Welcome to our monthly feature, Social Bootcamp With Gogo Bethke!
In this episode, Gogo discusses the importance of being consistently active in social media. She goes into detail about branding and how to view social media as a “store front.” Gogo also provides tips on how to feature local businesses in your posts and stories and how that can lead to new business. Gogo also talks about her Social Bootcamp and explains what she and her team teach. Last, Gogo gives some tips on how to get the most engagement from your social posts.
If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube!
DISCLAIMER: Gogo’s 30-day moneyback guarantee is no longer available.
Gogo Bethke can be reached at gogosrealestate@gmail.com and at her Instagram account.
Purchase Gogo’s Bootcamp by clicking here – Keeping It Real Podcast listeners get a discount!
Transcript
D.J. Paris 0:00
This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by gogos bootcamp Are you a real estate agent looking for the best social media training program on the planet? Gogo Beth key is considered the top Instagram Realtor in the country. And her step by step training program will take your social media game to the next level. She’s so confident there’s a 30 day money back guarantee so you have nothing to lose keeping it real listeners receive a special discount so please visit Gogo podcast.com That’s Gee oh gee Oh podcast.com for your special discount and now on with the Show
All right, welcome to keeping it real, the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. I am your guide and host through the show and today we have our monthly series yet again called Social bootcamp with gogo Beth key. Let me tell you a little bit about Gogo. If you’re new to our show, go go Beth ki came to the United States in 2003. To build her American dream. She was broke, she had no sphere of influence, no experience, barely spoke English and only $6 to her name. So that left her with nothing else but Facebook to help build our business, which is where she started, she created gogos real estate and her real estate career began. Now with the power of social media gogo has sold over 45 million and residential real estate transactions. She shares the good, the bad, and the ugly side of real estate. And our honest snippets in our everyday life got her 10s of 1000s of social media followers. And in the real estate community, she has earned the nickname the social media queen. Now after being asked to present at various conferences and events with realtors. She built her own social media Bootcamp for realtors called Go Go’s bootcamp. Today she has a team of almost 200 agents growing nationwide. Her goal is to help as many agents as possible make a name for themselves in real estate use utilizing social media. Now if she can do it, this girl from Transylvania, Romania with no formal US education, no sphere of influence, no money, no experience and an accent, then anyone else can do that as well. Please follow gogo on Instagram at gogos real estate. So geo geo s real estate. Also, we highly, highly recommend signing up for her program called gogos bootcamp. For our listeners, we have a special website set up with a discount you can visit at Gogo podcast.com Gee, oh, gee, Oh, podcast.com. And please sign up for it. It’s an amazing system. I couldn’t recommend it more highly. We never recommend anything on the show. This is the one thing we recommend please, everyone, go buy it. It’s amazing. And it’ll help you build your business. Welcome again. Gogo, thanks for being on the show again.
Gogo Bethke 3:06
Well, thank you so much for having me. My pleasure every time.
D.J. Paris 3:10
It is it is fun. And this is such a great series because social media is so important right now, especially even though now we’re realtors are starting to get more into being outside and maybe even some are meeting with clients face to face. However, for the last three or four months, social media has played such a significant role in how we get news, just staying in touch. And the activity on social media has just exploded probably due to the pandemic. So I’m so grateful we’re continuing to talk about the even as things start to slowly return to normal the importance of social media.
Gogo Bethke 3:48
Yeah, I mean, if you think about it through the pandemic, people were home doing this all day. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, and your goal is to be an option, you might not be the choice, but you at least want to be an option. So by them seeing you constantly on social media, it’s like a reoccurring event in the brain. It’s they might not read what you’re posting, they might not even watch the video that you posted, but they it registered in their brain is always the Go Go check again. Oh, she’s a realtor. She just posted again. Oh, they’re so hot. So she’s working, she sold another houses they go go check again. I just want them in their brain in the back of their mind to know my name and know what I do. So when they’re ready, and they need a realtor, they know where to find me. And that’s your goal. So on social media, you look at your profile as your storefront and you want to make them pretty, you’re selling you’re selling something and there’s a lot of stores that are on the same street that they’re selling pretty much the same thing. So you’re gonna a lot of other realtors. So you pretty much want to make sure that yours is so pretty. It’s so attractive that there is a reason for them to come in and buy something that you have for sale and you’re not selling houses. I know many Realtors just blew your mind. You’re not we’re not selling real estate. You’re selling yourself and you services is there’s almost two more million realtors out there. Why on earth should someone choose you? And that’s yet to achieve on social media.
D.J. Paris 5:08
This is this is branding. And this is so important that if everyone can understand, think of yourself as a brand, so I’ll tell a quick story. When I, when I was I was a financial advisor A lifetime ago, and one of the most successful financial advisors in my office, he had been doing it 30 years, we were doing a presentation together for a bunch of prospective clients. And I said, Okay, when in the presentation, do we ask for the sale? He goes, you never ask for the sale. He goes, if you have to ask for the sale, you’re doing it wrong. And he said, this is about branding. And so what what go go with what you’re just talking about is so important is what is the I mean, it used to be really difficult to do branding, because you didn’t have social media, you had to go through traditional other media outlets and pay newspapers or radio ads, or television ads, which you obviously can still do, or, or buy bench backs or get billboards, you can all you can still do all of those things, but a lot cheaper and easier. And there’s so many great technology tools to be able to assist you in branding on social media, but really think of it as you know, because sometimes people ask well, how do I get clients on social media? Like, don’t think of it so much is how to get clients think about what is your brand promoting? What are you choke showcasing? On your social media profiles? And that’s, that’s what you teach?
Gogo Bethke 6:23
Yes. And what are you trying to achieve with that post? Because I tell our students all the time, it’s not about posting to post, what are you trying to achieve with that post? Are you trying to attract an agent to your brokerage? I am trying to sell a listing that you just put on the market? Are you trying to help another person who is not licensed yet to even consider the idea of becoming a realtor? Are you trying to get leads to find buyers in the market? Is this an open house promotion that you’re doing? Are you doing an event with local people that you just want awareness of your brand, and you’re doing maybe a client appreciation, and there’s so many different reasons. But whatever that post is about, you have to have an end goal. I’m not just posting a pretty picture, and posting that to try to get something and there’s a point to and I usually start with a story with every picture that I post, there’s usually a story, and then something that I asked them to do, or respond or share or tag or something at the very end, there’s usually something that I’m trying to achieve. So talking about,
D.J. Paris 7:21
we’re talking about engagement. So it’s like we have to think about okay, what our strategy has to be, you know, who’s our who is our audience? What do they want? What can I provide them with social media that meets their needs, but also keeps them engaged with with with the brand. So it’s not just let me post a beautiful picture of my dinner last night, which is okay, if that’s what you want to do. But then you really need to be thoughtful and say, Okay, what’s my intention? I’m using that as a non real estate example. But what’s my intention? If I’m just having fun? I want to show everyone what I made for dinner great. Or do I really want to engage my audience, maybe then you could follow up by saying, Hey, here’s the recipe I use, does anyone else have a recipe that they want to share that that could be an example of trying to encourage engagement in a non real estate way.
Gogo Bethke 8:09
Or if you’re in a restaurant, you’re doing that to support that local restaurant, and you should be in it. So it’s not just the dinner, but it should be you with the dinner in front of you and say, Oh, guys, this is my favorite place to go is the wooden spoon downtown, right and and this is my favorite dish. And I come at least once a week to get it. So when you are here next time, make sure to get the blah, blah, blah. So right now what did I achieve with that? A they see that I’m a normal person, I eat carbs. Just kidding. No, that’s not the goal. But that’s one of the goals. I want them to know that I passed up. Now what I want with that is then support that local business because then in return when I go back to the wooden spoon and say, Hey, guys, I want to target Pine Creek with monthly market blah, blah, blah, have it be a postcard, okay, can you give me something is there something that your restaurant can give me the free appetizer maybe drinks for to maybe this or that were on the back of the postcard now I can put a wooden spoon poopin which didn’t cost me anything. But because I’m helping promote wooden spoon with the same post. Now they also have a reason because it generates them business. So now I can give a 20% off on a you know on an agenda for two
D.J. Paris 9:17
weeks now is now is such a great time to support local restaurants. Of course we all know nationwide restaurants are are struggling. And even the most successful restaurants are still it’s a difficult time. So when if you’re eating in in store and you’re going to take a picture and you’ll make sure to obviously tag the restaurant. I personally what I would do is with you know with Instagram of course you can do multiple photos in a single post. So what a great opportunity to you know, showcase the dish you want to see have everyone know about but then also go take a picture with the staff or maybe the owner or the chef and say Hey, is it okay? If I take a picture with you guys and send it out? I work I’m a realtor. I work with people in this area who you know might want to come in to hear and I really want to just make sure everyone knows you’re open, they will be so honored and thrilled. And then you can say, Hey, by the way, I want to start doing this regularly. Maybe I want to do a mailer go goes, you said, Can you can we offer something to my, to my followers, you know, any sort of special discount,
Gogo Bethke 10:16
you might send out a monthly email and you feature a local restaurant or feature local. So this could be your crowd that you’re sending out to and say, Hey, I have about 250 local people that always read my email my automated emails, and I send out monthly. Can I feature you guys this month? Is there something that you can give to my to my followers, and then I say, Yeah, give 20% out. So now not only that, you’ve promoted a local business and they might have even heard about the, the like this restaurant and I love going to local, it’s called the wooden spoon. They are Farm to Fork style and they grow most of their stuff in the basement in the wintertime. Right there. So it’s fresh herbs, it’s fresh, it’s green. So things like that they might not even know most people just probably drive right by in front of it not knowing how good the restaurant is. Become a you know how many times I got leads from a restaurant by the way, can I give you another tip since we only do this if you’re a good tip, or if you’re sucking tip or don’t do this. But if you’re a good tipper I always, you know, leave my very nice tip and then I slip in my business card and I put on there if you have any other research I would love to do. I love it. And if you get they will fit it’s gonna go straight in the trash. So don’t waste your business card if you’re not a good tipper. But I got a lot of business out of that. Just by, you know, being a good tip for and always, always, always leave your business card in restaurant.
D.J. Paris 11:35
And another thing too, if you’re in the restaurant, and you’re taking a picture with the chef or the owner, and wanting to feature them and say, Guys, this is such a great place, please support the restaurant. You can also turn your video on and do a quick little interview to say is it okay? If I just if we do a quick you know, Instagram Live or Facebook Live or just record on video and upload it later. But I can we can just explain why people should come to your restaurant, what do you guys do that special in your case, you know, explaining what the wooden spoon does, you know that is is often in time. So better said bye. Bye. The owners are the people who are passionate about to start that business. So you know, your phone is a camera, it’s a video, go use it and then say is it okay? If I promote this on social media? They will absolutely say yes. And here you go, you’re helping them and hopefully, you’ll be driving traffic to their business. But hopefully that will they’ll they’re gonna want to share that post as well ask them, Hey, I’m gonna I’m gonna tag you. Do you mind sharing this as well with your followers. And there you go. And hopefully you get
Gogo Bethke 12:33
to do the more you become that so that local experts, and then of course, after you post it, you’re going to ask them, Hey, would you please share it. And then they were like, Oh my gosh, we just got featured on Google’s real estate guys look at you know, check us out. And then now all of their followers get to see your posts as well. So now you gain followers as well even though that wasn’t your intention with it, you were truly just trying to have a look restaurant, but it’s keep growing for everybody. That’s how we can get back.
D.J. Paris 12:57
Perfect. Let’s let’s talk about photography, or just the the the social media has really transformed from being a written media where Twitter and Facebook really become became more popular just by reading posts, and they weren’t as popular around, you know, the photography and the images. Although that’s all it was always a part, then Instagram came and changed everything right. And now we know that Instagram is really the number one place people are spending time. This is obviously you know, one of your specialties. But what what I think it’s done and I want to get your opinion is it’s really changed our entire behavior patterns as a society, we now instead of reading, we’re looking, we’re looking and evaluating a visual image, we you know, we now have apps that that can, you know, change the dynamics of a photo to make it more attractive, less attractive, brighter, you know, darker. It used to be only you know, graphic designers have the ability to do that. Now we all have that ability. How important is that when it comes to listings, and the photography that we’re showcasing for those listings,
Gogo Bethke 14:03
I’m into just like like cold calling. You know, when somebody is cold calling, you can tell in someone’s voice if they’re happy, you can tell them they’re nervous, you can tell them they’re mad you can have they’re annoyed. So same thing when somebody is really good at cold calling, they are really good at changing their personality and always sounding cheery and always sounding like they know what they have to gather so send it social media, they don’t post it post you’re not just going to take a shitty photos who’s my friend and just post it out there just because you have to get a post them by noon today. Your microphone, don’t even do it because you’re gonna do more damage than good. If you’re not when I decided to do social media, I take it seriously it’s my job. I make sure that I have a very nice photo every single day to post I really should and I have a quote, at least every six thing that I post is a quote I make sure that it’s edited I make sure that my blah blah blah, make sure I tag I mean try hashtag. So it is absolutely very important to edit those photos. And I joke around but this is the truth. I take at least 46 photo until one is really good. My children are trained. I used to pay now they’re 11 and 13 but they were like four and six at a time when I, you know, two and four at a time when I started. And as they were growing up, I pay him I used to pay him $1 For every photo, but then when they took 46, I would have $46. And none of them was because I was like, no, no, no, no, no, from now on, it’s $1 for the photo that I actually post, so then they have to put a little effort into it, make sure my hat is not cut out, and all the stuff and then I put it through a lot of apps. So I literally just had a message woken up waking up this morning, somebody asked me, Do you have photographer walking around with you? Nope. All the photos are taken with my phone. I have the iPhone 10 to 27. And what happens is literally Who am I right with whoever I’m with. Or if I’m in a random restaurant by myself sitting at the coffee table, I asked the stranger sitting right next to him like, I’m so sorry. But I built a brand on social media and I have to maintain it. So I need a photo of me sitting here working away. I’m not even going to look at the camera. I’m seriously going to act like I’m working. Would you please just shoot a couple photos from all sections? I get your coffee and your coffees at me. And they were like, oh, yeah, sure. I’ll do it for free. No, no worries. No worries, I usually offer something in return. I just met with an agent. Couple weeks ago, there was a guy walking into a restaurant as we were walking out. We didn’t have a photo together. I asked this random dude I’ve never seen before. I’m so sorry. But would you take a couple photos of us and buy a couple I need like 46. And he was like, I got it. I have a wife. I’m like, okay, good. I literally just stood there every smile, and he posed to me to me, and then he took the photos. So then you put it through a lot of apps, then you’re gonna go and find which one is the one that truly representing you. And your best side, meaning I don’t want to crap before I don’t want to picking your nose. When I close I you know, I mean, like, you’re going to find that one that it looks like you it’s going to put a smile on someone’s face. And it goes along with the message that you’re trying to portray for the day. Because all of my posts go along with something or it’s a mindset or it’s a goal or to something that is realistic or entrepreneurialship related to the photo kind of need to match the message that you’re trying to achieve that day, then you’re going to put it through a few apps. So for iPhone users, Android users, my two favorite apps, if the photo is close up, so you want to edit your face, like just make it you know, if you have iPads and things like that, which, you know, you know, you want your vast version out there if even if it’s not reality necessarily. But in order for people to take a look at it and to capture their attention or, you know, capture their attention, I think is what I need to say. You want to make sure that that photo is the best version of yourself. So for that the closer photos, will you add any faces, it’s perfect 365. You might on I use it up forever. Now I’ll be honest with you, though, I wrote an article about them that they track your location, and you really can’t turn it off. So if that bothers you, then don’t use 19. But I tried to disclose all of the apps every time I use them if I have, and so perfectly 65, the one that I use all the time to put filters on my photos. Because if you see if you go to my profile and Google’s real estate, you’ll see that most of my photos are very orange. So right now I go through an orangey phase. Sometimes I go to a pink phase, sometimes I go to a you know allied almost like a black and white phase. It’s just depending on what phase I’m going through. So you want to make your storefront that brand that it looks the same. can think of the word. So for that I use what is it called? Dark Room?
D.J. Paris 18:24
So the two apps we’re talking about are perfect. 365. Which and dark room?
Gogo Bethke 18:30
Yes. So if you can see that here. This is perfect. 6365. And this is dark room right here. Is that correct? Yep. So those are the two if you have a droid I think darkroom is called Lightroom. But it’s the same app.
D.J. Paris 18:44
Oh, good. Good to know,
Gogo Bethke 18:46
I think darkroom we actually have to pay for I don’t think it’s 100% free. But it’s worth every penny to me, because this is my job. Yeah,
D.J. Paris 18:53
I mean, remember everyone, this is your advertising. This is your branding. And even if you’re not necessarily saying, Hey, I’m a realtor, if you need to help buy or sell or rent something, you know, whatever messaging you’re putting out there, you need it to look a certain way, it doesn’t have to look perfect, it just has to look a certain way. And that certainly has to reflect your personality, your brand, and it asked to have good content associated with it to get people to want to continue to follow your social media. As you can
Gogo Bethke 19:21
see, I post five photos and a quote, always say that there’s a quote than five photos is a quote and five photos. Say that right now when you’re looking through them. It’s a little bit orangey, same orangey phase, and then when I decided to change it, and I use the same filter for the next who knows how many pictures until I get through that phase, and I put something else.
D.J. Paris 19:41
And by the way, we should mention because we’re getting close to the end here. We should have mentioned this is exactly this is exactly what you teach at gogos bootcamp. Can we just we, you know, I feel like we’ve never really talked that much about it. Can you just tell the listeners because I couldn’t be a bigger fan of this? Tell them what this is why they should sign up.
Gogo Bethke 20:00
So this is like what we are talking about is probably less than 1%. So it is it is over probably 200 hours worth of video training on social media. So anything from the basics. So this is basics asked us and why we do things a certain way, so you understand why you’re doing it, because that’s the most important part because anybody can post a photo, but it’s gonna take you nowhere, if you don’t have a plan, or you don’t understand why you’re doing this, what’s the end goal? So the series, so what was boot camp is a few different series. So original boot camp was three series series one, series two, series three series, one was the basics of social media, again, what apps I use, what systems I use, how to implement everything, how to link your account, why you’re doing things, all that stuff, series two was how to work in your business. So by side strategies, listing side strategies, what to do at open houses, and just kind of anything real estate transactions related, like how to run a CMA, that kind of stuff. Series Three was how to work on your business, meaning, eventually, you want to be able to have a business where you can remove yourself from it and it runs without you’re making money, ideally, passively, or for a long time, it’s going to take a long time before you can fully remove yourself from transactions and have a brand that runs without you. But that talks about when to hire an assistant how to hire an assistant, what are the risk assessments, like having all of the the facets of a real estate business, like CPAs, financial advisors, all those things that requires for you to run a successful business, because you can make a lot of money if you don’t know what to do with that, it’s gonna go poof. So for that, you’re gonna need a CPA, you’re gonna need a financial advisors, you’re going to need to go coverage, all of those things. So that was the first series, then Instagram and Facebook decided to change their algorithm about every every five minutes. So we come out with new content all the time. So then we came out with Google’s bootcamp 2.0, that pretty much covers everything that’s new with their algorithm, and added on to the original series, then we came out with Finast. And now everything I do and teach personally, I teach you how to do it organically, meaning how to build your own brand, and lead generator never bought a lead in my entire career. And by the way, I sold 60 million now and at 45. Need to update it there. And so pretty much my goal is to teach everyone how to I call it fishing, because anybody can handle your fish. But if you are standing there and holding your handout waiting, you always rely on that second party. And you don’t want to have to always rely on the zeros and the true leaders and your broker and all that because yeah, they might hand you a fish. But guess what, you’re gonna give them back 50% of your Sure, yeah. In order. My goal is to teach you how to do that how to work smarter, not harder. Because right now, for every one transaction I do, an agent who accepts a lead does twice the amount of work, because you give away 50% of your commission. So if I can show you how to make more money with that one transaction that you generated yourself, but you didn’t have to pay cut to somebody, I feel like I did my job number one. Number two, when you know how to fish, you’re always searching No matter what the market is going to do. You’re always searching and no, yeah, I might have to go change the lake commission. And I might have to pay attention to the weather conditions, I might have to change out my bait, my fishing line and all that. But I know how to catch a fish. So if I change those little things, if I adapt to the market conditions, I’m always going to be able to catch a fish. So that’s my goal is to build a brand strong enough for you, you generate it yourself, and most of the time they come to me. So that’s the difference. I don’t have to have a listing presentation. I don’t have to spend a penny on it, because this is organic lead generation. Yeah, because
D.J. Paris 23:25
they’ve been following your content. They they they see you as a trusted adviser, they see you as the knowledge source, because you are presenting that image and that is who you are. It’s your authentic self. But you’re presenting that authentic self in social media. And that is a skill that people need to develop, which is why Go Go’s bootcamp is so helpful because what it’s not necessarily this is not necessarily just for people who have never done anything on social media, although those there is that that that training, but this is for people that want to take it to that next level and really think about how do I how do I brand myself? What What should my posting strategy be in my scheduling be? And how do I actually incorporate this? And then how do I make this into my part of my overall business? And that’s exactly what you teach. It’s excellent
Gogo Bethke 24:13
mindset. Because I believe about 90% of your success is six inches. Between Your Ears, you have to believe you have to know who you are and what you bring to the table. You have to have market knowledge and all that. So I teach courses, I think there’s over 80 videos on mindset alone of how did I get to have this mindset. And hopefully, every single one of them was a life lesson. But hopefully they can learn through my life lessons. So they don’t have to go through that. And then one of the biggest chunks of it is finance. Finance is the ads of Facebook ads generation of leads. We also teach that not only we teach them, but we give you our most successful ads ran ever, where they can literally with three clickable buttons takes all of our ads and upload it into their own ad account, throw five bucks, 10 bucks at it and the ads are running in your account in your market. And these are ads like we get if you go on Google’s bootcamp.com You can see the screenshots on this accessory of other agents were generated $1.2 million listing with $1.75 spent. Right? That’s a good return dollars for a $37,000. Commission. Yeah, yeah. And that’s in your control. So that is also not only how to generate those ads, but then we also teach you how to turn those cold leads into warm leads. Because now when the lead comes in, now, what what am I supposed to say? What am I supposed to do? How do I turn them into a client that turns into a commission? So we also do all that, and I am so sorry, but my child is diabetic. And he has called me three times. So I have to grab this real quick.
D.J. Paris 25:34
Okay, no problem. Go, go ahead. And while Google is doing that, I’m gonna mention something also, that’s really, really important. So a lot of times when you’re thinking about how to post on social media, specifically on Instagram, you might be thinking, Okay, what images am I going to show? What am I going to? How am I going to make it look? And how am I going to try to engage my audience? Well, here’s another way that you can do that. Forget about posting for a moment, what about contributing to other people’s posts, right, this is another great branding strategy. It’s a great way as my friend, Ryan dePriest says, doing research and development, so you want to look at everyone else’s posts on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, wherever they wherever else they might be posting. And this is a great opportunity for you. Because we know that all of us know the experience of we post a picture somewhere with with some, you know, some sort of text, and nobody responds, maybe we get some likes, but we don’t see any comments at the moment, we get that first comment on an on a photo that we’ve posted, or any sort of post it feels good. And as Realtors you have this ability to go to your sphere of influence, go through those posts, and and leave some comments. Let people know that you witnessed and saw what they did, don’t just like it, write a little two or three word comment, this looks great. Your clients will appreciate it, I’ll remember you and you’ll be one of the few people because very few people ever leave comments. So just a little pro tip there.
Gogo Bethke 26:59
Awesome. Sorry about that. I’m back. No problem.
D.J. Paris 27:01
But I was just mentioning how you can also use social media to stay in touch with people by commenting on their on their posts.
Gogo Bethke 27:09
Absolutely. I knew that you have to if you’re expecting that in return and yours, just assign an hour of your day when you are relaxing on the couch, maybe watching the show with one eye open a brainless show, and then just go on your social media and just kind of return the favor, keep in touch. Because even though I credit everything through social media, because it is that’s where it goes. But a lot of it in a way it’s considered to have influence is my friends, it’s my family, it’s the people that I actually know, that buy and sell with me. So what they also are reminded of what I do because they see my posts all the time. Like it’s hand in hand. But now if you want them to see yours in common tenuous, you have to go over to give, you know give a little bit of attention to theirs as well. So then you just kind of stay on top of mind. And when you kind of from your business account as well, then their friends or see who is this go goes real estate check out or so it just a full circle.
D.J. Paris 27:58
Yeah. And it also demonstrates that you care. And that’s ultimately what people say they want more than anything. And a real estate agent is somebody who cares. So you have to demonstrate that and you can demonstrate that by picking up the phone or texting. But you can also demonstrate it by commenting on people’s social media posts. So please use this as an opportunity. Even if you’re like, Well, I don’t like to post that much. At the very least you should be commenting on, you know, a lot of posts from your sphere of influence on a daily basis, just so people know that you actually care. And by the way, that gives you something to talk about the next time you speak with them. Hey, I saw you were just on vacation. I saw you guys went here. You know, and you can have a conversation about that. So
Gogo Bethke 28:36
yes, yeah. So let’s walk through photos very quick, since we have to like yeah, let’s do it. So when you’re posting a photo, you always want to tag a location. We talked about this last time, when you tag the location you’re generating eyeballs from that location onto your post. So they might not be following you they might have zero interest in real estate but they follow real like let’s say they follow up right in Michigan. When I fly to Michigan in my post my poll is going to show up in the Brighton Michigan port so now the people that follow Brighton are going to see my posts they’re like who is this Go Go check again. Eyeball so you want to do that because you can real estate is local Yes, you can refer business anywhere to somebody who has real estate license but but for you personally to work on a transaction it has to be in your neck of the woods. So you want to tag location you also want to tag the people that you are with so just before making the post it’s going to ask you do you want to tag people and that’s where you let’s say we are taking a screenshot right here with DG Paris which I should just a little reminder for myself there we go. Now when I posted I’m going to literally just tag DJ so now it’s going to remind him that I made this post here’s going to share it now all of his followers gonna check out who is this guy go check all of my followers gonna check out who is this DJ Paris, and now we helped each other grow. And also if your posts if 20% of your picture or letters, Instagram and Facebook is not even going to show your posts so don’t waste it. The when you create a flyer, but it’s not going to work for social media marketing, if you go look at my profile, you’re going to see one, one quote every six photos a call. But other than that I never have letters on my on my pictures because those to me look like a flyer and flyers are for what I’m selling you something, selling you something and somebody look at it like, Oh, you’re trying to sell me something I’m running for the hills. So even if you’re selling a property, you better off posting 10 pictures of the property and in the description, tell them how it is don’t just hit the market, it’s 123 main cities 279,000 house close to the whatever school district however you want to do it. But don’t post a flyer of the property, don’t put the picture of it and put the address on it and put any of that because it’s not going to take less than 2% of your existing followers are going to see it and none of the people that don’t follow you is going to see it. Right, there is no chance for you to grow with that. I also use professional photography and all of my listings, I use visa media for that I’ve been using them for six years, I am so sorry, they just changed your name. And I’m not sure what the new name is. But you can probably Google these immediate I want to say they are almost in every single state, they do a phenomenal job, they can do those nighttime images, they can put in grass, if grass is missing, they can put in blue sky blue skies missing, they use the wide glass lenses. So when you go into your property, you can actually feel the space versus looking at an actual photo. I preach it always, always, always use professional photography, when you’re doing your listing, that is your job, you’re a listing agent. Otherwise anybody can go in and take a picture like those iPhone photos or the agent is in the mirror. I mean, come on. You can’t you can’t do that, you know what I mean? Put a little effort into it take your job seriously, you are technically marketing, you have the marketing rights to that property. And you want to market it properly. I think that’s it for for all and staging nowadays. Photography free companies. Also some of them do a Virtual Staging. So that’s why I’ve actually never physically staged a property. We have an agent here locally who does amazing business. And she has like a whole staging company, she has warehouses full. With actual furniture, I don’t do that. But we have Virtual Staging. And we did an hour a couple of our listing that weekend. We didn’t do the whole house when we did the major room, the one that was kind of tied to the kitchen and all that. And so you can ask a photography company, if they do Virtual Staging, if they do and you have a vacant property, you already own an awkward property. Sometimes it’s just awkward, and you’re like our couch never going to fit here. So by designing it virtually now they’re like, oh, okay, most people are visual guys. So if they can see it, in my indoor mind, it exists, it can happen. But if you just have an empty blank canvas, they’re like my couch never gonna fit here.
D.J. Paris 32:40
And the other thing, in addition to professional photography that I’d recommend is find something that is incredibly unique. Every property has one cool, unique feature, and have a friend come with you or turn your phone towards you. And just say, Guys, I have this new listing, I just want to show you this one thing you got to say this is really cool. And just have them follow you into that room, you know, zoom in on whatever it is and show them and explain it. People love to see little cool things about an individual house. You know, you don’t necessarily have to do an entire tour of the house, although you can absolutely do that as well. But I always think picking one little bite size thing and making it a 60/92 video and just going and saying You guys gotta see this is so cool. And it’s really gonna get a lot of views.
Gogo Bethke 33:25
Yeah, like I had one recently where it had a I didn’t even know what it was to be honest with you. I was looking at that thought it was a laundry who but he was like a very narrow thing with two metal rods in it. I’m like, What the heck is that? So I’m looking up and I’m looking down and like there’s no hole What is this? So my clients like oh, that’s a doorbell. I’m like what? So she Hi hits the door button these two metals have like a little ball or something between them and hence I created a video about that I’ve never seen one like that it had the most kind of like oh my gosh, my grandma used to have one like this I miss it you know so just stuff like that is like when you find that cute little thing is just start a conversation that just reminded them of their grandma and made them feel fuzzy. And then it also even though you didn’t say hey you want to buy or sell with me it also shows oh god who’s out there showing houses. Oh, this is a real estate, oh just houses for sale. Like you just kind of reminds them of what you do. As you said, you can go down probably 10 years on my social media feedback and find once when I asked
D.J. Paris 34:21
for business, yeah, I was just I just came back from Tampa, my sister. They gutted and renovated the home that they just bought and they made everything really beautiful and modern and cool. One thing that they did that would be something that’s really simple the features My sister loves and I don’t know if you remember these. This is goes back to like the Earl maybe the like the 1930s I think when a light switches had the push buttons, so it was a push button and a push button off and on and off. But they were two different buttons. So they protrude and they’re really cool. There’s a little brass. Yeah, pushing Not Yeah. And it sounds silly, but she got every single LightSwitch done that way in the house. And it probably cost a fortune to do that, because they don’t even sell these things anymore. But she she got she got it done. And if I was trying to sell her house, which I’m not, but but that’s what I would I would say you guys got to see us you remember these from old hotels and you know, remember those push button and we in wherever we go, visitor, everybody comments on these little push button thing? So again, that would be one feature to to highlight. So if there’s anything even sort of silly like that people really get a kick out of stuff like that.
Gogo Bethke 35:33
Yeah, yeah, I remember one time before maybe one it was even legal and stuff. I showed a candle. And my clients there, we opened the door to the closet. And it’s all stainless steel, the walls and there’s light. What is this and he goes sold. It was and he goes, Oh, that’s that’s a growing thing. I was like, I didn’t even know what it was thing yet. I didn’t post it on Facebook. But I probably would have if he was really what it was. But like things like that when you find like different things in a property that it’s a conversation starter, like one time they had a huge thing in the basement. Now like I have no idea what this thing is. I’m like, Hey, guys, what is this, and I snapped a photo of it. But I put it on Facebook. And then people start commenting people are giving their knowledge and their opinion and stuff like that. So you keep them interactive, the more time they spend on your site, the faster your site shows up on the first page of Google, and one and that’s what video helps you with, because videos are going to sit there and watch it for two minutes, three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, which means they’re spending time on your site. And that’s what you want, the more time they spend, the higher you show up on Google. And you just kind of you generate that traffic to yourself.
D.J. Paris 36:45
I’ll leave you also with one last tip because you just reminded me of something. So this is a quick one. And we can go into a deeper dive in a future episode. But for everyone who isn’t who doesn’t have their own Google My Business page, this is the business page that shows up when when people Google you, or it can if you have one, and you just Google the word Google My Business, you can sign up for account. It’s free. You can write posts on there, but but also you can upload photos and videos. So if you do a cool video for the property, you can upload it there as well. Now I’ll give you an example. I asked our Realtors here too, if somebody would do a testimonial. So we got like 10 testimonial videos, people just turn their camera around and said, Here’s why I like working at scale Realty anyway. So I took all those videos, and we were using them in various advertising projects. But I also uploaded them to Google My Business. Because prospective Realtors might want to look at those who are thinking of joining our firm. In the last day alone, over 3000 people watch those videos in 24 hours. Now not they didn’t watch all of them. But 3000 p 3000. views were out of all the videos we uploaded in one day. And we don’t have a lot of people looking us up on Google to you know, in that way felt like we have a huge Google presence in that sense. So if you are doing videos, upload them to your Google My Business page, and you will also get tons of traffic that way. And people just go Oh, that’s cool. Most businesses don’t. Oh, yeah, sorry. I was just gonna say most businesses never upload photos, and they never upload videos. You want to do this for your business with Google My Business. Go ahead. I’m
Gogo Bethke 38:25
sorry. Yeah. So just keep in mind Google, my business only allows posts for seven days, so they’re gonna go poof. So it’s not like Instagram or Facebook, or you post up forever. It’s only up there for seven days. And then but just get into the habit of to maybe put a note for yourself every Tuesday to remind you to oh, I need to post something on Google My Business.
D.J. Paris 38:41
Yeah. Well, and remember the videos and the photography, they stay up forever. The posts are only there for seven days. So just like gogo said, every we do this at our business. For example. Juneteenth was obviously several days ago, we posted something for Juneteenth. Father’s Day was was the day after that. So he posted something as well for Father’s Day. You can it doesn’t even have to be real estate related, but post something and upload your photos and videos. And you’ll be amazed at how many people now will see it because Google prioritizes their Google My Business results in the search results. So they really are pushing that hard right now. So don’t forget about Google My Business. We’ll talk about that on a future episode. But I want everyone who’s listening to definitely check out gogos bootcamp. So we have a special link for you. So go to Gogo podcast.com, geo geo podcast.com, to learn all about gogo and her social media bootcamp. It’s like she said, 200 hours of videos, and so many modules and we just talked about some app editing and she’s like, that’s like not even 1% of what is offered there. This is a full course that specifically goes from start to finish of exactly what you need to know to actually build a social media following for your business. It’s amazing. It’s great. It she has a million great reviews because she’s got the best program out there. So please everyone go check it out. Go Go podcast.com Go go. On behalf of the listeners, once again, thank you, thank you, thank you for providing this great content. We love it, we appreciate you. And then on behalf of Google and myself, we appreciate you the listeners for continuing to support our show to watch our episodes or listen. And remember, please two things, please tell a friend think of one other agent that could benefit from hearing this great interview we just did with gogo and send them either a link to our podcast, or send them over to Gogo podcast.com To learn about the social media bootcamp. And then also follow us on Facebook, please find us@facebook.com forward slash keeping it real pot every single day we post an article that we find online designed to help you grow your business. And of course, we post all of our episodes there as well. So go go was a pleasure seeing you and chatting with you again. And I guess we’ll see in a month
Gogo Bethke 40:56
in a month. Let’s talk about videos next time.
D.J. Paris 40:59
Let’s do video. So next time guys videos. And we’ll end with this if you have questions that you want go to answer about social media video posting, send those in, you can do that right on our Facebook page. You can do it on our website, keeping it real pod.com. There’s a million ways to find us. You send us your questions, and we will answer those next time on keeping it real with that social bootcamp with gogo so thanks, go go. We’ll see you next time.
Gogo Bethke 41:23
Bye guys. See you next time
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