OK, that is a pretty pretentious title. Who am I to tell you how to use Twitter? The simple fact is (and it’s one of the true beauties of social networking) there are no “rules” about how to use Twitter. The title, and gist, of this post however, fits in with my previous post, How Not to Use Twitter. That, and Louis has been bugging me to complete this “series”…

Rules or no rules, there are some tips and techniques that you can utilize to increase your chances of “success” on Twitter.

Whoa, “success” on Twitter? How do we define “success”?

Depends. Personally, I think if you are using Twitter for the sole purpose of generating leads (and eventually commission checks), then you are making a mistake and likely wasting your time. If you want to expand your sphere of influence, if you want to get to meet and engage with people from all walks of life, if you want to share and expand your knowledge and increase your “internet presence”, then by all means, utilize social networking tools like Twitter.

Simply put, the “hard sell” doesn’t work in social media. Start with the “I’m a REALTOR!” and “I’m a top producer!” or “Look at my new listing!” talk and people will instantly tune you out (if not outright unfollow or block you). In my opinion, the single best thing to do with a tool like Twitter is use it to engage with people. Ultimately, you can use Twitter to actually meet people “IRL” (In Real Life). And let’s face it, in real life is still the best social network ever, bar none.

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Twitter is all the rage in social media.  But how can you get business from Twitter when you’re restricted to 140 characters?   Simple.   Use my AKS (Anyone Know Search) Method. 

Here’s how it works:

Go to Search.Twitter.com and type this in the search box: anyone know a realtor in [fill in your city or town]

Here’s an example: 

Check the results.  If you’re lucky, you’ll find a real estate need (the word lead has been taken to the place where they keep bad words, like “used car”).

Now, send a tweet reply to this person and offer your help.  Since you are fellow Twitterers, you share something in common, making it more likely the person will talk to you.   Try it. (And send me my 25% referral fee in small bills.)

But there’s more to the AKS strategy. Continue reading this post

Consider this:

Mitch Ribak will sell more than 340 homes this year using HomeGain.

Others will make hundreds of thousands of dollars with HomGain.

- See Top Performers of 2007

- See Top Performers of 2008

One agent has crosssed the one million dollar commission mark using HomeGain and is closing in on two million dollars.

Another HomeGain agent has reached the $1 million commission mark and will be annonced next month.

Using HomeGain and Social Media tools like Twitter are not mutually exclusive.

Indeed they compliment each other well.

More on that in a future post.

Louis Cammarosano

homegain.com

On a panel with Matt Fagioli, Michael Simonsen and myself at RetechSouth last week, Pat Kitano remarked that it was rude to not follow the Twitter followers who follow you.

Do you agree? 

Take the poll:

Louis Cammarosano

homegain.com

Matt Fagioli organizer of ReTechSouth and I were talking last night. “I agree to talk while you are talking” is how I described the practice of following those on twitter who follow you in a bid to get your follower numbers up.

This practice seems near mindless. Most people who agree to take on hundreds or thousands of courtesy followers immediately filter them out using Tweet Deck or some other software (you’re not so clever, they do the same to you!)

I recently asked a couple of friends who have thousands (one has over ten thousand) followers to tweet one of my blog posts with a Tiny URL (a great tool BTW) attached.

Later I checked Google Analytics (another great tool) to see the number of visitors received from Twitter from my friends’ tweets. The amounts of visitors were surprising:

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Consider: Why do you think they call it “social” media?

In the words of Todd Carpenter who was recently appointed as social media manager at the National Association of Realtors :

“You won’t “get” Twitter until you stop trying to figure out how to get business from it. You have to do it for fun. You have to genuinely want to talk to people, not market to them. If you just try to market yourself there, nobody will want to connect with you.”

Remember social media whether facebook or twitter, is not business media. Mixing business with pleasure is often difficult.

Todd futher advises:

“Again, I’m on Twitter because I like to meet and talk to people. I don’t care if it ever earns me a dime. But on the other hand, the top referrer to my newest blog is… Twitter. Five of the first six people who confirmed they were coming to RE BlogWorld, I met on… Twitter. The local meetup of RE 2.0 talent I organized today was promoted and organized largely on… Twitter.

I didn’t “get” Twitter either because I was trying to figure out a business use for it. But I got hooked on it because it was fun, and now the business opportunities are bearing fruit.”

Louis Cammarosano