facebook for real estate agents

Do you know why your Facebook lead generation, your direct mail efforts and your email marketing are failing? ONE reason and one reason only…

Featured Download: The Facebook Page Setup Checklist – specifically for real estate agents – get your Facebook page setup to capture real estate leads.

Do you know why your Facebook lead generation, your direct mail efforts and your email marketing are failing?

There is ONE reason and one reason only, and guess what? I am going to talk with you about that today, teach it to you, walk you through how to overcome that reason and what to do instead.

Today, I am going to talk to you about why, the one reason that your Facebook lead generation, your direct mail efforts and your email marketing are not working for you.

Okay, we are going to talk about the one reason that your lead generation, all your lead generation, your email marketing, your direct marketing, your Facebook, why you are struggling with it. Why it’s not working.

Here’s the deal- let me give you some examples, these are real people, I’m not going to say their names, I’m not going to say their genders, I’m not going to give you their information- these are real situations that have come to me and flat out said “this is not working.

I’ve poured two-thousand dollars into my Facebook lead generation and I tried it for a few months, and it’s not working.”

Or “I dumped five-hundred dollars into a direct-mail mailing, and I didn’t get any results.”

And “I put twelve-hundred dollars into a paid list, and I sent out an email, was told the list was going to work, did not get any results.”

And “I put up a booth at a home and garden event- I spent a hundred dollars on giveaway stuff and I even had a drawing and got no results.”

Have you ever done any of these things and just been like “what on earth??” Throw your hands up, get frustrated, comment below and let me know.

Have you ever been so frustrated, when you did direct mail, you did Facebook marketing, you did direct-mailing, you did booths at events and stuff, and they are not working?

Comment below, I want to make sure that what I’m talking about today and is something that you need help with. So let me know.

What do all of these things have in common? This is where every single one of these things have something in common- every single one of these lack an understanding of the psychology of people. Now, that sounds all scholastic and academic, and do I really need to get into this?

Let me explain more, okay? It’s when you are lacking the knowledge of who the target (your person) is, what their desires are and how they will take next action.

So let me explain this, it’s a little “heavy” I guess. Basically, all of these lack an actual strategy. Every single thing that you do, you will fail if you don’t first understand the underlying strategy.

It’s not really about lead generation, it is, but it’s also not all about it either. I mean, lead generation is your end result, right?

Bear with me as I talk about this- the thing is, the most important thing about this that you must understand, in anything that you do, is the consumer, is the prospects of the very next logical step, and it’s a micro-step.

Now this is not your next logical step for them- it’s their next logical step. And I’ve talked about this a little bit, but here’s an example. When you send an email to somebody, via email marketing, the very next microscopic step is to get them to open the email.

When you send an email, the goal, at least for most of us, is “I want to get an appointment!” But that’s not actually the next logical microscopic step, it’s not the next thing that you need to work on.

When you send an email, the very next thing you need to work on is getting them to open the email. You need to get them to open it. So it’s not about a conversation, it’s not about a phone call, it’s not about an appointment- that’s the end game- but you need to bring them on the journey to make that happen.

So after they have opened the email, the very next microscopic step you should take is to get them to read the email. And this means that what you say in the subject line better be delivered in the email itself.

You better be truthful, and honest and actually giving them what you promised in the subject line. Because if you are not, then they won’t open any more emails from you. And they will start reporting your emails as spam, etc.

So you don’t want to disappoint them. In fact, you want to deliver more than they think they are getting. So focus on “wow-ing” them, I guess is the best way to say it.

This concept is exactly the same for your Facebook business page, your direct mail, of course your email, your open houses, the Home & Garden shows that you go to, everything, that is your focus.

You need to be thinking the next microscopic step- “how can I bring them through this journey?” You have to learn who your person is, what they want and what they need. You have to give them valuable reasons why they should trust you.

This should not be you telling them why they should trust you- you cannot tell people “trust me, I know what I’m talking about.” Oh boy, I wish I could! I’ll explain that a little more later today, I really wish I could, but you can’t tell them. You have to show them. And you have to show them over and over and over and over.

There are five-billion other people, five-billion other noises out there and you have to be the one who is consistent, and the one that is giving and the one that is teaching, educating, inspiring, motivating. You have to be the one that makes them say “Oh, that’s who I want to go with” and “that’s who I want to see.”

Here’s the thing- our industry actually does all of us a disservice when we “focus on getting the appointment.” When we’re focused on that, just that, we are in a rush to get there.

Let me give you an example. I was at a street fair this weekend, it’s a huge events, street fair, Art on the Green, it’s a huge event, I think we have fifty or sixty thousand people who come into the town itself for it, that’s not my estimate, that’s what I’ve heard from the “officials,” they come into our area just for this event.

So we are at this event, we are there, it’s morning and we are totally chilled. I am business turned-off, tasks turned-off and just enjoying myself. We walk past a booth that is for Anderson Windows. We are looking into, we are starting the looking process to replace our windows.

Now we know, based off the brands we had been looking at before, and because of where the windows are in the house and how many there are and the fact we need wood windows, we know for a fact that it’s going to be expensive.

So we are a couple of years out, so this is a similar situation to someone who is going to buy a house, we are a couple of years out, so go to this booth.

We have already started looking at this Anderson dealer because number one, we have been using Home Depot and we are trying to some more customized windows and we want someone to make the windows that are truly the right size, so we know what we are looking for, right?

So we walk past this booth, and I go “oh look, an Anderson Windows booth” and they had a little slip of paper where I could fill out my information to be contacted later on, so I think “okay, I’ll do that.” So I fill out my stuff.

The lady in the booth, well, she pissed us off. Like I just wanted to fill that out, and have them contact me at a later date because I wasn’t truly focused on that because I was on a “vacation day,” so to speak.

I was serious about buying windows, but not for another two years or so. But she was relentless, she kept saying “make an appointment now” and “let’s make an appointment now,” and finally I was like, “I’m not going to make an appointment right now. I’m not going to do anything this year, it doesn’t matter what kind of deal you give us. Have them call me after this event.”

And they had even said “make sure you give us your information, because we will contact you later.” So it’s a commission thing, but she was nasty, frustrating and nasty, because all she could think about was getting to the appointment, because that’s probably what she made money for.

That’s our assumption after we left, based on how high-stressed she was.

Instead of her going “okay, where are these consumers? How are they doing? What are they doing at the street fair?” If she could only get the leads during the street fair, there are ways to do that- “hey, can I get your number, I’ll text you later on so we can do something via text so that I’m not interrupting your time right now.”

That would have been the next logical step, because literally, that’s where everybody else is, relaxing. We are not interested in looking at our calendars and making appointments for next week. I had no interest in doing that.

And so, that’s what I really want to stress here, is that when we focus on getting the appointments, we are more likely to lose the appointment. When we realize “what is the next step? How can I make it easier for them, to get them to where I want them to be, right from where they are?”

That’s why people feel pressured, and run screaming away from realtors, because they know it’s not about them as a consumer, they know it’s about the commission that they bring.

So, they don’t want to give us information. Same with this Anderson Windows woman- all she wanted to do was make an appointment. I was like “Nooooo!” Every hint that we gave her, she wasn’t even really responding, she was doing this “script, script, script,” bit. I hate those, I hate those.

They make me go, I don’t actually do this, but I want to say “Look, shut up. This is what we are doing, if you want my business, contact me later after this.” I did not do that, but that’s how I feel.

That is how the consumer feels when you, as a realtor, are just railroading over them, and trying to get to the appointment. So you need to consider and see what the very next step is in their journey.

Where are they? What mood are they in? What event are they at, and what would they most likely be doing?

Home & Garden shows are very different then a general art fair where people are just chilling out, we are going to Art on the Green, which is all art stuff, we are just chilling. Very different.

So just be aware of that, know where they are and treat them as if you are not stressed to get the appointment.

There is a distinct difference between a hard sell, and a know-like-trust business relationship, you know, if she had gone “you know, today is a day of relaxing, I’ll just text you later today or tonight, and you can respond at your leisure and I’ll give you some appointment times.”

That would have been way better then her trying to push me into something.

But, here’s the thing, just between you and I, let me walk you through what I’m doing, right here and now. I’m going to lay it all out right now, exactly what I’m doing right now to develop relationships so that you know that I am the source of what you need, and that’s my goal.

I went live every weekday in August, and I am probably going to actually extend that because I am having so much fun.

Why?

Because there are three main reasons- the first one is for myself. I want to develop the habit and the self-discipline to challenge myself to commit to doing something, and to do it even when I don’t want to do it or even when I’d rather do something else.

Let’s be real- every single weekday at 10 am, it’s been gorgeous here! I want to go into the pool sometimes, ya know, I want to go out with my husband sometimes, there are some ideas to have this business so I can be flexible. There are just times when I just don’t want to do this right now.

So I wanted to do this for myself, to develop a habit of self-discipline and to challenge myself to move forward.

The second reason I wanted to do this is for you, to give insane value. I wanted to answer the hundreds of questions that I receive every single week, to give you a place where you know you will be given the truth.

Tell it like it is. Where you won’t feel sold to, where you know that the answer I give you is best for you and your business, and not me and my business.

I wanted to have these videos and these resources for that exact reason.

So number one was for me, number two was for you and number three, here’s the underlying thing, when I do it all, it’s for Leads and Leverage.

I want to reach more real estate agents. I want to expand the business, I want to create a whole lot of content that I can repurpose.

I can use these videos for other trainings, I can use them as launch points for deeper lessons inside of Leads and Leverage, I can use them as a way to reach you on something that you are struggling with, because not all of you are struggling with all the same questions that I get, you are all struggling with your own things.

By doing this, I am able to reach you, guide you and give to you. This is huge. So those are the three main reasons why I do this.

So if you notice, not a single reason I’m doing this is to push a sale on you. If I have something that could help you, duh, absolutely I’m going to share it!

My main focus is not about selling, my main focus is about reaching you, so that I can build know-like-trust relationships.

My end game, of course my end game is to expand the business, of course my end game is to get more of you inside of Leads and Leverage so that you can experience the amazing community we have in there. Of course, that’s my end game.

But if you are new to this right now, if this is the first time you have ever watched one of these videos, if that’s all I was doing, was pitching to you to get into Leads and Leverage, you would have been like “dude, back off.” And you wouldn’t watch any other videos.

So I am very, very focused on building relationships with you.

I have a very specific passion for real estate agents, because our industry sets us up for failure.

87% of real estate agents are out of the business within five years, and quite frankly, that’s horrific. That’s terrible.

I am so sick of seeing the supposed successful agents pushing “this one way and one way only” to become successful.

Heck, I have lead generated more transactions than 99% of those gurus and terrible agents could ever even imagine possible. Ever. We have had a huge business consistently over time, and I know the behind the scenes secrets, I know that people have been changing.

Here are the keys- back in the 80s and 90s, buyers and sellers essentially did whatever we told them to do without research, without objection, they just did it.

Why?

Because we knew them. Because we knew nearly 100% of our buyers and sellers- they were referred to us by friends or other agents, but it was very much relational back then. We already had a know-like-trust relationship, boom, there was not a lot of noise, so they trusted us.

Then, between 2000 and 2010, there was a small shift- people started using the internet to do “pre-searches,” that’s what I call them.

They started learning that they could do actual research. And yet, real estate agents didn’t hop on board.

Oh my gosh, they didn’t. WordPress came out in 2001, or 2002, something like that, I mean, hello, Youtube came out in 2004, Facebook in 2006, to the public- and yet, so many of you don’t have your own website.

Like, you seriously don’t. You have a broker site, or you are using some vendor site but you still don’t have your own website.

When we realized where this was going, real estate agents didn’t hop on board, but we did, which is why we scaled so fast, and stayed that way. But it was still, back then, all about “selling” on the first meeting.

In other words, we were trying to build know-like-trust relationships all in the first thirty-to-sixty seconds we talked to someone, saw someone, etc, whether on the phone or in person.

And this is why video did so well for us, because we started the relationship before we ever even met people. That’s what gave us a leg up. That was huge.

Then, come 2010 to present, there has been a massive shift. This is where the keys came about- the ability to understand the psychology of people, the microsteps, etc.

Where was that shift? Well, it was social media, but it’s also the noise. All of the noise. You have to be on social media, absolutely, if you want to have a successful business, you have to be on social media.

However, however, you do not need to have profiles on every stinking social media thing that comes out. If there is some weirdo thing that oh, will get you referrals, how many of those do you guys get? How many of you sign up for these things? Because they are “free” and you can, you know, you signed up for it. There are like five bajillion of them and they will do nothing for you.

So it’s not just social media. You have to be on one or two platforms, that is it. I don’t care. If you are not Linkedin person, don’t get on Linkedin. If you hate Twitter, get your butt off of Twitter. Don’t bother. Do not bother. Be where you are going to be.

For me, that is Facebook and Instagram. I use Pinterest, but I use Pinterest for personal. I use Facebook for personal and for business, and I use Instagram for mostly personal but a little bit of business thrown in, and then I use Pinterest for personal.

Yep, I have profiles on Twitter, and LinkedIn, and I don’t know how many other but I do not use them. They are not helping you, so stop trying to be in all places at once. You cannot do it, it’s not possible, because you need to dive deep, not wide.

So you need to be developing relationships and creating them, but you cannot do that when you have multiple platforms.

It’s not possible. If you keep doing what “seemingly” worked before, and I mean the whole expecting people to know-like-trust you, and still expect to get in front of someone and actually get their attention for thirty-to-sixty seconds and get them to be loyal to you, if you keep trying to do it that way, you are going to keep failing.

It doesn’t work that way anymore.

There are two things that have been tossed around in the real estate business for, I don’t know how long, for like fifteen years, maybe twenty years, ever since the internet came along, and people were able to get sold data in most areas or they were able to start getting information- the words “authenticity” and “transparency.”

But here’s the thing, it’s still the industry’s idea of “authenticity” and “transparency,” is the data.

That’s it. That’s what they think is being “authentic” and “transparent.”

Do you know that social media is about real “authenticity?” It’s about real “transparency?” It’s about “real?”

What does that mean?

I’ve said this before- it means that if it sucks to sell right now, and you would never even want anyone you know to sell right now, but you are out trying to get a listing and saying “oh yeah, how’s the market?

Well, it’s better than I deserve!” Or however the heck your answer is, or whatever the kind of intensive training answer is that you have learned- that’s not authentic.

When you can tell someone “you know, unless I had a job transfer, unless I had XYZ, or whatever it is, I wouldn’t be selling anything right now.”

Until you are ready to be actually real, and authentic and truly transparent, everybody is going to know. The consumer’s going to know- do you know why?

Because there is someone else out there being truly authentic and transparent. They are telling you what’s working and what’s not.

The fact that I’m telling you that most vendor stuff does not work and it just creates noise- I get it. I’m not selling those vendor things, so I don’t have invested interest in that, however, those same vendors have contacted me “hey, you could make $100,00!

Just send all your information in of your email list.” Yes, that happens every single week- I get contacts from vendors who want me to sell crap to you guys. Some of its good, but I’m not going to sell it to you.

Why?

Because that’s not what you need! You do not need more crap!

You need to understand what’s going on right now, through people and the industry, and outside of the industry, and how to get past all that sales crap to get into the hearts and minds of people so that they want to use your services.

You want people to know you, to like you and to trust you.

Social media is about real authenticity, about real transparency and it’s about being real. It’s about you, not a brand. It’s about you, not a company.

It’s about you, not a business. Which is why logos, and colors and all that crap- they are useless. They’re useless. They are pretty, they are fun but they are useless, because what people remember is how they feel after they’ve experienced you.

How do they feel? Do they feel oily and icky because you are telling them “yeah, right now’s a great time to be buying or selling in the market, the market’s going up, you will want to get in before it goes down.” That’s just an example.

Or, are they feeling like “Oh, what else does this person say? Should my desires to buy or sell go beyond what I think? Should I buy or sell, should I not?” It works, because you are telling them the truth of what’s going on.

So how do they feel? You must connect with your prospects, flat out, before they will ever connect with you.

And if you want them to stick, you have to be real, you have to be transparent and you have to be willing to tell it like it is. I’m sure you could do it in a much more gracious way than I have ever done- I’m more blunt than most people.

But you need to be clear, you need to let them know, and you need to make them not worry about the sale or the one you might lose. You cannot worry about that- you have to focus on giving value, because quite frankly, the more people you help, the bigger your business will be.

It’s really that simple. But you really have to help them, you have to really help them.

So when you do this, when you focus your business on this, you have a huge leg up when you connect with people before they use their services.

And you stay connected through value and serving. Why? Because no amount of “guru hard-sell” will ever celebrate a loyal follower from you.

When you have done something, given something that has changed their life, changed their knowledge, changed their experience and you keep doing that, they are loyal. They won’t change.

What you hold to be true over time, do you know how many businesses similar to mine, when I started Leads and Leverage in the fall of 2013, I was literally the only company that was doing this.

There was not a single company out there that was teaching you like this, video, etc, on how to use Facebook for your real estate business, period.

There was not.

There were companies out there trying to sell you content for your Facebook business page, or posts to go on your page, yep, and it was a once or twice a week thing, well, there were businesses like that, but there were none like what I am doing.

Then, over the years, many have popped up, there are some that have completely copied what I made and tried to sell it, they have popped up. But they are not there anymore-why?

Because they are not invested in you. They don’t care. They have something to sell, and they are focusing on the deals, not on the long game. They are not focusing on that long stretch.

So what are you going to do now? I want you to reverse all this- I’m sharing all my knowledge and insight with you, what are you doing to focus on the long game, for someone’s life choices, for when they are buying and selling houses?

What can you do, who can you be? Because let me just tell you, if you are focusing on the deal, that’s all you will get- just a couple of deals.

But if you focus on helping people in the long run, I know that we hear this all the time in real estate, “every seven years, they become a client and I’ve got this many” and you are thinking “geez, I don’t have seven years because I needed food yesterday.”

But if you don’t start thinking that way and going “okay, I realize that I’m not helping anybody right now and that I don’t have any leads in the pipeline right now,” but if you don’t start helping people right now, you will always be struggling and trying to get leads into the pipeline.

You have to think of the long game, you have to think of the relationships you are building, absolutely. I don’t care if you are task-driven, or people-driven, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, because the name of the game is relationships.

So if you are not focused on teaching people and helping people through their journey, you are going to fail.

Eighty-seven percent of real estate agents fail- there is a reason for that. It’s because what we are taught- sucks.

It doesn’t actually work. It doesn’t.

You see the big “gurus” up there who have only been in the business for five years, even some that have made it a couple of years but there are so many “40 under 40” who don’t even make it past their first five years, they are part of the 87% too.

There are very few agents who apart of the big “guru,” who ever make it past the five year mark, and many of them are struggling because they haven’t adapted their businesses to what’s going on now.

Their profit margins are getting smaller because they keep throwing their money at the same things they were doing before, because they have more money to do that but their profit margins are getting smaller.

You are going to see a lot of them starting to shut up, shutting down. You see all these people starting to struggle, as you see us move towards another.

Featured Download: The Facebook Page Setup Checklist – specifically for real estate agents – get your Facebook page setup to capture real estate leads.

by Christina Ethridge Leave a Comment

Facebook page likes are powerful. The problem is, most real estate agents think they aren’t. Get the most highly effective strategies for real estate Facebook page likes now!

Featured Download: The Facebook Page Setup Checklist – specifically for real estate agents – get your Facebook page setup to capture real estate leads.

Facebook Page likes are powerful creatures.

So powerful, that if you are not focused on your page like strategy and consistently growing your page likes, you are missing out on an awesome lead generation aspect of your Facebook business page.

The thing is, it is very hard for real estate agents to see the power in Facebook, let alone the power in Facebook page likes.

Why is the Facebook page like power so hard to see?

Well, for one, real estate agents are being taught how to use Facebook, by people who have no idea how to use Facebook for lead generation. Oh, they look like experts.

They talk about the social aspects, how to engage with people in only 10 minutes each day, how to use it for name recognition and brand awareness, making sure you wish people Happy Birthday in unique ways so your posts stand out on their wall, etc.

They themselves are engaged with their following (people they’ve met in real life or who have made a connection with them in some way – in other words, their sphere of influence.)

All of those things are fine and well and good, if you are doing them from your personal profile and you are simply focusing on your typical ‘networking’ style by reaching out to people you are already connected to.

These experts also say that people will see who you are and what you do, people you don’t know, by your participation on their friends and families posts. Well, yes, this might be true. Notice I said ‘might’ be true… and it works for a closing or two each year.

But what about those of us who want more than a couple of closings from our Facebook efforts? What about those of us who want to have a steady stream of leads coming in?

Leads that are people we are not connected to, leads that are people we do not know. Leads that we wouldn’t have connected with outside of Facebook?

There are those of us who know, in our guts, that Facebook is a powerful lead generation source. The problem is, we just don’t fully understand how, where, what, when and why.

What do real estate agents typically think about page likes?

Many real estate agents think Facebook page likes are a competition. The more likes the better.

The problem is, when they think this way, they tend to go hog wild and ask anyone and everyone (plus their uncles) to like their business page.

They don’t stop to think whether those people would be interested in their business or services. They pull out the stops and practically guilt their friends and family into liking their page, under the guise of “support me and my new business page.”

Another big issue with this is that Facebook encourages this kind of behavior!

Facebook is constantly reminding page owners that they need to reach their next milestone… whether that milestone is getting a page user name, getting their first 100 likes, or getting 400-500 likes so they can access different analytics and targeting available to pages with more likes.

This encouragement from Facebook is a Catch 22 for real estate agents. They want to achieve those milestones and Facebook isn’t teaching them about truly targeting their likes.

They are simply encouraging more likes which unfortunately, is setting up that page to fail, by Facebook’s own algorithm!!

Another group of real estate agents (and their coaches) think that page likes aren’t leads so don’t bother.

This group of agents are usually pretty vocal. They talk about “moving the dial” and that page likes aren’t moving the dial. They firmly believe that page likes shouldn’t be pursued or measured.

The thing is, they are partially right! Page likes are typically not someone who is ready, willing and able to buy or sell a home right this minute.

However, page likes are what I call “thawed out leads.” In other words, they liked your page for a reason. They have some idea that they either like you, like your business or might possibly need your services in the future. They’ve made the first step towards you and your services.

Now, the above only holds true if you have pursued targeted page likes. This does not hold true if you’ve asked anyone and everyone (plus their uncles) to like your page.

It especially doesn’t hold true if you are asking your colleagues around the country to like your page.

Page likes are not created equal.

Don’t mistake anything I’ve said above. Not all page likes are equal. Not at all. In fact, there are page likes that are beneficial and page likes that are detrimental.

You want the beneficial page likes and you want to avoid the detrimental page likes.

So what are detrimental page likes?

Detrimental page likes, according to Facebook’s algorithm, are page likes that are not interested in your page. They aren’t likely to engage with anything you post. They are inclined to “unfollow” or “hide” you in their News Feed. Facebook considers those actions negative and will penalize your page by not showing it to as many News Feeds if you have page likes doing this to you.

Detrimental page likes are also likes that are not your target niche or audience. In other words, they aren’t likely to use or recommend your services.

How are detrimental page likes accumulated?

Detrimental page likes are accumulated a number of ways including . . .

When real estate agents start a page, their first goal is typically to accumulate page likes. So they start asking people to like their page. Typically it starts out with family and friends then it quickly moves onto their colleagues around the country.

If those friends and family are not in your target market, they aren’t going to be interested in what you have to say or share on your real estate business page. They end up becoming detrimental page likes.

Those colleagues around the country are not your target market. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that you might possibly get a referral from one of those colleagues. Sure you might.

But in the meantime, that colleague is not interested in what you have to say or share in your market. They are likely to unfollow or hide your page (or even unlike it.) These are negative behaviors that Facebook will penalize your page for.

Additionally, these friends, family and colleagues that are not in your target market, are watering down your future Facebook advertising efforts. More on this later

Another way detrimental page likes are accumulate is by ‘paying for likes’ via services that promise you a certain amount of likes for a preset sum of money.

They even promise that these page likes are real people. Often they’ll promise the page likes are from your specific country.

While you’ll definitely accumulate Facebook page likes this way, you are harming yourself even further. For one, these likes are pointless.

They are useless to you. They are detrimental for engaging, targeting and advertising. They will never become leads for you, so why bother?

The third way detrimental page likes are accumulated is through running untargeted or poorly targeted ad campaigns or boosting posts to poorly or untargeted audiences.

Another way detrimental page likes are accumulated is by participating in “like exchanges.” There are Facebook groups dedicated to this practice.

When you join one of these groups and share your page asking for likes, and in exchange going through and liking their pages, you are participating in a like exchange.

The final way page likes are accumulated is by running “sweepstakes or contests” on your page that offer something anyone, anywhere can win and receive. Especially when the goal is page likes.

So how do you avoid detrimental page likes?

You avoid detrimental page likes by not focusing solely on accumulate likes!

Don’t ask anyone and everyone to like your page. Don’t use page like services that promise a certain number of likes for a certain amount of money.

Don’t run page like advertising campaigns until you know how to effectively utilize Facebook’s advertising and targeting programs.

I’ve talked about detrimental page likes enough. Now. Let’s move on to beneficial page likes.

What are beneficial page likes?

Beneficial page likes are likes that are your target client. It’s really that simple.

Beneficial page likes include your past & present clients. They include locals who are likely to use your real estate services. They include anyone, anywhere likely to use your services.

However, the better you know your target audience, the more beneficial your page likes will be.

In other words, do you prefer to work with buyers or sellers? Do you prefer to work with first-time home buyers or rental home sellers?

How old are your favorite clients? What’s the price range of home they typically buy or sell? Are they married? Single men? Single women? Have children? Empty nesters? Snow birds?

Only you know your target and your market. You definitely need to focus on your niche here and you need to seriously set aside the whole idea that “you might lose a deal if you define your target and leave someone out” mentality that is held by most real estate agents.

Seriously. Let it go. You’ll have plenty of people within your ideal target that you will be referring out those that want to use your services who aren’t your ideal client.

So how do you accumulate beneficial page likes?

You accumulate beneficial page likes by knowing your audience, deeply.

You accumulate beneficial page likes by targeting people you know who are already your clients (past & present), locals you know who are your target audience.

You ask these people personally to come over and join in the success of your business by liking your page.

Then, you accumulate beneficial page likes by using Facebook’s targeting algorithms and running ads to your targeted audience.

You make sure your page is promoted on your websites & blog sites with a like box. You make sure your page is promoted in your email signatures. You make sure it’s on your business cards. You make sure it’s promoted in your snail mail campaigns.

Yes you want people in your email database, but that is another step of obligation for people to jump to. Facebook page likes are a very easy step for most people. It’s a low threshold.

There is no obligation on their end and they feel anonymous. But, they just profiled themselves to you and that is where the power comes in. More on this later.

Why are page likes so powerful?

The thing is, page likes are powerful because, if you’ve accumulate beneficial page likes, you now have a group of people who have made the first step of interest in you and your business.

They’ve moved towards you a single step. A small step to be sure, but it’s a step and it’s a step in a powerful database.

And yes, you should think of your page likes as a form of a database. It’s a database that serves as a funnel into your main database (your email database.)

When you have beneficial page likes, you are then able to target those page likes through the content you share, through the things you say and more powerfully, through targeted advertising.

The thing is, the statistics show that people who like your page are more likely to buy your products or use your services.

The result? I’ve found that fans are most likely to BUY! Repeatedly when I have a product to promote, I find that fans buy at a very high rate. On the flip side, people who are less likely to know who I am (and trust me) are far less likely to buy.

~ Jon Loomer

The power in page likes is to use Facebook as a sales funnel:

Build a targeted audience (your page likes)

Give them what they are looking for in the content you share

Build their trust

Get their email addresses

Nurture them to a closing

This is why page likes are so powerful. They are the targeted audience you are building on Facebook. When you have a targeted audience, you can target them through Facebook advertising.

Detrimental page likes cost you money.

When you are using Facebook advertising to target your page likes, every detrimental page like you have costs you money. You are paying to reach someone who either is a fake profile or is not your target audience and you are paying to reach them repeatedly.

When you have friends, family and colleagues that are not in your target market, they are watering down your Facebook advertising efforts. This costs you money. Here’s an example…

Say you have grown your Facebook business page to right around 500 page likes. You did this by asking friends and family, past and present clients, and colleagues around the country to like your page. You also joined some groups that do like exchanges with each other.

Let’s break this down a little more. Around 40 of those likes were past and present clients. Another 20 were family and friends. The remaining 440 were from like exchanges, buying likes or other detrimental like accumulating processes I described in detail above.

Any advertising you run targeted towards your Facebook page likes will be less than 10% effective. You’ve only got around 40 targeted likes on your page. So for every $50 you spend on advertising to your page likes, $45 of it is money down the drain.

Beneficial page likes make you money.

When you use Facebook advertising to target your page likes, you are targeting page likes who are interested in your services. The goal with Facebook advertising towards your page likes is to move them along to the next step in the sales funnel process.

When people put that step forward by liking your page, targeted people, they’ve just raised their hand saying “yes, I’m interested in what you have to offer.”

This is them profiling themselves and this is where the power comes in. They’ve raised their hand. They’ve expressed interest.

Now, through the content you share on your page and the advertising you do, you can move them through the funnel into your database, where you will further nurture them until they “buy or die.”

So, after reading this, what has changed for you? What are you going to start doing, stop doing, change?

Featured Download: The Facebook Page Setup Checklist – specifically for real estate agents – get your Facebook page setup to capture real estate leads.

by Christina Ethridge Leave a Comment

Discover the top 3 things you’re doing on Facebook that is killing your business (plus 2 things you can do now that will GROW your business)

Sneak past your colleagues and dominate Facebook. Join me inside THE VAULT: CLICK HERE to join:

Is that tactic that you are using on Facebook actually helping you? Or is it killing your real estate business?

Today I am going to talk about three things that you are doing on Facebook, at least probably doing on Facebook, that is actually killing your business.

And I’m going to give you two things that you can do that will psychically grow your business, using Facebook.

Today’s topic was inspired by one of my Leads and Leverage members. It was actually inspired by many of them, but this just happened last night, or this morning rather, so I was thinking “this is a really good thing to talk about.”

A member found a great Chrome add-on that would help them send bulk email without adding all the stuff on the bottom. And that inspired me, I’m going to go inside the membership and talk about that today, very specifically, what’s legal, what’s illegal but that’s not actually what we are going to talk about today.

What it did do was inspire me to realize that there are a whole bunch of tactics that we are using, and tools we are using that may actually be illegal, but mostly killing our business rather than helping our business.

Just because we find a tool or a tactic, and we think it looks great on the surface, when we don’t know or understand the tactic itself, and it’s strategy behind the tactics, then it’s dangerous to use them. So that’s what we are going to talk about today. You guys are amazing!

What are three tactics that you are using on Facebook that probably aren’t helping but just hurting your business?

Because they are available to use, whether it be “Vendor tool,” or “Leverage,” or “Automation,” just because they are available to us, we think they are okay to use.

Auto-posting your listings to your Facebook business page.

So, with this first one, the one about the listing, maybe you are using your listings to grow leads for your business- please be aware that I’m not saying that the tool is a bad thing- what I am saying is that how you are using the tool can be a bad thing.

So auto-posting your listings to your Facebook business page, that can be, like if you are putting it as “listings to leads,” I think if you put in your ad your listing, then you can have it auto-post to your page.

Auto-posting your blog posts to your Facebook business page

Blog posts, if you are doing auto-posting for blog posts to your Facebook business page, like a lot of people who use “Wordpress,” and there is a plug-in you can get that auto-posts your blog posts to your Facebook business page.

Auto-posting of generic real estate posts through a vendor.

So if you are using something like “Real Estate Agent Directory,” or “Back At You Media,” or any of the other vendors who provide generic content, whether it be “ItWorks” photos or articles, and you are using those, this is where you are going to get in trouble.

So why are these bad? Please note again, that the vendors are not bad, it’s how you are using the tool that’s bad. So why are that bad?

First and foremost, your page is not a brochure, it is dynamic, not static.

It should reflect your customer, their lifestyle, it should be ever-changing, it should be engaging.

Remember Facebook owns it all, all of this we are using, right? So Facebook wants you to have a meaningful engagement. They do not want you to push stagnant posts out to the world just because you can.

That is the difference between a static brochure and thinking that you just need to pop stuff on there and “keeping it active,” it actually works against you, by the way, all versus a dynamic page where you are trying to create conversation.

Now here is what I mean: if you are just auto-posting stuff, auto-posting your listings and your blog posts and that generic real estate content, Facebook is not going to push it out because they can see that it is auto-posted and they can see it’s generic. They can see that no engagement is happening.

So when you post that out there, they go “nope, we are not going to send that post out.” And every subsequent post that you put out that’s like that, you get less and less reach until you have zero.

They are not going to push out crap that they don’t want on their platform. It’s not censorship, it’s because their goal is to page engagement.

If what you are doing does not create enough engagement, guess what? It’s not going to get pushed out there. Then some of you say “well fine, I’ll just put an ad out there then.” Here’s the deal- if your page is not active, engaged and creating meaningful engagement, your ad costs are just going to go through the roof.

It’s going to be insane, and trust me, it’s going to get more and more, because they know that it’s not what people are wanting. Therefore, your ads are getting less connection. You cannot just circumvent it, with ads.

So the consumer-the person you have never met- wants to engage with you, not a automated page. They don’t want to see dull posts come across their feed.

I realize that some of the stuff that these vendors provided is not really engaging per say, but it is cool, when you are just posting it and not engaging it, like you aren’t starting a conversation with it, that’s where you are getting into trouble.

If you actually want to leverage your Facebook business page, then you have to actively be involved.

You do! Not your assistant, not your VA out in the Philippines, not a tool, you.

You can use all of those things, but you have to be involved. You have to be the voice. If someone is going to be “talking” on your page, whether it was on video, or on texts, then it needs to be you.

Why? Because you need to get to know your prospective customers, and you must help them, and give them what they want. Some of them want a real reason to connect. They do not want more noise. They do not.

So it’s on you to create the conversation, it’s on you to pique their interest, it’s on you to humanize your page, so that you can build know-like-trust relationships with people that you have never met before, so that you can use your Facebook business page as a conduit.

Remember, it’s not a destination, you can use it as a conduit into your database. And so that you can nurture your database, so that you can help people buy and sell real estate.

The whole point of this is so that you can create conversation, it’s on you to pique their interest, it’s on you to humanize your page, so that you can build know-like-trust relationships with people you’ve never met, so that you can use your Facebook business page as a conduit to your database, so that you can nurture your database, all so you can help people buy or sell real estate.

That is how it works. It is a journey. It is a process.

So, instead of those three things, (auto-posting your listings to your Facebook business page, auto-posting your blog posts to your Facebook business page, and auto-posting generic real estate content through a vendor to your Facebook business page), what should you do instead?

Two things you can do instead that will actually work!

Facebook likes it, consumers like it, your prospects like it, and it makes it easier to leverage a page and it makes your ad costs go down.

You need to turn your page into a lifestyle page.

What do I mean? You need to focus on your prospects, and on their lifestyles in your community. At least one-third to one-half of your posts should be local.

Local photos, local check-ins, local article shares, local happenings. They should be local. And a good half of those posts should involve you. Because you need to be seen. People need to want to connect with you, all on a local level.

Then they need to connect with you, a real human being, doing business.

People also want to support local business. But if your page is “Jane Doe Realtor,” and all you are putting out and spewing out is that auto posting crap, it doesn’t matter if it’s “Jane Doe Realtor in local area,” they still see it as a cardboard cut-out of boring.

They are not going to give you the time of day. You need to be engaged in the community.

Best practice if you are going to use vendor generated content

The second thing is, if you are going to use vendor generated content, including ours, inside of Leads and Leverage that we have really curated what people really like, if you are going to use any of that, you must look at each and every piece of content that you are putting on your page, and make sure that that piece fits your community.

You also need to start the conversation with that content- you cannot just put up stuff just for the sake of putting it up. You just can’t do that. It’s killing your presence on Facebook, with Facebook and with the consumer. You have to take that content, and customize it.

A lot of you, I know a lot of you, when we were with CRS, we would get the CRS blog posts and newsletter, a lot of people would just start popping up those blog posts, which doesn’t help you.

It’s the same thing- you can’t just pop up the same content. You need to customize it. You need to put your thoughts on it. You need to put your ideas on it. You need to relate it to something in your community. You need to make it engaged with you and the consumer.

So if you are going to use vendor generated content, including what you get inside Leads and Leverage, then you have to look at each piece and cater it. Not lose all of it, but cater it to your area, for your prospect, etc.

If you want more, then you need to join me inside “The Vault,” which also gets you inside of Leads and Leverage, where you are going to find the full “Facebook Lead Generator Course- How to Set Up Your Generation Funnel,” and also, this is the kicker, “The Art of Nurture- Cultivating Clients for Life.”

So those pieces right there, that right there is your golden ticket from how to nurture people you do not know into clients. Through Facebook, through email, through snail mail, through all of those realms, that is the key on there.

And for the entire month of August, inside of Leads and Leverage, we are actually doing an August challenge that brings engagement and conversation into your Facebook business page, all inside Leads and Leverage.

So if you want to join is, you need to click this link and join us inside “the Vault.” Prospects, consumer, unknowns and unmets all love these kinds of posts. They engage with them.

And by the way, so does Facebook. If Facebook likes it, and consumers like it, you are going to get higher organic reach and lower ad costs.

One of the things that I am doing, especially this month, and I’m actually seriously contemplating doing this for the rest of the year, I am going live every single weekday at 10am, helping answer a question that you all have.

And so, on that note, if you have questions, put them in the comments below, I have a whole lot of days that I am going to be answering the questions, I am going to be giving you the tools.

And I want to give you the strategies, and the tactics and show you all that you will be needing for each one of these things.

That is what I’m doing to help you on your page. Sorry, I can’t make local posts for you because you guys are all over the world, but I can help you with what you are struggling with.

I can help you with some of the questions you may have about these tools. I can help you identify the strategy, to figure out the tactics that are working and that are not working. The only way I can do that though is if you ask your questions.

Ask your questions, in the comments below, I am following up on every single one of these videos, and I will be doing a video every weekday at 10am, Pacific time, through the month of August, and I’m seriously considering doing it the rest of the year.

So far, I’ve got about forty different questions I need to answer. Well, I actually have about a hundred questions, but forty from this. So let me know!

Sneak past your colleagues and dominate Facebook.

Join me inside THE VAULT: CLICK HERE to join: