Leverage Social Media

For most, participating in social media is like going to a rock concert.  You find yourself surrounded by people that all have a common interest (be it AC/DC or real estate).  You like the familiar, loud music, you like the energy of the crowd, you feel connected.  But, at the end of the show, there are only a select few that the whole crowd remembers.  It was those on stage, leading the audience to be connected, who made the biggest impression.

So with your efforts in social media, you need to make the choice: Are you going to be on stage, making the lasting impression?  OR are you going home in an overpriced souvenir T-shirt, telling all your friends how great it was?

Social Media has made it all too easy to organize a formidable community.  Now, to be successful in leveraging that community to “work” for you, it is your responsibility to get up on stage, in front of them, night after night, and start leaving an impression.  If you go to the show just to hold a lighter, you’ll always be just a face in the crowd.

1. Get there early to develop the largest amount of followers as possible.
2. Regularly provide relevant, compelling, eye-catching, and impressionable content for the community to consume – and share.
3. Update your status regularly with relevant, compelling, eye-catching, and impressionable bite-size content.
4. Participate (comment, message, tag, nudge and friend) in the Greater Community to grow your reach, relevance and influence.
5. Lather – Rinse – Repeat.

We can’t stress enough how important it is to learn to use these social tools of today. Be certain, they aren’t going away. The generation coming up under us will make sure of that.  So get up on that stage and make a lasting impression!

Source: Adapted from an article by Jim Cronin

Leverage Facebook For Your Real Estate Practice

*One in every five page views in the U.S. occurred on Facebook, bringing in more than 400 billion page views this year.

*The average visit time on Facebook is 20 minutes.

*Facebook members know a thing or two about loyalty.  About 96% of Facebook visitors have returned within the past 30 days, as of April 2012. 

Based on current numbers, it’s estimated that by the end of 2012, Facebook will approach one billion members.  As social media has become a big part of life in a technology-saturated world, it developed functions other than to connect with friends and family.  Social media helps businesses and professionals network, promote their products and services, and find potential clients.  However, it’s a fine line, building one’s “funnel “ of prospective buyers and sellers, while not annoying them with your unsolicited marketing efforts.  How you engage them is key.  

A lot of you in real estate have embraced social media, and some have really learned how to fully leverage it in your business.  The Corcoran Group out of NYC, in particular comes to mind, as does the Get Home Denver team.  Both have iPhone and Android apps, blogs, and integrate other effective social media tools into their Facebook.   And equally important, they seem to have a grasp on that fine line of the right content to engage and convert, without putting people off with overly done marketing. 

Join us for an informative workshop to learn the ins and outs of leveraging Facebook in YOUR real estate business!  This intensive workshop will teach you all the necessary basics to use Facebook for your business including the following: 

Everything you need to know about the new Facebook Timeline 

How to grow your brand with a compelling business page 

How to best engage customers and prospects, build loyalty and create brand advocates 

How to generate leads and business on Facebook 

This is not a generic Facebook workshop but is specific for the real estate industry. You will leave with an actionable plan on how to grow your real estate practice using Facebook.

Speaker: Nadine Kagan Wilson, Moxie Consulting 

Date: Wednesday, June 13, 2012 

Time: 10:00 AM—11:30AM 

RSVP: Erika.Kalpakoff@fnf.com 

Where: Fidelity National Title– Training Room 

60 E. Rio Salado Pkwy, 11th Floor 

Tempe, AZ 85281

Source:  Mashable, Samantha Murphy

How To Make People Fall In Love With Your Website

In the court of online real estate, your customers are judge and jury, but the testimony that you hear will take place out of earshot. The rules are unwritten but they are set in stone. Give your customers a really good reason to trust you, like you and feel like you can serve their needs and they will toss aside their inhibitions, along with their reluctance to part with their business. That’s because they want you, the right website and the right business, the right broker to make their decisions easy. Not guilty by irrational reasoning. (i.e. crazy in like) Your customers hear every message you send – intentional or not. Your attitude is nearly everything. Customers want you to show a certain degree of eagerness, but not desperation. They want you to believe in yourself and demonstrate why they should believe in you too. They want you to be fun but also someone they can lean on for help. They want to trust you.

The web version of chocolate and roses in the world of online real estate is:

-Build your site to answer your customer’s questions.

-Know your niche and be the customer’s expert on it.

-Get to know your customers and what their pain points are.

-Make searching on your site an intuitive engaging experience.

-Translate what you offer into solving customer pain.

-Build your site from the users perspective.

-Make it easy to gather and share what they came for.

-Use photo and video visuals liberally.

-Create interesting non-pitchy content and give it away.

-Always deliver on what you’ve promised.

-Provide absolutely impeccable service always.

-Optimize for SEO, rinse and repeat.

At the end of the day, what we’re working to cultivate is trust in an environment lacking human interaction. These are a just few of the ways that you can cultivate that trust, forge new relationships and enhance existing ones. Falling in love is just the first step; you have to deliver even after the bloom is off the rose.

Source: Seth Price, GeekEstate

Congratulations to Carlye Buxton - FNTA-Maricopa's May 2012 Employee in the Spotlight

Our May 2012 Employee in the Spotlight was born in New York State – Queens Village in Nassau County, to be exact. With two sisters, one older and one younger, Carlye Buxton and her family moved to Arizona from New York when she was ten years old due to her dad’s job transfer. Carlye thought the “move” was an exciting event to say the least. You can imagine what a ten-year-old growing up in New York pictured when told she was moving to the desert. She was sure she would see lots of sand and camels.

This “peace-making, over-achiever” middle child was very active during her high school years. Freshman class president, three years in the National Honor Society and President of her school’s Key Club Chapter in her senior year tells us how well-rounded Carlye became. Somehow she managed to fit cheerleading and volleyball in there, too. None of this is a surprise to those of us who know Carlye and her infectious laugh and constant smile.

After graduating from Seton Catholic High School in Chandler, Carlyle packed up and moved to San Diego to attend the San Diego Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising. After completing several quarters of study, Carlye had to return to Arizona due to her dad’s failing health. She enrolled in what was at the time called Chandler/Gilbert Community College where she earned an Associate’s Degree in General Studies.

Carlye’s introduction to “escrow”, believe it or not, came by way of an association with “The Magic Kingdom”. While in San Diego, Carlye worked part-time at a Disney Store and when she moved back to Arizona, she transferred to the Disney Store at Fiesta Mall where she worked two evenings a week and weekends. During the week, Carlye worked as a receptionist at a nearby ATI Title office. It was soon evident that Carlye had the qualities needed to work in the fast-paced, sometime pressure cooker world of escrow, and so began her escrow adventure.

                Carlye is married to Ken (She calls him her personal chef!). Together they have two little girls, Ivy, who is 11 and Luci, who will be seven in May. Luci loves animals and participates in an after-school Phoenix Zoo program called Zoo Vets. Ivy is what Carlye calls “a book-a-holic”. Ivy loves to read and last year logged reading 3,800,000 words. The program entails reading a book, taking a test on the book, and if the test is passed, the student is awarded the corresponding number of words. Ivy is also in the Drama Club. Family time for the Buxton’s includes playing board games, going to movies, riding bikes, and getting to Disneyland as often as they can. In her leisure time (if she can find any), Carlye enjoys reading, movies, and scrapbooking. No dust settling in the Buxton household for sure!

                Sharing a little life lesson with us, Carlye says, “We all need to laugh a little every day and to make a real effort to find a way to enjoy whatever it is you are doing at the time and enjoy the people you are with. The joy is always there; you just have to look for it.

                Congratulations, Carlye, on being chosen the FNTA- Maricopa May 2012 Employee in the Spotlight. We appreciate your constant dedication to honing your craft. Thank you for all your contributions and for sharing your expertise with our Fidelity family. We are grateful for all you do. 

Melissa Shapiro Promoted to VP Sales and Marketing for FNT Maricopa

We are pleased to announce some very big and exciting changes happening here at Fidelity Phoenix. Steve de Laveaga, SVP Sales and Marketing Maricopa County, has been appointed to Senior Vice President, Regional Sales and Marketing for FNTG Western Operations. Steve has made outstanding contributions to our operation, applying his more than 20 years of sales and sales management experience to be a collaborative part of the our operations financial success. 

Melissa Shapiro
Vice President-Sales and Marketing
Fidelity National Title Agency - Maricopa

We wish Steve well in his new position, and it is with great pleasure that we announce the promotion of Melissa Shapiro to the position of Vice President-Sales and Marketing Manager for Fidelity National Title Agency-Maricopa. Melissa has worked diligently in Sales over the past five years, and she stands ready to accept her new position dedicated to creating a smooth transition.

Melissa’s tenacity, perseverance, and commitment all contribute to her proven success in her current role, and we can’t think of a better individual to lead the FNTA-Maricopa Sales Team. As Director of Sales and REO for Fidelity National Title, Melissa led a team of nine in producing record profits and growing REO markets. Her 15 years of sales experience combined with a strong desire to provide the highest level of customer service has led her to rise above a declining market and grow Fidelity’s REO market by 20% in 2010. 

Please help us in welcoming Melissa to her new position. 

Sharpen Your Communication Skills

The English language is a curious animal; we oftentimes make statements or write instructions, absolutely convinced that we make perfect sense. Until we get a strange look, a blank stare, a response that makes no sense whatsoever, or an outright “Huh??”  Or when we go back to it later for one reason or another and realize “Hmmm… I don’t remember what I really meant by that…”  Sound familiar?  Things don’t always come out the way they were meant. It's true of everyone, from time to time, albeit some more than others.

And the margin for misinterpretation increases ten-fold when it’s in writing, rather than verbal communication. We’re all over-committed, racing through our day, multi-tasking, and often, our mouth and fingers sometimes get ahead of our analytical skills or better judgment. It’s amazing how fast and easily you can confuse the heck out of people, or worst case, destroy your reputation and credibility these days by keystroke. 

In any case, once something comes out of your mouth or you hit the send or post button, it's out there for your boss, coworkers, customers, and more often than we realize, the entire world to see. You own it forever, you literally can't take it back, so it’s vitally important it conveys as intended.  Once you make the mistake once or twice of being less than clear in your communication-- as we’ve all done -- that should be enough to make you more diligent in ensuring you are.

Sounds easy, right?  But the ability to write clear, unambiguous instructions and communications is truly an art.  Our own Pat Baldwin, CSEO,  is conducting a great class to assist escrow folks in sharpening their skills in communicating clear instructions and learn how to ensure that what you say and write has both the intended impact and as few unintended consequences as possible.  Please join us!  Details below:

Class to be held on:

Tuesday, May 15, 2012, 9:30am until 12:30pm

Class to be held at:

Green Street Realty
3131 E. Camelback Road, suite 410
Phoenix AZ 85016

For more information or to RSVP:
Contact: Bernadette Espinosa
Email: BEspinosa@fnf.com