Let’s talk about real estate agents and brag posting.
We’ve all been there.
Myself included.
What we post on social media says a lot about who we are and when it comes to real estate agents, I have found there are two types.
Those who post about their wins.
And those who post about their client’s wins.
These might sound the same to you, but there is a stark difference.
You see, it’s all in the intention.
A lot of agents love talking about the numbers. “Last year we sold X and X million in property”, etc etc and hey that’s really cool and it shows you’re getting results and clearly doing something right.
But we have to ask ourselves, how does the client receive this, and are we secretly sabotaging our image and reputation as a professional by giving our social media this slant?
When I see these posts now, I just yawn and think, yep, another brag post. If I was a client, seeing this pop up in my feed would make me feel like I just donated to that new Porsche the agent was showing off last week.
Am I just another cog in the wheel and did they even give a sh*t about me when we were working together?
Perhaps others see it differently? I know I’m viewing this through the biased lens of a person in the industry but I can’t help but feel the general public might feel the same. Just a hunch.
In the noisy world of social media, where a brag-post typically attracts the validation hit we all secretly crave, it can be tempting to jump on the bandwagon, but what if instead of spruiking the dollars and the number of deals, we celebrated the number of clients we helped?
I’m feeling a little better about this already.
As real estate professionals, I believe we owe it to ourselves to showcase an authentic version of who we really are online — and if this means posting your wins, I have no problem with that.
I just think it can be done in a more client-centric way.
The industry has gained itself a pretty bad wrap over the years, featuring high on the list of the top ten most untrustworthy professions, and one has to ask, why?
Why do they dislike us so much?
As an agent who has been playing this real estate game for 27 years this year, it pains me to think that after so long, the public still think we’re a bunch of crooks.
And sadly, I don’t think social media has helped our cause.
For a service industry, we seem to be more focussed on ourselves than on the people we serve.
Perhaps if we shifted our focus away from this rockstar persona of me! me! me! and brought our clients onto centre stage, we might start to move off the “Most Distrusted Professions List” altogether.
Now, I know I’m sounding bold, but as an industry, lets stop and think about what it would actually take to get off that ugly list altogether.
First and foremost, the perception of agents needs to change for this to happen.
I mentioned that word authenticity earlier and perhaps that is where we need to start?
What if we stopped to think about our personal brand values for a minute and asked ourselves, “who am I as a professional and how do I want people to perceive me?”
What do I stand for and who am I here to serve?
Brag post or client win?
When I left the agency I was with and started Wendy Russell, Independent Buyer’s Agent in 2015, I took a good hard look at who I wanted to be in the space.
For me, it was important I showed up as the real and authentic version of myself, but I must admit, I was a guilty brag-poster.
I had been conditioned that this was just what you did to showcase the wins and appear successful.
Spruiking the sales results made you look good in the eyes of potential clients, but the more I worked with professional clientele, the more I realised that revealing the numbers was not the way to go.
These people wanted discretion from their agent.
And so I started giving it to them.
For one particular client, a high-profile CEO of a well-known airline, I went as far as having the selling agents sign non-disclosure forms and cancel all media to the auction we were bidding at.
For me, I’d felt I had a real win for the client, not just because we bought the house under budget, but because I managed to keep the purchase out of the media.
For my client, this was of high importance to them.
Did I want to spruik this win far and wide - of course!
But I kept it on the down-low, only posting minimal information and certainly leaving the price out of the equation.
This is why you can’t always believe those online stats that show the weekly sales figures. They don’t have all the information because agents like me keep it private and discreet.
I guess it’s a fine balance really - and all about getting that mix right.
My social media now consists of a variety of posts that show who I am as a person outside of real estate, my client wins (minus the purchase figures), images of the beautiful homes I buy, blog posts like this one, and a little bit of real estate education from time to time.
I make it a rule of thumb to ask myself before I hit the Share button, “does this feel like a brag post?” Because that’s certainly not my intention anymore.
How to Create a Strategic Social Media Feed.
If you’re an agent reading this and want to learn more about how to make your personal brand stand out professionally on social media, I go into great detail in my Masterclass for Women in Real Estate - The Polished Professional.
Module 2 focuses on Personal Brand Values - how to discover your own and show up authentically online so you stand out to the right clients who won’t throw objections to working with you. (This is because they’ll feel connected emotionally.)
To get a head start, here are some questions to ponder when planning your social media content for your personal brand:
Who is my ideal client?
What do they want to see from me?
How do I want to be perceived as a professional?
Am I posting content that reflects the real me?
What are my hobbies or interests outside of real estate?
What are some of the goals I’m working towards?
or REVIEW THE COURSE OUTLINE here.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wendy Russell writes about the realities of a career in real estate. She is a self-made woman and Independent Buyer’s Advocate based in Brisbane Australia, representing busy professionals in luxury home purchases.
