online – The Property Writers

Okay, hands up if you remember the song ‘Everybody’s Free To Wear Sunscreen’.

Yes? No?

If you need a little reminder, or distraction, see the original music video below.

(Copyright lies with Baz Luhrmann and associated creators)

Poignant and direct, the lyrics most likely have something in there for everyone. It is a wonderfully engaging stream of advice, including being advised to floss, getting plenty of calcium, as well as remembering compliments that you receive.

One such piece of advice is

“Do one thing every day that scares you”.

This piece of wisdom was originally said by Eleanor Roosevelt.

Easier said than done, right?

But what is interesting about this, is that it can be a little more daunting applying this principle to your business and business practices.

Why is this? It’s not a rhetorical question, I really don’t know why this is!

Perhaps it is because our business or workplace and how we operate within our work can have a knock-on affect to plenty of others. Whether they are colleagues, clients or even future or prospective clients, drastic or ‘scary’ changes can cause ripples.

Whereas, making personal decisions, such as a change in hair colour or a choice in holiday destination, are less likely to offend, annoy, or upheave others.

Here at The Property Writers, we’ve had plenty of decisions to make along the way since our fruition and already in the span of a year have made changes to the way we work. Most of these changes have been overwhelmingly positive.

But have we really challenged ourselves to the extreme, or even scared ourselves? Nope, not really! The end of financial year is fast approaching and amid our meetings and talks on financials and processes and future goals, I’m going to be throwing into the mix the notion of mixing it up a bit and scaring ourselves.

This could be as simple as picking up the phone and phoning some targeted clients who have been on our wish list (so far, from afar!).

OR, utilising a social media app that has admittedly confounded us a bit until now *cough, cough*, Snapchat!

But we are going to mix it up a bit around here and scare ourselves.

After all, nothing ventured is nothing gained, right?

I have skydived before. Yes, I have jumped out of a plane, after only agreeing to do so around 4 or 5 hours beforehand. And I remember being strangely calm while doing so.

But I was reduced to a shivering, terrified mess recently in Bali. I was climbing the set of stairs, to go on a water-slide that most 12 years around me weren’t thinking twice about. This water-slide absolutely terrified me. I did go on it, after my initial almost tamper-tantrum stating that I wasn’t going to! But the prospect of jumping out of a plane from 15,000 feet was significantly less scary, for me anyway.

We all have have our ‘things’ and all have our levels of what we as individuals are comfortable with. We’re a diverse group, us human beings.

How about you? What are some things you can do within your business to scare yourselves?

Is it joining Snapchat like us? (Eek, we are so terrified!) Let us know on Instagram or Facebook!

So a couple of weeks ago I wrote about the concept of propinquity, which basically says that the more people interact with you, the more they’ll be inclined to both like and trust you. Useful to keep in mind in an industry which is always struggling against the perception of untrustworthiness, right?

And I also said that I’d talk more about how to do that in the online environment. Because it’s no longer enough to sponsor the local Christmas Pageant or have your face on the side of a bus: both millennials and Gen Xers, are living their lives on the internet, and plenty of them are also looking to buy houses. They want to see that you’re a real person, and that you know your stuff, and you can do that by putting in some time online.

1. Make your website compelling

You no doubt have a website, with your current property listings available for searching. But what is drawing readers to your site in the first place? Why will potential new vendors click on that URL as opposed to the one down the road? Maybe they’ve seen your name on billboards around their areas or your shopfront has caught their eye, but you can also do a lot to make sure that your site pops up at the top of a generic search using great web copy with SEO-optimised content and a good web designer.

But great web copy only gets you so far. Remember, the aim here is to make you seem familiar before the vendor decides to find an agent. You already do this in the real world, so what you’re going for here is the equivalent of driving down a street and seeing your thoughtful, eye-catching billboards every day.

2. Make your content fresh

This is where content marketing comes in. Before a vendor has decided whether to list their properties, they’ve been researching online. They’ve costed out a renovation (too pricy!), they’ve looked at how much their area’s appreciated, they’ve done some thinking about where the best schools are or whether there are any beach suburbs that are still affordable. If your site is offering information on those peripheral issues (and the list is endless!), and they’ve read your articles, then you’re becoming both familiar, and an expert, in the back of their mind.

3. Write for other sources

It doesn’t just have to be your own website on which you’re sharing all of this: plenty of larger, high-traffic site will accept sponsored content from contributors. That means that instead of paying for an advert on a website, you’re providing them with an informative article. They save on staff writers and have quality to offer their readers, and you as the contributor have got your name out there for people to remember.

And if you’re blanching at the very idea of writing for a high traffic website, here’s the biggest secret of all: ghostwriters don’t just work with books.

4. Maintain a social media presence

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram…the number of social media platforms is growing all the time. Depending on your goals and objectives, you can maintain a social media presence across several platforms or just a few. The important thing is that you understand how each platform works, and you’re prepared to post regularly. The etiquette of social media requires that you interact with your audience, rather than just posting links: try and stick to an 80:20 rule where no more than 20% of your posts are promoting native content. Respond to posts by other people, thank them for their interactions with you, and forge connections. You’re showing people who you are, and the more natural that comes across, the better. You can outsource this work as well, by the way, but it’s important to maintain your voice, so if you can find the time to do it yourself, all the better.

If all of this seems overwhelming, remember you don’t have to do it all at once. Pick a quiet time of year – winter is coming! – and put aside some time to improve one avenue first of all. A neglected social media presence is almost worse than none at all, so start with the thing you’re confident you can maintain and add things as time permits. We’ll be publishing more how-to articles on each of these subjects, so check back in with us as you go!

~ Tanya Ashworth-Keppel

Do one thing every day that scares you

How to shine when you get online: propinquity #2