I am Jeff

While I’m not a huge fan of marketing your listings on Facebook to begin with, I definitely wouldn’t do it this way:

I received this message tonight from a local agent (whom I’ve technically never met), and decided it would make a perfect example of how to avoid a potentially embarrassing situation.  You see, by sending this listing out as a message to all your friends you run the risk of someone leaving a comment that you may not want others to see. What most people don’t realize is that when sending a message out to a group of people, the “reply” button is automatically replaced with a “reply all” button.  Therefore anything someone thinks they’re sending back to you as a private reply instantly gets emailed to everyone else on that list.

Imagine if your client was one of the people in that list (because naturally you want to show them you’re actually marketing their property) and someone sent a message back saying something along the lines of “I toured that dump yesterday, and it smelled like there were dead raccoons under the floorboards”.  Think that may be an embarrassing situation that could have been avoided?

My preferred method of marketing listings on Facebook: show or tell something interesting about the home.  Here’s a good example from another local agent:

There’s a couple things going on here.  First, it’s not your typical automated syndication directly from Postlets.com. The agent actually wrote up a blog post of her own about the property and linked back to her blog. She benefits by getting the link and traffic back to her site, which has potential lead capture built into it using a good IDX platform. Visitors may find one of her other listings, or begin using her property search and convert into a lead. You never know…

She also put some thought into the little commentary above the post, letting her friends know what is so interesting about this specific property, and why it’s worth taking a look at. So many times I see things like “check out my new listing” or “open house-sunday-1-3pm”. Those messages aren’t really that compelling.

I think in the end, it comes down to knowing your audience, and figuring out the best possible way to connect with them. Social media is a great way to connect, you’ve just got to put a little more thought into it instead of just blasting your message out to anyone who will listen.

And apparently it is… Quickly in this case.

I wrote yesterday about the Nestle/Greenpeace Facebook debacle and how it was quickly spinning out of control for Nestle.  I didn’t know much of the background on the story, so this presentation really shed some light on things for me.  Check it out:

Still no official response from Nestle on this.  I have a feeling whoever was running the fan page is no longer calling the shots on this one.  PR crisis anyone?

Or in this case, 93,000+ fans.

There’s been an awful lot of discussion lately surrounding using Facebook as a marketing platform.  Right, wrong, 10 fans, or several thousand fans, it just seems to be a hot topic no matter how you look at it.

So, here’s my thought: “What happens when a good thing goes bad?”

Let’s say you’re Nestle.  You’ve got a good thing going, or so it seems.  You’ve got a Facebook fan page with thousands of “fans”. Then one day all hell breaks loose!  Someone finds out you’re using a product that has a negative impact on the environment, and is responsible for destroying the rain forests. I’m sure there are other issues here, but this seems to be the underlying one. Problem #1.

Next thing you know, your fans turn on you.  We all know the viral effect Facebook can have.  Someone leaves a comment, their friends see it, they “like it”, their friends see that, and so on and so forth.  Within hours you have a blood bath on your hands, and your brand is quickly bleeding out!

What do you do?

Well, you certainly don’t make things worse by lashing out at your fans. Problem #2.

Stop the bleeding!

This thing is so out of control, there’s no hope for saving it.  If I were Nestle, I would kill the page.  Damage control time!  A press release saying this online marketing campaign no longer fits into our current marketing plan might be a good way to go about it.

With all the apparent successes of Facebook marketing lately, this is bound to happen again, possibly to someone in the Real Estate space. What would YOU do? Do you have a plan?

Well, I think the title pretty much sums up how I feel about this one.  Although the more I check out the Facebook girls to the right, the more I reconsi… Oh nevermind.

I really wish there was a way to disable peoples ability to “invite” me to become a fan of their page. Recently, after the 13th invite that I declined, I decided it was time to unfriend the perpetrator (one of many). But, it got me thinking… There’s got to be a better way. A better way to get people to acknowledge the value that your fan page provides (it does provide value, right?) and become a “fan” voluntarily.

There is hope though.

Take Dale Chumbley for example. The guy has pretty much started a movement. Now it seems everyone and their mom is wanting to start a “365 things to do…” fan page. The thing about Dale’s “365 Things To Do in Vancouver, WA” fan page that caught me off guard was that I had never heard of it when I finally stumbled across it.  Had Dale forgotten to invite me to be a fan?  I mean, there were already over 6,000 fans.  I felt a little left out.  But upon further inspection, I could tell there was something different about what was going on here.  Dale was getting a TON of interaction from fans.  He was responding to questions, and probing for further interactions.  All of which promotes organic, viral growth on Facebook.  When I spoke to Dale about this, he confirmed my suspicion in that he had not sent a single “invite” out.  100% organic growth. Genius!

Now let’s get something straight here.  I predict most people don’t have what it takes to pull this off. Dale does. I mean, the guy has taken like 600+ daily mugshots.  That’s dedication!

Provide value on your fan page, and people will come.  You can’t force it upon people.  Sure you may get a couple hundred fans by sending out invites, but we’re seeing much better results in a short amount of time, using the same strategy Dale has employed.

Or, just get some hot chicks to wear skimpy shirts with your fan page URL. That works too!

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