How to Make it Easy for Your Real Estate Agents to Participate in Your Brokerage’s Social Media
I hope you enjoy my stock image choice. :-) I think they all look like they’re having an awesome time contributing to their brokerage’s social media!
Making sure your brokerage has a strong presence on social media is essential for a few big reasons. But no matter what your brokerage’s social media marketing plan entails, you’ll want to feature your real estate agents as much as possible. And to do this, you’ll need to (somehow!) get your agents to participate in your brokerage’s social media.
For over a decade now, I’ve worked with real estate brokerages to plan and implement their social media strategy. I know how challenging it can be to get agents to contribute and participate in social media, even though it benefits them. However, I truly believe that featuring your agents is a must!
People simply don’t engage with cookie cutter content on social media. Plus, you need to make sure your audience likes, trusts, and knows your brokerage and what you’re all about. Your audience needs tangible examples and evidence that your brokerage is the one for them (whether they are an agent, buyer, seller, etc.).
Now, I know this is kind of a niche topic. Not a ton of brokerage’s out there do content marketing that goes beyond the basics. *Most* brokerages out there are only posting photos of their agents’ home listings (if they’re posting anything at all on their social accounts) and “happy [insert holiday here]” posts. But if you’re here reading this, it’s because you’re ready to create or improve upon your brokerage’s presence on social media.
So, why don’t more brokerages showcase their real estate agents on social media?
First, it requires a thorough understanding of how social media marketing works. (I’m not talking about “how to post something on Facebook”; I’m referring to larger concepts). Second, it takes a decent amount of resources to create and implement social media strategy. Creating a dynamic social media post can mean lots of planning, graphic design and writing skills, mastering all of the nuances of different social media platforms, and a decent chunk of time to execute well.
Then there is the challenge of getting your agents to participate.
But let’s back up for a moment.
Why is featuring your agents in your brokerage’s social media marketing so important?
In my blog “6 Key Objectives That Should Drive Your Real Estate Brokerage Marketing in 2024” I break down what you must keep in mind when you’re developing a marketing plan. Featuring your agents is one of the many types of content you can create, and it just happens to “check all of the boxes.”
In my experience, social media posts (photos and videos) with people in them (and not just stock photo people—your people!) get the most engagement. Your content shouldn’t be too generic—you want your content to be so specific that it’s content ONLY your brokerage could have created. Even if you have a larger brand that provides your company with content to push out, you should be adding your brokerage’s unique personality to it.
Over the past 10+ years, I’ve worked with a variety of real estate brokerages on their social media marketing, as both a content creator (in the trenches and doing the work!) and as a consultant. One of the most challenging things to incorporate into a brokerage’s online presence is their real estate agents, and coincidentally, I believe that this is one of the most important aspects of a brokerage’s social media marketing plan. You can feature your agents by sharing:
Quotes from your agents (Community knowledge, local recommendations, market expertise, etc.)
Photos of your agents (Office events, out in the community, with clients, behind the scenes of buying/selling, etc.)
Videos of your agents (Sharing knowledge, having important conversations, volunteering, etc.)
… and more. But these are the basics!
So if you’re the marketing manager of a real estate brokerage, how can you create or gather all of this content so you can package it up beautifully and share it on social media?
Think of yourself as not only a content creator, but as a curator.
To illustrate the basics of how you can go about gathering content, I’m going to share a specific example.
Let’s say you’re planning a social media post that will go up on Facebook and Instagram. You’ve decided to do a post that features small businesses in your city. Rather than simply pick a few small businesses yourself, you’re going to feature your agents sharing their favorite local small businesses. Bravo!
Now what?
First, you need to think about what you want to include in the post. On Instagram and Facebook, you’ll need to have a caption in addition to some type of visual:
Photo/Graphic: In a perfect world, this would be a photo or video of the agent at the actual small business they’re recommending. You might be able to get a photo of just the business (hopefully a nice pic of the biz exterior with the sign out front, or a cute scene inside). Or at the very least, you have your agent’s headshot, which you can feature on a graphic with their quote.
Business Name & Quote: Getting the name of an agent’s favorite local small business is a great start, but what is 10x more interesting is if they share WHY that business is their favorite. So, let’s say you decide that they should also share a quote about their chosen business.
All of this is admittedly pretty basic so far. (You could easily do the same thing with video, too.) But now you’re in for a challenge: Collecting this content from your agents.
If you work at a 🦄 unicorn brokerage, then when you ask agents for their photos and quotes, they’ll email you what you need by EOD. But if you don’t work at the 🦄 unicorn brokerage, then your agents are going to need a bit more hand-holding to get you the info you need to make this social media post a success.
Here are my tried-and-true tips for getting responses from your agents:
Have a dedicated space for content input requests. This could be a private Facebook group, a Slack channel, for even just an email. Maybe your brokerage already has a Facebook group or Slack channel. Where are your agents most likely to see your content request and actually respond to it? Build on a system your brokerage already has versus creating something brand new.
Be as clear as possible in your request for content. Agents are running a mile a minute, and you need to be able to capture their attention and clearly outline what you need from them. You need to state:
What the topic of the post is. (Favorite local small businesses.)
Where you will be posting this information. (Your brokerage’s Instagram and Facebook.)
What photo(s) you need from them, if any. (For this particular post, we won’t ask for a photo, as most agents probably don’t have a relevant photo to share, and this may prevent them from contributing to the post altogether. But sometimes, a photo will likely be necessary for participation!)
How many favorite businesses they’re allowed to choose. (There’s always someone who asks, and it’s ok if the answer is only one.)
What type of quote they need to share and how long it should be. (“Share WHY this small business is your favorite in 2-3 sentences.”)
The hard deadline for when their input is due.
You can even include a photo for extra attention if you’re posting in a Facebook group, for example.
Here’s an example of a request you might make:
***
What Is Your Favorite Local Small Business?
[ [ Insert your photo for attention ] ]
We’re preparing a social media post for our brokerage’s Facebook and Instagram that features your favorite local small businesses! Each agent will have their fave small biz featured on a graphic along with a quote and agent headshot.
Here is what you need to share to participate:
Share the name of your favorite local small business.
Share 2-3 sentences about this business. (Consider sharing why you love the biz, what people can purchase here, what makes it unique, etc.)
Responses are due no later than December 10, 2023 at midnight PST.
***
There you have it. Clear, concise, and easy for agents with short attention spans to scan. 😉 (I am also assuming you already have your agents’ headshots, so you don’t need to ask for that.)
Share a few reminders that the deadline is coming up. Consider sharing a reminder a few days before the deadline, and then 12-24 hours before the deadline. Sometimes there’s nothing like an impending deadline to motivate! And, if you’re posting somewhere like Slack or in a Facebook Group, make sure to either re-share the original post with the reminder, or re-post ALL of the submission info so agents don’t have to go looking for the info.
Reach out to agents directly. Oftentimes, I’ve found that if someone is asked directly if they’ll participate in a social media post, they’re happy to contribute. They may have missed the original call for content, they may have forgotten about it, or maybe they just needed a nudge and that personal touch.
Pro tip: In my experience, there end up being a handful of agents who “get” the concepts behind this type of marketing, and they’ll be the ones to participate over and over again. While they should be rewarded (aka featured on your brokerage’s social media accounts), you should make a serious effort to give everyone equal(ish) air time.
Get your leadership to participate. Depending on the type of post, it can be great to get owners, managers, and other staff involved as well. Getting leadership participation can set a good example and can be a good way to get agents more interested in participating.
Once you finally publish the post, the fun is just getting started!
You’ve worked so hard on this post, and now it’s time to make sure as many people as possible see it.
Here is a checklist for what to do once your social media post is live:
Tag everyone, everywhere! Make sure all agents and featured small businesses are tagged on both Facebook and Instagram. This is *especially* important for Instagram Stories; when you tag another account in Instagram Stories, it gives that account the easy option to hit the “share” button, getting your post more exposure.
Share a link to the post in the place you made the original content request. Send an email in the original email thread, post in the relevant Slack channel, or post in the Facebook group. Let everyone know the post is live, and provide links directly to the Facebook and Instagram posts so people don’t have to go looking for it.
Message the post to agents who participated on the platform the post is on. What I mean is this: Get on Facebook and message the Facebook post to the agent on Facebook. That way the post is sent directly to them, they can click right on it and hit that “like” or “share” button, and/or comment on the post. Do the same for Instagram. You want to make it as easy as possible for your agents to share the content they helped to create. And of course, thank them for their time and for participating.
I know a lot of this may seem like overkill, or a lot of work. And it is a lot of work! But in my experience, it’s often necessary to take all of these steps to ensure that you’re creating high-quality, original content that is seen by the most people possible. When executed well and done with consistency, this type of content has the potential to get some incredible engagement and exposure for your brokerage and agents.
If you’re curious to learn more about creating a marketing plan for your real estate brokerage, then check out my blog “6 Key Objectives That Should Drive Your Real Estate Brokerage Marketing in 2024.”