Success With A Facebook Fan Page In Edmonton

While it can be difficult to quantify how Facebook measures up versus other marketing opportunities, it’s certainly a place to keep your circle of influence informed. And while feeding content from your primary brand is a start, top Edmonton AB Real Estate firm ‘The Schmidt Realty Group’ is rapidly accumulating a following … by finding efficient ways to participate:

Hi Kathy. Looks like you’re having a lot of success in Facebook. What are you guys doing with your page to get all those fans?

Thanks Chris! We have worked hard to develop a page worth following Our page is less than one year old and we are constantly seeking to improve our online presence. When we first created our site with Kinetic we did a phone campaign as a team to check in with all our past clients and we had an exciting new website. Similarly with our new Facebook page we got in touch with our clients in a number of ways to let them know about it. We announced it in our monthly newsletter and every team member did a post on their own Facebook profile to invite people to visit our page. As well, we emailed our clients to invite them to check it out as well. And for our whole first year we have let people know that we will donate a dollar to Habitat for Humanity Edmonton for every new fan on our page!

Of course getting the fan is one thing, keeping them is another! We are very aware that we have to earn the right to those fans every day. In terms of content, we have a number of posting “streams” to keep it interesting and varied. I created a Facebook Team in my company, which consists of myself, our marketing coordinator and one of our realtors who not only has an interest in Facebook and social media, but who has a great sense of humor and is already active on Facebook herself. Each of us has a clear role. Danielle, our marketing coordinator, is responsible for consistency – ensuring that that we have a consistent presence on our page. To do this she posts our new listings (weekly, not daily as then it’s too much about “sales”), and she also posts information on new marketing approaches we are taking. I am responsible for credibility – this means that I ensure that there is information going on the page about the market and our local economy. I forward online articles about our economy or other items of interest to homeowners in our area to Danielle to post on the blog, and then these become part of our FB page as well. Natasha is responsible for personality She collects stories from the team (and steals, with permission, from our team member’s own Facebook profiles) to give our fans a feel for who we are as people, and for our corporate culture. A lot of these posts are pretty funny, and some of them are just plain happy, like pictures of clients getting the keys to their new home. Together we form the Facebook Trifecta lol! And it seems to give us a good balance of content.

Also, it’s important to note that everything we do is connected. We post to our blog (thank you again Kinetic Knowledge!) and it automatically feeds to both Facebook and Twitter. All of our team members are also fans of our page and so they get the new posts in their own newsfeed. We encourage them to “share” a post once a week with their Facebook friends, and to add a personal comment to the post so that it is truly from them,

Wow, incredible discipline Kathy. Do you guys set & pursue any goals in particular?

Obviously it’s good to have a lot of fans, but in particular I hope that the people we already have relationships with will find enough value to be worthy of them following us. We are a referral based business and deepening our relationships with our clients is not only smart business, frankly it is a really fun way to do business as well. I love connecting with my own past clients on Facebook and having a company page is just one more way to stay in touch. Our next focus will be to engage our fans more in conversations on our page

So right now, its reinforcement of your brand & repeat impressions with people who know ‘The Schmidt Realty Group’. Has it been difficult to find the time?

By linking our FB page with our site, and by sharing the workload with our internal FB Team, it is not overwhelming for any of us. We have run contests from time to time as well to encourage other team members to send their photos and stories to Natasha to ensure she has lots of material to draw on.

Have you been able to generate new business?

Definitely! FB has brought us business, specifically through the personal profiles of our team members and their efforts to connect with people. It’s difficult to measure whether or not our page has brought us business on its own as it is all so inter-connected, however we recently hired a new staff member and the top two candidates looked at our page and really liked what they saw! So, while it might not be the first place people hear about us, I believe that increasingly it is a place where people will visit to decide if we are the kind of organization that they would like to work with. That’s why we focus so much on making sure our corporate culture rings through loud and clear on our page

Thanks for sharing this with everyone Kathy

My pleasure Chris! I hope it’s helpful to your readers! If I can make one final comment it would simply be this… Just start! Take the plunge into social media. Get your feet wet and learn by doing. If you wait till you’ve got it all figured out, the landscape will have changed again anyway Start connecting today!

Facebook released a short video on the new features here:

‘Facebook Like’

For instance, ‘Facebook Like’ was the early arrival to social sharing craze. Facebook made a widely accepted site application available to all site owners so they could add it [via an icon] to their pages. So, Facebook has been widely used for quite awhile to allow visitors to share good sites, pages & content with friends, family & the circle of influence that are ‘Facebook friends’.

The Google +1 button is slightly different in that it offers a bit of a new spin on soial sharing.

‘Google +1′

First, when you see the +1 button anywhere clicking it can serve Google’s version of a social network. Certainly not the network Facebook is yet, and the value does require you and friends be logged into individual Google profiles. It’s recommended you customize your Google profile because what is and is not private is always something to consider, but it’s especially neat to see what folks are searching for, looking at and/ or clicking. Profiles can be configured as public or private and, if private, only you will see the results of your clicks. If public, it can be nice to know what running sneakers folks in your circle are clicking … or to share what you like.

Second and for those of us in business looking for better organic search placement, Google +1 marries search and social. Very much like Facebool Like or ReTweet, Google +1 clicks are a readily measurable signal to Google’s algorithm for better search results. It still requires the user have a Google profile, but you’ll see +1 next to the individual results of a Google search results page AND any result can be clicked on the spot. Google has also made a widely accepted application available to site owners, so they can add +1 to their pages for visitors to click. Other words, if folks are searching and they see +1 they can vote for their favorite sites and pages right there & then. If they are on your site and they see +1 they can not only share with friends, but they will ALSO vote for their favorite sites and pages.

Differentiating ‘Google +1′ and ‘Facebook Like’

In all, both help us ‘business folks’ gain more AND better visibility; the potential for more traffic and more leads! Google’s value is a little more search, and I’d argue the value of search is in the intent of individuals. Facebook’s value is a measurable search engine signal, but much more socially driven – and still incredibly viral and valuable.

For Kinetic Knowledge clients, Google +1 is readily available for social sharing customization in a way that cooperates with existing ‘look & feel’.

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Your Site Working With Your Social Network Accounts Yet?

For those looking to get started with, or interested in understanding more about, Twitter … I recommend it!

Just go here ‘Free Ebook: ‘How to Use Twitter for Business – An Introductory Guide for 2011′, register for and download!

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For folks wondering why they might even need a presence in Facebook, this gentleman does a pretty nice job describing the benefits of Facebook Fans… but please read on for some cautionary thought on the subject as well:

Big Brand Behavior

Let’s add some context & relevant caution for those wondering how they might prioritize Facebook Fans… taking valuable time and also our own brands into consideration.

Some suggest a Facebook Fan Page is of even greater importance than one’s own site or brand. This is mostly due to Facebook’s enormous registered user count, but more recently some have added that proof is in the behavior of a few large brands. Proof based upon brands that run Facebook Fan Page URLs AND NOT primary site URLs in their TV ads. Why do they do it? For starters, it’s likely large brand name companies are assured consumers can find their sites online; however, out on the open web voluntary connections and/or subscriptions may or may not have occurred to a degree they had hoped. In Facebook, Fan Page connections offer both an unprecedented access to personal information and, possibly due to ‘the nature of intent’ in social environments, a more trusting consumer. While the intent of the average Facebook visitor is social and not necassarily ‘looking to buy’, the belief may be that a social environment is more prone to participation. Apparently, games & contests can be very successful. And hey, when friends are doing it… there’s always that herd mentality thing.

As marketers [ourselves], can we blame the big brands? After all, with more personal information and trust there’s benefit. BUT, in lieu of big brand name recognition, should we lesser brands sacrifice any long term potential engagement [i.e. direct traffic & subscriptions] for an environment that is neither ours nor in our control?

What’s More Important, My Site Or My Facebook Fan Page?

Let’s also bring forth some sobering thought on social networks, marketing online and our brands as a whole. If you’ve followed Kinetic Knowledge over the years, you know our position: it’s a priority to establish an independent brand with content that’s in your control, now and far into the future! We strongly encourage social network visibility, participation and then we also recommend caution and understanding.

Social Networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are incredible options for visibility, but their control over the environment and status as ‘the brand’ suggests they may be best leveraged as important tools. Remember: social networks retain a right to change and, essentially, do whatever it is they please with your content and presence. MySpace’s rapid decline only supports the fact that social networks can loose their audience, so we must always factor that possibility into how much time/ effort/ money we invest where. When used to their maximum capability, modern sites can push content to an unlimited number of different places [i.e. search engines, social networks and certainly Facebook] all capable of driving traffic back to our own brand. In the event personal time to fully participate is a challenge, auto- feeding content from your site offers – at least – a current social network presence.

History Screams For Caution!

These posts from others are doses of reality:

1. Why I deleted my ActiveRain blog posts
2. Facebook is a Sleazy Organization
3. Facebook had a class-action lawsuit filed against it for Beacon
4. Facebook stood hand-in-hand with Google AGAINST user privacy
5. Facebook CEO spoke poorly of users

Ultimately, the potential benefits of a presence in Facebook for your business are obvious; in many cases they’re proven BUT the environment is neither ours nor in our control… so, we feel it’s best to be careful with content and to always focus on our own long term brand first! Facebook and other social networks second.

PS: Admittedly, we’re a little ‘old school’ and possibly even skeptical SOCIAL networkers around here.

So that client sites offer the most ‘marketing mite’ possible, we’ve been adding useful WordPress plugins with educational support as a part of our Standard Monthly Service.

In January we decided to focus on social sharing. Why Social Sharing? If you’re NOT familiar with how powerful the possibility of your brand being broadcast from any one of your pages out to any visitor’s ‘social network circle of influence’ is, its high time you take notice. Given the added power in Google & Bing’s recent admission that Twitter & Facebook have an effect on your search rankings, it should be a requirement of any WP install… custom or not!

WordPress Management Services & Social Sharing

The problem is there are literally 100s of social sharing plugin options in the WordPress directory. And while we’ve used random amongst these for different clients, it was time to focus on something that made this simple and readily available to everyone. Where do focused business people find the time to go through them all, not to mention vet for favorable features, performance and security? And then there’s configurations, which are ultimately managed via trial and error? We decided to look for an option clients could easily customize to their liking. We chose a combination of two share plugins to offer the what appeared to be the most relevant set of options. We then created an instructional video to support:

Social Sharing Explained

Anytime a visitor clicks [i.e. Facebook likes or shares, Re- Tweets, Diggs, etc., etc.] a share icon, typically positioned at the very bottom of your pages or posts, your content and YOUR BRAND is essentially pushed to that visitor’s friends, followers and / or circle of influence. That’s right – that visitor’s click just promoted you to an entirely new audience! The fact that a visitor driven action can SIMULTANEOUSLY promote better search engine rank for your content [because it creates a search engine measurable back link on that persons social account] makes it doubly important to your organic advertising visibility.

What Is Your Site Doing To Support you?

With custom WordPress there is lots to do… BUT worthwhile when a networked web offers an unlimited opportunity to broaden your visibility online! If it’s not about building a unique & visible online brand, traffic and the conversion of more leads … than why even spend any time and money online? And have a look at our Standard Monthly Services… there isn’t a more reliable or crucial value in the marketplace!

So, How Can Your Site HELP YOU Work With ALL Social Network Accounts?

A number of people have expressed confusion on this subject, so let’s take a look. To start, it never hurts to define some things.  The Internet, for instance, is a worldwide network of interconnected computers. The World Wide Web is an application for helping people to find and to access web page information on the Internet. The two not only make it possible for people, but also for information to flow between sites. And this includes your own site, which is capable of pushing content directly to your and also your visitors’ social network accounts… saving you time and also making it easy to distribute your brand!

Sites, Hyperlinks, Feeds & Social Network Sharing

Let’s take a lay person friendly look at what’s going on with all those social icons, RSS feeds and the common ways your site can work with your social network accounts.

I. Social Network Account Hyperlinks = Direct Links From Your Site To Your Social Network Accounts

Follow Us!: It’s pretty common to see some variation of these and other icons on any site you visit these days. Ultimately, it’s a set of hyperlinks to the site owners’ social network accounts. If  you want a visitor to jump over to your  facebook fan page and become a fan or if you’d like a visitor to follow your twitter feed these make it easy for them. So if you haven’t already, have your site designer set up icons like these with hyperlinks to your social accounts!

II. Social Sharing Network Icons = Like a Referral, When People Click These Icons They Are Sharing Your Page With Their Own Social Network Accounts

Share Us: Anytime a visitor clicks a share icon, typically positioned at the very bottom of your pages or posts, your content and YOUR BRAND is essentially sent to that visitor’s friends, followers and circle of influence via their social network account. That’s right, that visitor’s click just promoted you to an entirely new audience! The fact that a visitor driven action can SIMULTANEOUSLY promote better search engine rank for your content makes it doubly important to your web visibility. If not already, talk to your site designer about share icons!

III. Social Network Content Feeds = Automatically Feed Content From Your Site’s Feed To Your Social Network Accounts When You Publish New Content

Feed Content: While this has nothing to do with those icons, it has everything to do with your site working with your social accounts. And while it can be a tedious and confusing process to set up, most major social networks allow for your site’s content to automatically feed your social account. If nothing else [and versus repeated copying, pasting and reformatting], it saves a lot of time to have this automated. Not to mention, you want your content going anywhere it may find new prospects. If you can’t figure out the setup yourself talk to your site designer about automating content to the social networks!

Folks, a networked web offers the opportunity to constantly broaden your brands’ visibility online. Some call it ‘inbound marketing’, but call it what you may… it’s high time you have a site that is a prolific advertising tool. Or maybe you need to look into building one that is - see Kinetic Knowledge Site Designs.

Because it is now confirmed, by both Google and Bing, that links shared through Twitter [and also Facebook] are a competitive search engine signal [Google uses over 200 signals!] for ranking content, this November 2010 Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project Twitter study is highly relevant to all organic advertisers = you! Be sure to have forwarding social network icons [Retweet, Facebook like, Digg, etc.] on all your posts so you’re making it simple for visitors to network your content to their circles of influence! Twitter just being one opportunity to reach a large audience.

Bottom line: anytime a visitor retweets [or facebook likes / shares] your content it exposes YOUR BRAND through that very content to a new audience…. the fact that it is SIMULTANEOUSLY promoting better search engine rank for your content makes the practice doubly important to your organic advertising visibility! 
 

The entire US has approximately 310,000,000 *people* of which 78% or approximately 240,000,000 use the Internet. Pew Research Center shows that 74% of American *adults* [rather than all people] are Internet users, meaning that their research shows Twitter usage amounts to 8 % of the American adult Internet population and 6% of the entire adult population.

If Twitter is something you’re looking for help with, we’re happy to discuss strategies. See our Organic Advertising Services , including Twitter management.

While it’s a great convenience to automate the feed of your content in to your Facebook Fan Page, the

In this case, it appears Facebook has raised the security bar. Facebook’s Networked Blogs has posted an explanation and fix , for in the event your connection has been broken, as follows:

•Go to the syndication page: http://apps.facebook.com/blognetworks/syndication.php
•click “configure” next to your fan page.
•Make sure the “auto-publish” checkbox is checked.
•This fixes the issue for future posts. For existing posts, please publish them manually by going to your blog page on NetworkedBlogs and click on the syndication link under the post and then click ‘publish’ next to your fan page name.

Older Users Outpace Young Adults For Social Media Growth!

According to Pew Internet Research, Social networking use among Internet users ages 50 and older nearly doubled—from 22% in April 2009 to 42% in May 2010.

According to Mary Madden, Senior Research Specialist and author of the PEW report, ““Young adults continue to be the heaviest users of social media, but their growth pales in comparison with recent gains made by older users.”

To further support the fact older users have arrived, Pingdom reports that 57% of social network users were 35 or above!

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• The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Marketing
• The Value of Managing Your Brand With a Business Blog
• Do You Maximize Advertising Visibility Everywhere On The Web? … we sure try