RE Barcamp San Diego session: Posterous

The first session I joined when I came back from lunch was about a website called Posterous. Honestly, I’ve heard about it a few times, but didn’t get the value.  Basically, it’s a simple blogging platform and content syndicator.  Even at barcamp, I heard the posterous talk, but it didn’t really sink in until I slept on it. The next morning – ding! The two reasons I think real estate agents will find it of value: The ease of use (after it’s set up) and having it feed your lead generation systems.

So what is Posterous? For the record, I haven’t spent much time using it, but some say it’s the best tech tool of 2009. It’s a website that you can post content to – just like a blog, or facebook, or twitter, or flickr, or youtube, or [____]. You know how you can take pictures and post them to flickr? Well, you can take pictures and post them to posterous. You know how you can write an article and post it to your blog? You can write an article and post it to posterous.

One of the cool things about posterous is that after it posts your content to your page, it will forward the content to flickr or twitter or wherever you tell it – with a link back to your posterous page included.  Why is that important? Because your posterous page is designed to match your website (including links to your lead generation systems).

How do you add content to posterous?  Via email. Write an email to posterous, click send. Done. The content in your email, including attachments, are posted to your posterous page and forwarded to the social networks you’ve set-up. It knows which updates to add to which networks.  However, you can manually control the syndication by changing the email address you send to. There are several different email address combinations that tell posterous where you want the content sent after it’s posted.

Bottom line it’s a cool tool.  It does require programming skills to design the page to match your website.  If you’re planning on using it, factor in hiring a programmer to set it up correctly.  And my thoughts on syndication remain unchanged – don’t let it be the only way you participate in a community.  It’s always better to go into your social networks and engage others rather than having a robot auto-post everything.  A healthy mix of both can be effective, but you’ll build a stronger, more loyal community if you talk with people instead of always talking to them.  I’ve yet to see an effective tool that automates engagement.

I think posterous is next level compared to it’s competitors.  I recommend re-reading this post, let it sink in. Go and play with it (while it’s still free).

(Next session: Advanced Facebook. You like?  Subscribe with your email or RSS reader.)