How to Make Outsourcing Social Media Work For Agents
One of the things I think we get asked the most by agents is: can your team manage my social media? And the answer is usually no, but there’s a good reason for that…
Success in social media is obviously about being social. It’s about being personal, it’s about making connections, it’s about engagement; and that’s just not something a typical third-party company can do for you, because they aren’t you.
Most agents start by posting their listings on social media. Of course, that makes sense, because listings power your business and intrigue your market. But, if you take a deeper look through an agent’s feed, you’ll likely notice that images of agents doing something receive the highest amount of interactions.
Why? It’s because social media is meant to be personal.
Most agents use social media as an advertising tool by promoting themselves constantly, not engaging anyone, and taking a ‘hey, look at me!’ approach, and that’s the wrong way to do it. Sure, you should be posting your listings, but the most success in social is often seen when you actually use it to be social.
★ Social media is an important part of any digital marketing strategy. Check out these tips to take your social strategy to the next level:
- Why You Should Have an Internal Social Media Destination Page
- Why You Should Promote Your Blog Posts on Social Media
- Get Our Social Media Template Bundle
For agents who love social media, outsourcing it is simply not the right move. Why ask someone else to do something you genuinely enjoy doing?
But what if spending hours online, posting frequently, and commenting on and liking posts is just not your thing? A lot of agents just don’t have the time or desire to post or interact much on social media. And that brings us to the second most important part of establishing social media as a valuable marketing channel: consistency.
If you’re only posting once or twice per week, you can almost guarantee that no one will see your posts. That’s just how the algorithm works these days.
A beautiful and engaging Instagram feed is nothing without consistency. Picture this: you find a new business online and the first thing you do is head over to Instagram to see what they have posted recently. When you scroll through their feed, you see the last time they posted was two years ago. Are you going to trust this business? Probably not. But what if you go to the same Instagram feed and see they are posting regularly several times per week and they have a variety of posts? You’re likely to spend more time on that page, like their posts, and eventually give them a follow if you enjoy what you see.
So what’s the solution for real estate agents? A multi-pronged strategy that combines a personal touch with evergreen content to keep things fresh. (You can read more about the benefits of an evergreen content strategy right here.)
What Does an Effective Social Media Strategy for Real Estate Look Like?
When it comes to real estate social media, variety is really the spice of life. An example of a diverse and engaging social media strategy for real estate could look like this:
- Listing content including coming soon, just listed and recently sold posts
- Market-related or educational content like market updates or commentary on the latest news stories
- Evergreen content like blog posts, testimonials, and promotional callouts such as getting a home evaluation or signing up for newsletters or listings alerts
- Personal content showing what you’re up to during the day
If this looks like a lot…well it is. It’s important to strike a balance between promotional content, educational content, and authentic personal content. Finding the right mix will help you stand out online, drive traffic to your website, and grow and engage your audience.
Looking at this list, you can probably pretty easily see which types of content are in your wheelhouse and which are not.
Anything else can likely be outsourced in order to keep your feed looking current and consistent. It’s not about handing over the keys to your social media accounts and never logging in again. The best approach to outsourcing social media for real estate agents should be viewed as a collaborative effort.
Third-party social media management can work if you know what you are getting and you understand that you still need to pepper your personality throughout the content.
It involves strategy, yes. But that strategy will fall flat if there is no input from you. After all, as a real estate agent, you are your brand, and people are paying to work with you for a reason.
When you outsource social media to a third-party marketing company, they should know you well and understand your target audience. The strategy should be focused on consistency so that even if you aren’t doing anything exciting on a specific day, or you don’t have a new listing coming out or a market update to promote, you still have something to post that will appeal to your audience.
★ Need help keeping up with a consistent marketing strategy? Check out these posts to help you make better habits with your marketing:
- The Steps to Building a Trustworthy Personal Real Estate Brand
- The 5 Key Traits of an Effective Real Estate Newsletter
- Building a Successful Follow-Up Strategy
Earlier in the article, I mentioned that I usually say no when people ask if we manage social media. And that is true.
But there are some cases when we do manage social media for clients.
For clients who work closely with us on their overall marketing strategy and implementation, social media is a natural progression. We do a lot of work to understand our client’s specific audience and niche, which helps us mimic and elevate your tone and aesthetic. When evergreen social media posts have that much research behind them posting is like you doing it yourself only better–since you don’t actually have to post the evergreen stuff anymore.
The bottom line here, is that outsourcing social media can be successful, but only if you do it right. The goal should be: consistency.
When you don’t have to worry about posting every single day, you can focus your energy on posting about things that actually matter to you, and that are actually engaging from a personal perspective. It gives you the opportunity to have fun with social media, cultivate connections, and get the full ROI of being active online.
Want to create a more consistent, professional look across all of your social media? Download our social media template bundle. It’s a set of pre-built, real estate specific Canva templates that you can customize and use to create professional looking posts for Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and more.
