Engagement-Boosting Social Media Strategies

hey welcome back to the podcast today
i've got courtney with me now courtney
you're looking awfully tall on the
podcast today um i actually invested in
some stilts is that what it is because
are you like four eleven
no
five two all right my license is 5'3
because i thought i was gonna grow
that is so good
[Applause]
if you follow me you know that courtney
helps me with all my social and i've
asked her to be on the show today
because i know every person listening
right now or watching wants to do a
better job
connecting with people growing their
base and ultimately let's just call it
just expanding their trust amongst the
people that are you know on their phone
on all these different apps so we did a
mastermind a couple weeks ago we had
over two days about four i don't know 45
50 people in the room between the two
events yeah they were all these mega
successful rock star team leaders and
every one of them's like tom i want what
you got i need courtney like like that's
that's the secret right that's how i'm
gonna grow my reach and become like
social famous yeah and we know that's
actually not the case not true i'd love
for you just to break down for us some
of the things you shared with that group
so everybody in our world can get some
insight from you on how do they touch
more people via social yeah i think the
first thing is is having a strategy
that's like the main
overarching
concept is that you need to have a
strategy a plan in place of like what
your goals are for your social what your
goals are at the end of a quarter at the
end of a year and what you're
reaching for
the main goal right of like is it
following give us an example yeah like
is it following is it engagements do you
just want to get your name out there
like what is your real goal i know a lot
of people are driven by like the
followers that's what you think but if
you have let's say
2 000 followers and you're getting
great engagement is that not enough
right you know like these people are you
can buy followers like yeah you see
these people that buy followers and
you're like then you go in and you're
like okay you have all these people like
and everyone comments but like they have
most of those followers have like one
person that they're actually following
it's that person yeah it's a little
funky so i think followers i would take
off
i would go with engagements yeah but if
it wasn't just engagements what else
would you look for i mean can could
somebody be as bold as to say
quarter over quarter i would like to
sell four houses yeah from instagram
four houses from facebook could you go
that deep yeah but the main thing is
setting up that goal right it's like
what is the goal of social for you are
you on it just because everyone else is
on it you should have some sort of
strategy in place as to why you are on
social is it to touch more people is it
to sell more homes like what is it
and i think that's where please don't
have it be just so you can post your
listings to play yourself because nobody
ever comments or likes or does like
these pages of people just agents with
just listening after listening after
listening and nothing else no well think
about it put yourself in the seller's
shoes or the buyer's shoes whatever
when i go to your page i'd
you already sold that house why do i
need to look at it right you know like
you want to see what they're doing
day to day you want to see what they're
into their interest like that's when you
start to build all right you're going
into the action so step one is strategy
have a goal what's step number two well
i can go a little further into the
strategy because
a strategy isn't just the goal that's
not just one thing it's putting in place
like how often are you posting
what channels are you posting on
do you have a
geotagging strategy of
every four posts were tagging orange
county every five posts were tagging los
angeles um do you have a hashtag
strategy you know so
we have different blocks of hashtags if
my post is about travel i use
these three blocks if my post is about
this i you need to really
map out everything
so you can track it can an individual
agent do this
i think so
it's one of those things where it's you
can always
have outreach right you can get help for
this
social media is huge now huge like i
didn't go to school for social media i
think a lot of people think that it's
like a degree that you get like oh
social media management like it's not
it's something that you learn it's a
task that you
over it's an art it's a skill yeah and i
think that there are a lot of people
that are interested in it that are in
school
and
have figured out okay i can't get a
degree in social media but i need to get
a degree because my parents want me to
get one you know that a lot of people
are willing to
internship or they want to have a chance
yeah you know and if you can ask someone
hey can you put together a strategy for
me i'd like to see what it looks like
like
then from there you can have help yeah i
think it's actually important for the
agent listening to say these are my
goals i remember so uh jim marks who
passed away a couple years ago he
in like 2007 2008 he was like hey get on
facebook right and i was like okay good
i'm like why and he's like because
everybody's there and even like 2008 not
everybody was there but we knew
eventually everybody'd be there so he's
like well what's your goal and i'm like
i want a hundred thousand followers and
he actually like just laid into me
he's like that's stupid it's not about
the number of followers it is only about
engagement so the person listening right
now you may say like to your point
earlier i want way more people right
that will come with time if your content
is good and you keep doing what you're
supposed to be doing and you follow all
the hacks you'll win
but i really think it is about
engagement so so when you went from
engagement you went right to frequency
channels geo tagging hashtag strategy
because all those things are going to
help me
engage with more people
so so breakdown frequency how often
let's just say they're just going to do
facebook and instagram because i can
technically do that from one app
what's the frequency you recommend and
what are the buckets
of content you recommend so
when starting or when you're starting to
come up with i guess your strategy
around frequency you need to have some
sort of like content bucket so that
so that you're not every day trying to
figure out what type of content to come
up with right like let's say a bucket is
mindset so
um content that falls around mindset so
it could be quote cards that are about
mindset it could be a video of you
talking about mindset like so when
you're going to create content you know
okay i don't have enough mindset bucket
content right i need xyz content like i
recommend having at least five buckets
of content it could be
mindset
shows day in the life behind the scenes
and so when you're creating that
frequency of content
i would think of two to three posts
within those buckets yeah you know a
week and in terms of frequency so
actually i'm gonna i'm gonna interrupt
you don't be well enough i interrupt all
the time no
i'm thinking for the agent listening
right now if they did behind the scenes
they did around town they did day in the
life which is like this is what my life
actually looks like not what you see on
a million dollar listing but like this
is me at 11 30 at night the good the bad
like writing offers and like working on
my business yeah um
setting up their marketing but the thing
i think most of them miss is there
should be something like
what in your life
is deeply important to you and it could
be like
harley davidson motorcycles
it could be yoga like whatever it is i
what i think a lot of people miss is
they like they're trying to be glamorous
on instagram they're trying to be like
look at me versus like this is me like
we talked about it before like me coming
out of the gym with my hat on backwards
you know in the car on a saturday doing
a rant oftentimes the best post because
it's like this is me in real life now
i'm not in a suit i'm just doing i'm
just being me exactly and
a good example too is like when you see
someone in person versus when you've
seen them online yeah like sometimes you
see a celebrity and per are online and
you're like oh my gosh they're so great
you meet them in person and they're an
you know like so right so it's
like you want to be your authentic self
on both ends of the spectrum if if you
have this persona online and if someone
runs into you while you're getting
coffee and you're having a bad day
they're like oh normal right you know
they're not like oh they're usually very
nice like why are they like this yeah
like you need to be yourself and that's
what attracts
the followers right it's not
it's not everything else that you think
it would be no they come
[Music]
right you know well they become it's
it's like attracts like exactly right
now the key is again i go back for the
person listening or watching is you
gotta figure out like
just who you are and
instead of like you see these people
that try and create this sort of facade
of who they are right like hey we see
all these like instagram people me with
the lamborghini me with the jeff and i
just walked up to that there's no way
like it's like yeah it's so phony right
like if you have a visla dog then walk
your dog right if you have 16 cats
no i don't all right 38 cats if you have
38 cats you should just be surrounded by
all your cats right like
be yourself because people with cats
like people with cats people with visa
dogs like people with visa dogs and and
that's okay it's okay if that's if it's
just i live in irvine terrace right so
all of a sudden i'm the local hyper
local mayor of irvine terrace as a real
estate agent so i'm at the irvine
terrace park i'm walking the streets
people see me there and they're like oh
he is he's one of us in this community
yep but then how do i turn that into a
structured plan
well
so that you just came up with buckets of
content right you just came up with your
dog your family life whatever that's
another piece of content so in terms of
your question of also frequency of
posting
the best way to put it is like put
yourself in in a follower shoes or a
user shoes how often would you like to
see content from them yeah if i'm
following you i kind of want to see
content every day of like what you're up
to right if you post every
maybe two times a week you you fall
short with what i'm looking for yeah and
also the algorithm too is going to be
like this person doesn't really care
about social media so
why am i going to serve their posts so
with followers let's say you have 2 000
followers you're posting every day the
algorithm is going to serve your post to
those 2 000 followers which then the
engagement comes then the following
comes you know so it's it's more of
i would post every year i would post
every day of what you're doing even if
it's on your stories ten stories of like
hey this is me working out
okay now i'm in my car now i'm doing
this like stories do count as posts big
time it's it's it's the ultimate behind
the scenes it's
it shows like million dollar listing so
successful when you see agents doing the
same thing yeah
like we have clients like here's me
roller skating like yeah all right okay
you're human
and on facebook you can do stories as
well facebook twitter has stories now
linkedin has stories it's like it's one
of those things where you need to put
the effort into it yeah because that's
when you see the return yeah even if
like you have posts and you're like oh
my gosh that has two likes like how
embarrassing keep it up because you
never know right in three weeks in a
month that post could go viral and it
could pick you know it could pick it up
so it's like don't ever delete things
because you're embarrassed right right
just put it all out there and the thing
i would say too for the person listening
is like we i used to talk about hey you
need to hit the live button right on
facebook the live button live right like
going live people like what if there's
only like you know 13 people on there
i'm like you're talking to 13 people who
cares and then i'd say and then leave it
up and also it's it's the end of the
week and it's got 350 views and people
are like it only had 350 views and i'm
like excuse me
how much time would it take you to knock
on the door to call
350 people and share what you shared in
that video that would take like weeks if
not months for people
and you did it in 14 seconds exactly
right so it's it's not even about like
how many is the fact that you touched a
few and as long as the message was right
for them that's awesome exactly so
frequency content buckets frequency
sounds like at least one time a day i
would but it maybe twice i would post
like a a feed post a day and then in
your stories i'd post like five to ten
stories a day easy because the stories
are easy i mean taking a picture of you
in the car
like
the feed posts i understand because some
people are a little more cautious of
like the feed aesthetic and what it
looks like and all that stuff so if you
are like that then take time to plan out
your feed posts but in terms of your
stories
what just be
stories
sorry i was actually doing a story as we
were talking there yeah but that's the
point like it's just stopping and just
doing it
it's acknowledging like i'm in my car
i'm going someplace stop boom yeah hey
i'm pulling up starbucks boom hey it's
three o'clock in the afternoon i got a
listing appointment at five i'm having
starbucks bang yeah people want to see
that exactly
and i know some people are a little bit
um cautious of like well i don't want
the person to know i'm there at that
specific time like sure then you can
just take it and upload it later exactly
you know here's here's my entire day in
one you know bing bing bing bang bang
exactly
okay let's talk about geo tagging
because that sounds advanced for some
people what is geo tagging geo tagging
is tagging the location okay yeah
pretty much that's it i know
geo tagging though is like a really how
do they do it
what do you mean what do you how do they
how do they do it you just
type add location you just type in a
location okay there's someone right now
that's literally writing it down type
hit location type like come on that's
the teacher in me i can't help you the
one thing
geotagging is kind of controversial
especially with like um
like because i camp a lot and geotagging
a lot of people don't want others like
in that location that specific spot or
like camping area because they don't
um
treat it with proper care like people
are going to these locations and like
leaving trash and leaving all this stuff
so like a lot of campers and like they
hate geotagging they're like that kind
of stuff is a secret you know like they
don't want you to tag the exact location
so sometimes like with housing they you
probably they don't want you to tag
their exact address right so just tag a
general yeah the community community
yeah orange county when you actually
live in mission viejo or yeah you know
yeah okay that makes sense because some
people are very
especially some of these campers that
are tired of you and your husband making
a mess it's like a privacy thing you
know have a conversation with miles
about his messiness in these places
that's not a very personal just for the
record okay hashtag strategy you shared
the waterfall hashtag strategy uh at
that mastermind and i watched people
taking notes like crazy yeah first of
all maybe give the person that that
doesn't really understand why
hashtagging is so important like why is
it important and then maybe share the
strategy yeah hashtagging is important
because it's another avenue for people
to see your post
a lot of people hashtag
because
when you click on the hashtag it'll send
you to that
i mean all posts that are under that
hashtag and it could be something of
interest to you
so a lot of people
should be using multiple hashtags not
just like one or two hashtags because
you want to be able to spread your post
across multiple
hashtags if that makes sense right so
how much how much time are people
searching for hashtags
i do all the time okay to be honest like
if i'm if i'm going to a new restaurant
or if i'm going to a new location i'm
that type of person that likes to like
know before i go there and so i'd look
at hashtags to see what
what it's like or if i'm going to a new
location like let's say i'm going to
mammoth i'd look up hashtag mammoth and
i could see recent posts of like okay
the weather says it's you know 70
degrees but these people are posting and
it's raining or like yeah it gives you
another
avenue for how that location or that
specific post is doing i'm super curious
about that like like i i know i search
hashtags right and then i follow certain
hashtags as a strategy for like knowing
what's going on all the things that
matter to me and i'm just curious like
it'd be fun for us to get some data on
that to like actually be able to say to
people the percentage of people that are
searching hashtags are x because then it
really like we see we see the impact
yeah well you can see like on instagram
on your insights tab you can see how
many people found your post from
hashtags right
so that person literally was looking up
hashtag tom ferry and that's how they
found it
real estate coaching or hashtag homes
for sale in atlanta yeah whatever
whatever that is yeah that's how they're
finding them and the in when it comes to
like a hashtag strategy you shouldn't
just be tagging things that you think
are popular right right like if your
post isn't about real estate don't be
posting hashtag real estate and your
stuff is going to get lost anyways but
it's like you want you want your
everything to be cohesive right that the
post relates to the geotag relates to
the hashtags like everything is cohesive
so it's not it's not like i look up
hashtag chocolate and i see your listing
right exactly yeah that would be weird
it's just weird but what's great so so
again uh the post the hashtag and the
geotag all being cohesive and and just
to be clear like if you've never done it
takes like four seconds oh my gosh yeah
right it's not a complicated thing it's
location right like i do it all like i'm
in dallas yeah every now and then you're
like he's in london
in london well the picture was taken
right the picture was taken there and
then the hashtag and like like here's
what i tell people like if i can do it
right if i can do it everybody can do it
because it just means i'm just taking
the extra effort right to do the post to
add a little more to write a little more
because i'm trying to reach people i'm
trying to connect with people yes and
i'd say like if you think about like
from your heart not your head and
definitely not your wallet
right like how can you just like i want
to connect with people i want my friends
my followers my the people that i love
and trust right to get this message so
i'm gonna go the extra mile to make sure
that happens yeah teach them the
waterfall strategy so the waterfall
strategy um it's basically
so that you rank higher and lower
hashtags and then once you start ranking
there it'll then serve you to the higher
hashtags so it's like a a 10 5 10 5 kind
of thing so having like
10 hashtags that are kind of under
5000 under 10.5 000
so when you click on the hashtag smaller
number of hashtags yeah and then you'll
go to five which would have a little bit
more like the super reacher type hashtag
so it would be like a hundred thousand
to two hundred thousand and then you do
another ten of like maybe
500 000
and then you'd go into the super
reachers which would be five of like 1.2
million hashtags 2.5 million whatever so
that the idea is that you start ranking
in these smaller hashtag buckets and
once your post because when you go on a
hashtag it'll say top posts and then
it'll say recent post so you want to
start ranking in those top posts and
then it's going to start
serving them
into the other buckets yeah so
in terms of like hashtags a lot of
people are also like do i copy and paste
them like does that affect it
when you copy and paste it can you still
click on it yes so that's not
and they're like instagram knows i copy
and pasted it no they don't yeah you
know as long as the hashtag once you
have it in a comment or have it in a
caption wherever it's clickable yeah
then you're okay so there's also the
debate around so first of all the person
listening you just got a massive insight
on how we've been able to grow our
following continue to keep our content
in front of people and every now and
then have like a post go a little more
viral than it normally would based on
our frequency and you know the number of
people that follow us so um so you're
starting small right so you're like
like is there a place is it hashtag like
where like what apps should they get or
recommendations so they so they don't
have to like try and create this and
search it just go to an app and like
download it and then just get the ones
that you should add so i use hashtastic
they have a free version for it and
essentially on that website all you do
is type in like let's say i type in
hashtag tom ferry it'll also serve me
like 20 to 30 hashtags at other people
who have been looking up hashtag tom
ferry are using oh so then you can use
those hashtags as like a block
so a block would be like 10 to 15
hashtags on a post so i like that i like
that app or that website because it's
kind of like doing the thinking for you
yeah yeah all right so hashtastic i
think it's only a an app
no it's i use it on the website okay
good all right cool yeah all right so
hashtag so so we talked about strategy
you got to have goals quarterly monthly
you got to track and measure which we
didn't discuss but we you know we look
at the data all the time like hey
where's our following account going hey
we lost some people like that happens
right hey but we're gaining people
that's awesome then we talked about you
know maybe making engagement your number
one focus your number one priority then
we talked about frequency we talked
about content buckets we talked about
channels a little bit we got into
stories we talked about geotagging we
talked about the hashtag strategy let's
talk about reels okay because reels are
entirely different in my opinion yeah so
so if somebody wants to
really connect with a lot of people i
think reels on instagram right now is
probably the spot it's it yeah we talked
to a facebook rep weekly and she kind of
gives us like oh this is what's trending
this is what's not you know and she
basically told us that well reels is
coming out with ads so now you can put
ads on reels this is like a heavy focus
right now right because instagram wants
to be able or wants you to be able to
use every aspect of their platform right
so like can we just say they just want
to kill tick-tock
truly
right we'll see and i'm like i'm very
indifferent about tick-tock because i
think it's a i think it's a different
type of it's
tick-tock is awesome it's purely
entertainment yeah right it's not brand
building but it can be brand new because
now we see like glenda baker and zachary
and so many others that are blowing up
on tick tock and and directly doing
transactions from it
but they have to be super entertaining
yeah
well going back to real thrills is like
it's only
short form video content you can also
now put pictures on there too if you
think you can kind of do like a montage
of pictures if you'd like but it's
showing that like behind the scenes the
fun
using trending sounds like so you're
yeah give them the strategy so it's like
you you do a short form it's like 29 to
30 second video second video right
i think it's all about the music next
yeah so looking you can type in on
google trending real songs and it'll
give you a list of them the reason why
you want to use those songs is that you
can have the song very low too like you
can turn down the audio on the song to
like seven so it's just barely playing
in the background but so your video
shows up under that song when people
click on it bingo you know so song and
then what about text
the text i would always put text on the
video it pro i've seen it perform so
much better than if you don't have any
text at all yeah and i think that's just
because of like seo picking up on it and
also a lot of people use their phones
you know in an office and they don't
play the sound right so they want to be
able to read the text on there yeah and
it and the thing is is like in reals you
can create all this on the platform like
you don't have to go to a video editor
and it's so simple yeah it it step by
step okay you've uploaded the video
now do you want to add text do you want
to add a video music yeah yeah it's very
easy
so so if you went back and looked at the
content buckets should they follow the
same strategy like here's some behind
the scenes here's day in the life here's
me doing my work right here's me with my
visa dog i don't have a visa dog by the
way but my brother patrick does but you
know like like so do you want to show
all five of those would you do all five
in a row or would you kind of go here's
a couple of this side of my life and a
couple of that side of my life and a
couple this side of my life what would
you recommend well i would i would try
it all it's like it's one of those
things where you really do need to test
it because your audience could be
different than my audience true you know
like i could be posting behind the
scenes stuff on my page but my followers
don't like it but i post it on your page
and they like it yeah it's all about
your your following you need to look at
your insights because that's when you'll
figure it out not everyone is the same
because some people say
well this worked really well for me you
try it doesn't work well for you yeah
do you think it's okay for agents to
literally go onto facebook and say you
know what content are you most
interested in or what like maybe they'd
ask the questions maybe differently
right but they might say like you know
what are your concerns worries fears
about housing
you know what do you think because then
you get from your customers what's on
their mind then you go create content
yeah you're speaking directly to their
ambitions their fears their desires yeah
what are your thoughts on that well i
know
so yes to that and another thing is some
people think well i don't have enough
followers to get that response right
like no one's going to respond back to
me then start sending dms to your
followers right right and ask them be
like hey hope you're having a good day
i'm creating content right now i was
really curious xyz what's interesting to
you yeah like reply with abcd what's
interesting or when you think about your
home
right when you think about you know
living in in your neighborhood today
like what matters most to you what are
you excited about what are you fearful
about yeah give me this give me the
scoop yeah if they're if you're not
getting the engagement by you posting on
your story then go out
asking for it yeah you know and sending
a dm is so easy people are going to
respond to it right and it could lead to
a further conversation with someone yeah
you know yeah what about um so that we
do a lot of like q and a's yeah right
we're all just you know like hey i'm
getting on an airplane you ask me a
question like and you see it because
you're like active on my page like i get
a lot of questions yeah should agents be
doing that
what yes okay yeah 100 i was giving you
a softball i was hoping you're gonna say
yeah that's right like
hello oh yeah yeah why not right you
know uh why questions about the market
questions about home prices yeah
questions about what's you know what
whatever buying a house like what
questions you even if you get like one
or two questions what again what i pick
up on when i'm doing this so thank you
every one of you that's ever answered or
asked a question there what it gives me
is deep insight on what's on your mind
yeah and when i get like 14 questions in
a row essentially that are like i'm at
25 sales i want to go to 80 sales what
do i have to do hey how do i get my
first listing how do i build my team you
start to see like okay people are really
interested in these six or seven things
yeah and then i'm like hey let's go film
some content just on that yeah and at
the same time i also love it because i'm
helping people i'm seeing some of the
best agents on the planet and people
i've never engaged with ask a question
that i get to directly say courtney oh
my god hey this is what you should do
boom boom boom boom boom yeah right and
i think over time too you start to
really find the themes like right now
for your content yeah we you do the ask
me any things there's always at least 10
to 15 new agent questions right always
right yeah you know so we know that our
content we should have some sort of new
agent content pocket just for that yeah
because it's it and over time we've
started to see that yeah you know that
name so it's like you need to stick with
it right even if initially you're seeing
you're not seeing the results you want
they will come yeah
you know that was okay that right there
is a mic drop because
when i look back at like starting my
youtube channel in 2007 and then my next
one in 2009 starting on facebook in 2008
and literally my wife would like walk in
and she's like what are you doing you're
spending all day at your computer
and you're talking to people on facebook
like really and i was like
baby i'm not talking to people i'm
talking to clients
friends and potential clients around the
world i was doing that in 2008 yeah
right i was like this is like my version
of prospecting right like i'm just hey
courtney how's your business what's
going on and you get in these
conversations back like but it felt like
you could do that all day long on
facebook
and everybody actually saw what was
going on versus the news feed being a
million miles now
um but i know making that decision early
on like if you care enough and you want
to connect with people like
you just got to do it differently today
and that's really what we're talking
about yeah the different things you have
to do exactly and from you doing that
back in 2007 there are still people now
in 2021 that are like i remember when
tom responded back to me he's such a
good guy or like you know people
remember that kind of stuff like they'll
always remember how you made them feel
bingo you know bingo
all right so we gotta bounce but i hope
you got some well i know i'm taking hope
out of this i know you got some value
you're probably gonna listen to this six
or seven times probably gonna send it to
your marketing director and say please
listen to this um so courtney thank you
again for being on the show as always i
did i should have got a photo of the
apple boxes that are suddenly taller
than me
really not that short yes but hey give
us a comment let us know what you think
and thank you so much for being a part
of the podcast and listening to all of
our fun stuff we wish you a great day
and we'll see you soon
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you