, etc. For example, show the top three neighborhoods in the city that are perfect for families with young children.
• … and more!

There are so many possibilities and you’ll discover new opportunities as you mix and match social media in new and interesting ways!

For years, real estate professionals have struggled with finding ways to connect with potential and previous clients to remain at the top of their minds for when those people want to buy or sell again. Calendars, fridge magnets, and the occasional mass mailing were the only way…

… Until social media came along.

Social media in general — and Twitter specifically — offer real-time connection to your potential and previous clients. You’ll know exactly what they’re thinking when they’re thinking it and that will help you to engage them before they make a real estate decision. Along the way, Twitter also gives you the ability to position yourself as an expert in a particular marketplace (i.e. to a specific niche or for a specific neighborhood).

Signing up for Twitter is free and very simple. And finding people (especially locals!) is also very easy.

Okay, so you have a Twitter account and you’re already to tweet. What should real estate professionals tweet about?

Here are 12 ideas that you can build off of to tweet an unlimited number of tweets!

1. Tweet buying tips: Tweet to give people tips on buying a home in the area you cover. Is there something specific to watch for? Are there great opportunities? Is an older neighborhood regaining traction as a trendy locale?




2. Tweet listing tips: Tweet to give people tips on how to sell a home in your area. Are there challenges to overcome? Is a certain type of buyer moving into the area? What are the key features for many of the homes in the area? When is the right time to list?




3. Tweet about reasons and statistics to encourage buying and listing: Let people know when it’s a seller’s market or buyer’s market. Keep your readers up-to-date on how interest rates, the economy, and the local marketplace are combining to make it the perfect time to buy or sell.




4. Tweet neighborhood stats: Buyers wants to move to an area because it has the right combination of things they’re looking for. Let them know that YOU know how many parks there are; what the student-teacher ratio is at the local grade school; how many Starbucks are nearby; how many buses serve the area; and what the home-sale trends have been like recently.




5. Tweet about ideas to enjoy the home you’re living in: On average, people move once every seven years. So, for seven years, they’re not necessarily thinking about you and your services. Unless you help them to enjoy what you helped them buy. Give them ideas to increase the value of their home, increase the safety of their home, and make their home feel like their castle and refuge. That will make you an integral part of their home investment for the seven years between the time that they need your services.




6. Tweet links to homes you’ve listed: This is an obvious one! Don’t overwhelm your followers with tweets about the homes you list, but definitely send out a few tweets a day that say: “Growing family? Check out this home: [link]” or “Newly retired? Check out this home: [link]“.




7. Tweet your achievements: Be proud of your achievements! Tweet about the awards you won (when you win them; you probably shouldn’t tweet regularly about them after that), and especially tweet about when you list a home and when a home sells. A real estate pro who regularly tweets “I just sold another home! #awesome” shows potential clients that they can get it done.




8. Tweet what you are doing right now: Real estate professionals are busy people. (You don’t need me to tell you that). So keep people up-to-date with what you’re doing by telling them. “I’m showing a home in the East Culbert neighborhood” or “I’m just about to meet with a potential seller.” Keep it generic and positive and accurate.




9. Tweet about local neighborhood news: If you are positioning yourself as an expert in a particular neighborhood, become involved in that neighborhood by tweeting their news. Talk about the upcoming street-wide yardsale or the gradeschool magazine drive to raise money for new playground equipment or the quilting bee at a local church to send money to a South American orphanage. Soon, people will recognize you as a place to help them disseminate their local information and they’ll not only pay attention to you for local news (which will include “I’m listing a house in your area!“) but they’ll also think of you when they’re looking for a local expert to help them list or buy.




10. Tweet to cheer local teams: This tip is related to the above tip but it’s not as “newsy”. Get involved in local teams by cheering them on and reporting their successes. Ball leagues, soccer leagues, bowling leagues, even the dart league at the local watering hole. They won’t mind the extra attention and it will benefit you and them in the long run.




11. Tweet about local businesses: Like you, local businesses are trying to get by with local clientele. Sometimes it’s easy; sometimes it’s hard. Generously promote local businesses. If one of them is having a special, tweet about it. If one of them is holding a barbecue, tweet about it. If you’re bringing your shirts to the local laundromat, tweet about how much you like their service. Generous promotion is reciprocating, even if those businesses aren’t on Twitter as much as you.




12. Tweet to engage local people: This one is huge. Don’t just tweet things out as if they were announcements. Don’t just follow the above 11 tips and ignore this one. If you only have time to do ONE of these 12 tips, do this one! Engage your followers. Talk with them. Joke with them. Empathize with them. Communicate with them. Listen to them. Share what they are talking about.

Sit down with these 12 tips and come up with dozens — or even hundreds — of potential tweets. Once you have a big list, you’ll be armed with tweets for every occasion… and you’ll have a reason to send people to your Twitter page. Some of these tweets you can tweet as they happen. Others can be scheduled and put into a rotation (using a social media tool like Hootsuite).

Want some additional ideas about what you can tweet about? Check my blog post 101 retweetable tweets!

Getting and keeping clients in your real estate practice can be so challenging: There’s a lot of competition and customers only buy once every 5 to 7 years. You have to fight for every Lead and nurture that Lead into a Customer.

To help you succeed in the intense real estate profession, here are 6 sales funnel tips that you can use to grow your practice:

1. Differentiate. There are so many real estate professionals out there and they’re all promising the exact same thing. As a result, Customers don’t know or care who they go to, to buy or sell a home, because they don’t perceive a difference. Don’t be a real estate pro that’s just like everyone other real estate pro! Set yourself apart! Last year, I wrote a series called “5 marketing tactics Realtors commonly use that can hurt their business” and I talked about differentiating the following situations: Offering free home valuations, promising to give great service, using schtick (like a chicken costume) to capture attention, guaranteeing a home sale, calling yourself a “city expert”.
2. Ramp up the emotional quotient of your marketing. Buying or selling a house might be commonplace for you but it’s thrilling and scary for everyone else. Lots of real estate professionals do a good job of trying to portray confidence and success in their marketing, to assure Customers that they know what they are doing. Customers want to feel that. But they also want to know that you understand and empathize with their extreme feelings. Unfortunately, not very many professionals empathize with the emotions that their potential buyers or sellers are experiencing. Take another look at your marketing content and see if you can take the emotional level up a notch. For example, buying a house for a growing family isn’t just about proximity to schools and parks. It’s about giving children a safe place to play with friends and learn so they can grow up to be whatever they want to be. Or, selling a house for empty-nesters isn’t just about downsizing now that the kids are gone. It’s about an indulgent reward for the years of sacrificial parenting (while also sensibly preparing for the joys of grandparenting).
3. Define the stages and steps in your funnel. Most real estate professionals work hard to acquire Leads, but too many pros use the “shotgun” approach: They get names, follow up with some of them, and maybe convert a small few. That’s because there isn’t a clear sense of the journey that these potential buyers or sellers are on. When you know what steps your sales funnel contacts typically take, you’ll be able to sort your Leads better. This results in better communication and faster sales (because you’re prioritizing your contacts). Check out this blog post about how to identify the steps in your sales funnel.
4. Segment your list. As you meet new potential buyers or sellers, learn more about them and use that information to segment them. By doing this, you’ll see which ones are the most profitable and you’ll be able tailor your services to them. Use this list of 55 target market questions to help you understand who your Customers are and how you can help them the most. That doesn’t mean you won’t help anyone else, but it does mean that you can become an expert in some aspect of real estate that will attract your most profitable Customers.
5. Stay in closer contact. When I bought my (current) house about 7 years ago, my real estate agent was really helpful. Until the day we got the keys. I never heard from him again after that. No calendar. No fridge magnet. No Christmas card. I know he’s still a real estate agent because I bumped into him not that long ago. But before the rest of the real estate industry pats on the back for distributing calendars each year, consider this: I get tons of calendars from real estate professionals. So do my neighbors and friends. The next real estate agent I call to sell my house and help me buy a new one won’t be one of the calendar-givers who think they are staying in touch with me (but don’t know me from a hole in the ground). Rather, I’ll list my house and buy a new one with with someone I’ve built a relationship with. And a calendar isn’t a relationship. Get closer to your customers. Show up in their lives from time to time. Get onto their speed dial. Get invited to their kid’s soccer game.
6. Get referrals. Since most people move every 5-7 years, staying connected with your customers is important to get that sale every 5 to 7 years. But what will you do for the interim 5-7 years? Remember that they have friends and those friends will also need a real estate professional. Get people talking about your business. Differentiation helps, so does remaining in close contact with your customers; however, the most effective way to grow your real estate practice profitably is to create an army of Evangelists. Check out the Evangelist Equation to learn how to get more of your Customers filling your sales funnel for you.

Real estate professionals are always looking for new ways to grow their business — to increase their list of potential sellers and buyers. Twitter gives them access to a huge group of people, and allows Realtors to focus in on people who want to sell or buy a home in a specific city, town, or neighborhood. Here are 13 ways that Realtors can use Twitter to attract and engage an audience.

1. Tweet individual listings of houses. Link to MLS listings with short URLs that you can measure. Keep track of the most popular ones and retweet those.
2. Search for keywords like “sell house” + “[your city]” or “house hunting” + “[your city]” on http://search.twitter.com.
3. Tweet community news and information: “Baseball sign-ups start this week in [neighborhood]“.
4. Any time you post anything on the web – something new on your blog, website, Facebook page, or YouTube channel, for example – tweet about it.
5. Always add your city’s hashtag at the end of your tweets (#miami, #lax, #nyc). IF applicable, add a neighborhood hashtag.
6. Tweet your favorite things about a particular neighborhood. Do a rotation through all of the neighborhoods you serve. (For example, write 10 tweets on Monday about your favorite things about one neighborhood and then 10 tweets on Tuesday about your favorite things in another neighborhood).
7. Tweet regularly about tips people can use to get more money when selling their home.
8. Follow everyone you know… and follow everyone THEY know… then become their biggest fans. Engage with them, retweet things they say, talk to them… don’t blatantly promote your service.
9. Tweet about elements that people look for in homes: “I have 2 homes with BIG kitchens, perfect for BIG families”, etc.
10. Become a central hub of community information. (This will give people a reason to follow you and read your tweets even if they aren’t yet looking for a house).
11. Cross-promote other organizations in your community. Got a favorite accountant? Got a favorite stockbroker? Got a favorite lawyer. Recommend them. Generously promote them on #FollowFriday.
12. Link to positive stories about your city or community. For example, link to newspaper articles about the employment increases, crime decreases, and more.
13. Hold contests and giveaways to your followers. For example, hold a draw to a local restaurant for your top retweeters in a month.

I was reading Alan Weiss’ book Million Dollar Consulting. It’s a pretty good book (although I like his Ultimate Consultant Series better). In the Million Dollar Consultant he mentioned something that I thought was a valuable way to look at gaining a competitive advantage:

Weiss suggested that there were 3 “levels” of value on which you compete: At the competitive level, in which your offerings are similar to your competitors; at the unique level, in which your offerings are – obviously! – the only ones on the market; and at the breakthrough level, in which your offerings are so insanely valuable and insightful that the others aren’t even in the same league.

That makes sense and I think most entrepreneurs would agree that these are the three levels of value a business’ offerings should have if the business is going to survive.

But here is where Weiss takes a surprising turn: He says that your products should be competitive, your services should be unique, and your relationship with your customer should be at the breakthrough level.

Weiss suggests that it is expensive to implement breakthrough characteristics across all three offerings (products, services, and relationships), and that products and even services can easily be copied by competitors. So instead, he says, your products should only be at the level equivalent to compete with your competitors… the real difference is in the relationship, which should be astonishingly value-added.

I’ve spent some time thinking about Weiss’ ideas and am building on them with my own ideas below:

HERE’S WHY THIS IS GOOD NEWS FOR EVERY BUSINESS

• Existing businesses spend a lot of money on product innovation while their relationship-building remains lackluster at best. Investing even half of the money spent on adding innovating product value into adding relationship value can have a huge impact on customer retention and word of mouth.
• Some businesses – especially smaller home-based businesses (Tupperware, Norwex, Avon) and businesses where there is no product differentiation (real estate, investment firms, accounting firms, dentists, freelancers) – simply CAN’T innovate their products or services. So relationship value is going to be the key differentiator.
• It costs money to innovate products (and often services). It doesn’t cost as much money to innovate relationships. Rather, it costs time.
• Start-ups that have a simple product and not a lot of money can still compete in the big leagues with unparalleled relationship building.

HERE’S WHY BUSINESSES WON’T FOLLOW THIS MODEL

• Product innovation is sexy and gets way more funding in budgets than relationship-building
• Linking sales to products is much easier than linking sales to relationships – and when you innovate your product and see sales go up, it’s easier to make the connection between product innovation and sales.

WHAT CAN YOUR BUSINESS DO TO ACHIEVE BREAKTHROUGH RELATIONSHIP BUILDING VALUE?

• Start by analyzing your sales funnel to understand how you market, sell, and build relationships. Understand how specific activities in your sales funnel move contacts forward.
• Implement a CRM system. In other words, stop leaving customer names on sticky notes on your office wall. Tie your CRM system to your sales funnel.
• Keep diligent notes on your clients.
• Market your ass off to load up your list of prospects and build relationships with those contacts. Sales will happen if you do that.
• During a sale, keep your customer informed at every step. Don’t ever let them wonder about what the next step is or whether you’ve forgotten about them. (Note to self: I’m definitely guilty of this).
• Find out what your competitors are doing and go an extra mile. No, wait. Go an extra ten miles. Call your customers more (without bugging them). Email them. Follow them on various social media. Participate in their conversations.
• After the sale, remember that you have a relationship with them. Don’t ignore them. Don’t treat them like a prospect. Build an entire system around the post-sale customer. Send them valuable things (not just coupons for another product, but information that you think they’ll find valuable). Take a personal interest in them. Figure out what they need in their business and connect them with people and information that can help them… even if it means no additional revenue for you.