Many letting and estate
agents will tell you they have so many hundreds or thousands of followers on twitter
or so many likes on facebook.. the more the better. However,
you need to stop and ask yourself – why do you want more Facebook likes or
twitter followers? Yes, it’s nice to look popular on estate agency or lettings
row , but what good will looking popular really achieve? The truth is, nothing
at all.
The real value of social media comes from genuine clients, not facebook
likes. These are the landlords and sellers that will be past/existing people
who largely have an actual interest in your lettings or estate agency business
and what you have to say. It is generally worthwhile investing your time into
engaging with them as they are far more likely to convert into repeat sellers /
landlords, or more importantly, recommend you to others. Remember, all social
media is a form of communication. Communication is two sided affair. Say
something and listen to the reply.
The low down is, if you focus on just the quantity of likes/followers
(quantity over quality) then your facebook likers / twiiter followers won’t
have any genuine interest in your estate agency / lettings brand and certainty
won’t be receptive to anything you do; in which case they are of little or no
real value to you or your agency. It makes much more sense to build a group
organically which is always my preferred approach. Sure, this takes a little
longer to achieve, but it will result in a much higher quality of person who will have real intrinsic value for your lettings
business.
The lesson is this:
spend your time coming up with better ideas, give them (landlords – be they new,
soon to be, existing or big portfolio landlords) something interesting to read,
keep coming up with something new even more interesting to read and eventually,
they will come and seek you out. That doesn’t mean talking about tenants rights
or landlords rights, neither does it mean dispelling popular misconceptions
about the property market, it doesn’t mean
talking about the difference between s21 vs s8, neither does it mean talking
about protecting deposits or ARLA membership, definitely no horror stories,
nothing about landlords due diligence, no gas safety’s ...no ..no ..no. This might
be interesting to you Mr or Mrs Letting Agent but it isn’t to a landlord .. no
it needs to be something else ... I have been telling you what to say for the
last 4 weeks .. look back at the posts
.. decent local content about your local property market
Remember, I had a client
who wrote a blog for over two and half years. He ruled out 120 minutes once a
month, 60 minutes once a week and eight minutes
a day to do his blog ... 30 months later his turnover had increased by in
excess of £160,000 per year ... and he puts it all down to his blog. His
Linkedin connections are adequate, his twitter is none existent and he has a
facebook account that is old as the ark ... social media isn’t about that.
If you want to get
greater market share, its easy. You need to write a monthly newsletter about
your local property market, email it to over 5000 of the local movers and shakers
in your town, the important people, the landlords in your town, hand deliver it
to 300 important local dignitaries and signpost them to your daily blog .. and
off you go. It really is as simple as that...
Hold on you say
Christopher .. write a local newsletter with local content, email that out to
5000 landlords .. how do you do that? Well that’s what I do.. I
can teach you how do get those 5000 email addresses, I can write unlimited
stories and content on any town, any street or any housing estate in England
and Wales ... I have written thousands of words about towns I have never
visited (and the agents have loved it
. all the info is out there – you
just need to know where it is and how to make it interesting for landlords). I can
sort the content of the newsletter and advertorials, I can sort and work the
blog for you. That is what I do and if you put your mind to it ... so could you.If you want to know how, pick up the phone and lets have a chat. I promise there will no hard sell. 07950 147 572 ... and if you want some testimonilas of my work .. look here .. www.christopherwatkin.co.uk/testimonials.html