How Estate Agents Can Master Social Media & Increase Their Leads – With Elle McDonald #TheEstateAgentConsultancy

Hello, hello and welcome back to the Estate Aiding Consulting Podcast. Today I'm joined by Elle MacDonald. She is the go-to expert when it comes to estate aidings to generate leads, run ads and create content that actually works on social media. So Elle, thank you so much for coming on. So for those who haven't seen you on their social media, where have they been, give us a bit of background about how we've got to this point with your sort of career and sort of way up to with your life. Yeah, no worries at all. Thanks for having me. Well, I was training to be a doctor, but unfortunately my papa got poorly. My mum wasn't coping and neither was I. So I ended up crashing and burning medical school and ending up back home in my late 20s thinking, who on earth am I now? And I was doing networking and marketing for my mum's business because I've always done her marketing since I was little really. And yeah, I was at a networking meeting and bloke said, I might have a job for you. So I joined his estate agency and it was only six weeks old at the time when I joined, but he'd been in the industry like 15 years. So he trained me up and his business partner and we had an admin as well. And just three years later, the EA Masters was born and it was the first ever time that they changed it from the Sunday Times Awards. And it was like a six month long mystery shop, but it was brand new. So now, you know, it's happening, you know, so if you were interested in that kind of thing, you could, you could work towards it. But at the time we were just living our lives. And then we got phone calls to say that we needed to be at the ceremony and yeah, and it turned out we'd won, like the UK's number one. And we were like baffled because like I say, we were just doing our jobs. But it meant that the industry said, well, who are you and how have you done that? Because we didn't have a high street office, which wasn't the norm at that point. And we were quite heavy into our social media, again, which wasn't the norm at that point. So people were asking us to help them with theirs. And when you train people in marketing, they go, there's a lot more to it than I realised, can you just do it for me? Because you sound like you know what you're doing. So I've ended up with a marketing agency as well. Well, there we go. And how long ago was this? When did you, kind of what year are we going back to when you first started? Uh, 2014. Okay. 2014, yeah. Social media was kind of well and truly alive and up and kicking and sort of running by this point and sort of not an everyday thing, but it was very much sort of on the agenda, to say the least. Yeah, absolutely. So back along, it was, everyone else was using it, but estate agents, being the industry we are, we were a little bit slower to catch on. So, I mean, if you think Facebook's just turned 21, so we were already 10 years in by that point. And yeah, like I say, the estate agency world, we just hadn't really captured how to use it for business, you know, I was going to say B2B, but it's not B2B. And that's, yeah, that's what's different about it, I think, is that at that point, there were only a handful of us that were really noticing that you could utilise it. Now, of course, it's a completely different kettle of fish and everyone would assume that you're on it. And if you're not, that would be weird. But at that point, it was quite novel. So it was quite exciting. I do think to myself occasionally, I think to myself, why did I not put two and two together when I was an estate agent and Facebook first came out in whatever year it was sort of thing. I think to myself, that'd been such a niche to make for myself being that first estate agent to make video content and showing houses or whatever. Why did I not think of that? Yeah, yeah, you can kick yourself, isn't it? It's the hindsight 2020. Absolutely. Absolutely. So and how is the social media side of things evolved over that time? So you've been doing it for a long time now, or a fairly decent period of time. How has it evolved from sort of where you were back then to kind of where it is now? Well, I think short form video is the thing now. I just was reading an article this morning about how people are not using like the Radio Times type things to find out about TV programs anymore. They were getting that information from YouTube Shorts and TikTok. So those things are almost like it's the wrong phrase, but the gateway drug into a bigger TV program. But it's like you get a taste there all the time. And I think that when I started in 2014, video was only just coming in. And then by 2016, we were already all over video. And that's what's so scary is so many businesses aren't doing it even now. And that's and that's hard for them, because unless you start catching up, you're going to lose a lot of people, because it spans all the generations. I think there's lots of assumptions that social media is just for young people. And that's also changed, you know, so in the last 10 years, maybe 10 years ago, it was truer. But even then it was 10 years old. So it wasn't. And now people have been on it 20 years because of how old Facebook is. So it's really not an age thing or a generation thing. There's a real mix. I remember having a chat with a client about two months ago, and their social media was very Canva rich. So you can probably imagine what that was like. And I said to them, I was like, you guys need to update this, you need to start getting video content, you need to open yourselves in front of camera. And everyone's like, we're too busy, we can't do it, we don't want to be in front of camera. And I was like, it's a non negotiable, like you honestly, you are going to get a self employed agent more than likely come into your town very shortly, who jumps both feet into video content, short form content of producers, the podcast, all this stuff, and they're going to eat your breakfast for you. You know, that is going to come, you need to do it sort of thing. And with regard to the content side, I did a podcast last week or so about the sort of the numbers of people that are actually producing content versus not producing. And there was the 90, 10, 1 rule, I think it was. No, 99 and 1, must be 100. So it must be that there was 90% of all people just consume content, 9% of people comment and sort of like post effectively, and then 1% actually upload. So it's and I'd imagine from your experience, that's probably what I appreciate in a sense, you kind of have to more these days, but I'm sure there's still a huge percentage out there who actually don't upload video content or actually regular content at all on their socials. Absolutely huge numbers. And even people that sign contracts with me and agree that that's definitely what they're going to do. And they're paying me to help them with it. I'm doing everything I can. I just had a phone conversation this morning with my PA and we cannot get this client to agree to a date to film them. And all their social content at the moment, it looks like Canva's thrown up on it. And it's not going to do them any good. But what can I do? You know, I feel really, really hamstrung. And it's such a shame because they'll be great on camera. But it's this, I'm too busy. But the thing is, is that my argument is, are you too busy to go on an MA? Because it's as important as that. And that's how we positioned it within our agency. And we were really firm about that from 2016. If you don't like it, that's absolutely fine. You can go get a different job, because this is how we do it. And I think that it takes a strong leader to do that. And it's really hard to say things like that. But it's the world we're in now. And I think if you're not jumping on that train, you're really going to be left behind. And like you say, other people are going to eat your breakfast for you. Yeah. And I had a very simple conversation with someone a month or two ago. And they said to me exactly that, I haven't got time for social media. And I was like, well, it's not that you haven't got time for it, it's just not a priority to you. And I said, OK, well, let's do a deal. How about I pay you an extra £200,000 a year to do social media as well? Would you do it? And they're like, yeah, absolutely. For £200,000, I'd absolutely do it. I was like, that's how much money it's costing you every single year in lack of instruction, sales, completions. It's costing you £200,000 a year. So you are literally cutting your legs off below you by not doing it. So it's not that you haven't got time for it, because if you're getting paid well for it, you would do it. It's just not a priority to you. You just don't see the benefits. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that is what's difficult about it, because it's hard to see the ROI straight away. And it's even harder to see the ROI when you've been doing it a while because it's not a sales activator. So if like if the YouGov stats and things like that show that people take action, so they're more likely to buy a sales activation from a TV ad or from an email and then social media. And obviously, as estate agents, we're not doing a lot of TV ads and a lot of people aren't doing very good emails, even at all. So it's not surprising. And the thing is, is that when someone phones you and you say, and how did you hear about us? They might say, I've been watching you on Facebook for a while. I've been following you on YouTube. And those are things that have happened regularly in my agencies, the one in Somerset and the one in Spain. But if you don't hear that regularly, first of all, because you're often not answering the question, you're not recording the question properly, recording the answer properly. And thirdly, people say, oh, I just saw your board. My friend told me about you, but they don't then remember. Actually, I've been watching you on Facebook or Instagram or whatever for all this time. So you you can struggle to hear an ROI from it. And I'm asking people to trust me a lot. You know, I'm like, you just have to believe it's what happened for us. So that's why I teach it and that's why I promote it and that's why I do it. And I'm so passionate about it as well, because it has such an impact. But you've got to just believe it does. And I think that can be really difficult for, you know, people that are salespeople because you want a result. That's how we are as salespeople. You know, it's no different than when I was a cleaner. You clean something, you have an immediate result and you get to pat yourself on the back. You get dopamine hit. And when you go and get an MA sign up and someone's literally signed on the contract, you can visibly see that that has worked. It's really different with social media. And I think that's really challenging in our industry because of our personalities. Yeah. And I, I experienced that a lot. I'm not, I mean, probably somewhat from the social media side, but definitely with the podcast, for example. So I've never, ever had anybody phone me up and say, great, Chris, I listened to that episode. Can we start working together? But I've had many video calls where I've had a chat with people and they're like, oh, I listened to your podcast, by the way. And they're just signing up at that time sort of thing. So it's kind of like, you know, it's kind of like, it's like another touch point sort of in the branding sort of machine, should we say. So, so talk me through then. So obviously you've kind of harnessed some of the mistakes that agents are making on social media kind of by default, which are kind of either not posting video content, not posting at all, or having a very sort of Canva rich sort of content. So lots of agents are quite camera shy or can be quite camera shy and think they don't sort of have enough value to kind of offer the world or the estate agency world, et cetera, kind of via video. So if someone hasn't got that confidence to kind of stand in front of camera, for example, where, where's kind of a good place to sort of start or sort of kind of build up to that or warm up to it, or where do you think they should go to? Well, there's enough people talking about this in our industry. So I, I'm probably not going to say it's, it's easier said than done, but it's about getting out of your own way and just grabbing a selfie stick and walking along the street and talking. That's how we did it. And we just kept doing it. And the early ones we did a terrible, of course they are, but it doesn't matter. No one's scrolling back that far, but what it did do was meant that I now show up on socials without thinking about it because it's become part of my MO. And people say to me, oh, but you're so good at it. But I wasn't. And it's only because I showed up. Now the, the best tip that we ever had was to put a post it note over the screen. So if you're recording in selfie mode, you can't see yourself. And I think that was, that came from Chris at PBS video. So I would say that, um, that's such a good tip and also try not to try not to be too critical of yourself, which again is nearly impossible. I'm asking you to do the impossible without sending you to an incredible mindset therapist. You know, it's a lot of deep work in some respects, or you can just do it the shallow way, which is to just post and ghost, you know, just show up, post it, get on with your day, show up, post it, get on with your day. Don't worry about it. I like the expression posting ghosts. I think I've been doing that for the last two years without knowing it, but I love it. I'm going to nick that one. It's cute, isn't it? Um, I think something I said to an ex client of mine who, who then was able to go away and do it for themselves, which is so empowering and fabulous was just show up. It's like when it's raining. Okay. You don't analyze every single raindrop. You're just aware of the rain. And that's exactly the same for social media. You don't need every single post to be on point. You don't need to be a news presenter or go viral. We're not, we're not going to go viral. We're state agents. We're not that exciting. But if you just keep showing up, people go, Oh, look, it's raining again. Oh, look, it's raining again. And then you end up with the lake and they know that it was you and they know it's you. And like, you've just described Chris, how they talk about, Oh, and I've seen your, I've been watching your podcast. I'm listening to your podcast. I have the same thing as well. People come on with me and I've never seen them interact with a single thing that I have done online on any platform. And they go after watching you for months, I feel like I know you like you're kind of engaged because you've got no, again, it comes back to that. You've got no dopamine here. You've got no ROI obvious. Um, so I think practice showing up and fail faster, like Stephen Bartlett would say, and all those other people, the more you do, the quicker you learn. So, um, I know of one marketing lady who recommends you post four times a day on TikTok because you get it out your system. You stop worrying about it and you work out what your audience wants and needs. Yeah. And it's definitely about jumping in that deep end and going, actually, if I'm doing it, let's just go for, let's pull that bandaid off and kind of rock and roll from there sort of thing. So where do you think the line sits? So I, um, hosted a, um, American realtor on the podcast over there. And so before we had the podcast, I kind of stalked their social media and I w I would say kind of, yeah, they say everything's bigger in America. I would say, you know, her social media was bigger. It was very, it wasn't particularly property related necessary. It was very entertaining. And then, you know, there are lots of like, I wouldn't say dances is probably a bit strong, but it was very sort of like, you know, very social media. Like if you ignore sort of the estate tax excellence, it was very sort of on point trends and all clips of this and dancing, all this sort of stuff. Where's the line between sort of property related and sort of doing things for the algorithm? Because you know that if I do dance to this song, it will get a certain amount of like, where, where's like, where's the bar there and where's the line in the sand? For me personally, I think it comes down to the people involved. So if your bag is following the trends and you're type of, you're the type of person that enjoys creating that type of content, just go for it because the people that like consuming it are the people that are going to then come and work with you. If you're not that way inclined, don't do it. When we started leaning into our style of doing things on our social media for our estate agencies, we ended up with more happy clients. The team were happier and we had far fewer, you know, where they're just a bit thorny because they'd already been watching us. They already knew who we were and they'd already sold us to themselves. So if you're a trendy, up to date, funny, hilarious kind of wacky person and you can maintain that because that's genuinely who you are, then go for it. If I was to do stuff like that, it would come across as so fake because I'm not that person. I'm really quite dull and tedious and all I do is geek out on marketing and estate agency. So there's no point me coming on and trying to be all trendy on my socials because then if someone came to work with me, it would be really jarring because they'd be like, well, you're not who I thought you were. So I've seen some estate agents on TikTok. They've got like over a million views because what they're doing is for the socials and it's funny and it's awesome. Me personally, I'm not chasing those kind of views. And as an estate agent, I wasn't either because I was always niching to a very small area. So I think that if it's in you, do it. If it isn't, don't and don't worry about it because it's the consistency of showing up that's more important, in my opinion, because you're going to bump into the public, the real people that are watching these things at the school gates, in the co-op, at the pub, wherever you go. And that's the power of it. When we started doing it, we ended up having to get little badges for our outfits because people kept waving to us and going, oh, hi, because they thought we were their cousin's girlfriend or whatever. So once we got something branded on our on our outfits, they were like, oh, you're the property people. You know, I wanted to ask you. And all of a sudden, you're booking an MA over a pint. And that, for me, is the power of it. So however you get there, it almost doesn't matter. I suppose it's a little bit sort of vanity over sanity in some way, isn't it? Because, you know, vanity is, you know, a million views is amazing, but they all live in Timbuktu and have no idea about selling a house with you sort of thing, then kind of what's the point in the nicest possible way? Whereas if you've got 200 views on a video, for example, but they all live within your village and everyone's going to see you down the pub and they're going to chat about it later in that evening sort of thing, then that's great. That's probably a better place to be, I'd imagine. I completely agree with you. So I would say that I get quite a few people say, I want to increase our followers. And unfortunately, that's a really 2010 version of how social media works. And follower counts are relatively meaningless because the algorithms don't work that way anymore. They're not showing stuff to your followers. So in that respect, it can be really disheartening because you think, A, my followers aren't increasing and B, I'm not getting that many views. But if you're keyword stuffing your things, keyword stuffing is a negative. So if you're putting the correct keywords into your content, whether that's video or not, the algorithm knows who to show it to. So if you are an estate agent that's focused on your local area, make sure you're saying those things. Make sure you're saying the name of your area regularly in the words you're using in the content, on the stickers you put over the video, all of those little tiny things because it helps the algorithm. However, if you're a sort of agent that isn't focusing on a small area and instead you're focusing on a type of person, then yeah, maybe you could do it differently. So I've got one lady I'm thinking of and she is looking to grow a franchise of estate agents that all support later living, so older adults. So therefore, she's not looking at Guildford or Edinburgh. She's looking at this broader niche of people rather than place. So I think that's the balance on that front. And what do you think are some of the mistakes that agents make sort of day in, day out on their social? What are the things you look at and you see people do it and they're just like, oh my god, I can't believe they're posting that stuff. So they're either out of date or you think they just won't get any traction at all? The out of date stuff is like, it's not the nicest metaphor, but it's a bit like sleeping with someone on the first date. There's people that are putting entire video tours on social media. So you walk in through the front door and the hallway and through into the living room and here's every single corner. And that's no different in social media terms than the captions on Rightmove that say radiator front wall. That's not what it's about anymore. We're not surveyors. We're not meant to be listing every single part of the property. And social media having every single element of the walkthrough on there is so banal. That might be useful once they're at viewing stage or if you do a video and it's a clip and a clip and a clip and a clip, and then it says for the full video walkthrough message me. You're more likely to get people messaging you. You're more likely to generate interest. The same with all the photographs. Here's a front fighting photograph and here's the living room and the living room and the living. It's so boring. And that is people handing their power to Rightmove and the other portals. And it's proving that you're no different than anyone else. I was on a call with someone the other day and I was like, what's your USP? Why would I work with you? What's your specialty? Oh, well, our marketing is incredibly high quality. And I'm like, well, your social media says exactly the opposite. You know, and the photograph there, the first photograph I can see is a garden with a rotary washing line in it. So I would say that your marketing is not particularly attention to detail and it's not high quality. The other things that people are doing are putting external links to Rightmove. You're still just completely giving away your power. You're proving to the public that you have no value. And I think it's because we don't believe we have any value. You know, we and that comes back to sleeping with someone on the first date in some respects. You know, sometimes that's an empowered stance, but sometimes it's because actually you're just a bit sad. That's how much social media means to me. We have the power and we don't realize it to change how people think about our industry by using these platforms correctly, because we can elevate the whole industry by proving our value instead of putting our phone number and saying, call me. Well, they can't call you. It's Instagram. There's no button. Make it easy for people to get in touch with you. Make it easy for them to want to work with you. I think it's sort of stop being an estate agent all the time. Yeah. And just remember that you're a person. And I think for me, you know, I think people are so used to sort of picture perfect social medias and picture perfect, you know, photographs or marketing or whatever it may be that, you know, if you are an agent and you have a poor social media account, for example, or you have a poor profile picture of yourself, or you have a poor property photograph, or you've taken 15 pictures of the living room, for example, they just think you're a crap agent because they'll judge you on face value 10 times out of 10 and go, oh, that must be a rubbish estate agent. They can't even take pictures. They can't even have a social media account. Exactly. Exactly. And I don't think people realize the power of that. And you said earlier that it's different touch points. And that's a really key thing because there is in marketing, the rule of seven, which says that it's going to take seven different touch points before someone buys from you. But books like Digital Darwinism are suggesting that it's 50 to 100. So if these things are crappy, people don't have to wait around for the next six touch points to see if you're going to get better because they just move on. There's such a smorgasbord out there of opportunity for the consumer to go that crap. And I think I see a lot of people running Facebook ads that are really old fashioned, really the same as everybody else. They're not achieving anything. And all they're doing is driving traffic to a Facebook page that then has no organic content on it or to a website that's the same, that doesn't have any blogs, anything up to date, no manifesto. No. This is our passion and this is why I think people think, oh, I put the properties on social media because that's how you use social media. Or they palm it off to the administrator or the apprentice or, you know, my daughter's going to do it. Well, just because they can use the platform doesn't mean they're strategically utilising it. And it's quite different. Yeah, I remember the social media democracy in offices I've worked in historically has usually been who's the youngest. Right, you're the youngest. You must know how social media works because you're 22 years old. So therefore, congratulations, you're now in charge of the social media side of things. So we've now got a good idea then about kind of what not to do on social media. So with the clients you work with, what are sort of the winning topics? Where should someone start? You know, actually, this is a good topic for us to talk about, to kind of get positive engagement with their business. Always, I would say, start with who you want to appeal to. So I think identifying your ideal client is absolutely crucial. And it's a piece of work that most people haven't done. And I think that there's a really strong case, again, in this day and age to not only do it in terms of your location. So, OK, maybe you want to focus on Peterborough, OK, because that's where you're based. But who in Peterborough? Because take Edinburgh, for example, there are flats in, I can't remember the name of it, but there are flats in a rough part or there are like the Morningside million pound houses. So you can't just say I'm an Edinburgh agent because who are you working for? And it's the same everywhere. If you really identify and it might just be on this price range of properties, fine. Who are most likely to be owners of them or landlords and all that kind of thing? So it's true of letting agents as well. Who is it that you want to talk to and then talk to them? So if actually you get on really well with, let's think, the mummy market, let's talk to the mummy market. So what are mums interested in? Well, cleaning hacks, childcare hacks, what to do now the weather's turned, what to do with them at Easter, what to do in wherever it is that you are. If you're in sales, as an example, only three percent of your market are ever on the market at one time. And that's true of any economy near as dammit, because it's an average. If you therefore are only posting properties, it's really banal. You're not appealing to the 97 percent of your area who don't care about you and don't care what you do. So let's talk to them and let's talk about the things that they're interested in. I think making it much more like a magazine than Rightmove. If you pick up Home and Garden or Country Living or something like that, you can really lean into that kind of marketing mix. And you might put some data in there as well to show that you're an expert and you know these things. But I think if you can really just talk to people about things that people are interested in and whoever those people are, you're much more likely to to garner interest because they're going to resonate with it. And it's not just this property is for sale. This property has gone under offer because, of course, that property is for sale and that's gone under offer. It's your job. What else do you do? How do you add value? And I think the other thing to do, and you're not, again, going to get much interaction on it, but explain parts of your process. Now, I've had people say, we don't want to do that because the competition might copy it. Well, you're already all doing the same, according to the public. So if you start saying it first, you're already going to be ahead and they're going to be scrabbling to keep up. So don't worry about that because they've got to notice first. And most of these businesses, even when they're one or two people, they're like oil tankers trying to embrace change. They're not like speedboats nipping from whim to whim. It takes a long time. So share. Just share. Be a human. Yeah, I always think about it. I try and kind of picture a different industry. So I always think about if I was on a car dealers social media page and it was like, we've just brought this car onto the forecourt or we've just sold this car. I'd be like, well, Merry Christmas. You're a car dealership. That's what you do day in, day out. I'd be very surprised if you weren't listing and selling cars sort of thing. But actually they were like, let's see the inside of this car. Let's see some features about this car. Let's see how fast we can get this car going. I'd be like, I'll watch that video. It's so much more top gear, isn't it? And I think that's the thing. If you can think about it like a home's under the hammer or maybe that's not your style because they're do-er-uppers and but there's just so much interesting things about what we do for a living. So why aren't we proud of that? I think it's because we get so bogged down in the fact that people hate us and that we get treated badly day in, day out. But I think you can change that by using social media because you can appeal to the people that are going to like you. So I think if I was going to open a franchise right now, which I won't because Scotland's system is so confusing to an English person. So I would focus really on the people I want to work with rather than anything else. So, for example, this isn't true of me, but if you got on really well with people that like, you know, woo-woo stuff, if you're a real woo-woo person and you like smudging your house and crystals, really lean into that in your content and you're more likely to pick up people that enjoy that type of thing too. And then you're going to work together really well. I just put a state agent in touch with a friend of mine because actually they both love to travel. They both love dogs. You know what? She's going to get that instruction. Of course she is because they're such a good personality fit. And we talk about ourselves as matchmakers and yet we don't treat ourselves as matchmakers. You know, we just see it as the buyer in the house or something like that. Whereas actually if we were matchmaking ourselves, who would we match with? Does that make any sense? It absolutely does. And do you think that comes with a certain maturity of self and business? Because obviously when most people start a business, whether it's, you know, advertising on social media or whether it's just getting a house on the market or something, to start off with, they're like, you know, congratulations, you've got a post and a front door. You're my sort of client sort of thing. Whereas further down the line, usually sort of, you know, month six or year two, where are they going to get the point they're like, oh, actually I'm now the specialist in four bedroom detached house. I'm just going to say yes to those people and everything else I can say no to. Do you think it takes a certain period of time sometimes and a certain maturity of sort of person slash business for people to actually realise that they don't have to say yes to everybody. They can say no to some people to actually make the people they do want to work with kind of more important. Yeah. I think it's a maturity of person and I think it's an understanding of how business best works. I, in my marketing, only talk to estate and letting agents and yet I have clients in all sorts of industries and have had my whole career of doing this because actually people still resonate with me and I'm the front runner, you know, and I think it gets difficult when you've got multi branches. That's where it gets difficult. But that again comes down to a maturity of leadership and a strength of leadership. And John Paul talks about this a lot in his group. And I think that that's really challenging for people because they're like, oh, we don't want to say things like that. And I think, well, you know, more for you really, if you said we are the divorce specialists in West Edinburgh, if we are, you know, if you're selling a property and you're going through divorce, every single person in this office has been through divorce or been touched by divorce. We are the people to help you. And this is why. And you explain it over and over and over again. I believe you'd get even more business because I think it's more interesting than I happen to sell properties in this area because I live here. Do you know what I mean? I 100% know what you mean. I think it's absolutely bang on. So are there any, so obviously producing content and social media can be quite time consuming sometimes. Are there any sort of hacks, apps, websites that you would kind of use or recommend to kind of make an agent's life a little bit easier? Definitely. So I think if you're going to do it yourself, AI is absolutely wonderful and really, really useful, but you've got to be really careful with it because everybody's using it. And I don't mean everyone in the industry. I mean, everyone in the world. So people that aren't even in business are using it for things now. So if you have got all the key, you know, telltale signs that you're using AI, but then your marketing says, I'm a personal estate agent, you're really lying. And people can see that really quickly. So I think AI with caution, Canva, obviously, but try not to utilise the elements too heavily. I think that, you know, not my area of expertise, to be honest, I've never got to grips with it brilliantly because I just think it's an art form to do it beautifully. But it means you can drop photos into something really easily and it will be the right size. So I think that that's really useful. I think also being really strict with yourself, not claiming you haven't got time and treating it as as important as an MA is the key. The other thing to do with that is once you've unlocked that in your mind, that it is absolutely crucial. If you're if you're a self-employed estate agent, this is much easier. Do it how you best do it. So you might be more creative at certain times of the month. You might be more creative off the cuff. You might be more creative when you've planned things. So whatever consistency looks like for you, lean into that. And like I say, that's true if you're a self-employed agent or, you know, a one woman band. But it's harder to do if you're managing several people. How we did it in our agencies, every morning meeting, because we had morning meetings every single morning, we would say who's filming what and where. And then the following day, if they hadn't done it, well, not many people didn't do it because it just wasn't worth it. So if you've got a plan like that, you've got no excuse. So, you know, you're out canvassing, right? Here's my leaflet. Hiya, I'm Elle from so and so estate. Have you had one of these through your door? If so, please don't just bung it in the bin. It's me delivering them. And the reason is Janet and John really, really want to live on this street because their little girl Celia will love these gardens. And we all know that these gardens on this street are the best, don't we? So if you're thinking of something, that's how quick it is. There's no excuse. So you can either do it that way or you bulk create. So when we got to Spain and we were running our agency over there, we would shut the office one day every month. And it meant no MAs, no viewings. I'm sorry, we're already booked out on things that day. If there are any other times and days you can do, that's how easy that is to get round. And then we would have a plan for what we're all going to do that day. So you might answer the phone while you're out and about if you've got voice systems for your mobiles. But we would then have the video content done for the whole month, other than maybe a few little bits here and there. If something happened in the town, we'd film it or whatever. So I think that consistency can look different for everybody. Don't beat yourself up if one way works for you and another way doesn't. But just make sure that you're leaning into that. But if you're managing people, make it a non-negotiable. I think it's really important when you mentioned about having that meeting, kind of looking at what's coming up in the diary, I think the number one sort of regret from agents, and I have this myself all the time, is you walk out of a meeting or a conference with people and you're like, I didn't take a single picture. I had a conversation with a client a while ago and they're like, oh, I'm just stood in the property, you know, waiting for an EICR to be done. And they're like, I can't do any socials while I'm here. I'm like, do a video on what an EICR is, why you're in the property waiting for it, sort of thing. So it's always that sort of, oh, I could have done the video, or I should have taken a picture of that, or I should have taken a picture of that board when I changed, or I should have taken a picture of those guys in the driveway when they did the completion, the kind of shoulda, woulda, coulda sort of stuff. Exactly. So I think a little bit of thought eliminates that. And also if you're waiting, if you're like your EICR example, have a selfie stick with a tripod, always have it in your bag. And when you're in a property and you're waiting for someone, you can just film some B-roll. So it just means that you would put the tripod up and you'd film yourself walking up the stairs. You'd put the tripod up, you'd film yourself opening a door, closing a door. And then you can save all of that into an album in your phone called B-roll. And then anytime that you're stuck for content, you can post something of you walking up the stairs with some trending audio and some writing over the top of it. That's how simple it can be. Yeah. Yeah. I follow someone on Instagram and they literally do a very similar sort of thing. It's always just them like sat on a kitchen worktop or opening a door or like opening some cupboard sort of thing. And there's always just a text that comes up sort of thing. I'm like, that's such an easy way of producing content. As long as you've got like a few videos of yourself doing some stuff, you can just put stuff over the top of it. Yeah. And again, we've got no excuse because we're out and about most of the time. We're going on viewings, we're going on MAs, all of these sorts of things. And I think it's just getting into a habit and not letting yourself off the hook. And I think having some accountability can really help with that. So that's where people like me can be useful because you think, well, I'm not going to go to my next meeting with Elle because I know she'll be disappointed in me. You know, those sorts of things. I do it with my mentor as well. Final two questions, if that's okay. So what's one thing that every self-employed agent should be doing this week on social media to help move their business forward? That's your first one. I would make sure that your profiles are optimised. And that means that every single element of your Instagram, TikTok or Facebook page and personal all explain what you do and how you do it in a really clear, concise way with learn more or click here for more information and make sure that they're actually personal. So many people have their logo as their profile picture. Well, that doesn't tell me anything about you. Those tiny little things. And you can look at all of mine for, you know, examples. And I think that those little tiny tweaks make it a lot easier to get hold of you. I just did a poll on my LinkedIn yesterday about how do you contact somebody that you find out about on social media? Most people are saying in the DMs. So if I can't easily DM you, how am I going to get back here back from you? And I think you need to really be encouraging people to DM you because it keeps them on the platform and it makes it really easy for them. And you just want to make everything really easy for them. Yeah, you sort of alluded to that earlier on, didn't you, with regard to having a this is the flow. This is where you're meant to go. This is the next step of the process, sort of thing. Just press that button and away you go. You don't want to put any speed bumps in the way of what is your process effectively. That's literally it. Because if you watch YouTube, which most people do, any YouTuber worth their salt is going, and subscribe. And the reason they say that every single time is because people then go, oh, yeah, okay. If you don't do it, they don't. And when you start saying it, you realize your subscriptions have gone up. So it's that simple. And like, there's a guy called Jefferson Fisher. He's amazing. And he's a lawyer. And he's not too difficult to look at, which doesn't harm the watchability. But he at the end of every single one of his videos, he goes to try that and follow me. And so you go, make the calls to action really easy for people to follow and tell them they like being told what to do. And final last thing is how can someone get hold of yourself? I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say there's some sort of social media direction to go in here. But how can people easily get hold of yourself? I don't use it much. So I'm on LinkedIn, L McDonald, I'm on TikTok, estate agent, social media, and I'm on Facebook and Instagram as L McDonald UK. So don't do what I do. Make sure that the handle is the same over all of them. And yeah, you can email me L at Lwood.co.uk if that's easier, but I would say DM me. And if people want to DM me podcast, I have got an AI prompt that I've been working on that can audit how you show up online. So it'll give you really simply all the things that are missing from your website and your socials as to how you are showing up online. So if someone was to type into AI, who's the best estate agent in, then they're going to find out what to do to make that improved. So DM me podcast and I can send that over. Amazing. There we go. Brilliant. Thank you so much. You've been an amazing guest. Thank you so much for coming on. My pleasure. Thank you for having me.