Social media platforms are proliferating at such a dizzying pace that even 
internet yuppies like myself are having trouble keeping up. Tweet this, Facebook that, LinkedIn this, Digg that, and the list goes on and on and on.
This world is so hyper connected that it’s almost impossible to be “unavailable”. Remember those days when you could just screen your calls on your cellphone and use a lame excuse like, “Oh, I had no reception in the area?” and you received immunity from annoyed friends and family? You try that tactic now and you’ll hear crazy
things like, “I called you twice, left you a message, texted you, instant messaged you, emailed, twittered, facebook poked you! Where were you?!” You could reply back, “well obviously you didn’t get the message that I was trying to send you by not replying back!” but you might lose some friends that way.
As with any technological advance in the social realm, the medium inevitably encroaches into the business sector and the lines between “social” and “business” become blurred in a hurry. An entire industry has arisen out of social media marketing, and I have to admit, at first I was quite skeptical.
I hated the idea of businesses on facebook creating profiles and fan pages, or companies twittering news about their products because it seemed to defeat 
the purpose of what these social mediums aimed to create: a way to stay connected with friends and family. But where there is a new concept of communication there is always a buck to be made, and if there is a buck to be made, there will be 1000 vendors trying to make that buck. So instead of folding my arms from the sidelines in stubborn resistance, I’ve decided to embrace the undeniable and wrap my head around this new social marketing beast.
I shouldn’t be so surprised after all. Things have always been this way. Radio and Television advertisements have become so embedded into our social 
lives that we don’t bat an eye when a Geico ad interrupts our favorite prime time episodes or morning commute talk radio segment. I can’t even watch Youtube clips of Susan Boyle’s jaw-dropping performance without seeing an advertisement pop up in the window. So the question isn’t whether Social Marketing platforms are a viable way for real estate agents to reach prospective clients in non-traditional ways, but rather, how can it be done in a fun, creative, personalized manner.
Realtors, please mark my words. Putting up a link to your MLS listing on your facebook status or twittering an announcement of an open house for your listing is not creative, definitely not fun, impersonal, and does not fall in line with the normal user experience of the people using the social medium.
If you walk away with anything from this post, just hone in on this one point
and commit it to memory. People use facebook to connect with friends and family by looking at photos, videos, reading little blurbs about their friend’s mental musings. Thus, your social marketing efforts must seamlessly interface with the most common user experiences of your facebook users or else they will be utterly ignored and in some cases harshly received.
In my next post, I will attempt to demonstrate a way of marketing yourself as a Realtor to your facebook-using prospects in the context of their social mingling norms, utilizing features that these uers have come to love and become addicted to. Stay tuned!
