There are many people out there that still don’t get it… they don’t get the fact that Social Media Marketing and Word of Mouth Marketing are now the  same  thing! I recently came across several articles all based on the same survey, and it made me realize this critical marketing mistake. C’mon people, business owners, marketers, advertisers, etc… where do you think people are “talking” these days? Word-of-Mouth reviews are happening online now and consumers use these reviews to make decisions based off of what other customers say about a business. Are neighbors (still) talking to neighbors as they mow their lawns about the new laundry detergent one just used or the great restaurant the other one went to the night before? Of course, that part will never change. But what has changed is now those same neighbors, after mowing their lawns, are going back into their homes and going on their computers or back into their garages and whipping out their smartphones and telling all their friends… their ONLINE friends all about that great recommendation. What many marketers are missing is the fact that Social Media is set to become the way to spread word of mouth. Facebook is becoming the town hall of the future, and if you can get a group of people buzzing to each other online about your business, you can bring  in more clients.

Social Media is a powerful tool for your business. You can compete in your market using consumer reviews to your advantage. Build your online reputation by taking an active role in what your customers are saying about your business. Ask customers to rate you online. Ask your customers to create a video testimonial for you and post it to your social channels, your blog and your website. You should not only keep up with your online reputation, but you can also see how you compare against the competition and where you stand in the marketplace. Improve your reputation by acting on the feedback you receive in your reviews. Online reviews are the new referrals in your business and consumers doing online research of products and services pay attention to customer reviews.

You don’t need a crystal ball to know what it means. It means video is not only the content  variety of the moment, it’s the content variety of the future for years to come. It means video is everything, and any business owner that  refuses to believe that is taking a huge risk of being forgotten.  There’s no question about it—online video is booming.  Not only is over 48 hours of video content being uploaded to YouTube every minute, people are watching everything from online content to TV and movies online and brands are incorporating into their websites at record pace.  Online video is everywhere you look.

Back in November, Cisco’s VP for Marketing and Emerging Technologies, David Hsieh, predicted that web video would soon account for a huge portion of Internet traffic saying, “Today over half of all Internet traffic is video—51 percent.  And based on the current trends, we predict that in the next three years over 90 percent of all Internet traffic will be video.”  In a speech this week at CES 2012, YouTube’s head of global partnerships, Robert Kyncl, confirms this bold prediction. Kyncl also predicted that soon 90 percent of all Internet traffic is going to be video.

Video isn’t just for entertainment anymore.  It’s crossing over into all aspects of our lives, we are seeing the use of video purvey everything we do, whether it’s work, live, learn or play. It’s clear that, in modern society, people crave a quick, easy way to consume information.  They don’t want to have to read big chunks of text, don’t want to have to search around for explanations and online video has positioned itself as the perfect way to provide people with that quick, easy to consume content that they crave, when and where they crave it.

90% of all web traffic will be video. That’s just a huge, gaudy  number designed to do one thing: get your attention. In my case, at least,  mission accomplished. This is a ablosolute game changing prediction. Do not let this tidal wave pass you by, we can help. Contact us today.

There is a new study by Facebook Page analytics company EdgeRank Checker that could help Page owners answer that question. When you do this right you can avoid cutting short the lifetimes of your posts and overshadowing them with new content. Each Page is different and needs to find its own optimal posting frequency depending on its content and audicence. The average news feed post by a Facebook Page receives Likes and comments for 3 hours after being published. To maximize the engagement, impressions, and traffic driven by the news feed, Facebook Page owners should wait at least 3 hours between posts. , but no more frequently than every 3 hours is a good general guideline.

Last month after Facebook changed the news feed in September, EdgeRank Checker analyzed 30,000 posts by over 500 Pages with an average fan count of 140,000. The company defines the end of a post’s lifetime as when it receives 10% of the engagement per hour as it did in its most popular hour. The study found that the average post lifetime was 3 hours and 7 minutes, while the median post lifetime is 2 hours and 56 minutes. After a post’s death, it only receive a trickle of engagement and there’s little lost by posting again.

Most Page owners stick to roughly 2 to 3 posts a day.  Page owners should remember this study when they have tons of great content and are anxious to share. Take a breath and watch your last post’s Likes and comments rise.

Facebook is giving advertisers 50% off when they keep users within Facebook like “Sponsored Stories”, “Like” buttons or business page. This according to a new report by social-marketing agency TBG Digital. If you are not aware, you have a choice when running Facebook Ads where that visitor will land when they click on your ad. Do they land somewhere on your website outside of Facebook or somewhere on your business page within Facebook. While it might be cheaper to send someone who clicks on your Facebook Ad to a Facebook Page, it’s still a total waste of marketing dollar to send them anywhere that isn’t a targeted landing page for that ad campaign. Don’t send them to the Wall. Don’t send them to the INFO tab. Do send them to a custom opt-in landing page, or email squeeze page.

Still hurting over being unfriended on Facebook? Here’s a fun infographic that could help you pinpoint where you went wrong along the way. The study by NM Incite, a Nielsen McKinsey company, looked at why we “friend” and “unfriend” people on Facebook, . The data is based on a survey of 1,865 users. The study reveals the most common reasons why users friend (and unfriend) people. For 82% of Facebook users, knowing someone offline is reason to add them on the social network. The next most common reason for adding a friend is having many mutual friends, a practice reported by 60% of users. Receiving offensive comments and not knowing much about the other person are the top two motives for removing others on Facebook, followed by sales talk and depressing comments.

Social Media is a visual medium and how you use the most valuable real estate on your profiles matters. The latest research by Eye Track Shop demonstrates how people look at your Facebook profile, literally. The start up runs eye-tracking studies for advertizers to measures exactly where your customers look. This enables marketers to see immediately whether or not your communication is working. With this in mind, what is it that garners the most “eyeballs” on various social channels? And the winner is  - pictures. First and foremost th profile picture, then content on top like the Facebook photo strip, and who you know thumbnail images. Take a closer look at our Facebook Page for some examples of how to take advantage of this behavior to utilize this valuable space as mini banner ads with links and calls action to increase conversions and generate leads.

1. Profle Graphic – This is the most valuable real estate on your page. This is the best place to initiate the relationship with your visitor, make it work for you. The maximum dimensions are 200 x 600. When uploading your custom graphic add a description to the image that includes links and calls to action to drive visitors to your other sites and channels.
2. Photo Strip – This is the five images that scroll across the top of your page. Facebook displays the most recenent images that your page was tagged. These images should be utilized as mini ads for your brand to drive visitors to other pages, sites or channels. The thumbnail size is 97 x 68, the actual image size we used was 364 x 260 to give viewers a better experience when they click through. Again when uploading images add a description that includes links and calls to action.
3. Page Likers – The Facebook profile pictures of users who have liked your page carries a lot of weight. Not only on your page but on other sites. The Facebook Social Plugins especialluy the Like Button can be inserted into your other sites.

Now let’s apply these same principles to your Personal Page. You can click over to my Personal Profile  for examples of these principles. The two main areas you want to look at is the Profile Picture and your Info Tab. With your Profile Picture when uploading images add a description to the image that includes links and calls to action, or just add a comment to an existing image. The Info Tab make sure to edit the employers with links, phone number and email. By default Facebook puts this information on the bottom of the page and many viewers of your profile do not get the far “below the fold”

Leveraging a visual marketing strategy at all times will provide you with your highest return on investment. Utilizing these tactics that take advantage of your followers natural behaviors will increase converstions and generate more leads. Take a look at the study that Mashable published using the Eye Track Shop technoloy, the heat map sceen shots are a real eye opener, ha ha ha: Click Here

The social media Christmas story told through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google, Wikipedia, Google Maps, GMail, Foursquare, Amazon…

This video makes you think, times change, the media is new, the feeling remains the same.

Merry Christmas from all of us at Crack the Social Media Code

1. Thou Shall Not Believe the Hype – Have you noticed that Facebook has been a bit oversold as the magic bullet to increase production. Here is the reality, Facebook is not about leads, it is not intuitive and it is not free. What Facebook is about: 1. traffic (and lots of it), 2. connections and 3. branding. Done properly and consistently it will result in a very substantial return on investment.
2. Thou Shall Have Fun – You got into the real estate business because you like people not technology. The platform allows you to gain great insights into people. What your “Friends” think, enjoy and what their needs are. Interact and approach Facebook as – Relationship Marketing.
3. Thou Shall Approach As Any Other Marketing Program – Approach Facebook as another presentation of your brand. Brand integrity is critical in real estate. Whatever you do on Facebook should align with all your other channels; website, direct mail, print media etc.
4. Thou Shall Be Transparent – Be authentic and be consistent. The social consumer can spot a hypocrite a mile away. This commandment is true for all your interactions with more and more review sites like Yelp, Incredible Agent, Mountain of Agents your alignment with your stated values is only Google search away
5. Thou Shall Find a Trusted Partner – Facebook changes constantly and tactics for engaging fans are developing daily. Staying on top of it is a full time job. Find an agency that focuses on the essentials; strategy and execution. (i.e. Crack The Social Media Code)
6. Thou Shall Listen – The whole point of Facebook is to communicate. The best communicators I know are the best listeners. You can use tools to set up “listening post” to follow numerous conversations on a single screen and jump in with you see the opportunities to add value.
7. Thou shall be Hyperlocal – There is an old adage “All real estate is local” and in social media that is even more true. Facebook is about community and connection we advise become the community curator. You facilitate public relations with neighbors, businesses and locales in order to generate community cooperation.
8. Thou Shall Not Dump Visitors on the Wall – The wall is not the ideal place to welcome first time visitors to your page. You want to guide that first impression of your brand and compel them to take your desired action – click the “Like” button.
9. Thou Shall Have a Custom Landing Page – Guide a visitors first impression with a great brand message, specific call to action, opt-in tools to build your email lists. Most visitors will not return to page after they “Like” it so you must leverage that visit to grow your marketing base.
10. Thou Shall Get Smarter – Facebook marketing is still in its infancy. There is single tried and true way to be successful. Actively listen to your social media manager and take the advice and council. The key is to measure everything and use that date constantly improve on Facebook marketing strategy.

Cooliris blows up your Web-surfing experience into a larger-than-life graphical experience. It is a free tool that lets non-technical users showcase photo and video content in a compelling way. It takes the images and videos it finds on nearly any Web site, including Flickr, Picasa, Youtube and many others and expands them to a 3D wall. As media-rich content booms, users are constantly looking for better ways to share photos and videos. Cooliris lets your viewers surf through visual content in a classy interface that we think looks like some cool visual movie effect, it puts the “graphic” back in “graphic user interface”. Here is a video wall we created from our Youtube channel is just a few clicks in less than 5 minutes.

What do you think?

Posterous is one of our social media managers favorite tools. It has been labled one of the simplest blogging platforms available. Not only is it easy, it boosts your SEO, and you are able to syndicate from Posterous to a number of other platforms via email or mobile device. Your content is auto-magically syndicated to Twitter, FB, LinkedIn, WordPress, Blogger, etc. This article offers some great tips on how to customize your email with with tags and syntax so that your messages are formatted perfectly and will can also save you some time.

Prevent the inclusion of your email signature: Do you have an email signature that you don’t want posted? End your post with “#end” and Posterous won’t publish anything after it.
Email Tagging: Tagging posts is the best way for visitors to find content pushed off the main page. Tagging posts via email is a convenient way to ensure that your content gets properly bookmarked and saved when updating on the run. To tag your email posts, add this syntax to your subject line: ((tag: tagname, tagname2)). It’s that simple
Custom Email Options: Say you’ve configured your autoposting options but are sharing a pic that you want to post to Posterous, send to Twitter and Flickr, but skip Facebook. With the practically unlimited variety of custom email addresses, you can do just that. For this particular scenario, instead of emailing post@posterous.com, send your post to flickr+twitter@posterous.com. To post only to one particular site, send your email to servicename@posterous.com (eg. twitter@posterous.com). The options are endless, but the bottom line is that you have complete control over where your content ends up.
Inline Photos: When you post multiple photos via email, Posterous automatically creates a gallery of those images. It’s quite nice to look at but it does force viewers to tab through the gallery to view each photo. If, however, you’d like all your images to appear inline in the same post, minus the gallery, just add this exact syntax to your subject line: ((nogallery)).
Send Google Reader Items to Posterous: Google Reader recently updated their feed reading app to support sharing your feed items with your social profiles. The new option is called “Send To” and it’s accessible via the Settings tab. Should you select to enable Send To for Posterous, at the bottom of each item in your reader, you can click Send To to quickly post interesting items to your Posterous.

Here is a link to a great Posterous for real estate webinar