Using the Web and social media to sell real estate

Running a business with an online presence requires a substantial amount of planning. It is so easy to be detoured by shiny objects on the web and lose sight of the basic business goals as well as their proper implementation on the Web. I have been working on my own planning now for two solid weeks, in order to focus on my international real estate core, but I want to share with you what I have found to be the seven key factors that will enable or kill any business venture on the Web.

They are listed in order of importance, meaning they give you a sequence that will bring you from the darkness of imminent extinction as a Web entity to potential success (you need to put a lot of work into them to actually achieve the success you want).

1. A good market – if you lack a properly selected market with a reasonable amount of competition you are probably dead in the water even before starting. Beware of niches that have little or no competition, if they didn’t work for others they won’t work for you either.

2. A properly setup blog – yes it takes a WordPress blog to make a strong presence on the Web, and even if you use it as a regular site (not a blog per se), it must still be setup with the blogging platform by WordPress. Being on social media is not enough: the hub of your presence is going to be your blog.

3. Good content that spans multiple formats: articles, video and audio, according to what you like and what your followers like.

4. A reasonable traffic for your market – this requires some knowledge of the Internet marketing techniques that will enable you to grow your visibility.

5. A social media presence – you should have an account in all the major social media networks and specialize in those that are closer to your style. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Youtube to say the least.

6. A well defined personal brand – I am talking about you, not your business. I have for example chosen to promote my business through a domain that carries my name. You can’t be every where so start by securing your own personal domain name and build on it your business or businesses.

7. Relevant products with varying price levels, starting with something free, so to be able to offer an easy entrance in your funnel and then gradually up-sell when people are ready. Here you can also have affiliated products to begin with, but beware of offering junk, and in order to have a strong personal brand you will have to also develop something that is totally yours.

Daunting? Yes, but very factual. How do you eat the elephant? A bit at a time.

Roberto Mazzoni

Mercury is the only liquid that can cut a gold ring very neatly in no time or mix with it and turn into a silver-like dull metal. They call this reaction amalgamation and it is immediate. The only way to recover the original gold is to vaporize the mercury inside it, which few people are willing to do because it is toxic.

Today I am starting a major shift in the content of this blog because it is time that it focuses on its main subject: creating business opportunities, both in international real estate as well as other business and international areas. I am a fan of technology, blogging and Web 2.0 and I will be using these tools even more intensely in the future and maybe I will write an article from time to time on how to use these tools from a business perspective , but the transition is due now: I need to vaporize my old time passion for the Web as such and devote my blogging time to the main passion of my current working life, which is also where I can provide more unique content.

So what’s so special about international real estate or business selling? You have the chance of creating a win-win situation between a seller and a buyer, leveraging the availability of cash in Europe or other countries with the ample availability of housing or businesses for sale in the US. But some people get it wrong: they believe they can simply sell for an unrealistic price to someone who is far away hoping they would never find out.

With the modern tools, just anybody can find out anything in a few minutes and he can also get easily local people to check for him. So don’t do it. You will not have a second chance. So where is the win-win? You can probably get a more decent price and shorter closing terms if you involve a foreign buyer properly, but you need to do a bit of work: find out what tax advantages are available in the US as compared to the buyer’s original country. Yes, many times it is cheaper to pay taxes here than it is in Europe, believe it or not.

Find out the legal paperwork she has to sign and how you can make it easy for her to understand it and sign it. A translator doesn’t cost much and it can make a huge difference. Explain the huge advantage in renting a property in states like Florida, where prices have dropped, as compared to an average rental in Europe: it can up to be six times more profitable. Make it easier for them to get into the project with some owner financing.

And if nothing works of these, you can still ask me a few more ideas.

Roberto Mazzoni

There is a little story that I want to tell to make my point today. It is the story of the scoprion and the frog that some of you might already know.

One day, a scorpion decided that he wanted a change and went on journey until he reached a river.
The river was wide and swift and he saw a frog sitting on the other side and decided to ask the frog for help getting in crossing the stream.
The frog replied: “How do I know that if I try to help you, you wont try to kill me?”
The scorpion replied: “If I try to kill you, then I would die too!”
Now this seemed to make sense and the frog agreed to take the scorpion across the river.
Halfway across, the frog suddenly felt a sharp sting in his back.
Why on earth did you do that?” asked the dying frog.
The scorpion replied while drowning: “It’s my nature.”
Some people can be very convincing and there are many business opportunities that seem too good to be left alone, but you can’t get into a field you don’t know without knowing fully whom you are dealing with. In real estate for example, where most of my activity is concentrated, I get daily suggestions about “good” deals some of which are just not so good. And I know that many of the international investors that come to me for advice and service have had bad experiences, not deadly but painful.
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Financial newspapers and TV have long been the main channel to keep informed about what was going on in the business world. The Web has now replaced paper as a main source of reference both because most of the papers have gone online and because you find many more resources, closer to your particular niche and market, and they contain often articles or comments written by experts in the field or by people that are actually familiar with what they write about. Blog are ranking high now as a source of information on specific subjects.

In his “The Art of Money Getting” P.T. Barnum lists as rule number 12 “Read the Newspapers” but today he would have said read the most important blogs in your area. In doing so not only you can get valuable information for your business of for your passion, but you can also get ideas on you to structure your own blog.

Where can you find them? On Technorati.com the directory of the top blogs in any industry. You chose the subject or field and then you browse the list of blogs available, starting from the top. Some of them are actual magazines, written by several people, each contributing with her own knowledge and expertise.
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I have just started my series on PT Barnum’s “Art of Money Getting” and I have already changed the course of my professional life by applying the first rule that is “Don’t Mistake Your Vocation”. Looking back at my current and past activities I see that my passion is that of sharing information, for free with friends or for compensation, like when I worked in magazines or when I advise an investor about a possible deal in the US.

This is my core competency: gathering relevant information and sharing it with others and therefore this will also become the major target for my future development and the purpose of this blog. I will concentrate on giving you an international viewpoint about business and life in general and also information that you can use in your own activity.

Today I have passed my Florida license exam as a real estate professional, in this way I will be better able to competently and fully support European investors who are planning to invest in the United States. I already know that some of the work is going to be exciting, like researching and sharing information, and some is going to be boring but important, like the study of the different laws and tax regulations in the various nations.
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