View and share the replay of last Friday’s Diverse Solutions webinar, where Stacey Harmon was the guest speaker and presented Building a Brand & Business on Facebook: 3 Realtors Who Are Doing It Right. Watch the video below to learn how your Realtor colleagues are using Facebook effectively to connect with potential clients, generate engagement with their audience, and use Facebook ads to drive traffic to their page.

Here are links to the three case studies highlighted in the presentation. “Like” these pages so you can observe the activity of these realtors and pick up the strategies they use to optimize visibility and interaction with their clients.

• Raj Qsar, Realtor – Premier Orange County Real Estate
• The Robin Milonakis Group
• Didelot Real Estate Group

Feedback from agents who attended the webinar is that they got some great Facebook marketing ideas from their colleagues.  What is your top takeaway or tip from the video?  Let us know!

A key concept to understand if you are going to be an effective Facebook marketer is the difference between the news feed and the wall.  This post is designed to demystify the difference between them and illustrate the relationship between them so that you can:

1. understand what content you are seeing when you are logged into Facebook
2. be clear on who is seeing what posts you make in Facebook
3. have an understanding of how you can get better marketing exposure for yourself and your brand in Facebook.

The wall/news feed concepts are confusing for most because they are intertwined with two other important Facebook concepts which also tend to cause confusion – the difference between a profile and a page, and the complexity of Facebook privacy settings which impact the visibility of your profile wall to other Facebook users.  A good introductory explanation of this is given by Will Holloway:

The Wall is a space on every Facebook user’s profile page that allows friends to post messages for the user and the user’s friends to see. The Facebook community calls these messages ‘wall posts.’ Depending upon the user’s privacy settings, the wall posts can be private, but most people keep them at the default setting, which is public.

I’ve compiled the following screen shots to illustrate the differences between a wall, the news feed, and show the relationship between them for wall posts (click on the image to expand):

As the image shows, if you post content on your business page wall, you will likely see that post appear in your personal news feed (because you are the administrator and like your own page).  When people like a page, they “opt-in” to receive the wall posts of the page in their news feed.  All of your page fans (or people who like your page) have the opportunity to see the page wall posts in their news feed.  This is different than the post from your page appearing on your profile wall.  If users are to navigate to your profile, they will NOT see the post from your page.  You can prove this to yourself by viewing your profile wall (click the Profile navigation item in the blue Facebook search bar).  This is one of the great features of pages because it allows for a total separation between the content on your profile, and the content on your page and creates an opportunity to segregate your personal and your professional life on Facebook.

Further nuances and description of the difference between the news feed and the wall is as follows:

The News Feed:

• is also known as the home page of Facebook.  It is what you see when you log into Facebook.  Note that when you log into Facebook, you are logging in under your profile identity.  Even though you are logging into Facebook with your profile identity, you are not automatically looking at your profile wall.  Facebook programmatically takes you to the news feed when you log into Facebook, not your profile wall (even though you will see your profile identity in the upper left hand corner of the screen on the news feed).
• You can navigate to the news feed at any time in Facebook by selecting the Facebook icon or the “home” navigation tab on the Facebook blue search bar
• Reflect s “activates” or “stories” related to people, pages, and groups your Facebook profile is  connected to on Facebook.  Your Facebook profile has “Facebook friends”, your Facebook profile “Likes” pages, and your Facebook profile is a group “member”.  As a result, any of the activities from these connections can appear in your news feed.
• Is unique to you.  The activities and stories you see in your news feed are a unique display based on the connections you have in Facebook to people, pages, and groups.  Since everyone is connected to different people, pages, and groups, every user has a unique news feed.
• Has a toggle in the upper right hand corner:  Top News & Most Recent

The Wall:

• Is a place on a profile, page, or group where Facebook users post messages for others to see.
  • Profiles have a wall (visibility is controlled by each users Facebook privacy settings)
  • Pages have a wall (page walls are public and viewable by all internet users)
  • Groups have a wall (visibility is determined by the group settings and may or may not be visible to all Facebook users)
• is the default tab that you land on when you visit a Facebook users profile
• is the default tab that you land on when you visit a Facebook page, unless the administrator of that page has set another tab to be the default landing tab for non-fans of a page.  Once you are a fan of a page however, you will always be taken to the page wall by default.

Need further clarification?  Facebook has a post to check out:  Facebook 101:  The Wall vs. the Newsfeed

Still have questions?  Ask us in the comments below.

For those of us who are in Facebook all the time (I’m guilty as charged), having keyboard shortcuts can make a world of difference in navigating around Facebook.  Did you know that Facebook has released several “hotkeys” that make moving around Facebook more efficient? You can become a true Facebook power user by knowing the following key commands:

Step 1:

First you need to know what modifier keys to use in conjunction with the trigger key. This is operating system & browser specific as follows:

• Windows with Internet Explorer and Chrome: Alt
• Windows with Firefox: Alt + Shift
• OS X with Chrome, Safari, and some other browsers: Ctrl + Option
• OS X with Firefox: Ctrl + function

Step 2:

Once you have the correct modifier key, hold them down and type the following trigger keys to get the corresponding action:
(I noticed that these only worked with the numbers on the top of my keyboard. The numbers to the right of my keyboard did not function, even when the Num Lock key was active. I am on a PC. You may or may not experience the same thing on your computer.)

• ? – Move the cursor to the Facebook search bar
• m – Open the “New Message” composer pop-up
• 1 – Open the Facebook home page
• 2 – Open your profile page
• 3 – Open the Friend Requests drop-down menu
• 4 – Open the Messages drop-down menu
• 5 – Open the Notifications drop-down menu
• 6 – Open the My Account settings page
• 7 – Open the privacy settings page
• 8 – Open Facebook’s official Page
• 9 – Open Facebook’s Terms of Service
• 0 – Open the Facebook Help Center

Photo Light Box Commands:

When viewing photos in the recently launched light box format, some additional key commands apply:

• Right arrow key - View next photo
• Left arrow key - View previous photo
• Esc - Close the light box view and return to the previous Facebook page you were viewing (you can also click anywhere outside the lightbox…you don’t have to click on the “x” to close the lightbox view)
• Ctrl + r (Windows) or Command + r (OS X) – View the same photo in standard view vs lightbox view (helpful if you want to save the photo)

Thanks to InsideFacebook.com for the post from which this tip was adapted.

So which of these shortcuts is your favorite? Let us know.

This is the first in a series of posts that articulate the strategic details behind the 20 recommendations made in the Profile Optimization Checklist (download it for free) which gives Realtors a guide to best position their Facebook personal profile for optimal business development without violating the Facebook terms of service.

The terms of service state that you may not use your profile for your own commercial gain – for Realtors, this means NO listings or prospecting on your profile wall. You also can’t have two profiles. So, if you have one account for business, and one for personal, you are violating the terms of service and run the risk of being shut down.  However, this does not mean there are not a lot of details to attend to on your profile that are within the terms of service AND make your profile a powerful business development tool.  Your Facebook profile is the most powerful social media tool out there for establishing yourself as someone people know, like, and trust.  Make sure you have attended to the details that matter (the checklist lays these out).  This is the first in a series of posts that articulate the strategic details behind the 20 recommendations made in the Profile Optimization Checklist.

Tip #1:  Add a photo

Edit Profile > Profile Picture

Strategy Explanation

There is no trust in social media marketing without a photo. You must have one. The photo should look like you (you want them to recognize you off-line right?). Facebook is a fun and social place – the photo you choose of yourself can reflect that. You can have a more casual headshot in Facebook than you use in print marketing (although your formal headshot is better than no photo at all). The photo should be a minimum of 200 pixels wide. The photo can be no more than 4 MB in size. Picnik.com offers a free and user friendly photo editing tool if you need to adjust the image size to the recommended pixel width and size.

Agent Examples & Critique

A:B:C:
D:E:

A:  The first is a very casual look, but it is also friendly, looks like him in real life.  This image is very acceptable in the Facebook culture and is also not hurting him on the business networking side.

B:  Photo B is another example of a great agent photo for Facebook.  It is a current photo, it is clear, friendly, professional.  She looks approachable.

C:  This is a very modern take on the Realtor headshot and Facebook is a great place for this type of photo.  The photo itself is clearly a professional photo, but captures this agent in a very real way.  The cropping of the photo is also very modern and something to consider.  Sometimes the same photo can be totally revamped, by simply cropping it.

D:  Photo D is an example of a more casual take on the formal business photo and is also appropriate for the Facebook culture.

E:  Photo E is an example of taking your traditional headshot that agents use in offline business development and putting it online. This is considered very formal for Facebook.  It is better than having no photo, but having something that is more relaxed, and is reflective of you in your day to day life is generally going to give Facebook friends the highest level of comfort and trust with you.  Converting this photo to black and white, or maybe cropping the photo in a different way may be helpful.  Look at the difference in simply taking the same photo and converting it to black and white and cropping it in a different way – the whole photo takes on a more modern, less formal feel.  This will work better for you in Facebook.

Photographer Referrals:

If you happen to be in the Southern California area and are looking for a professional photographer who can capture a modern headshot that will work well in Facebook and other social media sites, consider interviewing the following two talented photographers whose work Pixel Coaching likes:

• Orange County, California:   Jason Maughan | www.jasonmaughan.com
• Los Angeles, California:   JennKL Photography | www.facebook.com/JKLphotos

The “About” box suddenly reappeared on the left side bar of pages on March 22, 2011 and this new (can it be new if it was part of the old pages layout?) functionality gives page administrators an important opportunity to present their elevator pitch  or provide a call to action – both of which can help in the marketing and business development functions of the page.

Feature Functionality:

• The box appears to accept 5 lines of text before it will truncate the text and add a link to the remainder of the text.  This is around the 130 character mark (spaces included) as illustrated here:
  
• If you exceed the 5 lines of text, if will truncate the text at 2 ½ lines and give you a “…See More” hyperlink.
  which will display the full text if the visitor clicks on the link:
  
• Hyperlinks are not active, even if you put in the http://.  Seasoned page administrators may remember that hyperlinks were allowed in the prior About box feature (sigh…RIP About box hyperlinks).
• The information provided in the about box is also displayed/repeated on the info tab.
• Page managers can edit the information in the About box via the page manager (Edit Page > Basic Information > About) or by selecting the “edit” link at the top of the box.

Recommendations:

• Present your message in 5 lines or less of text so that your users do not have to click any additional links to see the full text in the box.
• Include a call to action that encourages engagement on your wall, or people to like your page.
• Consider your key words. It is likely that this box is indexable (anyone able to offer a confirmation of this?) as pages are public and items like the page name and wall content are scanned by the search engines.

So what are you going to put in your About box?  Share a link to your page or post your pitch in the comments. We love seeing your page marketing efforts!

This Facebook marketing tip relates to the official & places pages marketing tools in Facebook. For clarification on where this tip fits into the greater Facebook marketing picture, please view our post Facebook Foundations: Facebook’s Marketing Tools Explained.

On February 10, 2011, Facebook made a major upgrade to its pages product resulting in many questions from page administrators about the new layout and functionality.  One of the most common is about the photo stream at the top of the new pages layout.  Although similar in visual layout (some may actually say identical) to that of our profile, the photo stream on pages doesn’t function the same way it does on our profiles – there are two distinct differences which are the source of common questions for page administrators.

1.  Displays only photos from the page:  The photo strip is comprised only of photos that have been posted by an administrator of the page (the most recent 5).  If you allow fans to post photos to your wall (you can turn this on or off in the page manager), photos posted by fans will not appear in the photo stream.

This is different from profiles where any photo that you are tagged in – whether you uploaded it, or another Facebook user uploaded it – will appear in the photo stream of your profile.

2.  Randomized:  The photo stream is randomized. Upon every page refresh, the photos will appear in a different order.  In other words, page administrators can not control the order of the 5 photos.

For example, here are screen shots from the Pixel Coaching fan page where I have uploaded 4 color blocks representing the logo colors along with an image of the Pixel Coaching logo.  See how the images can be rendered in any order:

When purposefully picking the images that appear in your pages photo stream (which represents a brilliant branding opportunity), you will need to take into consideration this nuance which is in contrast to the linear/static orientation that the photo stream has on profile pages which allows for some very creative visual tricks.

Hiding Photos

Another common question about the photo stream is how to have a photo not appear there.  It is possible and works the same way it does on your profile.  Simply hover over the image on your page in the photo stream and you will see a you will see a little “x” appear in the upper right hand corner of the image which, when selected, will hide the photo from appearing in the photo stream of your page.

Understanding how the photo stream works on pages is the basis for creatively using this Facebook feature to brand your page and build your business.  Have you seen any great examples of business page photo streams?  Let us know in the comments.

3.22.11 update:  Originally published on November 21, 2010, this post has been updated to reflect the latest visual and functional updates to pages and profiles.

One of the things Realtors most often misunderstand about Facebook is the difference between a Facebook profile and a Facebook page.  This post builds upon a prior post that explains the array of Facebook marketing tools that exist for the modern real estate agent.  This article is designed to serve as a basis for a Realtor to understand the differences between a Facebook profile and a Facebook official page (two of the most popular tools) so that an effective Facebook marketing strategy can be created.  Note that places pages are technically a different product than official pages, but for the purposes of this post, places pages fall into the same category as official pages.  The only significant difference between the two products is the inclusion of an address and the deals functionality for places pages. Other than that, places pages and official pages are basically the same.

Profiles and official pages (also commonly referred to as business pages, or fan pages) are as different as apples and oranges.  They are often confused however because visually, they look very similar.  In reality, despite their similar appearance, profiles and pages are two totally separate Facebook products with separate terms of service.  As a result, they require dramatically different strategies for marketing and business development success.

Pixel Coaching recommends that the core of a real estate Facebook marketing strategy is the Facebook profile (hence our Facebook Profile Optimization Checklist which you can download for free and will help you to build a solid foundation for your Facebook marketing).  But the allure of being able to totally segregate personal from professional on Facebook leads many real estate agents to be interested in Facebook business pages.  And, when properly utilized as part of a clear Facebook marketing strategy, Facebook pages can be an effective and profitable business tool for Realtors. But, when not understood and poorly planned, both Facebook profile usage and Facebook pages can be ineffective time sucks that yield no productive results for the real estate professional.  In order to not go down that path, you must first understand the difference between the two tools.

Identifying a profile and a page:

As a user, it can sometimes be tricky to know if you are looking at a profile or a page in Facebook.  The visual appearance of profiles and pages is very similar as the comparison below shows.  Both have a main profile image, both have a variety of tabs including a wall tab and an info tab.  In addition, both have a photo stream along the top which displays five images as the following example shows:

In this example, it is pretty intuitive to identify that the image on the left is a Facebook profile and the image on the right is a Facebook page because the imagery used for the profile is a person, and the imagery used for the page reflects a brand.  In addition, the name for the page on the left is “Stacey Harmon” and the name on the right is “Pixel Coaching”.  So, despite looking very similar in structure, it makes sense that the example on the left represents a profile and the example on the right represents a page.

The confusion for most real estate professionals comes in the fact that often in real estate, the brand that is promoted is the individual agent.  The agent is the brand.  And when an individual agent’s persona is being promoted via a page, many do not realize that a different Facebook marketing product is being utilized as this example from a Realtor who uses both the profile and official pages product on Facebook illustrates:

In this case, Heather has chosen to use a photo of herself as the branding in both locations and her name is the same in both places.  If you were to search “Heather Elias” on Facebook you would find both of these examples (although her image may have changed from when these screen captures were taken).

If you look carefully though, there are differences that tell you you are looking at a profile vs. a page.  The giveaway is that the terminology used for connecting/connections with the page is different.

Friend vs. Like:

A profile will have verbiage that asks you to “Add as Friend”:

This is in contrast to the verbiage on a page which displays the “Like” button:

So, the vocabulary is different between the two products.  Users will “friend” a profile and “like” a page.

In addition, the connections associated with a page and that are visible on the right hand sidebar have different terminology associated with them.  On a profile, you’ll see there is a “Friends” header followed by images of the persons friends (subject to the users permission settings) whereas on a page, the sidebar informs you that a certain number of “People Like This”, and you do not have the ability to see who the fans of the page are:

What else is different about profiles and official pages?

Connection terminology between profiles and pages is not the only difference between profiles and pages.  In addition, the terms of service are different.  Also, how you communicate with connections is different.  As a result, the strategy for success in business must be different.

Facebook Profiles:

Profiles are for personal use only.  Everything about the Facebook terms of service supports that.  The terms of service state that users are allowed to only have one profile.  Profiles are intended to reflect a person (you), not a brand.  Your personal name should be used on your profile and should not include your company or profession.  It is explicitly stated in the terms of service that a profile is not to be used for your commercial gain.  For Realtors, this means no posting of listings on their wall or direct solicitations with their profile.  The number of friends you can be connected to on your profile is capped at 5,000 (it’s tough for most people to exceed 5,000 friends if they are only using their profile for personal use).  In order for someone to see your full profile, you must both agree to become friends.  Without mutual acceptance, the full profile is not visible to each party.  In addition, the level of profile visibility can be adjusted with privacy settings. And, although both marketing tools have a photo stream at the top of the page, the functionality for this features varies.

Business Development with Your Profile:

Since it is against the terms of service to use your profile for commercial gain, the tactics to develop business using your profile while staying within the terms of service are about two things:

1. Making sure the static data on your profile screams “I’m a REALTOR and here is how you can reach me” in a way that works within the Facebook culture and terms of service (see our Profile Optimization Checklist)
2. Engaging with your sphere of influence so that they learn to better know, like, and trust you.

With your profile, the key strategy for success to is interact with your social sphere of influence.  The profile is set up to strengthen connections with people you already know.  It is best used to network and to socialize with your social farm.  Your profile is a modern supplement to your off-line networking opportunities that currently yield you business.  Connect to the people you socialize with on the soccer field, at the golf course, at the Chamber of Commerce, as part of your volunteer efforts, or at neighborhood events.  You spend a great deal of time off line getting to know people.  Over time, this leads to people working with you or referring you business.  Your Facebook profile is an outstanding opportunity to do the same thing in a more efficient format.

Facebook Official Pages:

In contrast, official pages are specifically for commercial use and therefore a perfectly appropriate, and Facebook legal place to put your listings and do explicit business development.  A page is basically a public website, just under the Facebook umbrella.  There are no privacy settings to apply to your page.  Google indexes the page, just as if it was a public website.  Facebook pages are open and designed to stay that way.  Anyone can choose to like your page – you don’t approve them and there are no limits to the number of Facebook users who can like your page.

The chart below illustrates the key differences in these two “Facebook products” and is essential to understand when formulating your Facebook strategy.

Hopefully this has clarified the key differences between profiles and pages.  As you can see, the differences are significant and highlights that profiles and pages are two very different marketing tools.  As such, your strategies for building business with each tool should vary.  Still have questions about the differences between profiles and pages? Leave us your questions in the comments.

A email came in to us at Pixel Coaching today stating the following:

Facebook re-activated my profile today after mysteriously de-activating it last Friday.
No warning, no explanation.
I am happy that it’s up and running again, yet shaken that it vanished for nearly a week.
Do you recommend a program or procedure that will protect me from losing everything?

This email underlies one of the important risks to know when you engage in Facebook marketing – Facebook is in control.  They have the power to shut you down, at any time, with no recourse.  Now, we may never know the reason why this person had their account vanish for a week then magically reappear, but we can mitigate the risk of loosing the data that you have put into your Facebook profile, should you find your profile ever shut down.

There is a process for downloading a copy of your Facebook data.  Check out this video from Facebook on the process and how to download a copy of your information.

Facebook does not currently have a built in tool for backing up your business pages, but a third party service has solved this problem.  Check out Backupify to backup your Facebook page.  They have a free plan which gives you up to 2GB storage and weekly backups.

This Facebook marketing tip relates to the official pages marketing tool in Facebook. For clarification on where this tip fits into the greater Facebook marketing picture, please view our post Facebook Foundations: Facebook’s Marketing Tools Explained

The truth is, it takes a lot of great content and diligent management to run a really effective Facebook business page. Successful pages have a continual stream of new, compelling content that creates a level of fan engagement and attracts new users to the page. In order to manage the process of coming up with great content for your page, take the time to set up a content calendar that maps out every new page post you will do for the month ahead.

Since this month has been all about how to incorporate Facebook into your 2011 real estate marketing plan, why not start by creating a January 2011 content calendar for your business page. Download a Microsoft Word or Excel calendar template and type in the content you plan for that day. You can even paste in URL’s making it easy to copy those to Facebook as part of your page post when the time comes.

Need ideas for what to include in your content calendar? Here are a few ideas:

• Link to:
  • blog posts or articles you are writing on your business site
  • articles from the local newspaper
• Market statistics
• Write a review of a local restaurant and link to the website
• Post photos from a community event
• Craft a holiday greeting
• Information on local events and things to do

Also, check out these successful Realtor run Facebook business pages for additional content ideas:

• Megan Ruiz, REALTOR, Windermere North Spokane, WA
• Nanette Labastida – Austin Fine Properties
• 365 Things to Do in Vancouver, WA

Bonus tip: If you want to kick up your plan a notch, use a tool like TweetDeck, Hootsuite, or the Roost Publisher to schedule your posts in advance and have them posted to your page at a specific date and time.

It’s time to get started with your Facebook marketing plan. After a month long series of tips, you have more than enough information to get you started. All that is left to do is get started.  So, time to get to it.  Here is to your Facebook marketing success in 2011!

This article is part of a month long series of tips, tricks, and strategies for real estate marketing with Facebook. View additional posts from our “Tip a Day” series on Pixel Coaching.

This Facebook marketing tip relates to the official pages and profile marketing tools in Facebook. For clarification on where this tip fits into the greater Facebook marketing picture, please view our post Facebook Foundations: Facebook’s Marketing Tools Explained.

Taking the time to post unique and fresh content to your Facebook page is one of the challenges of making a Facebook page really work for your marketing efforts. It becomes a lot easier to manage this process when you are updating your Facebook page from the field. And, there is a very easy way to send status updates, photos, and videos to your page – simply email them to your page from your phone. This allows you to post to your page from wherever you are in real time!

Each Facebook page has a unique email address associated with it. To get the unique email address associated with your profile, go to your page manager (“Edit Page”) and go to the mobile section:

If you select the “Learn More” button next to your email address, Facebook provides these instructions indicating that the subject line of your email is the status update if your email contains no photo or video:

Also, add a new contact on your phone with your unique email address (you can call the contact “Facebook Page Updates”). That way, there is no need to remember the email address and you can just send future updates to the contact you created.

Your personal profile also has a unique email address associated with it that you can use to post.  To find that email address, go to www.facebook.com/mobile and look at the Upload via Email section where it will be displayed.

Note that Facebook also has mobile applications for certain smart phones and these mobile apps are also a great option for updating Facebook from the field. Check out our tip on Facebook’s Mobile Applications for your smart phone.

This article is part of a month long series of tips, tricks, and strategies for real estate marketing with Facebook. View additional posts from our “Tip a Day” series on Pixel Coaching.