Sales is conversation with a purpose.

I recently had the pleasure of spending some time with Matthew Shadbolt of The Corcoran Group after coaxing him to Baltimore to speak at SMC SalesCamp. Those of you that know, or know of, Matthew will know that he’s an amazing smart guy. He’s a talented marketer and the voice of The Corcoran Group’s social media efforts online.

With so much to learn from Matthew, I was eager to chat with him for as long as his patience could withstand. And being the true gentlemen that Matthew is, he graciously accommodated me.

I learned a lot about how he sees the role of social media in the buying process. This means I got to ask him about some of Corcoran’s salespeople. The story that I remember most is his description of one of the agency’s most popular salespeople. She’s wildly successful (hundreds of millions in dollar volume each year), and is regularly seen holding 2 cell phones at a time, one up to each ear… negotiating. Hard core, no?

The phones that she’s holding to her ears aren’t just any phone, either. They’re dumb phones. Yes, [insert gasp here] they’re flip phones.

You see, this agent doesn’t use social media, or the Internet (at least not directly). As I asked more about how this agent conducts business, I learned that she’s very active with international investments and buyers. She’s been in Manhattan real estate for decades, and everyone in Manhattan real estate knows who she is. She networks. She gets deals done. And she has a reputation that precedes her.

I’m a proponent of social media in many cases, but I’ve never believed it to be a magic potion, and it’s certainly not for everyone. But how exactly is it ignored by one of Manhattan’s most successful agents?

Social media tools (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc) do not create dialogue. They only facilitate it. They give us a place to have the conversation or a means in which the conversation travels. Perhaps we should start calling them social mediums. Mediums do not create conversation. People do.

A quick Google search on the benefits of social media returns roughly a bajillion results. Overall though, most agree that main deliverable, not the scalability, or the amplification, but the jewel at the end of the effort; the feature at the end of the benefit…. is conversation. The ability to connect with another person or persons and speak with them on a direct one-to-one level.

You see, that Corcoran Group agent with two phones to her ears doesn’t need the social mediums to amplify her efforts. She built her network the old fashioned way. She’s connected one-to-one with thousands of people.

Salespeople. The original social media.

Related posts:

1. Why Do Your Listings Look Like Everyone Else’s? Try a Social Listing
2. When the Numbers are Too Big to be Relevant
3. Internet Marketing Deja Vu

If you can’t see the videos, click here.

Fun, Short enough for a commercial.

A personal tour (no vertigo from spinning cameras)

Edgey, and most definitely memorable:

Over the top:

Way over the top:

Do you have any favorites I’ve left out?

Related posts:

1. Are you Sharing Enough? Presentations, Video, Content, etc
2. When the Numbers are Too Big to be Relevant
3. Effective Communication with Social Media

Despite this impact, many builders are still somewhat skeptical of Facebook’s role in the buying process, and I can sort of see why. The product of the home building industry couldn’t get any more tangible, and the relationships that are fostered on Facebook are anything but tangible.

Believing fully that Facebook has long term value for our clients, but also understanding how our clients wanted to see something practical inside Facebook, we (“we” meaning ONeil Interactive) decided to test custom Facebook apps for our home builder clients. These apps take the builders’ community description and add them as a tab on the top of their Facebook page, where visitors could browse their current communities, watch a video, share the community with friends, and click-through to the builders’ website for more. The initial tests were fantastic. We saw an immediate jump in website traffic from Facebook, and the impact continues to increase. It currently increases referring traffic from Facebook by about 30% in our tests.

Based on our successes, we created Builder Web Apps – a simple web application that allows any builder to sign up online and list their communities on Facebook with a custom tab in minutes. We put together a short homemade video describing the app below.

No secrets here – Builder Web Apps is a product of my company, ONeil Interactive. We’ve implemented these for most of our clients and they’ve all reaped traffic benefits. The application allows you to add up to four communities for free – no strings attached.

Related posts:

1. Testimonials are Dead
2. My Mobile Real Estate Predictions for 2011
3. Want More Facebook Fans? Don’t Buy Them. Earn Them.

Identical

Generally speaking, most builders, salespeople, and real estate brokers I speak with agree that the last thing the Internet needs is another home search directory. Each time a new directory is introduced, it creates a new burden for the builder (focus, monitoring, plus a new SEO competitor).

Ask a consumer if the Internet needs another directory. I’d wager some coin that most of them say they don’t care – because they all have the same data anyway. You may think that your website does the best job of showing the photos, square footage, bedrooms, baths, and all the other typical data points. It doesn’t really matter. Its all the same data.

Why not go farther than the data? Why not try to answer the obvious question a homebuyer is asking themselves when they look at a listing – “What’s it like to live here?”

What if an new home salesperson or an agent chose to create a “social listing” – A day in the life of 123 Main Street to answer the question on the mind of the shopper. What kind of things would this social listing include?

A Photo Gallery (with more than photos of rooms):
- What’s the sunrise look like from the front porch
- What’s the sunrise look like from the Owners’ suite
- What’s the local grocery store look like
- Pool (community or private)
- Photo of the smoking grille cooking up lunch

A Video Gallery:
- Video the walk to the mailbox
- Walkable environment? Video the walk to the coffee shop
- Local nightlife
- Video the activity outside from the front porch
- What’s it like after dark? Video the evening air to show peace and quiet

YOUR (not just others’) Yelp.com reviews:
- Your honest review of a local restaurant or two
- Your honest review of a local nightlife spot
- Your honest review of a local grocery store
- Your honest review of the closest coffee shop

Foursquare:
- Link to any local businesses (or businesses’ specials) of Foursquare.

Google Street View:
- Embed the Google Street view of the home

While I think the data is important (bedrooms, baths, square footage, etc) its not a differentiator to your listing or to your website. Everyone has those details. If you want to be different, be different in a helpful way.

Related posts:

1. My Mobile Real Estate Predictions for 2011
2. Trying to Stand Out? Drop the Stock Photo Habit
3. It’s 2010, Do You Know Where Your Listings Are?

The idea that a generic, faceless, edited quote about how great you are will make me want to buy your product is absurd. Please stop using them.

I know you’ve handpicked those statements.

If you don’t give me something authentic, I’ll find it elsewhere. I have lots of options for real opinions on a business – Google Local, Yelp, Facebook, Foursquare, among others.

I want to hear from the people that don’t like you,  not just you’re biggest fans. I want a real view of you, not the filtered version.

I want the testimonial to come directly from the person. I want to see a photo of the author and see the comment linked back to an online profile (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc) somewhere so I know its a real person. I want to see what the user typed themselves, not what you edited.

The generic testimonails (i.e. “This is the best thing ever. Everyone should have 3 of your product”) are a waste of space at best, and at worst, an insult to me and the rest of your prospective buyers.

There are better options:

• Unedited video interviews
• Unedited audio interviews

And even better options:

• Facebook comments widget
• Disqus comments for pages
• Custom comment tools

If you don’t know how to use one of these above, find out how you can. The old method is a waste of time.

Photo credit: Adrian Clark

Related posts:

1. Don't be Afraid of Customer Criticism
2. Self-Prospecting with Social Networks
3. A Facebook App for Home Builders

The videos below contain my full presentation.

In this presentation, I was able to introduce the concept of Lead Curation – Creating an environment conducive to growing connections into prospects. I’m looking forward to digging deeper into this in the coming days/months.

I’ve also included my presentation, and the handouts made available to the attendees below. Please feel free to share this with anyone you think may benefit.

Part One Video:

Click here if you can’t see the videos, presentation, or handout

Part Two Video:

SMC SalesCamp Spring 2010 Handout

Related posts:

1. Are you Sharing Enough? Presentations, Video, Content, etc
2. Salespeople – The Original Social Media
3. 2010 is Going to Make You Cry

If I’m a true fan of a business (not just in the Facebook sense), I am rooting for that business’s success. I’m an advocate for the product or service. I feel a sense of pride when I see people using the product or I hear of the business’s growth. I’m invested. The business’s success is my success. That connection does not get created with the click of a button.

The volume of real Facebook fans you have is a trailing indicator of how your customers feel about you. You will not earn more real fans with giveaways and coupons. You’ll just build a list as impersonal and generally ineffective as the average non-customer email database. They will ‘hide’ you from their stream quicker than an ‘unsubscribe’ request.

Having a lot of Facebook fans alone doesn’t make you a popular company, just like having stacks of business cards doesn’t make you a good networker.

The businesses I’m a fan of have worked for that type of respect and investment from me. They didn’t give me a coupon in exchange for my allegiance or fandom. They built that respect before I was willing to click the button.

If you’re unhappy with your volume of fans, consider doing more to earn the allegiance of your customers before you ask for it.

Related posts:

1. A Facebook App for Home Builders
2. Don't be Afraid of Customer Criticism
3. Testimonials are Dead

The opportunities that I recommend paying attention to in 2010 have not changed much from what I recommended in 2009. They have, however, become much more targeted. I think 2010 will be less of the “year of new“, and more of the “year of better.”

In February of 2009, I presented “Internet Marketing: Five Things You Must Know in 2009″ to the Home Builders Association of Maryland. In that presentation, the key items I outlined for builders to focus on were:

• Website analytics
• Search – SEO & Paid Search
• Video
• Mobile Internet
• Social Media

Below you can see the slides I presented then:

Can’t see the slides? Click here

As I’ve prepared and reviewed marketing plans for 2010, many of the topics are generally the same, but in most of the categories, the specifics have gotten a lot more specific – AND the synergies [sorry for the buzzword] between them have all gotten stronger. Here are some examples of the convergences I’m talking about.

• Search Engine Optimization – What shows up on page one of a Google search, now more than ever, is impacted by real-time social media conversations. Additionally, the opportunity to have video results appear on that page have increased. Clearly, any 2010 SEO strategy is fully integrated with the social media and video strategy.
• Video - Moving beyond last year’s basics of high-quality and YouTube, in 2010, video will need to be a driver of traffic via search engines. It will need to be produced faster, and it will need to be available in more places – company website, YouTube, blog, Facebook, mobile friendly options, among others.
• Mobile - The continued proliferation of mobile phones offering a rich internet experience has made mobile a more realistic and justifiable investment. The cost of developing iPhone “apps” are steadily decreasing, as is the cost of developing a mobile website. In 2010, the focus will go beyond just being mobile. The prizes will be found by making the mobile experience fast, relevant, and rich – This means including prices, photos, easy contact options (integrated with the phone), social media integration, and mobile friendly video.
• Social Media – This year will bring out big evolutions in social media – Companies will focus on better integrating social activity into their own website, and everything else they do online, and many tools will simply mature to a level making it easier to recognize their business value.

So what will you be working on in 2010? Anything you think I missed?

Related posts:

1. When the Numbers are Too Big to be Relevant
2. A Nearly Free Mobile Website Option for Home Builders
3. Salespeople – The Original Social Media

So I’ve decided to take a serious dose of my own advice and go through 2009 to share what’s still relevant, and continue to share more throughout 2010.

Have anything in your digital archives to share? Here’s a few good places to start:

Video: YouTube will almost always be (one of) the right place(s), but also consider Vimeo from non-commerical high quality video, UStream for live streaming video, and Qik for brief video updates. Find my new profile on YouTube.

Presentations (PowerPoint/Keynote):  Slideshare is the place for this. You can also add an audio track to turn your slides into an all out presentation. Great to share a recorded webinar. Find my new profile on Slideshare.

Papers: Scribd is my preference for this. I uploaded my “Intro to Social Media for Business” paper there early in 2009 and it quickly racked up over 3000 readers. Find me on Scribd.

Look for upcoming posts to include some of 2009′s media.

Related posts:

1. Effective Communication with Social Media
2. Self-Prospecting with Social Networks
3. 2010 is Going to Make You Cry

I am convinced that the mobile web offers some of real estate’s most exciting opportunities in the next 5-10 years.

Some of the ideas I’m about to share are certainly not the “show me some case studies” type, but most great opportunities are best identified early, no? And as is the case with all impactful technologies, those companies that identify and take advantage of that potential sooner than their competitors, have an advantage. They gain critical “trial-and-error” wisdom that will take their competitors years to learn.

Check out my posts from September and November of 2008 for a primer on my thoughts about Mobile Marketing for New Homes and Home Builder Mobile Marketing with Google. Below I’d like to hash out what I see as the next step (not that, as an industry, we’ve taken the first one yet.)

What we’re just beginning to see is the power of the Internet, combined with location specific relevance, combined with mobility, combined with personal recommendations. Yes, all of this has taken off with a game by the name of Foursquare.

For those of you not familiar with Foursquare, I encourage you to check out their website and even sign-up to play – I was excited when the game was finally made available in my hometown of Baltimore. The short explanation – Foursquare is a game where users who register (for free) use their mobile phones to “check-in” at any location/business to which they travel – gas station, coffee shop, deli, school, etc. Players are rewarded for check-ins based on volume, frequency, and consistency. After regular check-ins at a particular location, a user may be awarded the status of “Mayor.” For example, a Foursquare player may carry the title of “Mayor of Starbucks – East & Main” or “Mayor of BP Gasoline – Downtown.” Players are also connected to their friends, getting to see where their friends have traveled, and even receive notes and recommendations left by their friends.

Why should any business care about Foursquare?

First, Foursquare is building a very reliable local directory. I’m sure more than a handful of people have been frustrated with local business directories online. Foursquare is using its players to build an accurate database of local business and is using the GPS data from their phones to help.

Second, Foursquare players are “early adopters,” meaning they tend to be early users of new technology, and have a lot to do with a product’s evolution into the mainstream. This also means that they have a high likelihood to be influencers within their social circle; i.e. other people go to them for advice.

Third, Businesses can identify loyal customers. Most businesses would like to think they know all their regulars, but for many, it’s not realistic. Businesses can identify those regular patrons and reward them. Many businesses in popular Foursquare cities, like New York, already offer discounts and specials to whomever has been crowned “Mayor” of their establishment – Click here for a sample. What better way to reward customer loyalty, and encourage others to visit more?

Fourth, Research. Where do people go after they leave your business? What competitors are growing/shrinking their popularity? What else do people do around or near your business?

And if those aren’t good enough…

It seamlessly integrates with Twitter and Facebook making it easy for people to tell all their friends where they are, too.

Two great places to learn more about how businesses are using foursqaure:

foursquare.com – Great samples, and the company has made a commitment to provide data to businesses in the future – Like web analytics for real life… Truly, this could develop into the online-to-offline traffic connection we’ve been wishing for since the dawn of the Internet.
Robert Scoble – In a recent blog post he shared quite a few examples of how businesses are using Foursquare. Its more tech and less business, but a great read.

So what does all of this mean for home builders and real estate?

Lets look at the key features of the game/service:
We’ve given consumers a fun tool that encourages them to log the places they’ve visited.
We’ve got a tool that employs geo-location to suggest new places to its users.
We’ve got a tool that encourages its users to leave “tips” (aka reviews at times) for their friends.

Below are just a handful of ideas:

1. A “Parade of Homes” where users would check-in at each model using Foursquare. Reward participants for checking in at all the models on the tour, and encourage them to leave “tips” for future visitors. A little while ago I projected that within 18 months, somebody will do this. I’d love to see it happen sooner.
2. What about organizing a Realtor tour? Encourage agents to visit your models on a tour, or simply encourage them to “check-in” at your models more often (with clients preferably).
3. Reward your regulars. Identify the agents who visit more than one of your communities.
4. Partner with a local business and offering their “check-ins” some type of bonus to stop over for a model tour.

But wait… there’s more

Foursquare recently announced it released an API (Application Programming Interface) – a way for other companies to build on top of its service. This means that almost any company who can think of a creative or useful way to use Foursquare’s service, can now integrate the data into another system. When announcing the release of its API, Foursquare shared that an integration is already under way with the Layar browser for Android powered mobile phones and iPhones. Not familiar with how cool Layar is? You can see an example video here. Mashable.com also has a nice write up on why this API is big news.

Waste of time?

Foursquare has been called a waste of time by some. How many remember when the Internet was called a waste of time? I still hear that from some people today.

Some of the thoughts I shared above use Foursqaure as the basis for the idea, but it may not actually be Foursquare that is eventually used to accomplish them. Like many tech startups, they can be bought in an instant, or their technology duplicated by someone with a better twist. With the release of its API, Foursquare has empowered a new world of possibilities. The eventual tool the home builder and real estate world embraces may not even look like Foursquare.

Who knows, maybe there’ll be a white label Foursquare solution available to Home Builders Associations, Property Management Companies, and Multiple Listing Services?

Most of this is a bit far out (not the concept, but the timeline). I don’t expect to see something like this for a while (maybe 3-6 months in an urban market), but I see amazing possibilities here.

What model home couldn’t use more traffic? What model home doesn’t want more visits from influencers in the community? What home builder isn’t trying to attract and identify active Realtors?

So, what are your thoughts? Waste of time, or real potential? I’d love to hear from you below.

Related posts:

1. My Mobile Real Estate Predictions for 2011
2. Mobile Marketing and New Homes – A Perfect Fit
3. Mobile Real Estate Marketing Just got Awesome… thanks to Trulia