Facebook Live for Real Estate Agents
“People spend more than 3x more time watching a Facebook Live video on average compared to a video that’s no longer live. This is because Facebook Live videos are more interesting in the moment than after the fact.” – Facebook
Video marketing on social media gives agents and brokers a great opportunity for getting the word out about their listings. Facebook Live gives you the ability to broadcast live video to potential buyers and record and save broadcasts for future promotions. And since this video platform exists within Facebook, your live broadcasts and videos are shareable and socially connected.
Combine the marketing power of video with the leading social media platform and promote your brand and listings using Facebook Live.
Let’s get started!
What you’ll need to get started
Mobile tools
• Smartphone (iPhone or Android)
• Facebook account (If you don’t have one already, you can set one up here)
• Facebook app for your smartphone (visit your app store via Apple’s App Store or Google Play to download)
Facebook Live on your desktop computer
While Facebook Live is currently available to iPhone and Android smartphone users, it’s not widely available for use on desktop PC’s and Macs. With that said, Engadget reports some Windows 10 users may be able to create live broadcasts using the Windows Facebook app. If you want to get technical and dive into Facebook Live on your desktop, here’s a resource to check out.*
Starting a Facebook Live broadcast on your smartphone
Here are some instructions from Facebook for how to start a live broadcast. Open the Facebook app on your smartphone and…
- “1. Tap ‘What’s on your mind’ at the top of News Feed.”
- “2. Select ‘Live Video’ from the dropdown menu.”
- “3. Add a description and choose your audience before hitting ‘Go Live.’ You’ll see a three-second countdown before your broadcast begins!”
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Practice makes perfect
It’s a good idea to shoot some live practice videos before your big debut. One benefit of using Facebook Live is that you can select an audience for your live broadcast (this is good to know both for practice purposes and to build an audience later).
Set your audience as “Only Me” so that your live-stream isn’t automatically viewable by the public, or select a small audience and invite them to interact with you as you shoot a live practice video. Do something fun and engaging like a question-and-answer segment so that you can get used to talking to an audience and interacting with their comments. Work on getting comfortable in front of a camera.
Once your practice live broadcast is over, review the recorded version of your video. Look for opportunities for improvement. Were you engaging on camera? How did you do with audience interaction? How was the sound and lighting? Make some adjustments and shoot a few more live practice videos. Once you get a feel for the technology and how it’s used, you should hopefully feel more comfortable with broadcasting future live videos to a public audience.
Ideas: Live Open House and Listing Update
There are a lot of ways you could use live video to promote your brand, listings, and services. Here are a few ideas to get started with:
1. The Live Open House
Host an open house, and live-broadcast it online via Facebook Live. This gives you the opportunity to meet buyers, answer questions, and point out the home’s highlights to a larger audience than you may have had without a live broadcast.
You could also use your smartphone to take your online audience on a walkthrough tour of the home. As you broadcast, throw in interesting anecdotes about the home, ask questions, “like” their comments, and engage with them. You can also take advantage of lulls in foot traffic to really focus on your online audience, and then when traffic picks up, use a tripod to continue your live feed as you welcome and talk with on site guests.
Tip: Make sure to keep your interactions balanced (you don’t want to neglect your on-site guests or your online guests!).
2. Listing and Market Updates
Try using Facebook Live to broadcast market updates throughout the week. You could use this to market brand new listings, inform potential buyers about price reductions, recap your current listings, give quick neighborhood or market updates, or get the word out about upcoming listings. You could even use live video to let your audience know about open houses, community events, and more.
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Want more video ideas for real estate marketing? How about 180 more ideas!
Get a free copy of our “Real Estate Marketing Kickstarer” ebook here.
Promotion
Build your audience and work at increasing your influence by generating some buzz about your Facebook Live broadcasts. Use social media to advertise and promote your live open houses, events, market updates, or any other creative ideas you have! If people are commenting on your promotional posts, respond to them, thank them for commenting, and keep the conversation going. Also, remember that your live videos are saved as recordings, so you can share and re-share your recorded content at a later date.
Start rolling
Now you know the basics! Get started with live video today.
*Since this method is more complicated than the smartphone version, you’ll want to investigate this further before diving into Facebook Live on your desktop.