I was asked by the Montgomery County Maryland Women’s Council of REALTORS® to give a presentation about what I have learned about social networking in the last couple of years.  I was honored to be asked and so I went last Wednesday to see the members of

I put my presentation together, keeping it simple for myself and for the members to not be overwhelmed by the massive amount of information that goes along with social networking.   I thought Blogs, Social Networks and Micro-blogging would be the a good place to start.  Far from being and über geek,  I have taken many classes over the last year, and still do now, to learn about this ever evolving way of doing business.

I put my presentation together, simple and what I hoped would be clear for the members to understand.  My  RE/MAX broker was great and loaned me the projector for my presentation.  I got there, set everything up, had my cup of coffee, waited for the meeting to be called to order and wouldn’t you know the bulb burns out in the projector!!  Never a good thing for a presentation, let alone my nerves.  Trying to fix it, to no avail, we decide to just us my laptop, turn down the lights and press on.

My main focus of the presentation was what Social Networking was, why we should care about it, and how can someone get started.

My suggestions for the group, that have worked for me personally were:

•  ActiveRain because it is a real estate community
• RealEstatetomato because of the extensive training 
• Facebook because we all need friends and exposure
• Twitter is easy and part of my social network

I told the members that social networking was the future of real estate marketing not only for Listing and selling homes, but also for branding ourselves in our community. 

I think several understood what I was saying and asked me several questions.  I told them I was not a technical person but would find out the answers for the things I did not know.   I think one of the biggest things I had going for me was that I am not a technical computer person,  I am a REALTOR® who can explain this type of information in a way that non technical people can understand.  We speak the same language of marketing homes not html. 

I had a great time with the members and was flattered to be asked.  Funny though, I think if I am involved with these groups, I think I am pretty mainstream, but I found that it is not popular as I thought.  I hope the members found my information helpful and will become active in social networking.

I hope that the members will take some time to explore these networks that I have shared with them.  I think they will be amazed at the support that they will receive from others who are already active in Social networking, there is nothing to be intimidated about, jump in!   I hope the members of WCR will try to join one network  at a time, slowly learning how to be a participant in the paradigm shift of our industry.