SMMCamp for Real Estate (Social Media Marketing Camp) is back:

Thursday April 12 at 12 Noon Eastern

As Always it’s online and free.

SMMCamp 14 will focus on What’s Up with the New Facebook and features 4 real estate experts who use Facebook to find new clients and close more business. Our experts will share how they’ve adapted to the new Facebook and will share their most successful tips and tactics.

This is a no fluff 3-hour workshop that focuses on tactics that work in today’s real estate market. Click here to view the list of speakers.

Register to the right ========>>>>>>>>

We have a great list of sponsors for SMMCamp 14 -The New Facebook this Thursday April 12 at 12 Noon Eastern. Register to the right ====>>>>

The reason you should be excited by this news is because each sponsor has a special giveaway available to anyone who registers for SMMCamp. Click on their logos.

I cannot believe it is 2012 already.  I am big on even-numbered years probably because I was born in one according to the “experts”. So here we are a new year and a new look to Facebook.  How many of you have the new Timeline?  How many of you like the new Timeline? How many of you would like to kick Facebook in the ass for one more change?

I have had Timeline since many of us could hack it through various different sites. Fortunately it was an alleged “legal” hack if there is such a thing so I didn’t have to look quite like this:

Besides I do not like to sweat.

I happen to love Timeline because it is timeless.  I can go back to the date I was conceived I suppose and make it part of my history by year, but then you would know how old I am and I don’t want you to know that.

I love the GREAT BIG PICTURES – and last week Mike Mueller nominated my cover picture as the best one he has ever seen. (if you are not a friend of his, you have to subscribe and it’s worth it).  Now that is an honor.

Here is the exact quote:

Have you been running around in circles trying to figure out a way to get the word out about an event you or your company are having?  Have you used traditional email blasts over and over again with not very impressive results? Are you dialing for RSVP’s?  Are you tired of spending hours of your precious time doing these things when you could be doing listing, selling and/or negotiations that put money in your pocket?

I bet you have never considered using an event service such as Eventbrite.  You type in a few words and hit send and the site handles the rest.  You can customize the event and send it out all neatly packaged in a format to match what you are doing.

AND it’s FREE as long as the event you are creating is also FREE!

Who doesn’t love FREE?

Who doesn’t like setting up an event in 3 minutes too?

I am President Elect for the Tampa Women’s Council of Realtors.  We are going to hold monthly tech/social media roundtables and I have already seen what using Eventbrite can do to make my work easier.  Invitees can accept or decline as soon as they open an invite and this will just make everyone’s life simpler all the way around.

Creating events for buyers and sellers to get your name or your company name (Mr/Ms Broker) is vital in this market.

We all know snail mail gets tossed in the trash can before it gets read and snail mail doesn’t fall into my favorite category of FREE.

Try it – I guarantee you will like it or I will give you your money back-oh that’s right it is FREE!

JUST SAY NO TO SNAIL MAIL!

http://mashable.com/2011/09/26/facebook-updates-timeline-to-avoid-outing-unfrienders/

Facebook fixed the bug – darn now I can not see who outed me…..

Carole

Ever since I saw the movie “The Time Machine” I have wanted to travel back in time.  It seems that Facebook has now decided to give us a chance to do that.

Coming soon to a computer screen near you……….”Timeline the  Movie”.

I actually have had the Timeline screen since last Friday.  I followed the directions on quasi-hacking that I found on mashable.com and went for it.  I like it.  It’s soothing…..what did you expect me to say?  I am 100% girlie and to me the page is going to  appeal to the feminine form because it is pastel.  And my friends wait until you see the size of your posted photos now.

As soon as I created (quasi-hacked) the application I went back in time.  Everything is there for you to see – including the old drama of course.  There are benefits.  The way Facebook is now our posts all go into some dead zone and no matter how magnificent the post is, no one can seem to penetrate that dead zone.

This really is an adventure into the future because while at first your Timeline will be auto-generated eventually you will go to your very own private activity log and view everything you ever shared since you hopped on the Facebook train.  How many times have you been told nothing ever goes away on the Internet????  Well here comes the proof.

Today the Daily Mail in the UK published one of their interpretations of the Timeline writing that in their opinion we will all be able to figure out who has un-friended us with this ability to travel into our past.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2041574/Facebook-New-feature-allow-users-know-doesnt-like-them.html?ITO=1490

I suppose some people with nothing exciting going on in their lives might travel back and forth to figure this out.  To me that is an entire waste of time and I don’t particularly care who did hit the X on me.

One thing I can say with enthusiasm about this is that the ticker is gone – I don’t like the ticker, I find the movement distracting IMHO.

I see change this way – this is our brain when we embrace change:

And this is our brain when we don’t embrace change:

Your choice.

The devil made me write this blog, and re-post it here.  I get a lot of comments on it, and I have no problem with anyone taking the idea changing it out for your market and using it because I believe in writing with humor. If you like it, use it.  WARNING: This blog post is NOT for the faint of heart

I call it “The Top 10 Reasons I Won’t Show You a Foreclosed Home in Tampa” (Tampa being the keyword in the headline that will get this blog to shop up on a Google search.).

I will show you foreclosed homes if you really insist and twist my arm and  I will bring with me my foreclosure-ready survival kit and you need to bring yours as I have written about below.

10.  The grass, if you can call it that, will be as tall as an elephant’s eye and the landscaping that was there will be growing across the sidewalks making it difficult to walk to the entry door.  Then there is the possibility that there may be living things in that overgrown grass and landscaping.  I suggest wearing waders when approaching any such growth, so pack them or bring them with you.

9.  Once the door is finally opened you will dodge mud wasp nests and spider webs always keeping in mind we have two dangerous spiders that like vacant houses – the Black Widow who spins her web from the bushes to the house and the Brown Recluse who likes to hide behind the lock boxes.  I will give you the code and a can of spider spray, you can yell to me when it is safe to come into the house after you check for spiders.

8.  The power and the water have been turned off, the bank expects me to pay to have them turned on, I think the lender who will make a lot of money on the deal should turn everything on, not me.  Therefore this house will be dark, musty and hot.  I will provide hand held fans and flashlights and nose plugs if needed.

7.  Now here is the really tricky reason I really don’t want to go into a vacant, foreclosed home-we don’t know if it is really vacant.  I suggest loudly knocking on the door as well as yelling as you enter before waving me in, because vacant homes have been known to have residents.  I will arm you with pepper spray.

6.  Now that you have assessed no humans live in this home, please be aware critters may have taken up residence.  If one window has been left open, one door, one dryer vent from the clothes dryer the owners stole there could be critters.  I will provide more pepper spray.

5.  Now that you have assessed the fact that there are no human or animal critters living in this house, look down.  That crunching sound under your feet is not a trail of potato chips, in Florida due to the humidity, they would not crunch.  Those are our state bird – the Palmetto bug also known as the largest flying cockroach known to man.  I have seen some as big as the State of Rhode Island.  Keep the waders on please.

4.  Keeping those flashlights on please train them to the wood moldings and anything else that is wood and I will at this time hand out magnifying glasses so you can get down on your hands and knees and look for sawdust piles.  If you see any then you will know that these are definitive signs of termites or other wood destroying organisms.  Nasty!

3. Please also train your flashlights to the corners of the ceilings in the bathrooms and laundry rooms where you might find mold lurking.  The advice by officials of the power company here is to crack one window on a vacant home so mold doesn’t develop – I guess they would rather have vermin move in than mold.   If there is a swimming pool be advised we do not have green pool paint here that is an overgrowth of algae and who knows what lies on the bottom of that mess.

2.  I know as you walk through these homes you will have noticed that there are no appliances, kitchen cabinets, plumbing fixtures or lighting fixtures.  That’s okay you want to re-design your new dream home to your perspective of what is acceptable.  If you purchase a foreclosure and get all the above cleaned up, killed, and repainted with everything brand spanking new here is the #1 reason I will not sell YOU a foreclosed home.

1.  You may not actually own it.  That’s right after plunking down all that money, doing all that work to make it YOUR dream home YOU MAY NOT ACTUALLY OWN IT and I don’t want to be sued.

(I hope you are smiling – and while I wrote it as tongue-in-cheek, I seriously do not show these properties. I let Larry, my husband, show them, he wears Texas boots I wear sandals.  My friend, Teresa Boardman, in Minnesota wrote me about sliding on ice in vacant homes after reading my blog.)

I apologize for the bug….when I originally wrote this the bug actually got people to read what I wrote-weird huh?

As a last suggestion – as much as I can I use “Greater Tampa Bay” or “Tampa Area” in my headlines.  People are searching by cities – your area is your keyword in your headline.  I hope you all come back

I just returned from the Florida Realtor Convention and it was very interesting.  I actually had people come up to me and tell me that they follow me on Facebook,LinkedIn and on this blog.  It’s humbling to have someone recognize you by name and I feel honored.

I saw many friends I have known for a long, long time and met many new and wonderful people.  You just never know where connections will lead down the road. I spent as much time as I could with people who had questions on social media both face to face in the hallways or in the back of the room.  On Saturday I was the “expert” on Social Media in the Business Trends and Technology presentation, another honor and it has made my phone ring.

However I think what surprised me the most were the two speakers who came highly recommended as ones I should hear who turned out to be drinking from the Haterade sippy cup when it comes to blogging and Google + and other social media platforms.

In the first presentation  given by a gentleman from the deep South, we were asked how many people read blogs.  Not very many of us raised our hands so that lead him right into the following line; “see only 6 people are reading your blogs so why the heck are you writing them?”  Of course not wanting to be on the outside looking in most of the audience laughed.  I didn’t.  I sat there for a couple more minutes but after being told I need to call 50 people per week, 200 in a month and that I needed to send personally written notes (200/month) in blue ink and stuff them into cream-colored envelopes I left.  Don’t scold me, I do write notes to people – sincere notes.

Every thing he spouted reminded me of 1990 in real estate.

The next presentation where the Haterade was in the sippy cup was all about recruiting new agents.  This new dude made the same lame joke about blogging and then he took it a step further.  He asked who in the room is on Google + and then he proceeded to whistle a funeral march stating Google + is dying.

He did not stop there, he bashed Facebook users and social media in general.

At first I thought that this was all about the generational communication I wrote about several articles ago. Then I talked it over with several successful agents who use every facet of social media and it dawned on me that both of these presenters had programs of their own they were trying to sell to the audience.  The last place they wanted our thoughts to be was on anything social media because they don’t sell that way. They are after the low-hanging fruit in the orchard of agents.  They want those who don’t want social media.  That’s ok, we can’t expect everyone to embrace what they don’t understand.

Low-hanging fruit, we have Mother Nature to thank for the expression. A fruit-bearing tree often contains some branches low enough for animals and humans to reach without much effort. The fruit contained on these lower branches may be not be as ripe or attractive as the fruit on higher limbs, but it is usually more abundant and easier to harvest. From this we get the popular expression “low hanging fruit”, which generally means selecting the easiest targets with the least amount of effort.

Those who poke fun at us are looking for people who want to connect the dots without much effort.  We who embrace social media love to color outside the lines – and we don’t drink the Haterade from sippy cups.  We drink in knowledge, we digest what we learn and we don’t have writer’s cramp from writing 200 notes a month, do we?

Come fly with me again soon.

I read an article on Mashable that YouTube recently passed 2 Billion views a day on their network. YouTube, a company that is barely 5 years old has become quite the major component to any businesses online marketing strategy.  Most of you know me as a social media speaker, social media advisor, or builder of Custom WordPress Sites. but over the past few months I have also become quite an addict to video and learning more and more about how to make better quality video.

Thanks to my buddy Mike Mueller, this addiction has grown exponentially.  If you don’t believe me, just check out my video gear page that lists all the equipment I use to shoot video now. So you may wonder why I love video more & more, well let me explain.

Next to behemoth search engine Google, YouTube (which is actually owned by Google) is the second most used search engine in the world. Companies can gain instant notoriety by establishing a solid video online. Examples: Remember the Social Media Revolution? This video regarding some statistics on the power of social media gave a businesses YouTube channel an instant jolt of traffic. Or maybe you remember the infamous song of how United Breaks Guitars? The band Sons of Maxwell became overnight successes because of their catchy tune about how United Airlines broke a guitar and refused to pay for it. They created a quick video poking humor at the event & within no time the video had been viewed over 8 million times. Their success was so great they even created another video United Breaks Guitars Breaks My Career that basically says thanks for destroying our gear, you made us famous!

So how does someone optimize their efforts on YouTube & other video sites? Well, there are a few things that if done consistently will help you to get the best results:

1. Tagging & Title of Video. Just like when you write a blog post, the title of the video is one of the most important parts. I had a client who had a video that was really good on something that people would want to see, but the title was done all wrong. In fact, it had just the basic random title that the video camera named it when they downloaded the video. When the client uploaded it to YouTube, they never took time to change it and could not understand why their video was not getting much traffic. So, we renamed the video from something like dsc02842.mov to a term people would search for & the video started to take off almost instantly. Now, that video has over 1,100 views! The tags are also important on a video because they help to categorize your video properly to be searched. I find myself going to YouTube now for answers on a question rather than search engines.

2. Distribution of Video. The second thing most people is load their video to YouTube but nothing else. Nowadays we all have Facebook, Twitter, websites, blogs, Posterous accounts & more. YouTube has now made it really easy to distribute your videos out to other networks. When I take my reach of all these networks & add them together, it is well over 15,000 people. Why not share those videos with that audience? The more exposure you can give to a video, the more likely it is to be viewed by masses. Not to mention, those who watch the video & like it will then also share it on with others. Each person has a wide net of connections and you can see quickly how your video can then spread like wildfire!

3. Keeping it to the point. Have you ever clicked on a video to watch & as it starts you see it is 8:39 and you just do not want to sit there that long? Videos that drag on longer than 3-4 minutes normally have a lot lower viewing level than those that are only 3-4 minutes in length.

In addition to these three tips on how to optimize the use of YouTube & other video services, here is a post I wrote a while back on how to create effective videos. This post shares with you 5 really basic tips on how to make videos that people will actually sit & watch without having to spend thousands of dollars to have the videos produced. It covers things like music, how to pan shots properly, and much more. It is a great beginners guide to starting on video.

In closing, if you are not yet using video in your marketing strategies, it is definitely time to start exploring this. One final piece of advice: You do not need to be a professional videographer to create good video. Most videos that go viral are ones shot with basic digital cameras, flip cams, and most of the times are not even edited. So do not allow things like that hold you back from getting started. Raw video can be just as beneficial for your business as one that is shot by the pros. If you want some assistance in getting started with this, feel free to contact me and I can help you. The biggest key however, is to just get started!

Make sure you sign up for SMM Camp 11 which will feature many great speakers all sharing their tips for creating great video.  Sign up here for SMM Camp 11

Since I could record my very first video I’ve been a huge fan.

It’s not that I like the way I sound on camera, truth is nobody does.  It’s not that I like the way I look either – I like to say I have a face for radio.  I love video because nothing can get the message across better.  The emotion,  the tone of my voice, the  look in my eyes, all tell the story.  That’s the power of video and nothing short of Face to Face can compare to it.  That’s what draws me to video.

I might be know for building custom facebook  business pages, or wordpress blogs but a big part of how I make a living is by shooting high def, short format video for clients.

Back in the ’80′s I started shooting video on an old Sony that recorded directly onto a full sized VHS tape.  I thought I was the bomb when I moved to a new fangled Sony Hi-8.  I was rockin the analog at 560×480.  Then along came digital.  I worked my way up from one ProSumer camera to another.  If you weren’t shooting with the best quality glass and equipment you were making garbage video.  Plain and simple.

Then came the Flip.  I bought one of the first and it changed me forever.

At $149 I was shooting when and where I wanted, popping out the USB and publishing on the fly!  I realized there was a wide world of video out there.  Not just a single style, but many styles – each one appropriate for a particular instance.

I started experimenting with screen capture video, talking head styles, overlays and even video email.  I studied the styles of people I liked including icons like Sergio Leone (remember The Good, the Bad and the Ugly?  Yeah that guy!).  Along the way I also learned to have fun.

I realized the power of sound and music and the ability for simple images to move in more ways than one.

Back in 2008 I put a a few forms of what I was doing into a single video and won a video contest.

Along the way I learned a few things.

The Basics of any video shoot:

Four things to keep in mind before you press the red button.

• Framing – is what ever you are shooting going to be visible?  Should you move in a little closer?  Sergio Leone close?
• Movement - are you stable enough?  I suggest using a tripod if and when you can.  Ok, make that always.  Nothing is worse than giving viewers motion sickness.
• Lighting – is the subject standing in enough light?  How about too much light?  Or standing in a dark room in front of a bright window?  Take a moment and think about your light sources.
• Sound – this might be the most important.  Quality sound.  Can I hear you?  Can I also hear the truck driving or the other conversations in the room?  Ambient sounds kill.  Echos kill.  Try a Boom or Lav or move to a quieter place.

Shooting from the Hip:

These days, when it comes to impromptu video I still carry my Flip (one of 6) or shoot on my cell phone or even my laptop.  Even with these tools I still have to consider the basics.  You might be compromising one aspect for another but look for the best balance.

Shooting the High End:

I also shoot commercial high def video.  For those instances I have a full studio I travel with.   I use a full high def Canon along with a few DSLR’s.  For a single conversation I might record 4 or more points of view.  I want to better control the aperture, white balance, shutter speed, frames per second, and ISO.  I use several different soft boxes with reflectors and diffusers to achieve the lighting I need.  I generally use a directional shotgun mic on a boom and pipe that to an external recording device or a series of Lav mics depending on the situation to get the sound I want.

Maybe the most important tip I can give you on video is this…

Just do it.

Shoot a video, learn what you could have done better and shoot another one, and then another one.  Just do it and then do it again.  You don’t need all the gear I have.  Start with what you have and go from  there.