As a real estate agent, using social media to market and grow your business can seem daunting. However, in today's online driven world, developing a working strategy to build your social media presence is imperative.

To the real estate professional willing to commit long-term, social media provides substantial benefits including expanded influence and a boost in credibility. In order to identify and connect with your target audience, you first need to understand:

• The wants and needs of your target market
• The preferred social destination(s) of your target market

Once you answer those two questions, you must work to establish a powerful online presence. Keep in mind, it is better to be consistently active in a handful of social networking sites rather than taking on too many at once and creating an inconsistent and at best, mediocre presence.

Your Social Media Strategy

Creating your social media strategy begins by understanding each social site and your goal behind it. From there you will determine action steps required to meet your goals.

Facebook:

What results do you want to achieve? For example:

• Increase website traffic
• Create buzz around your brand
• Connect with past/current clients
• Recruit local real estate professionals

Your next step is creating a strategic action plan. This should not take you any longer than 30 minutes to complete. Determine how you will:

• Network and engage friends/fans
• Increase fans and promote your page
• Keep content updated and consistent

LinkedIn:

If the possibilities of one connection expanding into thousands, connecting directly to your target audience in a professional atmosphere and speaking with the power players within your industry sound appealing, then LinkedIn is the platform for you. Take a few moments to assess your current LinkedIn profile and ensure that each area is complete. Once you have filled in all necessary data, move on to:

• Engaging and connecting with like-minded professionals
• Requesting endorsements from past clients and vendors
• Participating by answering questions and taking part in relevant conversations
• Connecting your LinkedIn profile to your other social media accounts

Twitter:

Twitter provides a unique challenge for many marketers. In 140 characters or less, you must craft both a succinct and compelling reason to take action.

• Determine what type of followers you are looking to connect with. Use Twellow to find people relevant to your niche and target within a specific geographic region.
• Create buzz by tweeting out exceptional content whether it is from your blog or other industry resources. Use hashtags to easily allow others to find your content based on topic and keyword.
• Get found by optimizing your profile. Complete your bio utilizing keywords, a link to your website or blog and connections to your additional social sites.
• Use a custom background to brand your Twitter channel and create consistency across the web.

Use Posting Tools and Automation

Save time and energy by automating a portion of your posting and content syndication process. There are many time saving tools and systems that curate content designed specifically for the real industry.

• www.roost.com
• www.socialmadesimple.com
• www.hoothut.com

You can also use:

• Google alerts to listen to what is being said about your personal brand
• Twitter lists to connect with clients and competitors
• Analytics to refine your social content in order to meet the needs of your fans and followers. Free services such as Hootsuite offer insight into what content is resonating with consumers and what is falling flat.

Your social interaction whether it is on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn should be an extension of what you and your brand represent. Let your social presence be a constant reminder to prospects, past clients and referral partners that you have created a realm where they can openly share and be heard. Your sole goal is to offer tremendous value and be the resource they call upon when they are ready to make a move.

To view the original article, visit RISMedia.