Here are five big mistakes still being made when businesses do social:

1. Being generic

Your posts need personality and your engagement. This doesn’t mean you should air all your dirty laundry, be negative, or relay a play-by-play narrative of your day’s events. It’s more about being human, and not appearing to be an automated robot churning out posts.

It also means you should avoid sending the same content all the time over all your networks. Think about your audience and the networks they frequent and tailor your message to them. This demonstrates that when you reach out to people, the interaction is directed to them.

2. Not writing for your audience

It’s fun to share things that interest you, but keep in mind, that if you want to attract the attention of prospects and others, you need to share information and updates that you know will be of interest to them. This is one of the major misunderstandings of social media. It’s not about you!

3. Not interacting enough

It’s so important to maintain a good level of engagement with your connections, as well as responding to what people are saying, asking, and commenting on.  Showing that you care will demonstrate to others that you take your connections seriously and strengthen your network as a result. So many still treat social media as a broadcast platform. Which brings us to number 4…

4. Using the space for advertising

You will destroy your network in a flash by constantly promoting your services and products. Social media is a platform for building, expanding and maintaining relationships, so directly selling to people will distance you from them. Keep any ‘selling’ to about 10% and the rest to 90%.

5. Not listening

Listening is vital to any relationship, and social media is just that. It is not a one-way system, so be aware of what people in your network and potential network are saying. Tune into their needs, feedback, and struggles. While many companies fear any negative comments about their business, it’s essential to monitor your social voice and address any concerns as they happen so you can circumvent any long-term affects.

What about you? What particularly irritates you about companies that don’t quite get social right? Let us know by commenting below or posting it on our Facebook page!

In November a subsidiary of HomeServices announced plans to pull listings from Trulia and Realtor.com. This syndication withdrawal may be among the first in a coming wave where brokerages and MLS decide to feed real estate listings only to sites that provide the most value.

The third-party real estate search business model does not reflect the brokerage business; they simply sell advertising in a manner of speaking.

The brokerage has thus far pulled its listings from Trulia, though the companies have devised a workaround that allows Edina agents to submit their own listings to Trulia if they choose. The brokerage is attempting to negotiate a similar workaround with Realtor.com before pulling its listings from that site.

Will listing syndication will be among the most controversial data issues in 2012?

Does deciding no to syndicate force consumers to the actual broker site, or miss the online target that relies on this exposure?

As the value of listing data is further assessed in 2012, multiple listing services may decide that value is worth a price, some experts said.

Taking control

If you don’t know where your listings are, you can’t track them. Rather than distributing their listings “anywhere and everywhere,” brokers are starting to take back more control of where their listings are distributed.

Even though you may contact all of the top players in your industry pointing them to the post, no links come back to you. No replies from those you emailed. You receive hardly any clicks on your post.

Your posts are skillfully crafted and offer a great angle. So why isn’t anyone reading them?

Is content really king like everyone says? We are led to believe that if we produce a truly great piece of content, we’ll get all the links we could ever hope for.

That used to be the case! The Web used to be a fairly uncluttered place compared to what it is now, and it was easier for people to notice great blog posts.

And now?

Now great is no longer good enough. There really is so much remarkable content that bloggers don’t have enough time to read it all, much less link to it.

If you want links now, you need to be more than great. You need to be connected.

It’s not what you know… it’s…

…who you know. Sort of.  Bloggers link more often to their friends than anyone else. If you write a reasonably good piece of content that interests their audience, they’ll link to you, mainly because they like you.

The secret to building a popular blog isn’t just writing great content. It’s also having well-connected friends.

How do you get connected? Here are a few ideas to get started:

• Write a guest post for another blog that receives a lot of traffic and comments
• “Vote” for any posts that others in your industry are pushing on social media sites like Digg, Del.icio.us and StumbleUpon
• Post an interesting question on a relevant LinkedIn group and spark a discussion
• Leave unique and memorable comments on other blogs
• Interview other experts in a post or a podcast
• Give first

The biggest key is finding ways that you can be genuinely useful to others in your industry; make yourself relevant and then use that opportunity to start building a relationship.

Today, bloggers are a main source of news for millions of readers. Their articles are typically better researched, more detailed, and more honest than newspaper or magazine articles. They may also be completely false, as bloggers do not fall under the same editorial scrutiny that media must comply with.

When something negative is said about your company through a blog, you may not find out about it until it has spread virally, doing extensive damage to your image, even if the information is not true. To combat this, you can use technology to keep an eye on what is being written about you and your company.

Technorati is a search engine designed specifically to search for blogs on the Internet using three types of searches: 1) keywords, 2) tags, and 3) blog directory.

Technorati also provides tools that allow you to keep on top of blog posts for specific subjects.

Here’s a small guide to keeping an eye on your business:

Search for your company on Technorati

Finding blogs that already contain some reference to your company can give you a rare look into your customers’ minds. People used to pay top dollar for market research that would take weeks to access this priceless information. Now you can see firsthand what your customers are saying, in real time.

Stay on top of your “social footprint”

Technorati allows you to save your searches as “watchlists.” Watchlists may be viewed in RSS format, which means they may be imported into an RSS reader to make it very easy to consistently keep track of who is writing about your company.

What do you do when you locate something?

When you find a blog that mentions your company, leave a comment on their blog. This lets them know that you respect them writing about you. If the post was negative, it also shows that real people from your company are reading what they’ve written, and are savvy enough to respond to it. Bloggers are almost always more cordial and less likely to be critical if they know they are being read by the person they are criticizing.

When someone writes something negative about you, it’s important to read all the comments before responding. You may find that a fan of your company has already defended you nicely and an “official” response may not be necessary. This happens more often than not, which is one of the biggest perks of today’s social media.

Have you ever had negative comments or reviews on your company’s social profiles? How did you handle it?

This year’s profile revealed these surprising statistics:

1. Bottomed out at last. Prices appear to be stabilizing in some areas. This is the first step in climbing out of the rocky bottom we have been in for the last several years.

2. Boomers are the key players. In 2010, due to the first-time homebuyer tax credit, the median age of first-time buyers dropped to 31. In many markets, the number of first-time buyers hovered at the 50 percent level. The smart move in 2011 was to market to Generation Y.

Over the last 12 months, however, there has been a substantial change that can have important ramifications for your business in 2012. In 2011, baby boomer purchases substantially surpassed the number of Generation Y buyer.

Why is this surprising? There are more Gen Yers than there are boomers. Generation Y is also at its peak buying age – marrying, establishing new households, and having children.

Furthermore, boomers are actively driving the second-home market. As a result, it may be smart to revisit your business plan for 2012 and to place more emphasis on working with boomers who are currently the dominant players in terms of purchasing.

3. More buyers are using agents. 89 percent of buyers purchased their home through a real estate agent or broker – that’s up from 69 percent in 2001. What are some ossible reasons?

Realtors shorten the search process when there are huge amounts of inventory on the market and people are pressed for time. Most likely, though, it’s the difficulty of the loan process both on the buyer’s side in terms of qualifying for a loan, and on the seller’s side based upon the appraisal process that marks the need for realtors.

4. Married couples or single female buyers? The trend since 2001 has been a substantial decline in the share of buyers who were married. From 2001-2008, the number of married couples purchasing homes dropped from 68 percent to 58 percent.

A historically high percentage of Gen Xers are actually unmarried. As a result, the market saw a huge proportion of single female buyers – the smart market niche for 2011.

In 2012, it’s an entirely different story. The number of single female buyers is still relatively high at 18 percent, but that’s the lowest number since 2004 and represents a reversal of a major trend. It’s time to focus on marketing that reaches couples and families in 2012.

5. Life changes drive real estate sales. The primary reason to purchase a home among repeat buyers is often because of life changes: the desire for a larger home, a job relocation or move, desire to be closer to family and friends, or a change in a family situation.

How will you focus on these 5 new developments for 2012 to reach more sales?

Sketches

Sometimes pictures don’t support the message you’re trying to convey with your clients. With Sketches, you can take a photo and then draw on it. For example, you might use arrows to point out certain features or write down the distance between two properties.

Around Me

Being able to give your clients instant information is essential. With this app you can quickly tell clients about the restaurants, banks, grocery stores and other shops in the area, making it much easier for a client to make a decision.

Walk Score

People in busy cities want to be able to walk to everything. This app will give you the ability to tell customers exactly how far the nearest restaurants, grocery stores, shopping and more are from their new home. It even has a built-in GPS so users will never have to type in an address to get results.

Real Estate by Smarter Agent

One of the biggest factors for an agent is knowing what comparables are selling for or what sellers are currently asking. Being able to access this information immediately is necessary in today’s instant gratification society. You’ll never believe how fast the contract can be drawn up once you download this app.

What apps help you in your real estate career?

It’s Not a Minor Issue

The problem seems to be growing.

In one senior community in Florida, 10 cases have been discovered in the past six months where children were living with relatives.  These families are faced with a choice of evicting the child or selling their home within a set amount of time.

It’s not surprising that there are more multigenerational households with the current economy, but bending the rules for even one child could get an age restricted community in serious trouble.

Up to 20 percent of residents in age restricted communities can be under the set residency age, but this exception is for adult children who inherit property. The rule is never used to accommodate minors. If a community is found to exceed the 20 percent limit, it could lose its exemption status.

There’s also the matter that senior communities aren’t equipped for children; there are plenty of safety hazards that would have to be addressed, such as golf cart transportation and swimming pool specifications and insurance.

Do you think there should be a policy created that both maintains age-restricted enforcement and considers extreme family hardship? Or should families in these situations have to choose between their homes and their children?

Let us know your thoughts by commenting below or on our Facebook page.

With that in mind, here are the five key issues as published by the Wall Street Journal that will determine the housing market in 2012:

1. Confidence and jobs: The housing market still needs the economy to add more jobs to stimulate demand for home purchases and to prevent mortgage delinquencies from rising. The good news is that housing is more affordable than it has been in decades. But many that are considering buying are not striking because they are concerned that the prices will continue to drop. Others don’t want to buy a house until they have more evidence that they’re not going to get laid off or see their hours cut back.

2. Foreclosures: Whether home prices hit a floor this year also relies on how banks manage a huge overhang of foreclosed homes that they haven’t yet taken back and resold. Banks and other mortgage investors own around 440,000 foreclosed properties, but there’s another 3.4 million loans in foreclosure or serious delinquency.

3. Rents: Apartment rents are rising as vacancy rates drop. If low mortgage rates aren’t enough to give urgency to buyers, rent hikes could accelerate their decisions to take the plunge. This is a good thing.

4. Mortgage credit and rates: Federal policymakers have taken extraordinary steps to keep mortgage rates low and federal-backed entities are responsible for backing nearly nine in 10 new mortgages. But it’s still hard for many buyers to get a loan because banks are demanding lots of documentation of borrowers’ incomes, and appraisals are tanking some deals. Banks will need to put their loan problems behind them before there’s much easing in lending standards.

5. Regulation: Many analysts don’t expect Congress to make major changes to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the election year, but several major regulatory changes could significantly reshape the future of the lending landscape in 2012.

Meanwhile, the regulator that oversees Fannie and Freddie is revamping the way that mortgage companies are paid for collecting loan payments.

What other key things do you think will affect the market this year?

You can read the entire post here. Here are our key takeaways from this post:

• Facebook’s explosive rate of growth and recent product releases focus on one goal: encouraging more sharing.
• Behind the liking, commenting, sharing and posting, there seem to be strong hints of jealousy, anxiety and even depression.
• Facebook is fundamentally altering our daily sense of well being in both our personal and work lives.
• It’s creating a den of comparison: users have a strong bias toward sharing positive milestones, and avoid mentioning the more humdrum, negative parts of their lives. This magnifies a culture of competition and comparison.
• Comparing ourselves to others is a key driver of unhappiness: as we judge the entirety of our own lives against the top 1 percent of our friends’ lives, we’re setting impossible standards for ourselves, making us more miserable than ever.
• Because of our fragmented time, hundreds of millions of people are less “present” where they are. Constant “tabbing” between real-life tasks and Facebook provides constant distractions that lead to late and poor-quality output.
• Perhaps the biggest: a decline of close, real-life relationships. As Facebook adds new features such as video chat, it is fast becoming a viable substitute for meetings, relationship-building, and even family get-togethers. People are missing opportunities to interact more deeply than Facebook could ever accommodate.

Do you feel sucked in by these negative impacts? How do you avoid these traps? Quit cold turkey? Limit your time with set schedules? Avoid gossip and online Negative Nancies? Let us know by sharing on OUR Facebook page, or if you’ve already quit, feel free to comment below

The same study also revealed that four in ten social media users think they will use it to help decide who to vote for in 2012. That’s 38 percent of American social media users.

John F. Kennedy is considered the first television President; next year’s victor could very well be determined by the impact of Facebook and Twitter.

Eighty-eight percent of adults who use social media are registered voters – no other medium can compete with those numbers. Candidates should take advantage of this reach by inviting them to join the conversation about who will be our nation’s next President.

Has Social Media swayed you in a popular, public opinion? Will you use it to gain insight in the upcoming campaigns? Do you think it’s a positive move or will it unnecessarily complicate things?