When Was the Last Time You Changed Your Social Media Profile?

Periodically, mortgage girlfriend members ask us to review their social media pages.  We start reviewing the profile page first, because that one portion is critical in building relationships, making connections, and getting to know you on a personal level.

What I have found is that most of the profile pages are not up to date.  They have changed companies or email addresses.  They use old cover photos, or cover photos that are not relevant.  They don’t include their lending areas.  Their website links are not working.

Here are some ideas for claiming and enhancing your online profiles. The suggestions below will cost you nothing to implement other than time. You will need to set up an account (or claim your account), but otherwise you should not have to pay a dime to edit these profiles.

For All Your Profiles:

• Make sure you are using a professional, current photo and make sure it clearly portrays your personality. A great photo can make all the difference in encouraging a potential client to contact you. Use the same photo for all your profiles.
• Make sure your educational credentials are up to date. If you have lots of letters after your name, explain why those letters are a benefit to the client.
• Make sure you clearly communicate how you are different and better than the competition.
• Make sure your contact information is both complete and consistent. Format your phone number and address the same way everywhere. In other words, if you use Ste. and not Suite, use it the same way everywhere. Consistency matters.
• You can use the same bio on all your profiles, and we encourage you to do so.
• Create links between all your social media profiles. That includes Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, and LinkedIn. This way it’s easy for the visitor to find you in more places.
• Add all the cities, counties, states that you lend in.
• State your specialty niche (don’t show every loan known to mankind—just your top niche).

When creating your online profiles, take time to think about how you want to be portrayed online. You only have a few seconds to make a strong first impression, so it is essential you have the basics covered. You need to be online because people expect to find you there as a real estate agent.

If potential clients try to check you out online and they can’t find you there, then that says to them you aren’t taking your business marketing seriously. If you aren’t taking your own marketing seriously, then why should that potential client think that you will do any better for them?