In my opinion the internet opens the door to unlimited potential to collaborate and market on a global scale. After listening to speakers like Guerrilla Social Media, Jase Group, Customer Magnetism and Operation Smile  my eyes were opened to what “New Media” actually is, and no, it’s not social media. New Media, in my opinion, is the never ending emergence of digital communication and networking through many mediums which are ever changing, thus the term “new” in new media.

Out of the box thinking is really what keeps an agent in front of consumers and ahead of the competition. I find we sometimes get complacent, and allow ourselves to become comfortable in where we are in our business. I have been guilty of this as well, but NO MORE. In order to meet my goals, I am renewing my commitment to grow my business and step out of my comfort zone. 

If you aren’t familiar with Twellowhood, Animoto, Google Reader, hash tags, social graphing, QR codes,  rss feeds, the benefits of blogging, tweeting and Facebook, then you have a lot of work to do. We have the ability to create an audience in the niche of our choice and collaborate on a global scale to build our brand.

I have been using Twellowhood (a Twitter application) as a tool to connect geographically with other Real Estate Specialists across the country. I decided to identify other large military bases across the country and target agents from those regions to network and pass military relocation referrals to and from. I can attribute 2 sales to this tool in the last 14 months.

In 2010, I was contacted by a past client, who stated during the prelisting appointment that they hired me because of my proactive marketing on Twitter & Facebook. He loved my property websitesand especially the sites we syndicate the listings to. The happy ending came when the prospective tenant came from one of my Twellowhood Real Estate Specialist friends from up north. We rented the home quickly at top dollar.

Last year I committed to being more consistent with my blog posts on AgentFaircloth.com. This year I am collaborating with a number of local professionals (Damien Smith, Scott Brown, Jason Gignac, George Russo, The FundraiseCZAR to name a few) who will be doing guest posts every Wednesday as a way to collectively build our brands. It’s amazing how there’s power in numbers. Between  links to relevant content and popular sites, my website activity has skyrocketed. I am amazed. This is such a simple way to engage the consumer and allow them to see past the sale person and get to know the person behind the brand.  Every October I do an online pumpkin carving contestsand solicit photo submissions for voting. We have had some amazing submissions and even more fun postings the results on Halloween.Take a peake at  the winner by popular vote in 2010, they  won $250.00.

Last year I came across another fun tool, Animoto.com which gives people the ability to create videos by downloading your photos, flip videos then putting them to music and making it easy to upload to my YouTube Channel. My clients love them, as do prospective buyers. Here’s a link a video we did on a home we just put under contract. 

Sit down and put your media plan in place. If you need a referral, shoot me an email.  Who is your target market?  Is there a call to action on your card? Have you identified a niche market? Is your message consistent? Are you on facebook? Are you blogging? Are you tweeting? 

When I entered this business I intended to make it my career, if I don’t embrace change someone else will.