You need to post on social media every day to stay relevant!

You’ve heard it time and time again from agents, trainers, influencers, etc. … It’s well-intentioned advice, and much of its original meaning was right at the time. However, I believe that, over time, the original intention has been lost. As social and online marketing has evolved, so should the advice.

Do you need leads from an organic social media pipeline?

The phrase “You need to post on social media every day to stay relevant” in its full form would be, “If you want to build a pipeline of business from organic social media, you need to post on social media every day to stay relevant.”

But, you may not actually need that pipeline. Any pipeline of leads that helps drive your business should be able to get you at least 25 deals a year. Organic social media is one of them. Even within organic social media, you could build strategies to drive clients that don’t require daily posts. 

On top of that, as social media has evolved, our feeds are flooded with content every day that people post for the sake of posting. It’s a common joke in real estate conferences, one I’ve said on stage before, that people don’t need that email with the latest pumpkin pie recipe or a reminder to change their clocks. Well, guess what? They also don’t need to know that it’s National Talk Like a Pirate Day on social media.

Let’s look at a few of the reasons NOT to post daily anymore.

Quality over quantity

When people post daily, they regularly struggle with what to post so they look for anything they can post. That means a lot of what goes out is just bad content. They’re jumping on the “I have to post something today” bandwagon.

Take the Daniel Day-Lewis approach. He doesn’t take every role he can just for the sake of being in another movie. He takes one when he feels it’s right. Roles that ignite his passion and he feels connected to. He puts everything he can into them.

You can go for the take-every-role approach and make a career, or you can choose the Daniel Day-Lewis approach, opt for the highest quality content you can and put everything into it.

Engagement over frequency

Let’s compare two scenarios.

Agent 1: Super organized, spends a day creating a ton of content and then schedules it out a month ahead of time. Now, they can move on to other important tasks and not look at social.

Agent 2: Posts maybe once a week, every other week, and some months only posts once. Throughout the week they spend time on social. Mostly engaging and talking to people.

I would be willing to bet that Agent 2 is the one who actually pulls clients from social media. They’re out there engaging with people. Building relationships. Agent 1 just checked the social media box and then threw the content into the void.

The brochure presence

Regular posting is a great strategy for many. It works for a reason. But, it’s not the best use of time and money for many others.

Some agents only need what I call a brochure presence. 

This means when people look them up on social, it acts like a brochure that shows the agent is good at their job. It shows their professionalism, what they offer and some social proof. A living brochure instead of a static printed one. 

This doesn’t need daily posting to achieve it. You can do this with a weekly or even bi-weekly post, plus your listings. This way, if someone looks you up, it won’t make them not want to hire you. If you still want to get business from your social media with a brochure presence, you’ll need to spend time engaging with people.

Opportunity cost

When you’re spending all this time thinking about what to post, worrying you’re not posting enough, then creating the post, figuring out how to post, then posting … then checking constantly to see what kind of engagement it got … that’s time you could be spending on other activities.

What other opportunities are you overlooking because you’re spending a lot of time doing these things? All of that time could have been spent taking a referral source out to lunch or being helpful in a local Facebook group. Those activities could potentially drive more business.

I hear from agents all the time about getting so stressed with social and how they’re dropping the ball. Except, they don’t even know where social fits into their marketing strategy. Take a step back first and map out your strategy. Then, figure out where social fits in for you.

Just because so many of us are saying you should be posting daily on social media doesn’t mean it’s true for you. Step back. Evaluate your marketing strategy, look at what time and resources you have and think about where they’re best spent. 

Your answer may be that you’re going to post daily on social because that’s the best fit for your business — but, it doesn’t have to be.