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CornerStone Seminar: Social Media – Build Your Business Through Your Personal Brand

BRADENTON, FLORIDA – CornerStone Title (www.cornerstonetitle.biz) is proud to announce the second event of the 2012 CornerStones of Success Seminar Series. The event will feature nationally recognized social media expert, Bernie Borges and will be held on Thursday , May  10^th at the Polo Grill on Main Street in Lakewood Ranch.

This complimentary seminar geared towards Real Estate Professionals will begin at 9:00 am for coffee and networking.  Bernie Borges will present his seminar “Social Media: Building Your Business Through Your Personal Brand” at 9:30 am. A delicious complimentary lunch will be served by the Polo Grill immediately follow the presentation at 12:00 noon.

Bernie Borges, owner of inbound marketing agency Find and Convert, is a leading Internet Marketer and Social Media Speaker. Bernie’s book, Marketing 2.0, Bridging the Gap between Seller and Buyer, lays out a strategic road map to develop, implement and measure social media marketing strategies.

Bernie will be sharing his wealth of knowledge and expertise in relationship building through content and online engagement. Real Estate Professionals attending this seminar should expect to learn how to better engage, educate and entertain their online audience in a way that builds relationship and trust.

The Cornerstones of Success Seminar Series is sponsored by CornerStone Title as an educational resource to real estate professionals in Sarasota and Manatee Counties. Each seminar offers in-depth, engaging and educational conversation about the hottest real estate and title topics, presented by some of the most dynamic thought leaders in the industry. In 2011, over 415 real estate professionals attended the events!

You can learn more about the presenter Bernie Borges by visiting his website at http://www.bernieborges.com/

Make your reservations early as seating is limited and Cornerstone expects to fill up quickly!

RSVP for this event at http://cornerstonesocialmedia.eventbrite.com or email mary@cornerstonetitle.biz.

CornerStone Title is located at 11061 Gatewood Drive, Suite 101, Bradenton, Florida 34211. Telephone: (941) 708-0300. Website: www.CornerStoneTitle.biz. Please contact Mary Howard at (941) 708-0300 or mary@cornerstonetitle.biz

Are you ignoring your best prospect?

Real Estate Professionals - Now that I got your attention, please ask yourself this simple question. Immediate family and friends aside, who is your best prospect? Go ahead, take a couple of minutes to think about it… Remember, people buy from people, so it stands to reason the people most likely to buy from you are the ones who have done so in the past. Yes, your past customers are not only your best prospect but over time can become a steady source of qualified leads. According to N.A.R., about 90% of home buyer’s would do business with their agent again, but only 10% can remember how to get in touch with them!

What’s his name?

While it seems counter-intuitive, up to 90% of realtors do not do any type of post-close marketing at all. Of those that do, nearly all stop post-close marketing after 90 days. Does this make sense given the average home ownership last 8 years? No, it really doesn’t and in to be frank, marketing post close for 90 days to a prospect that is almost positively not coming back into the market may actually be perceived as an irritation and have an undesired affect on the relationship. On the other hand, nearly all realtors admit that they have repeatedly missed opportunities because they did not stay in touch with clients post-close. It may be time to take an honest inventory and determine if you are missing out on this reliable source of qualified leads.

Double your closings!

How big a problem is this? The answer is closely tied to the agent’s tenure and success rate but the longer you have been in business and the more deals you have closed, the bigger the problem. Wow, talk about being a victim of your own success!

Let’s break it down to real numbers. To keep it simple, let’s say you have been in the business for 10 years and you are closing an average of 15 deals per year. This means  you have a “likely to make a move” population of around 45 prospects in your pipeline each year. This number comes from those clients that bought/sold  between 7 and 9 years ago. Let’s assume 80% of the prospects come back into the local market and 90% are willing to use you again – this works out to about 32 prospects a year.

Ironically, in this example, just a 50% close ratio with clients you have already sold would effectively double your current volume of business.

Stay in Touch by Being “The Resource”

So now you understand you need to stay in touch. So all you need to do is send a birthday card, a football schedule and be sure to remind your clients of  their one year anniversary in their new home, right? Well, that might help but think about how much more  effective your efforts would be if you stayed top of mind through relevant touch points instead? This is where we can help. CornerStone Title now includes our digital closing documents with every closing. This includes amazingly convenient digital access to all closing documents for your clients (they love it). Our digital closing documents  also includes a built-in “forever marketing” system that keeps you top of mind with you customers by keeping them up-to-date with critical updates on information specific to their property. You contact information is  displayed in each email and every time your customer accesses their closing documents.

The Silver Bullet

So we’ve laid out how to automatically stay top of mind for life with every customer you close, the only thing  left to do is to actually identify the precise moment your customer is coming back into the market. This sounds too good to be true and unfortunately, it probably is. However, it is possible to notify you when your client accesses any of their critical closing documents which is the leading indicator they are making a move to buy or sell. For example, your client logs into to CornerStone’s digital closing documents system to access their mortgage – you get a notification. Granted, they might just be downloading their documents for some light poolside reading, but let’s face it, not everyone finds closing documents as interesting as we do. 

For More Information

If  you would like to learn more about how to effortlessly implement and maintain a comprehensive post close marketing system that alerts you when your customer is considering buying or selling, you can watch our digital closing documents video here.

Boost Website SEO with Free Real Estate Videos

When is the last time you tried to explain title insurance or closing costs to a client? Was it a fun, entertaining and engaging conversation? Probably not for you nor your client. CornerStone Title has a solution and we’re offering it free to any Florida real estate broker, agent, mortgage broker, loan officer or builder. It has been said many times that a picture is worth a thousand words, but sometimes a video, even a simplistic one, can be worth one hundred thousand words.

Check out the Videos!

Check out these two videos  that provide a quick, entertaining explanation of both “Title Insurance” and “Closing Costs” and then read on to discover how these videos are going to help you get found and convert more of your website visitors to buyers and sellers.

CornerStone Title: What is Title Insurance?

CornerStone Title: What are Closing Costs?

Video Increases Your Website SEO (search engine optimization)

In addition to being a great resource to your prospects and clients, these videos are killer marketing tools. By embedding these videos on your website, you drastically increase the odds of being “found” by search engines. Websites that include video are 53 times more likely to appear on page one of Google. Even if you have existing video, these videos will further enhance your videos ranking. We have embedded keywords into the video related to Bradenton and Sarasota Real Estate and these will convey SEO points to your site.

Videos Makes Your Website Sticky

Additionally, these videos make your website more “sticky” by keeping visitors on your site longer. The average time spent on your website is a key metric to use to gauge how effective your site is. The longer visitors spend on your site, the better. When they are on your site for an extended period of time, the likelihood they will visit other pages goes up and the chances they are going to bounce off to one of your competitors sites goes down.  Translation, you create additional opportunities for your site visitors to contact you, do an MLS search or bookmark your page.

Technical Details

You can include the videos on your site in one of two ways. First, you can simply add a link to the YouTube url and direct your visitors there.  Another approach, and the one we recommend, is to embed the YouTube code directly into your site. This provides a much cleaner look and will result in more views. You can see samples of embedded video in this post or on our resources page.  Depending on your technical abilities, you may need the assistance of your webmaster to get this done. To get the link or embed code or for technical assistance, drop me a line at tom@cornerstonetitle.biz or call me at 941.744.0492.

What’s the Catch?

Oh, I forgot to mention there is one little catch.. If you are going to use the videos, there is no charge but we do ask that you include a link back to our website at http://www.cornerstonetitle.biz. Please choose one the following link back formats:

Video compliments of CornerStoneTitle - Bradenton/Sarasota Title Company

Video provided by our friends at CornerStone Title, the Title Company of Choice in Sarasota and Manatee

Realtors and Clients – People buy from People

In the last post, I mentioned the phrase “people buy from people” and I think this is a subject worth digging deeper into. According to realtor.org, 90% of buyers use the Internet to conduct their home search. Clearly the Internet has been widely embraced by the real estate buying public, but does this mean the entire sales process will go online? No – in fact, the opposite is true.

Technology’s Effect on Your Clients

The net effect the Internet and other technologies are having is to produce a more informed, educated and sophisticated client. This is a client that not only has a deeper  knowledge of real estate but has also more choices and

elevated expectations. Today’s client knows the right questions to ask, the right deals to seek and has a much higher perception of the skills his realtor possesses.

The Internet has been called “The Great Equalizer” because, in theory at least, it provides equal and unlimited access to information to everyone. In some ways this is positive and in others, it may be a negative. While information is generally helpful, information overload or inaccurate information can lead to a poor decision. It is important to draw a distinction between data (plain facts or raw data) and information (data in context that adds value). This is where the Realtor has an opportunity to be unique and set themselves apart from the crowd.

Differentiating Yourself

Because of “The Great Equalizer”, most Realtors experience the same net effect from the role the Internet plays. So two factors determine differentiation. The first is one’s reaction to the new technologies. For example, the realtor who has systems and processes in place to leverage the newest technologies will have an obvious advantage.  The second, and most important, will bring us back to the fundamentals – people, sales, listening and creative skills. The environment the game is played in may have changed but the rules remain the same.

“People buy from People” - so defining, refining and growing yourself in your chosen craft remains the surest path to success and prosperity. If you are keeping up, they will find you using the web. But what you do with them once they find you has little to do with technology and much to do with your personal skills inventory. Your goal is to engage your client, understand his/her needs and desires and put together a strategy that delivers results. The conclusion here may be “the more things change, the more they stay the same”.

One Good Idea

don’t miss  this…

So, here is one good idea that blends technology, fundamentals and supports the “People buy from People” philosophy. Attend a Hot Properties Event where you can creatively feature a unique property you represent, connect with other PEOPLE and differentiate yourself to your buyers, seller and peers. Hot Properties has been called the “speed dating of real estate sales”  and its all business, high energy and fun. If your curious or ready to be “different” click the link to learn more and make a reservation.

Social Media for Realtors: Expand Your Brand

Don’t miss the next installment of the “CornerStones of Success Seminar Series” entitled Social Media: Expand Your Brand. This seminar is specifically designed to benefit real estate professionals and is being presented by Alan Thompson, who brought down the house at January’s “Jet Pilots Don’t Have Rear View Mirrors” Seminar. The event  will be held Thursday, June 2nd (from 9 to 12, complimentary lunch following) at the Polo Grill in Lakewood Ranch and is complimentary to all real estate professionals – you can get more details by downloading an event flyer here.

Social Media has been clearly established as not only a legitimate business platform but possibly the most important technology related marketing development for real estate professionals since email. So all you need to do is register on Linked In, set-up a Facebook Account and start following up on the leads you’ll generate, right? Uhh, not so fast. Like anything else, what you get out of Social Media will largely depend upon what you put into it. Realtors and lenders have seemingly unlimited social media choices but if not careful, risk wasting a lot of time and being ineffective.

If you think about it, social networking is one of the oldest business concepts around. It is not the networking that has changed but the tools that are used for networking. Remember, people do business with people and utilizing social media does not change who you are, it allows you to get the word out in a more interesting and efficient manner. A solid social media strategy combined with process driven execution will deliver consistent positive results. Likewise, a poorly planned, loosely executed effort can actually have an adverse effect and damage your brand. .

During this complimentary seminar, Alan is going in-depth into Social Media and the most effective ways for realtors to use these new tools to leverage their personal brands. Attending this event is complimentary but you can be sure it is a solid investment in your most important asset – You!

RSVP to info@cornerstonetitle.biz