Good morning, and welcome to another Real Estate First Fridays. My name is Matthew Hodge, executive vice president here at LPT Realty. I'm joined by Louis Fuhrman, my co VP, and we've also got another special guest, Christina Griffin, who will be here in just one second. We'll bring her up on stage. But, before we get started, I just wanna see how, how are you doing today, bro? I I am doing well. I mean, it's I've been frozen all week. I don't know if a lot of you guys saw, but there were snow here in Florida. It's it's the craziest thing. Now granted, we're a little too far south to experience that snow, but it's been rainy. It's been cold. It's, yeah, pretty unnormal. Pretty unnormal. Yeah. I saw, on someone's social media, which is fitting that because we're gonna talk about a lot of social media today. I saw on someone's social media that, it was, like, they were, like, actually at the beach. Yeah. And it was, like, snowing at the beach, and they're like, that is the craziest thing. Ocean. It's like, who would've thought? Right. I guess, like, pretty water too. It's not like, you know, what you would see, like, in Jersey or New York. Like, it's like anyways, it was very, very interesting, very unusual to have that. We are, like, so blown away in Florida. In the desert. Yeah. What what temperature that's a good suggestion, Dave. What temperature is it where you are right now? I know when we woke up today, here it was, like, thirty nine, and that is not comfortable. Florida thirty nine is different than, like, say, New York thirty nine. Like, New York thirty nine is like, yeah, it doesn't feel as good. We're not we're not geared for it. We're not fair. In our cars are not ready for it. The tires, like, nothing's, like, geared. I don't have jackets appropriately for, like, in the weather. Yeah. It's just And I gotta know. It just, like, cuts through you differently here in in Florida. But anyway, let's see. Let me go look at these tables. Forty nine, thirty nine. Oh. Fifteen. Mm-mm. No. Thank you. Sarah. Where's Sarah? Hey. Where's Sarah? Yeah. Where are you from, Sarah? Okay, guys. Well, we are we are gonna jump in here. Today's topic is gonna be social media. And just like last week's format, we're gonna cover that in a broad stroke. And then, we're gonna have Christina who is then going to talk about that at a deeper level inside of LPT plus, which is at twelve o'clock for the people who subscribe to that. And so she's gonna kinda walk us through at a light level some of the things that they'll be talking about so that we are starting to merge kind of concepts. Right? We're starting to merge topics. One thing that we are looking to improve here at LPT Realty is ensuring that, let's say, if we are thinking in the month of February that social media is gonna be the theme, then our mentors and our, you know, our our speech coach. And, like, everybody is going to be talking about the same exact thing so you can digest it from so many different levels. And so as a part of that alignment, LPT plus is going to be doing the same thing. So we'll talk about it here lightly on a broad level that everyone has the opportunity to apply to their business. And then inside of LPT Plus where they do specific workshops and handouts and things like that and homework, they'll go a little bit deeper on it. So with that being said, Christina, I'll kinda turn it over to you for a quick second to walk us through, what we're discussing today. Alright. Sounds good. Alright. I love that you just started it off with how cold it is. So, today we're talking today we're talking about social media because, gosh, it's freezing outside, and who the heck wants to prospect right right now? I know a lot of you are sitting and and I I didn't get my door drops out, I don't wanna do my my open house, winter, it is tough. The days are shorter, air is colder, but here's the truth. While others are sitting, you have the opportunity to stand out. So we're gonna give you just some super simple, actionable things you guys can go do regardless of the weather. So, I'm gonna go ahead and dive in, and just gonna give you a few concepts for us to talk through. Social media. A lot of you, may or may not be on social media, but right now, I want you to imagine regardless of the weather, how you can use it to get more listings and create more opportunity without any cost. So Facebook Marketplace is one of the best, in my opinion, untapped resources that you guys can utilize, and we have agents that are having crazy success with our cash offer platform utilizing Facebook Marketplace. So first, we need to start with conversations. Step one, start conversations from anywhere. So here's an example. Regardless of where you are, you can use Facebook, and this should be a time block for you daily. So you've got four sale by owner listings, you've got four rent by owner, these are landlord, these are rental properties, that are posted just like I I call it the more modern version of Craigslist. So imagine a simple message that you can send to those for sale by owners or those for rent by owners on your Facebook marketplace. I noticed your property on Facebook marketplace. It looks great. I work with a investor that would be perfect for this property. Are you open to a cash offer? I saw your rental. Many landlords I work with have found that selling now offers great returns. Would you be open to a cash offer? So, that's the first concept is having those conversations, and I just wanted to open your eyes up to that potential on the properties that are listed there for sale and for rent. K. Next step two, build trust in Facebook groups. If you are not in Facebook groups, again, it's a really great untapped resource. Investor groups are my favorite. Type in investor in your local area, investor Florida, investor Texas, or your local area, and add yourself to all of those groups. It could be as simple as a message. Hey. I'm a real estate agent specializing in cash offers. If you're curious or you would like or or you're buying currently, please reach out to me. I'm looking for real cash buyers. Please reach out to me for a conversation. So, again, engage in these groups. It could be first time home buyer groups. It could be just your local market or your local neighborhood. You can build trust in these groups regardless of how cold it is outside. K? Alright. Step three, take advantage of this this season, right, this season, where, you have the ability to administratively put your head down and I call it do the work. Connecting with your older, opportunities, but most of us forget this part of Facebook. All the birthdays, stop stop posting on their wall. Stop posting happy birthday on their wall. Send them a private message. Just a simple happy birthday. How are you? Do you have anything special planned? Can I get your updated address? I'd love to drop you a card in the mail. This is something you guys can do to build rapport with people on your social media instead of just posting publicly. Alright, almost done. I want you to think about what would it do for your business if you spent thirty minutes daily on Facebook mark marketplace looking for for sale by owners, looking for for rent by owners, or even looking for distressed properties. Engage in three groups weekly minimum. Post, comment, and connect with property owners and potential buyers. Most of you may not be aware, all of these groups that for sale by owners and investors post their properties, and all these are great opportunities for your clients. Try and make ten meaningful connections a day on social media. And one thought I wanna give you that we some of you may or may not realize, you can post your own listings on Facebook marketplace. Your own listings, you can get permission to post other people's listings if they give you permission, and it's a great free way to engage with buyers or potential renters, that's not gonna cost you anything. Get them out of Facebook. What's your phone number? Add them to your CRM and nurture them, and, my goal today was just to inspire you, to do the work and engage with people that aren't gonna cost you anything regardless of the weather. And that cash offer strategy is really gold, because instead of just giving them your expired or your for sale by owner dialogue, you're giving them a CTA, a call to action, and getting them to engage with you, and it creates a lot of awesome opportunity. I I love that. So there's a couple of key things that you said there that I think make a lot of sense. One, you know, the way that when when the weather is outside is difficult to be in. Right? And in Florida, generally, that's in the middle of the summer is where people are like, hey, man. It's a hundred and nine thousand degrees outside. You know? I'm not going I'm not going outside today. Or, like, you know, in Arizona, I know that when we were, there in Texas and, you know, there were some months where it was, like, literally prohibitive to be outside doing this type of function. And so you're saying, okay. Hey. If that was part of my strategy, then what do I do now when that is eliminated from from my from my plate? And so I like it like what she's saying, which is, like, hey. This is a free way that you can go out there. It does take some sweat equity. It does require some work on your side, but it doesn't cost anything out of your pocket to go out there and start to use social media as a tool. And some of the things that I've heard in the past that people like doing is that they'll go to, you know, new construction town homes. I'm sorry, new construction model homes and tour that and, you know, put it on their social media. Hey, guys. I'm at this property. You know, let me walk you through all this home has to offer. Here's some of the things I love about it. If you are interested in finding your home this year, reach out to me. I'll be happy to help you. So they're just utilizing the house itself as the attention to draw. It's pretty. It's well decorated. It's a model home, yada yada yada. They're not saying if you're interested in this house, call me. That could happen. But they're saying, hey. I'm touring this house. Think about me when you're thinking about real estate needs. And if you've got a need, you know, let me help you walk you help you find the the perfect home. You know? So that is a great way again. Like, if you're back out in the wild, you're looking for ways to utilize social media in a way that doesn't cost you anything. There's just so many creative ways to do it again. You just have to be consistent in whatever you decide to do so you can get the the free Yeah. You definitely need to be consistent and purposeful with the approach. Right? And and, you know, one big thing about advertising and marketing is you truly wanna have a diversified marketing portfolio. And what that means is, you know, having different means that you are out there communicating with your sphere, communicating with new customers and prospecting. You never wanna just bank or put all your eggs in one basket, you know, because look again, like, if we, you know, bank on, you know, solely advertising through door knocking when the weather doesn't permit, maybe there's a storm, maybe there's snow or too much heat at, you know, a hundred and one thousand degrees, you know, as you said. You know, it it it's gonna be hard to facilitate that. It's going to be hard to do that. So how do we hedge those positions under those dynamics? And the same with social media, you know, maybe there are certain social media climates that are, you know, happening or certain things happening in that space that will require you to be diversified somewhere else. What we would recommend is, you know, as you're white boarding this, like pinpoint what your categories are. You know, what categories of advertising are you tackling and which ones exist out there that you may not be tackling and what can you do to turn on those edge engines in some type of way. You know, social media is one of those that oftentimes next to door knocking and and and and and that type of prospecting creates the most, heebie jeebies or fears for whatever reason. Right? Like, I speak to so many agents who they are very fearful of tackling advertising or marketing their businesses inside of social media. But one of the commitments that I would, you know, recommend that you place on yourself is just doing that hard thing. Like you never know where it's going to land. You never know if you're going to be able to penetrate a brand new audience that you were never able to penetrate before. And it was all because you did that one additional thing that maybe you are fearful of at one moment in your business arc. So highly recommended guys, like have a diversified marketing portfolio and then have a purposeful system behind it and have a cadence behind it and a frequency behind it. Like, no matter which marketing mechanism you choose to use, it will never work if you just spit one here, spit one there, do another one here like gunslinging. Right? Like, you have to have a frequency. You have to have a cadence. You have to have an agenda of when things are being released and you have to be consistent with those items. If not, it will never work. And then I'll kinda leave with this last thing on specifically regarding social media. And we've talked about this in a few, you know, in real estate first Fridays here and there where it's fun to see like the creative ways that agents use social media to, you know, advertise or market their business And one of those ways is how do you take, like, our hard print collateral and material that we offer at LPT Realty, and how do you transfer that inside of the social media space? Like, as we know, you know, part of our power packs, we get a sign writer with SMS capture technology where if the numbers text, you go to a property specific website. I've seen agents where they basically, right before they hang that sign writer on their yard sign, they'll walk with an easel to that property, stage the easel somewhere in the house, you know, whether it's overlooking the pool, you know, overlooking the family room, living room, kitchen, whatever the case may be. They'll take a few shots of that sign writer staged inside of their house. They'll take their door hangers and and the other neighborhood reports, lay them out on the bathroom countertops or kitchen countertops to take some pictures, and then they use that as a creative series of social media campaigns for the future. And then strategically, what they do is in the description, they don't put the property address. Because what happens? You put the property address, a nosy viewer, they're gonna go to Zillow, they're gonna pump it in, and they're gonna get all the info they want. Mhmm. Rather, they don't put that in the description. They don't give too much information that will lead someone to Zillow. So that way, if someone is interested in seeing more pictures of the house, which they're already seen on your advertising, it's, man, look at what this agent does. They're gonna SMS capture, which now you capture what you want, which is the name and number in return versus that customer ultimately going to Zillow. So, you know, social media is such a powerful tool to be able to incorporate. We just have to overcome the fear and incorporate some level of purposeful consistency behind it. Awesome. Awesome. Great great points. Christine, I know you wanna jump inside of there. Yeah. I just a few great points. And, Louis, I love that you just shared don't share the address. So a few key things around new construction, and I I see we have a few, post in the chat around I told my agents they need to go meet two or three sales reps. Some of you don't even realize, I'll give you an example, Doctor Horton, a big national builder, they will allow you to advertise their properties. There's a whole policy around it, so you can reach out to local builders, go visit them, like like what was recommended, go take photos, and you can post those on social media without the address. The investors, they will let you, many of them, share their off market properties with permission. So just think outside of the box, that's super important, but one thing I want you to think about, if you're gonna start being purposeful on social media, you're gonna start messaging for sale by owners and for rent by owners, or adding yourself to Facebook groups, you need to make sure you have an up to date profile. You have your Facebook says that you're a real estate agent, it could have your family and it can have your personal life, but your LPT site, your your Zillow, your realtor dot com, these sellers may Google you and figure out is it does Matt actually sell real estate? Or is he just somebody that's trying to get information about my property? So that credibility, it will go hand in hand, so make sure that you're set up. And I would say for me, one of the other points, be strategic about the Facebook groups that you join, and make sure to look at their their messages on what you can and can't do, because there is an ability when you post a property, you post your listings on Facebook marketplace, you can share into twenty Facebook groups at a time. So instead of manually doing that, you add a property, and it will give you the ability to post into twenty groups at a time, and it's really, really great lead generation. So, lots of strategies and ideally the consistency, and I love how, Louis and Matt spoke around time blocking. That's strategic, do it when you don't have a lot of noise, have it as part of your morning routine, just like we do with prospecting. The great thing is you don't have to worry about doing it during administrative time. One of my favorite times is over coffee after my devotional. I'm sending Facebook birthdays, and I'm checking properties. Do it during a time that you're gonna do it every day. And if it's super cold out, now is a really great time to get established in it. Yep. I love that. I'll I'll for one, the time blocking piece, I'm I'm happy that you kinda called that out because, again, if you are gonna be doing anything at a purposeful level, it requires you to set time aside to continue to do it. If you do it just sporadically, like, hey. I feel like doing it right now or I'm feeling motivated because I saw it on real estate first Friday. I'm gonna do it, and you haven't planned the next time that you're gonna then put that same thing into action, it's not gonna happen. You're gonna waste the efforts. And so, you know, step always number one is, okay. I'm gonna devote x amount of time per week or per day or whatever that cadence looks like for you to do this function. I wanna make this a part of my business, so I'm gonna take ten minutes a day or thirty minutes a week or whatever. But it has to be planned out. And so, you you know, if you don't do that, it drops off. But more importantly, once you've got that time blocked out, this gives you some ideas on how to utilize that time. Hey. I'm going to take maybe some of my previous listings, and I'm gonna put in there, hey. If you want more information about this, text, you know, one two three four five to the phone number. And it's the the information from your text writer sign, but it gives you that person as a lead. You get that lead information. They don't necessarily have what they want because they don't they can't, you know, look up the address online and, like, they can't bypass you and go to Zillow. You know, they have to give you your their information in order for you to receive in order for them to receive their info. And so that is I think is one of the, the most powerful ways to use a text writer sign on social media. That concept of a text you know, text me your info, and I'll give you the information you're seeking. So it's a great call out. Yeah. For sure. For sure. And, yeah, I mean, going back to that time block, that is so important, especially instead of real estate where our days could be very spontaneous. You know, once we crack that code of having, consistent files, you know, under contract, you are always subjective to spontaneous things arising in your day to day, you know, and and those spontaneuities can either come from a bad inspection report coming in or an appraisal report coming in or financing, you know, going south or your client is panicking. Yeah. You know, period. And then your life in the mix of all of this. You know, that's what creates one of the biggest challenges inside of real estate is that because we have to wear so many hats, some of the hats require you to be very purposeful and organized, and other hats require you to be very spontaneous and on your feet and very nimble. And that's why it's so important to have your times kinda blocked out. You know, there are swells in the day that you will recognize are much more prominent for the spontaneous issues to arise. You know, very it's not very frequently where at seven o'clock in the morning or eight o'clock, your customer's gonna blow you up, you know, hysterically. Right? Like, it could happen. Granted, it could. But, you know, there are better the likelihood is low. Right? And that's it becomes a likelihood game. Right? Where it's, you know, where are these times of the day that it's much less likely that these spontaneous things will arise. And now those are the hours of the day that I need to, you know, fulfill some of these more organized approach kind of mechanisms in my workflow. Because if not, you're you're never going to do it. Yep. You know, you you truly will not, and then you'll ride this roller coaster effect. What's gonna happen, you're gonna be very busy with contracts. You're gonna close out the contracts, and then you're gonna sit around and say, man, I have no plan. I have no marketing plan. I have nothing to create awareness. I've and and it's rinse, wash, repeat. Right? You incorporate these things. Things now go under contract, and then you stop doing these other things that got you there. And you never wanna do that. You always wanna focus on efficiencies. You wanna create new, floors and foundations as you're excelling through your business. Like, you never wanna be stuck inside of that roller coaster effect. And and and a big part of it is just organizing your day and figuring out when are those times that it's less likely that spontaneity will arise for you to now incorporate your And go ahead, Christina. You were gonna say Okay. I, so I some people are asking how to join Facebook, groups. So when you are on Facebook, you just type in, what you're looking for. So I see West Palm Beach, Florida. So type in West Palm Beach and investors. On the left hand side, you're gonna see groups, and that's that will allow you to add to groups. The other thing I wanna mention, some of you maybe maybe you don't know what to say. Get familiar with AI. You know, just a simple chat GBT, what should I post in an investor Facebook group? I'm an agent that wants to grow my clients, and it will give you ideas. The last thing other added in, whether it's, you know, your properties you just listed or your active marketing plans or LPT plus agents, your cash offer box, those sellers that you connect with on Facebook, you can create just a simple envelope and and send them your materials. So if it's too, too cold to go door drop and get your materials out, it could be a simple envelope with a cash offer letter, and it will create opportunity for you. It it's just the more connections you make, the better, your results are gonna be. So just be consistent. That's right. That's right. Okay. Well, we'll go ahead and close it there. One thing I wanna call out, Lewis, I got the text, so we were in a a group chat. We were on a episode of, called Wags to Riches. We didn't know the name of the show when we when we filmed it. But Shirell and her team, the alert team, they did the selling Tampa, episodes on our season on on Netflix. The new version of that is called Wag to Riches because she went down to Miami. She's married to a football player, whatever. Blah blah blah. Anyways, you were on there, and it's funny because we got a screenshot because, I guess, Netflix as they're promoting the show, like, scrolls through scenes so that becomes and you were the one of the scenes, man. It was so funny to see you. I'm looking at Netflix, and there goes Lewis, sitting sitting there with, with Sherrell. So, super excited. And, and that that they continue to have a very strong, marketing strategy around social media. So, again, that would be the extreme version of it. Someone who has taken their total social media presence and aimed it towards growing their infrastructure, growing their business, growing their connections. I think Sherelle now has five hundred and twenty five thousand followers on on Instagram, and, Ashley, who's also on the show, has, like, six hundred and something thousand. Like, that is an extreme version of taking hey. I'm gonna take my total focus and point it here. And through that connection was actually how we originally were introduced to the developers of Saint Martin, which ended up being, you know, a fifty five million dollar project that we took on on her behalf. So we're talking about the extreme. So you don't necessarily have to say, hey. I'm gonna go do a reality show and use like, I get it. Like, that is really far down the pendulum on that side. But I'm just bringing that up to show the potency that if you want to tap into this, the market is there. It does work. You can choose how much you wanna invest and how big of it, like you said, of your portfolio you wanna make it or how big of your strategy you wanna make it, but it does work. You just have to do it consistently, and you have to do it with the approach of saying, hey. This is what I'm gonna go do. I'm either gonna go into these investor groups and make sure that I'm known to these investors, then I'm gonna start researching what type of information investors find value, and I'm gonna put that in there. I'm gonna brand myself to that. Or it could be as simple as saying, hey. I'm just gonna be I want you to think about me when you think about real estate, so I'm gonna constantly put real estate things in there. It could be me touring houses and not giving any stats. It could be me giving a light stat about what's happening on interest. Like, you have to pick what makes most sense for you. But whatever you do, set the time aside to do it every week so you can do it consistently. Build out a small plan like, Christina said, use chat GPT or something like that to give you just a rough guideline of, hey. What should I do this week on social media? Things are cold outside. I'm a real estate agent. I'd like to reference real estate sales to the weather. And it's gonna give you some ideas. You format it to what makes most sense for you and your personality and put it out there. It doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to be highly produced. That was something that I that Dave got me out of. I struggled with that for a long time. I'm like, I'm not putting anything on social media unless it's fully four k edited. Like, you know, it it doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. Just let people think about you when they have the need of real estate needs and just start the action. If it starts to grow, then, yes, worry about what the next step is or the next higher level of production or whatever that is the next step. But today, just get started with time blocking it and making it a part of your business. I mean, Nike nailed it. Right? Just do it. Just over overcome the fear because you never know what code you will crack. You know, this may be something and and that goes with any aspects of your business. You know? Look back at certain things that maybe at one time you were fearful of. And sometimes we kinda forget those things. Like, remember the first time you interacted with a customer? Remember the first time you went on a showing tour or the first time you negotiated and had to overcome a an inspection issue. Like, each and every one of those times, those butterflies were there. But we forget about it once we've done so many of them, and now you're immune to it. Right. Same thing now. Like, if you're fearful to go inside of this world, like, it's no different than how it happened before when you had those butterflies and trying to overcome it. And now, you know, some of you can do these things in your sleep. So you never know what Cody will crack. You never know how you know, what type of organic growth you will grow inside of these spaces. And, you know, just just go out there and just do it, guys. Awesome. Awesome. Alright. Well I I love that Gina said be authentic. So I I agree with that, and and we do in LPT plus, they have we they get all the handouts because I actually give them the scripts on what to say and what to post. So they're just be authentic and, stay consistent. And thank you for letting me, pour into the agents on the call today. I appreciate it. Awesome. Okay, guys. Well, if you guys wanna know more information about this, Christina is gonna be doing, a deep dive, at twelve o'clock with LPT plus group. We also have Caitlin Rhodes who teaches two times per month, and she has tons of templates and social media strategies and hashtags and all these things. So look for her class if you're not a part of LPT plus or not interested in doing that. If this starts to make more sense for you and you're like, hey. I wanna go deeper on these topics. LPT plus is a great way for you to do that. If not, we will see you Monday for motivational Monday. So have a blessed and hopefully stay warm weekend, and, we'll see you Monday. Alright. Bye. Alright.