Hey welcome back to the podcast. Today, i've got courtney with me now: courtney you're, looking awfully tall on the podcast today, um i actually invested in some stilts. Is that what it is? Because are you like four eleven? No five, two all right, my license is 5'3 because i thought i was gon na grow. That is so good.

If you follow me, you know that courtney helps me with all my social and i've asked her to be on the show today, because i know every person listening right now or watching wants to do a better job connecting with people growing their base and ultimately, let's Just call it just expanding their trust amongst the people that are, you know, on their phone on all these different apps, so we did a mastermind a couple weeks ago, we had over two days about four. I don't know 45 50 people in the room between the two events yeah. They were all these mega, successful rock star team leaders and every one of them's like tom. I want what you got.

I need courtney like like. That's that's the secret right. That's how i'm gon na grow my reach and become like social famous yeah, and we know that's actually not the case, not true. I'd love for you just to break down for us some of the things you shared with that group, so everybody in our world can get some insight from you on how do they touch more people via social yeah? I think the first thing is is having a strategy.

That's like the main, overarching concept is that you need to have a strategy, a plan in place of like what your goals are for your social. What your goals are at the end of a quarter. At the end of a year and what you're reaching for the main goal right of like, is it following give us an example yeah like is it following? Is it engagements? Do you just want to get your name out there like? What is your real goal? I know a lot of people are driven by like the followers. That's what you think, but if you have let's say 2 000 followers and you're getting great engagement.

Is that not enough right? You know like these people are, you can buy followers like yeah, you see these people that buy followers and you're like then you go in and you're like. Okay, you have all these people like, and everyone comments, but like they have most of those followers have like one person that they're actually following it's that person yeah it's a little funky, so i think followers i would take off. I would go with engagements yeah, but if it wasn't just engagements, what else would you look for i mean can? Could somebody be as bold as to say quarter over quarter? I would like to sell four houses yeah from instagram four houses from facebook. Could you go that deep yeah, but the main thing is setting up that goal right? It's like what is the goal of social for you are you on it just because everyone else is on it.

You should have some sort of strategy in place as to why you are on social. Is it to touch more people? Is it to sell more homes like what is it, and i think that's where please don't have it be just so? You can post your listings to play yourself because nobody ever comments or likes or does like these pages of people, just agents with just listening after listening after listening and nothing else, no well think about it, put yourself in the seller's shoes or the buyer's shoes whatever. When i go to your page i'd, you already sold that house. Why do i need to look at it right? You know, like you, want to see what they're doing day to day you want to see what they're into their interest like.

That's when you start to build all right, you're going into the action so step. One is strategy. Have a goal. What's step number two? Well, i can go a little further into the strategy because a strategy isn't just the goal.

That's not just one thing: it's putting in place like. How often are you posting, what channels are you posting on? Do you have a geotagging strategy of every four posts? Were tagging orange county every five posts were tagging los angeles um? Do you have a hashtag strategy? You know so we have different blocks of hashtags. If my post is about travel, i use these three blocks. If my post is about this, i you need to really map out everything, so you can track it.

Can an individual agent do this. I think so. It's one of those things where it's you can always have outreach right. You can get help for this.

Social media is huge now huge, like i didn't go to school for social media. I think a lot of people think that it's like a degree that you get like. Oh social, media management like it's, not it's something that you learn. It's a task that you over it's an art, it's a skill, yeah, and i think that there are a lot of people that are interested in it that are in school and have figured out.

Okay, i can't get a degree in social media, but i need to get a degree because my parents want me to get one. You know that a lot of people are willing to internship or they want to have a chance yeah. You know, and if you can ask someone hey, can you put together a strategy for me i'd like to see what it looks like like then from there you can have help yeah. I think it's actually important for the agent listening to say these are my goals.

I remember so uh jim marks, who passed away a couple years ago. He in like 2007 2008. He was like hey get on facebook right and i was like okay good, i'm like why and he's like, because everybody's there and even like 2008, not everybody was there, but we knew eventually everybody'd, be there. So he's like well, what's your goal and i'm like, i want a hundred thousand followers and he actually like just laid into me, he's like that's stupid, it's not about the number of followers.

It is only about engagement, so the person listening right now. You may say like to your point earlier. I want way more people right. That will come with time if your content is good and you keep doing what you're supposed to be doing and you follow all the hacks you'll win, but i really think it is about engagement.

So so, when you went from engagement, you went right to frequency channels, geo tagging hashtag strategy, because all those things are going to help me engage with more people, so so breakdown frequency. How often, let's just say, they're just going to do facebook and instagram, because i can technically do that from one app? What's the frequency you recommend and what are the buckets of content you recommend so when starting or when you're starting to come up with. I guess your strategy around frequency. You need to have some sort of like content bucket, so that so that you're not every day trying to figure out what type of content to come up with right.

Like, let's say a bucket is mindset so um content that falls around mindset, so it could be quote cards that are about mindset. It could be a video of you talking about mindset like so when you're going to create content. You know, okay, i don't have enough mindset bucket content right. I need xyz content like i recommend having at least five buckets of content.

It could be mindset shows day in the life behind the scenes, and so when you're creating that frequency of content. I would think of two to three posts within those buckets yeah. You know a week and in terms of frequency, so actually i'm gon na i'm gon na interrupt. You don't be well enough.

I interrupt all the time. No i'm thinking for the agent listening right now. If they did behind the scenes they did around town, they did day in the life which is like. This is what my life actually looks like not what you see on a million dollar listing, but like this is me at 11, 30 at night, the good, the bad, like writing, offers and like working on my business yeah um setting up their marketing.

But the thing i think most of them miss is there should be something like what in your life is deeply important to you and it could be like harley davidson motorcycles. It could be yoga like whatever it is. I, what i think a lot of people miss, is they like they're, trying to be glamorous on instagram they're trying to be like look at me versus like this? Is me like we talked about it before, like me, coming out of the gym, with my hat on backwards, you know in the car on a saturday doing a rant oftentimes the best post, because it's like this is me in real life. Now, i'm not in a suit, i'm just doing i'm just being me exactly, and a good example too is like when you see someone in person versus when you've seen them online yeah, like sometimes you see a celebrity and per, are online and you're, like oh, my Gosh they're so great you meet them in person and they're an you know like so right.

So it's like you want to be your authentic self on both ends of the spectrum. If, if you have this persona online, and if someone runs into you, while you're getting coffee and you're having a bad day, they're like oh normal right, you know they're, not like oh they're, usually very nice like. Why are they like this yeah like you need to be yourself and that's what attracts the followers right? It's not it's, not everything else that you think it would be. No, they come right, you know, well, they become it's.

It's like attracts like exactly right now. The key is again: i go back for the person listening or watching. Is you got ta figure out like just who you are and instead of, like you see these people that try and create this sort of facade of who they are right? Like hey, we see all these like instagram people me with the lamborghini me with the jeff, and i just walked up to that. There's no way like it's like yeah, it's so phony right like if you have a visla dog, then walk your dog right.

If you have 16 cats, no, i don't all right 38 cats. If you have 38 cats, you should just be surrounded by all your cats. Right like be yourself because people with cats, like people with cats, people with visa dogs, like people with visa dogs and and that's okay, it's okay! If that's, if it's just, i live in irvine terrace right, so all of a sudden, i'm the local hyper local mayor of irvine terrace as a real estate agent. So i'm at the irvine terrace park, i'm walking the streets.

People see me there and they're like oh. He is he's one of us in this community yep, but then how do i turn that into a structured plan? Well so that you just came up with buckets of content right. You just came up with your dog, your family life, whatever that's another piece of content, so in terms of your question of also frequency of posting, the best way to put it is like put yourself in in a follower shoes or a user shoes. How often would you like to see content from them yeah if i'm following you, i kind of want to see content every day of like what you're up to right.

If you post every maybe two times a week, you you fall short with what i'm looking for. Yeah, and also the algorithm too, is going to be like this person doesn't really care about social media. So why am i going to serve their posts so with followers? Let's say you have 2 000 followers you're posting every day the algorithm is going to serve your post to those 2 000 followers which then the engagement comes. Then the following comes, you know, so it's it's more of i would post every year.

I would post every day of what you're doing, even if it's on your stories, ten stories of like hey. This is me working out. Okay, now i'm in my car now, i'm doing this like stories, do count as posts big time. It's it's! It's the ultimate behind the scenes.

It's it shows like million dollar listing so successful when you see agents doing the same thing. Yeah like we have clients like here's me, roller skating, like yeah, all right, okay, you're, human and on facebook. You can do stories as well. Facebook, twitter has stories now linkedin has stories, it's like it's one of those things where you need to put the effort into it, yeah, because that's when you see the return yeah, even if, like you have posts and you're like oh, my gosh, that has two likes Like how embarrassing keep it up, because you never know right in three weeks in a month that post could go viral and it could pick you know it could pick it up.

So it's like don't ever delete things because you're embarrassed right right. Just put it all out there and the thing i would say too, for the person listening is like we i used to talk about hey, you need to hit the live button right on facebook. The live button live right like going live people like what, if there's only like you, know, 13 people on there, i'm like you're talking to 13 people who cares and then i'd say and then leave it up, and also it's it's the end of the week and It's got 350 views and people are like. It only had 350 views, and i'm like excuse me how much time would it take you to knock on the door to call 350 people and share what you shared in that video? That would take like weeks, if not months, for people and you did it in 14 seconds exactly right.

So it's it's not even about like how many is the fact that you touched a few and as long as the message was right for them. That's awesome exactly so frequency content, buckets frequency sounds like at least one time a day. I would, but it maybe twice. I would post like a a feed post a day and then in your stories, i'd post like five to ten stories a day, easy because the stories are easy.

I mean taking a picture of you in the car like the feed posts. I understand because some people are a little more cautious of like the feed aesthetic and what it looks like and all that stuff. So if you are like that, then take time to plan out your feed posts, but in terms of your stories, what just be stories? Sorry, i was actually doing a story as we were talking there yeah, but that's the point like it's just stopping and just doing it. It's acknowledging like i'm in my car, i'm going someplace stop boom yeah, hey i'm pulling up starbucks boom! Hey it's three o'clock in the afternoon.

I got a listing appointment at five, i'm having starbucks bang yeah people want to see that exactly, and i know some people are a little bit um cautious of like well, i don't want the person to know i'm there at that specific time. Like sure, then you can just take it and upload it later exactly. You know: here's here's my entire day in one. You know: bing bing, bing, bang, bang, exactly okay.

Let's talk about geo tagging because that sounds advanced for some people. What is geo tagging geo tagging? Is tagging the location, okay, yeah, pretty much, that's it. I know. Geo tagging, though, is like a really.

How do they do it? What do you mean? What do you, how do they? How do they do it? You just type add location, you just type in a location, okay, there's someone right now, that's literally writing it down type hit location type like come on. That's the teacher in me. I can't help you the one thing. Geotagging is kind of controversial, especially with like um like because i camp a lot and geotagging a lot of people.

Don't want others like in that location, that specific spot or like camping area, because they don't um, treat it with proper care. Like people are going to these locations and like leaving trash and leaving all this stuff, so like a lot of campers and like they hate geotagging they're like that kind of stuff, is a secret. You know like they don't want you to tag the exact location so sometimes like with housing. They you, probably they don't want you to tag their exact address right, so just tag a general yeah, the community community yeah orange county.

When you actually live in mission, viejo or yeah, you know yeah, okay, that makes sense, because some people are very especially some of these campers that are tired of you and your husband making a mess. It's like a privacy thing, you know, have a conversation with miles about his messiness in these places. That's not a very personal just for the record. Okay hashtag strategy, you shared the waterfall hashtag strategy uh at that mastermind, and i watched people taking notes like crazy yeah.

First of all, maybe give the person that that doesn't really understand why hashtagging is so important like. Why is it important and then maybe share the strategy? Yeah hashtagging is important because it's another avenue for people to see your post a lot of people hashtag, because when you click on the hashtag it'll send you to that. I mean all posts that are under that hashtag and it could be something of interest to you. So a lot of people should be using multiple hashtags, not just like one or two hashtags, because you want to be able to spread your post across multiple hashtags if that makes sense right.

So how much? How much time are people searching for hashtags? I do all the time - okay to be honest, like if i'm, if i'm going to a new restaurant or if i'm going to a new location, i'm that type of person that likes to like know before i go there, and so i'd look at hashtags to see What what it's like, or if i'm going to a new location like let's say i'm going to mammoth i'd, look up, hashtag mammoth and i could see recent posts of like okay, the weather says it's, you know 70 degrees, but these people are posting and it's raining Or like yeah, it gives you another avenue for how that location or that specific post is doing. I'm super curious about that. Like like i, i know i search hashtags right and then i follow certain hashtags as a strategy for like knowing what's going on all the things that matter to me, and i'm just curious, like it'd, be fun for us to get some data on that to like. Actually be able to say to people the percentage of people that are searching hashtags are x because then it really like we see, we see the impact yeah.

Well, you can see like on instagram on your insights tab. You can see how many people found your post from hashtags right, so that person literally was looking up hashtag tom ferry and that's how they found it real estate, coaching or hashtag homes for sale in atlanta yeah, whatever whatever that is yeah. That's how they're finding them and the in when it comes to like a hashtag strategy. You shouldn't just be tagging things that you think are popular right right like if your post isn't about real estate, don't be posting hashtag real estate and your stuff is going to get lost anyways.

But it's like you want. You want your everything to be cohesive, right. That the post relates to the geotag relates to the hashtags, like everything is cohesive. So it's not it's not like.

I look up hashtag chocolate and i see your listing right exactly yeah. That would be weird, it's just weird, but what's great so so again, uh the post, the hashtag and the geotag, all being cohesive and and just to be clear, like if you've never done it takes like four seconds. Oh my gosh yeah right. It's not a complicated thing, it's location right like i do it all like i'm in dallas yeah every now and then you're like he's in london in london.

Well, the picture was taken right. The picture was taken there and then the hashtag and like like here's. What i tell people like, if i can do it right, if i can do it, everybody can do it because it just means i'm just taking the extra effort right to do the post to add a little more to write a little more because i'm trying to Reach people i'm trying to connect with people, yes and i'd, say like if you think about like from your heart, not your head and definitely not your wallet right like how can you just like i want to connect with people. I want my friends my followers, my the people, that i love and trust right to get this message.

So i'm gon na go the extra mile to make sure that happens. Yeah teach them the waterfall strategy, so the waterfall strategy um it's basically, so that you rank higher and lower hashtags and then once you start ranking there, it'll then serve you to the higher hashtags. So it's like a a 10 5 10 5 kind of thing. So having like 10 hashtags that are kind of under 5000 under 10.5 000.

So when you click on the hashtag, smaller number of hashtags yeah and then you'll go to five, which would have a little bit more like the super reacher type hashtag. So it would be like a hundred thousand to two hundred thousand, and then you do another ten of, like maybe 500 000 and then you'd go into the super reachers, which would be five of like 1.2 million hashtags, 2.5 million whatever, so that the idea is that You start ranking in these smaller hashtag buckets and once your post, because when you go on a hashtag, it'll, say top posts and then it'll say recent post. So you want to start ranking in those top posts and then it's going to start serving them into the other buckets yeah. So in terms of like hashtags, a lot of people are also like.

Do i copy and paste them like? Does that affect it? When you copy and paste it, can you still click on it? Yes, so that's not and they're like instagram knows i copy and pasted it. No, they don't yeah. You know as long as the hashtag once you have it in a comment or have it in a caption wherever it's clickable yeah, then you're, okay, so there's also the debate around. So, first of all the person listening, you just got a massive insight on how we've been able to grow our following continue to keep our content in front of people and every now and then have like a post go a little more viral than it normally would.

Based on our frequency - and you know, the number of people that follow us so um, so you're starting small right so you're like like is there a place? Is it hashtag like where, like what apps? Should they get or recommendations, so they? So they don't have to. Like try and create this and search it just go to an app and like download it and then just get the ones that you should add, so i use hashtastic they have a free version for it and essentially on that website. All you do is type in. Like let's say, i type in hashtag tom ferry it'll also serve me like 20 to 30 hashtags at other people who have been looking up hashtag tom ferry are using oh so then you can use those hashtags as like a block, so a block would be like 10 to 15 hashtags on a post, so i like that i like that app or that website, because it's kind of like doing the thinking for you yeah yeah, all right so hashtastic.

I think it's only a an app. No it's! I use it on the website. Okay, good all right, cool, yeah, all right so hashtag. So so we talked about strategy.

You got to have goals quarterly monthly. You got to track and measure which we didn't discuss, but we, you know, we look at the data all the time like hey where's, our following account going hey. We lost some people like that happens, right, hey, but we're gaining people. That's awesome! Then we talked about you know, maybe making engagement.

Your number one focus your number one priority. Then we talked about frequency. We talked about content buckets, we talked about channels a little bit. We got into stories, we talked about geotagging, we talked about the hashtag strategy.

Let's talk about reels, okay, because reels are entirely different in my opinion, yeah. So so, if somebody wants to really connect with a lot of people, i think reels on instagram. Right now is probably the spot. It's it yeah.

We talked to a facebook, rep weekly and she kind of gives us like. Oh, this is what's trending, this is, what's not you know, and she basically told us that well, reels is coming out with ads. So now you can put ads on reels. This is like a heavy focus right now right because instagram wants to be able or wants you to be able to use every aspect of their platform right so like can, we just say they just want to kill tick-tock, truly right, we'll see, and i'm like, i'm Very indifferent about tick-tock, because i think it's a, i think it's a different type of it's tick-tock is awesome.

It's purely entertainment, yeah right, it's not brand building, but it can be brand new because now we see like glenda baker and zachary, and so many others that are blowing up on tick, tock and and directly doing transactions from it. But they have to be super entertaining yeah well, going back to real thrills is like it's only short form, video content. You can also now put pictures on there too. If you think you can kind of do like a montage of pictures, if you'd like, but it's showing that, like behind the scenes, the fun using trending sounds like so you're yeah give them the strategy.

So it's like you, you do a short form. It's like 29 to 30. Second, video. Second video right.

I think it's all about the music next yeah, so looking you can type in on google trending, real songs and it'll, give you a list of them. The reason why you want to use those songs is that you can have the song very low too, like you can turn down the audio on the song to like seven, so it's just barely playing in the background, but so your video shows up under that song. When people click on it bingo, you know so song and then what about text the text? I would always put text on the video it pro i've seen it perform so much better than if you don't have any text at all yeah, and i think that's just because of like seo. Picking up on it and also a lot of people use their phones.

You know in an office and they don't play the sound right, so they want to be able to read the text on there yeah and it, and the thing is, is like in reals. You can create all this on the platform like you, don't have to go to a video editor and it's so simple yeah it it step by step. Okay, you've uploaded the video now. Do you want to add text? Do you want to add a video music yeah yeah, it's very easy! So so, if you went back and looked at the content buckets should they follow the same strategy like here's, some behind the scenes, here's day in the life, here's me doing my work right.

Here's me with my visa dog: i don't have a visa dog by the way, but my brother patrick does, but you know like like so do you want to show all five of those? Would you do all five in a row or would you kind of go? Here's a couple of this side of my life and a couple of that side of my life and a couple this side of my life. What would you recommend? Well, i would i would try it all. It's like it's one of those things where you really do need to test it, because your audience could be different than my audience. True, you know like i could be posting behind the scenes stuff on my page, but my followers don't like it, but i post it on your page and they like it yeah.

It's all about your your following. You need to look at your insights because that's when you'll figure it out not everyone is the same because some people say well. This worked really well for me. You try.

It doesn't work well for you yeah. Do you think it's okay for agents to literally go onto facebook and say you know what content are you most interested in or what, like maybe they'd, ask the questions, maybe differently right, but they might say, like you know, what are your concerns worries fears about housing? You know what do you think, because then you get from your customers what's on their mind, then you go create content, yeah, you're speaking directly to their ambitions, their fears, their desires, yeah. What are your thoughts on that? Well, i know so. Yes to that and another thing is some people think? Well, i don't have enough followers to get that response right, like no one's going to respond back to me then start sending dms to your followers right right and ask them be, like hey hope, you're having a good day, i'm creating content right now.

I was really curious, xyz, what's interesting to you, yeah like reply with abcd, what's interesting or when you think about your home right when you think about you, know living in in your neighborhood today like what matters most to you, what are you excited about? What are you fearful about yeah give me this. Give me the scoop yeah, if they're, if you're, not getting the engagement by you posting on your story, then go out asking for it. Yeah, you know and sending a dm is so easy people are going to respond to it right and it could lead to a further conversation with someone yeah. You know yeah what about um so that we do a lot of like q and a's yeah right.

We're all just you know like hey, i'm getting on an airplane. You ask me a question like and you see it because you're like active on my page, like i get a lot of questions, yeah should agents be doing that what yes, okay, yeah 100. I was giving you a softball. I was hoping you're, gon na, say yeah, that's right, like hello, oh yeah, yeah! Why not right? You know uh why questions about the market questions about home prices, yeah questions about? What's you know what? Whatever buying a house like? What questions you, even if you get like one or two questions, what again what i pick up on when i'm doing this, so thank you every one of you, that's ever answered or asked a question there.

What it gives me is deep insight on. What's on your mind, yeah, and when i get like 14 questions in a row, essentially that are like i'm at 25 sales. I want to go to 80 sales. What do i have to do hey? How do i get my first listing? How do i build my team? You start to see like okay, people are really interested in these six or seven things yeah and then i'm like hey.

Let's go film, some content just on that yeah and at the same time i also love it because i'm helping people i'm seeing some of the best agents on the planet and people. I've never engaged with ask a question that i get to directly say: courtney. Oh, my god hey. This is what you should do.

Boom boom boom boom boom yeah right, and i think, over time too, you start to really find the themes like right now for your content, yeah, we you do the ask me any things, there's always at least 10 to 15 new agent questions right, always right, yeah. You know so we know that our content, we should have some sort of new agent content pocket just for that yeah, because it's it and over time we've started to see that yeah. You know that name. So it's like, you need to stick with it right, even if initially you're seeing you're not seeing the results you want, they will come yeah.

You know that was okay, that right there is a mic drop, because when i look back at like starting my youtube channel in 2007 and then my next one in 2009, starting on facebook in 2008 and literally my wife would like walk in and she's like what Are you doing you're spending all day at your computer and you're talking to people on facebook? Like really, and i was like baby, i'm not talking to people, i'm talking to clients, friends and potential clients around the world. I was doing that in 2008. Yeah right, i was like this is like my version of prospecting right, like i'm, just hey courtney how's your business. What's going on and you get in these conversations back like, but it felt like you could do that all day, long on facebook and everybody actually saw what was going on versus the news feed being a million miles now um.

But i know making that decision early on like if you care enough and you want to connect with people like you, just got to do it differently today and that's really what we're talking about yeah, the different things you have to do exactly and from you doing That back in 2007, there are still people now in 2021. That are like. I remember when tom responded back to me, he's such a good guy or, like you know, people remember that kind of stuff, like they'll, always remember how you made them feel bingo. You know bingo all right, so we got ta bounce, but i hope you got some well.

I know i'm taking hope out of this. I know you got some value. You're, probably gon na listen to this six or seven times, probably gon na, send it to your marketing director and say: please listen to this um, so courtney. Thank you again for being on the show.

As always, i did, i should have got a photo of the apple boxes that are suddenly taller than me. Really not that short, yes, but hey, give us a comment. Let us know what you think and thank you so much for being a part of the podcast and listening to all of our fun stuff. We wish you a great day and we'll see you soon.

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