Some things don't mix

You don’t mix wine with emotions — Hemingway
You don’t mix meat with milk — God
You don’t mix alcohol and tats — Ashlee Simpson

You don’t mix Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 — Me

Your site is either 1.0 or 2.0. In my mind, the twain should never meet. You can’t graft a few Web 2.0 branches onto your old school trunk and expect results.

I’ve spoken at a bunch of events over the past few months. I’m seeing real enthusiasm for new ways of treating customers and marketing property. I get a lot of email and LinkedIn invites after these events. People are eager to connect, to share. But they also reveal some common mistakes. It is from these well-intentioned communications that I offer the following:

– Don’t join LinkedIn, invite people to connect, and then send them sales spam.
– Don’t join Facebook and become discouraged when it doesn’t bring you new business immediately.
– Don’t create a mashup and place lead generation forms behind every click. 
– Don’t make a video of yourself sitting behind a desk selling yourself.
– Don’t design a new splash page to sit in front of your Advanced Access Website. 
– Don’t put a live chat plugin on your site that says you’re available when you’re not.
– Don’t incorporate lead generation into live chat. (see image above)
– Don’t create a blog if you’re only going to post once a month.
– Don’t create a blog if all you write about is your personal life.
– Don’t launch a blog and not allow readers to leave comments.
– Don’t use your standard "Realtor photo" when creating your social network account. Lose the trademark stuff (blue hat, phone to ear, meet my dog).
– Don’t build a Web 2.0 Broker website and make "Find an agent" the first link in the nav bar.
– Don’t build a Web 2.0 site with links that point to pages "under construction". Take a moment and explain what’s coming and when.

If you’re going to embrace Web 2.0 in real estate, don’t dangle your toes in it. Jump in. Halfway doesn’t work here; old and new don’t mix.

– Davison