If you’re a real estate agent, you have some serious competition. In fact, there are an estimated 1,236,544 active real estate practitioners in the U.S. this year across 86,000 brokerage firms, with 183,789 licensed agents in California alone. Furthermore, at least 91% of those Realtors are using social media to advertise in some capacity.
What does it all add up to?
If you’re a Realtor and want to separate yourself from the competition and not only survive but thrive, you better use social media correctly, including Facebook.
However, one of the most glaring errors I see Realtors make all the time is that they co-mingle their personal Facebook profile with work. In fact, only about half of all real estate professionals have a Facebook business page for their vocation. Even when Realtors do have a Facebook page for business page, they rarely manage it correctly, and it becomes an afterthought to their personal page.
That’s a huge mistake, as they’re wasting invaluable (free!) opportunities to market, promote, and grow their real estate business – and their bottom line. In a field where even one or two more home sales a year make a huge financial difference, it’s critical that Realtors set up a Facebook business page and utilize it correctly.
So what are the benefits to a business page? I’ll cover 10 important reasons why they are better than personal pages here and 10 more reasons in part two of this blog:
1. No limit to the number of fans
Facebook personal profiles are capped at 5,000 friends, which you can reach pretty quickly if you have a growing business or practice. But with pages, there is no limit on the number of fans and followers you can engage and interact with. In fact, there are Facebook-affiliated pages with almost 500 million followers! Out of private pages, the Cristiano Ronaldo fan page has 121 million + followers, Shakira has 104 million, and Vin Diesel leads all Americans with 101 million likes!
2. Facebook Insights
With a Facebook page, you don’t need Google Analytics, as Facebook Insights will do the job for you. With Insights, you can access a mountain of data about your viewers, audience, reach, etc., using it all to improve your reach. You can even download a custom Insight report for more detailed stats and data, but this is only available on pages – not personal profiles.
3. Facebook Tabs
You may notice on sophisticated and well-built Facebook pages that there’s a tabbed area under the cover photo, sort of like a horizontal menu on a website. You can customize those tabs (sometimes with the help of third-party apps) to do just about anything from Search Now and other call-to-action buttons to newsletter and blog opt-in forms, giveaways (we’ll talk about that later), video introduction, featured listings, and just about anything else you can think of. Sorry; can’t do that with your personal profile.
4. Run contests, raffles, and giveaways
Facebook is pretty specific with their rules regarding contests and giveaways on personal profiles – you’re not allowed to do it. But Facebook pages are the perfect place to run these special offers and fun contests, energizing your audience, creating a buzz, and feeding your marketing funnel (gathering emails, etc.). If you’re not doing some of these on a regular basis, you’re missing out on a HUGE opportunity (just make sure to check DRE for any regulations).
5. Facebook Offers
While you’re not supposed to run any offers, promotions, or deals on your personal profile per Facebook’s regulations, business pages are made for just that. Facebook offers are the ideal to reach and engage your audience, and the best part is that when fans or non-fans take advantage of your offers, their other personal Facebook friends can see it, which further boosts your brand.
6. Offer a fan-only reveal code
One fantastically effective Facebook deal is the fan-only reveal code, which rewards fans for liking your page by offering them something for free, like a discount coupon, free eBook on market conditions or home buying tips to download, etc.
7. Connect to Facebook Places
When your Facebook business page is optimized correctly, that page will connect automatically to the appropriate Facebook Place. Not only will that display all of your professional contact info, but it allows your clients and friends to check in. Check-ins are huge for growing your business because they show their friends that they’ve using your services, even in a mobile business like real estate, as well as sharing photos, videos, comments, and reviews of your services. That’s a very valuable promotional opportunity – and free with Facebook Places.
8. Contact info and other nuts and bolts
I can’t tell you how many times consumers find a business website, page, or other social media account but can’t locate the most basic of info, like their phone number, address, website, and hours of operation. There is no good place to highlight these things on a personal profile, but with a business page, all of that will come across loud and clear – helping eager home buyers or sellers find you!
9. You can convert your personal profile to a business page
Have you invested years of time and work into your profile, building it up to a few thousand friends? If that’s the case, then you definitely don’t want to lose that social media account, but the good news is that you can convert your personal page to a business page seamlessly, keeping your existing friends but opening up to all of the benefits of a business page. (However, you will lose your past content, so download all of your Facebook photos in a zip file, first.)
10. Enhanced privacy
Business pages offer many more ways to monitor, screen, and filter the content that others are sharing on your timeline and page. Likewise, since your business page deals with your practice and not your personal life, you’re creating a safety buffer to protect your identity, data, and even your family. I can’t stress that need enough as these days, being cautious and safe is so important for all Realtors, but especially female agents that might be working alone.
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Look for part two of this blog with the remaining 10 reasons why you should be using a Facebook business page soon!