Social media telemarketing
Realtor Notebook
By Teresa Boardman, Thursday, September 24, 2009.
Flickr image by melloveschallah.I still have a land line. It wasn't all that long ago that I had two phone lines at home: one for personal use and the other was a business line that went into my office, with an extension to my workroom in the basement.
These days my cell phone serves as my business line and my personal line, too. I get calls on the land line but I rarely answer it, as most are from corporations that I don't want to talk to or charities asking for money.
It is time to get rid of that last land line. At first it was a useful tool. We could call people from it and they would call us. Then the telemarketers started calling and we got an answering machine mainly to screen calls. Then we got voice mail, and then later caller ID. We could see who was calling and wouldn't answer if it was a telemarketer.
Then along came the Do Not Call list. For a time we actually picked up the phone. Today it is never answered because no one who we know or want to talk to ever calls on it. We check and delete the voice mail every couple of months.
The phone isn't of any use to us anymore and it doesn't make sense to keep paying for it so others can bother us.
The same thing is happening with e-mail. When I got my first e-mail account there wasn't anyone to send e-mail to. None of my friends had it yet, and neither did the local businesses. As people came online we used to send e-mail to each other to keep in touch or to relay important information.
I remember how fun it was when some of my family who live far away got e-mail. We used it to keep in touch once they learned that e-mail could be used for more than forwarding.
As a Realtor I use my e-mail a lot for business. I don't send out nearly as much e-mail as I get, and I delete or filter out more e-mail than I read. Maybe someday I will figure out how to run my business without a traditional e-mail account.
For now, spam blockers and the delete key are my only defense. When the spam blockers are too strong I lose business. I need to be careful about which e-mails I open, as some contain viruses.
These days I am on the Internet a lot, with blogs and social media accounts. With the blog, the comments used to come from people who were looking for houses for sale or who were interested in buying them. Lately that has changed, and most of the comments come from spammers or from other businesses that want to get a link from a page with page rank to help their own Web presence. ...CONTINUED
All rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, in part or in whole, without written permission of Inman News. Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright law.
You must login or register to post a comment.
Submitted by Gary Williamson on September 24, 2009 - 10:17am.
Hi Teresa,
You are right on with your assessment of today's social network mediums. Has anyone conducted a study to determine the millions of hours of lost productivity as many people anounce what they just had for lunch? I am on facebook, iinked in & active rain. I will soon be terminating every account due to the usless social spam I am inudated with by the hour. Lets hope the lessons we learn today will be wisley used in our next generation of personal & business communication mediums.
Submitted by Peter McCullough on September 24, 2009 - 11:59am.
Things are certainly changing if the IRS is using Facebook to find, or should I say fine, people who have not paid their taxes.
It is certainly a fluid landscape with social media and the purposes for which it used. A tool is only as good as the results it produces.
Nice article, good lesson.
Peter McCullough
Submitted by Elizabeth Weintraub, #00697006, Lyon RE on September 24, 2009 - 12:04pm.
I have considered getting rid of my land line for the very reasons you mention. I rarely answer it and let the answering machine screen calls. But it does serve one useful purpose. When you're calling a person who may recognize your cell phone number on Caller ID, and let's say this is a person who is avoiding you for some reason -- and you know there are agents who do that -- I place the call from my land line. I don't know what I find more annoying, whether it's the fact an agent then immediately answer the phone or that I have to resort to that maneuver.
Submitted by Bruno Skopinich on September 24, 2009 - 1:18pm.
You forgot the next BIG thing in marketing communications...
Text Messaging
The next generation of buyers are addicted to it.
Submitted by Wayne Harriman on September 24, 2009 - 3:00pm.
It is sad that every form of communication, sooner or later, falls victim to the onslaught of marketing. As technology has progressed, it seems that marketers find ways to abuse each new medium faster than the preceding one, with no regard to whether or not we want to see it. In the years ahead, as newer and faster methods of communicating are developed, marketers will conceivably already have a foothold in them as soon as they are moved into general use, and then BEFORE they are made public. Wouldn't it be ironic if, in order to finally be free of the marketing shackles, we were destined to come full circle and return to the only medium of communication that is ad-free: face-to-face?
Submitted by Teresa Boardman on September 24, 2009 - 3:29pm.
Bruno - I have been using text messaging in my business for years. I am addicted to it and some of my buyers are too. Lucky for me I don't need my land line for it and so far only people that I know have sent me text messages.