I'm a Twitter kind of gal ... I can easily express my thoughts in a limited amount of characters and now, without correct punctuation. Sure, it drove me crazy in the beginning. I felt robbed of my education when I was forced to delete certain letters and leave out a period at the end of a sentence. But - I have quickly gotten over it. The world of texting and micro-blogging really does make you take a second look at your priorities.
Mary McKnight recently penned a new article and posted it on her blog Netamorfasis (catchy name, huh?) How did I learn about it? Why, Twitter, of course! Because I'm very good at taking directions, I wandered over to check it out.
"Top 100 Social networks every Realtor should have a profile on"
The title is more than thought provoking - it's almost a challenge. My personality type wouldn't just let me read the list - I had to print it out and highlight it. Which networks am I involved in? Which ones not? Did I need to be? Will it increase my sales? Improve my relationships? (BTW (by the way) - when did they become relationships and no longer connections?)
I perused the list and was quite proud that I can claim "membership" on at least 50-60 of them. Unfortunately though, I don't spend enough quality time on any of them to nurture the relationships that I've started. However, in my own defense, I'm actually "connected" to those same people on at least 5 other networks.
I wonder: If main stream society is pushing us towards increasing involvement in social networking - which networks are the tops?
I invest my time on my Active Rain blog, my personal blog and my other one, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and I also find it beneficial to stay connected to our MLS system. (It too comes with messaging).
Since we're all connected and we're all building our business through our social networks, which ones are most beneficial to you? How many of the 100 can you claim? Which ones are actually helping you to generate more business and closed transactions?
More than just me - Inquiring minds want to know.
I think you said it when you said "invest time". There doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day for all of it. I see the value in active rain, but that's about it for now.
There is no way in the world I can keep up with 100 S/Ns. I am doing durn good to keep up with 5 or 6... and have memberships on 25ish.
Calie,
I'm a newbie but I'm exploring ActiveRain, Twitter, FaceBook, MySpace and linkedIn. It's all new and exciting and acdicting! Thanks for the post!
I LOVE Facebook!!!! Like activerain and working on becomming twitter bug but it really BUG'S me!!! I would love to have you come talk about this at our Tech Thursday!!!!
thanks again for the info and the link
hugs
Shelli
Thanks for the plug. My favorite is Twitter. I have reconnected with professors and formed new relationships with peole in the various spaces I work in. I have found it very useful for breaking back into te VC world and really getting to knwo people better. You find out so much about everyone when you answer the question What Are You Doing.
ActiveRain is my favorite, and the only one that I am really active in. I find the collective tribal knowledge emanating from members here as extremely valuable.
Active Rain, Linkedin, zillow, my own blog & web pages. Sheesh, we could spend all our time on the web.
Love AR, but having had a (finally) great connection on our local mls blog, wouldn't rule it out as a great conduit to like-thinking (and area specific) problems/solutions. MUCH less complicated than Twitter, which is an anomaly to me, despite having signed up. I'm a dinosaur. Ick.
I've finally gotten the hang of Twitter and am having fun with it, but now I have to find a balance between all the things I have to do as my blogging has fallen off. So much to do, so little time ;-)
Investing time to social networking groups is a very good thing. I do agree with Debra....So much to do and so little time! But that wont stop me from trying. Great Post Calie
Charlie, Lane, Tony, Shelli, Myrl, Eileen, Debra & Dione - sounds like we all have the same issue - TIME. How are we to develop quality connections that will eventually lead to (hopefully) more business and an extensive referral base AND make a living at the same time?
Mary - Thanks for the inspiration for the post & for stopping by!