I chose to research real estate agents in North County San Diego.
1. The Lawhead Team: A husband and wife sales team
2. www.marilynlawhead.com
3. The website has links to Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Linkedin. They also have a blog on their website. There is a link to sign up for email newsletters.
4+5. Blog: same actual posts as FB and Twitter, last post Feb.11
Facebook: 300 followers. The last post was Feb. 11, 2017. They post frequently with personal pictures, information about football, real estate articles.
Twitter: they have 214 followers. The posts are identical to the Facebook posts. They post every few days.
Linkedin: 500 connections.
Youtube: they have a handful of videos. Some are more personal such as fishing in Mexico, a sunset from vacation in Mexico. Then there are a few videos of their home listings.
6. This team is on several social media sites, but the posts are the same. I'm not sure why they don't do more videos of their home listings. It might be because they sell so quickly! Their Zillow profile has reviews.
1. Laura Barry Luxury Estates
2. www.laurabarryluxuryestates.com
3. The website has a blog link, but no links to social media. However, I found her on Facebook (300 followers), Youtube, Linkedin and Instagram, and Pinterest. There is a link to sign up for email newsletters.
4+5. Blog: last post was in May 2016.
Facebook: last post was Sept. 2016. She used to post her open house announcements, listings and awards received.
Youtube: she posts videos of her listings through a channel called "California Rich", but does not have her own channel.
Instagram: 280 followers, she posts pictures of her listings.
Pinterest: she posts pictures of her listings, and pictures of beautiful interiors and properties
She appears to have been much more active on social media in the 2013-2015 timeframe.
6. She seems most active on Youtube, her current listings all have videos. It is strange that one has to go searching for her social media posts. They are not linked to her web page.
1. Team Manion (Heather and Holly Manion)
2. www.teammanion.com
3.The website has a blog link. The website also has links to Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Youtube and Google+. There is a link to sign up for email newsletters.
4+5. Blog: last post was in January of 2016.
Facebook: The latest post was Feb. 11, and they appear to post every few days.
Youtube: They only have one video on their link, and it is from 2014. They post their videos on Vimeo, but do not link them to their website.
Twitter: Last post was in July 2016 and they have 696 followers.
Google+: they had several posts from 2012-2016, but they haven't posted in about 8 months.
6. They seem to be the most active on Facebook. They post their listings and open house announcements. They also post about the real estate market in general and home tips. Videos of their listings are on Vimeo, but there is no link from their website.
1. Janet Lawless Christ
2. www.ranchosantafe92067.com
3. The website has a blog link and links to Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, Linkedin, and Google+. There is a link to sign up for email newsletters.
4+5. Blog: latest post Feb. 11, 2017. Posts are about the local art scene, golf, local restaurants and some political posts.
Facebook: last post Feb. 11, 2017. 600+ followers. Posts about local real estate trends, open houses, restaurants, golf events, local businesses.
Youtube: She posts videos of her listings, local news, local events
Instagram: 4 followers, posts the same pictures as on her FB page and blog
Linkedin: has a profile
Google+: hasn't posted for 6 months, local interest topics
6. She seems to be most active on Facebook and her blog. She has videos of her listings posted on Vimeo, but there is no link from her website.
1. The Harwood Group
2. www.theharwoodgrp.com
3. The website has links to Facebook, Youtube and Twitter
4+5. There is no blog.
Facebook: They have 139 followers, the last post was in March 2016. They posted their listings and open houses.
Youtube: They post their listings
Twitter: They have 283 followers, the last tweet was in March of 2016.
Vimeo: they post their listing videos on Vimeo, but there is no link from their website.
6. This group has minimal social media presence. The posts they do are strictly business related pictures and videos of their listings.
The real estate groups that I researched are all large, established real estate sales groups who have been doing business for 20+ years. On my own, as a comparison, I should look at the social media usage of newer groups. I was not that impressed with any of the groups social media presence. When I thought about it though, a house is something that you do not buy that often. You might be very interested in the housing market when you are looking for a house, but when the purchase is over, you settle back into daily life. Real estate is not like buying clothing or even art. Real estate is usually a large purchase made, at the most, every few years. Maybe real estate doesn't lend itself well to social media. Perhaps for real estate, the most effective use of social media has not been discovered yet.
In these five businesses, it appears that Facebook is the predominant social media site, although two of the businesses have not posted in 6 months or so. The businesses had between 100-600 followers. On any given post, it was very rare to see a comment. The "likes" on any given post were 5 or less. The posts that obtained likes and comments were those posts that were more personal in nature. There must be some way to get followers more involved! Even the Lawhead group who was disciplined about posting information relevant to home owners such as home maintenance, tax information and market information did not get comments or likes on these posts.
Youtube and Vimeo were popular sites for these real estate groups. The content was typically a video of the home for sale, although some of the videos were more personal in nature. The views on the videos ranged from single digits to over 1000 views for certain properties. Logically, the more affordable properties had more views than the larger, multi-million dollar properties. Short videos are a great way to advertise real estate.
Although not necessarily considered social media, the real estate websites such as Zillow.com, Realtor.com and Trulia.com had profiles and client reviews of each of the real estate agents in the above groups. The profiles on these real estate websites have address, phone number, website link and social media links for the agents. The agent's current listings were also listed on these sites. These sites come up immediately when a property address is googled. They have very high SEO.
Most of the real estate groups had Linkedin profiles which establishes the "business" aspect of the position. A few groups had links to Instagram and Pinterest. These sites were used to share pictures of the listings and did not seem to be very well-followed. Some groups had a Twitter account. Oftentimes, the same posts on FB were also placed on Twitter.
I am interested to read how the other businesses (researched by my classmates) are using social media. The social media outlets for these high producing real estate groups seemed pretty quiet. The agents might be putting out content, but the communication seems to be largely one-way. From the dates of the posts, it looks like the real estate groups tried social media for a few years (2013-2016), but have now given up. As I reflect on this, maybe I can think of a more creative way to engage the customer.
This week I commented on the following blogs: Gina Schwendel, Priscila Jourdan and Nicole Blea.
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