PHASE FOUR: Broadcast Your Brand

Step 1 - Go back to the social network sites and take inventory. Some of these sites will allow you to post your latest BLOG entries to your social profiles via RSS. This is great because it will establish more circular references for you on the web and show the search engines that you are a qualified source worth referring to.

Step 2 -Start reading and commenting on other popular blogs. This is important but make sure that you do this with some etiquette. Don’t just spam someone’s site, leave a thoughtful comment and leave your blog URL in the signature. This will get you noticed with other bloggers and get them to visit your blog to read your content. Also, don’t be afraid to drop an email to bloggers and let them know about your new blog.

Step 3 - Think of search engines as the largest referral network and it only wants to refer business to people that are experts. The more you write and talk online, the more likely you will be visible when someone is searching in your area of expertise.

Step 4 - Now your digital footprint is much larger than when we started this journey. The last frontier is to go back, review your goals in regards to what area you want to influence and start looking for local, regional, national and international partnerships that you can establish. This is really fertile ground because everyone is already at these major sites so this is where we can really start mining quality leads and business referrals.

Step 5 - Below is a list of sites to start with but the list is endless depending on how far you want to go! The object of this exercise is to call these sites and see if you can, at the very least, setup a link sharing relationship in which they link to you and you link to them. The real gold we are looking for is for them to syndicate your blog on their site. Sometimes this will be free but for the most part this is where you need to establish a budget and pay for placement. Trust me, it’s worth it.

Think about the influence you can have once this network is established. You post one blog entry and it hits all your social networking sites, your past and present customers. Then you automatically update local sites, regional sites and international sites. In one push of the button you have theoretically communicated with thousands of people worldwide! This is exciting and the true power of social networking.

A. Local Sites To Partner With Could Include

Chambers of Commerce: Great local presences and a good source for relocation leads. Here are some ways to leverage the relationship with the chamber of commerce. First, use content from their site as far as community events, networking events, and data that affects the local business community. These can be great discussion points that speak directly to your audience.

Second, which is the best case scenario, post content to the chamber’s site. If this is the case provide users on their site with quick links to your open house data, blog article topics, featured homes or general property search forms. Economic Development Sites Great local presences and a good source for relocation leads Visitor and Information Centers Great local presences and a good source for relocation leads Educational Sites These are great sites to help with SEO. Search engines love these sites and if you give money for scholarships or grants, make it a stipulation to the deal that at the bare minimum you establish a link sharing and on a grander scale, you share content. This is gold.

Local News Outlets: Establish content sharing with your local newspaper websites, TV stations and radio stations. This will cost some money but it is very much worth the time and dollars. These are usually high traffic sites that the search engines love because they are a respected source of content and guess what, you can leverage a bigger media buy that drives traffic to this site and then to your blog: really a key aspect.

Local Government Sites: These .gov sites get some qualified traffic and believe it or not people go to these sites prior to relocating. Once again, the search engines love them.

Local Nonprofit Sites: These sites can be a great way to align you and your broker with a good cause.

Local Bloggers: Identify some local bloggers that might want to share content or will at least want to contribute to a link exchange program. You can also start building a network of small comments on blogging sites were you comment on an article and post your blog in the signature. This is a great way to build link exchanges. The only thing we recommend is that you make it a worthwhile comment and don’t over promote your blog…just a little blog etiquette!

Local Business Partners: This could be insurance companies, mortgage companies, banks or other local business partners that you do business with that would be willing to share content or link exchange that reach your target and compliment your business and voice.

Home Owners Associations: For individual agents these can sometimes be great micro sites to get affiliated with and usually these sites have an online community board to post your links and information.

Niche Compliments: For example, if your expertise is luxury homes, target areas and websites these folks frequent: golf courses or professional clubs, etc. If your target audience is 1st time home buyers, reach out to banks, local colleges, etc.

B. Regional Sites To Partner With
These regional sites encompass some of the larger sites in the above categories but you can also look at more regional partners that are outside of your coverage area. This could also include other brokers from outside your area.

C. National Sites To Partner With
These can include any national trade associations or national portal sites like LinkedIn and other sites. Most of these sites have been identified earlier but these could also be national business partners that want to develop a link and content sharing relationship.

D. International sites to partner with
These partnerships can really develop some qualified leads and the best part­nerships here are with trade associations and direct relationships with brokers that want to share content and listings. This can provide you with good content and provide you with some very qualified buyers in today’s market.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Building a successful social network will take some time if done correctly. It is important that you take inventory of the contacts and relationships that you already have because this gives you a starting point. Building on the network you have will not only give you an easier place to start but it will help you to uncover relationships that you didn’t think of in the process. If you work through each of these phases that we have discussed in the past few days, you will be well on your way and ahead of most. Some may think social networking is just a trend but we think it’s a valuable business tool that can bring in quality referrals and leads if done and used correctly.

If you have any questions, we would love to help! Good luck!