The Future of Real Estate Marketing blog is a very special place for me. When I was getting my feet wet in this industry, FOREM was one of my go-to daily reads. The content that Joel Burslem created was no where to be found in 2006, 2007, and 2008 – back when people were saying, “Facebook – what is that?” When I came on board with Inman News in November of 2009 and was asked by Brad Inman, founder and publisher of Inman News to take over managing editing duties and become the primary writer for FOREM, I was honored, excited, and a little nervous.

I knew I had big shoes to fill, and had several conversations with Joel about why FOREM had the success and audience it did. A big part of it was the content – offering a fresh eye, talking about what was new and exciting and also looking at other industries to see the parallels to the real estate technology space. The other part of FOREM’s success was Joel’s personality. Anyone who knows Joel knows that he is a great guy – down to earth, super smart, and one of the nicest people you’ll meet.

So for the first couple of months, I tried to be like Joel and what I quickly realized, and any blogger reading this can relate, is that I needed to find my own voice. It wasn’t soon after January 2010 that I really found my rhythm. I started writing about things that I knew real estate agents wanted to know more about and things I was passionate about. I talked a lot about Facebook and Twitter – do’s and don’ts, getting started, and taking it to the next level. We also talked a lot about mobile technology – especially with the iPhone and the iPad. It’s hard to remember a time before those two devices!

In the fall of 2010, I started to bring in some fantastic guest bloggers to talk about technologies they were working on or to offer another point of view. Over the course of 2010 and now 2011, our readership grew and grew. I’m very proud to say that we increased our RSS readership ten-fold – literally growing from a couple thousand RSS subscribers to now almost 12K and quadrupling our number of page views. We also won the coveted “Best Blog Award” from NAREE (National Association of Real Estate Editors) this year – taking home the second place award – competing with blogs like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal real estate blogs. I say all this not to pat myself on the back, but to really give credit to you – our readers. It is our readers and our devoted audience who have helped form and grow FOREM; and through your feedback, comments and sharing – have made FOREM what it is today.

So what is next?

I think there is a huge opportunity to take FOREM to the next level and offer a larger variety of content, have more contributors, and reach a broader audience. I am excited to announce the official launch on Monday 7/11/11 of Inman Next, produced by Inman News. Inman Next will be a place for real estate agents to learn about the latest tips and tools in social media, mobile, tech & gadgets and events. FOREM will play a big part in Inman Next.

You will be able to find all of the content from FOREM on Inman Next – it will all be marked “Future of Real Estate Marketing.” Going forward, you will continue to see longer form posts and more in-depth articles marked as “Future of Real Estate Marketing” articles on Inman Next. I am collaborating with Chris Smith, co-founder of Tech Savvy Agent and now Chief Evangelist with Inman News to launch this exciting new channel. In addition to Chris and I, we have a fantastic list of contributors who will be submitting posts regularly to Inman Next.

Special invite

We will be launching Inman Next this Monday, July 11th at 11 am (PST)/2 pm (EDT) and I would love for you to be a part of our special launch event. Please go to Inman Launch and enter your email to receive a special invite to our launch event this Monday, July 11th.

Thank you for all of your continued support and contribution to FOREM. Please join me on Monday the 11th as we usher in one of the most exciting things to debut for real estate agents in a long time. I’ll see you there!

Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

At Inman News, we talk a lot about workstyle and how much has changed in just the last few years. How real estate professionals work, has been a fundamental theme of Agent Reboot and Real Estate Connect.Why? There is an absolute fundamental shift in how we do business, that has occurred because of technology, mobile and social media.

I wanted to share this awesome infographic I found on one of my favorite sites, Gist.com. This infographic really outlines so well how we (especially in the real estate industry) have changed how we do business.

Enjoy the infographic and thank you to our friends at Gist! (view the original post here)

Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

Facebook doesn’t make many big changes quickly. Since it’s launch in 2004, with each new change comes a wave of people complaining or asking for it to go back to “the old way.” It looks like it may be that time again.

According to VentureBeat, Facebook’s developers are currently in the process of testing a new change that is probably going ruffle some feathers!

What is it?

Facebook’s new site design will prominently feature advertisements.

Who likes ads? Not too many people except for advertisers and Facebook!

However, check out these two key parts of the redesign:

• Static elements. The new redesign would keep the placement of advertisements and the menu navigation window static. As the user scrolls down the page, scanning their News Feed and checking in on friends, these elements would follow them. The navigation bar at the top of the screen and even the site’s footer would also remain static.
• Limit the number of ads. The other interesting change is that it will only allow Facebook to display a certain number of advertisements on each page.

I think this could be a huge game-changer for real estate agents and brokers who invest in Facebook ads. Why? Facebook ads already rock because of the laser focus you can choose when creating them, but this new redesign offers agents better ad positioning, an ad that is more likely to convert, and an ad which could turn more likes into leads.

Imagine an ad that you see (on YOUR page) that is targeted to you, and your likes and interests. Instead of seeing it once as you scroll by it, it follows you where you go throughout Facebook. If it’s done in a non-annoying way, this could be a great way to get your ad in front of the same people but for longer periods of time. Most people when they see an ad don’t react to it – they have to see it over and over and perhaps this new redesign will breathe new life into ads and give real estate agents one more reason to invest time and money into a Facebook marketing strategy.

What do you think? Hate it? Love it? I’d love your feedback, leave me a comment below!

Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

In the last few weeks, Facebook has made some great new updates available to page admins. They are definitely making it easy for page admins to get the help and assistance they need, get their questions answered, and make their page as successful as can be. In the past, when a page owner was looking to advertise on Facebook, or install a certain app, it took a little bit of “hunting and pecking.”

Now, on the new admin panel interface, there are a number of extremely helpful links to help you develop your page.

Here is a screen shot of the back-end of the Inman News page:

Once you click on “resources,” you can see there are 11 links and resources available to page admins. Many of these were available to Facebook users – and were in various places on Facebook – but to have them in all one, organized list just makes sense!

Here are some of my favorite key hightlights out of the 11 links:

The 1st is the top link: “Best Practices Guides to Make Your Page Engaging” – which takes you to this page:

This is a page that I refer to often on Facebook to find out about the latest changes and updates to Facebook pages. This page is chock-full of awesome tips and tricks like the pages manual, the insights guide, bloggers guide, and so much more. If you are a real estate agent just building your Facebook page, or need to spruce it up, I can not recommend enough checking out these resources!

Additional links on the back-end of your Facebook page include a link to set your username, add a social plugin to your site (i.e. adding the “like” button and other options) and the ability to send an update to everyone who has “liked” your page. By the way – are you sending updates to the people who like your page? This is a quick and easy way to send a custom message to a select group of people who like your page (geographically) or to all of the people who like your page.

Overall, I love with the new interface of the admin panel. I can find what I am looking for quickly and easily.

Facebook is smart – I’m a lot more likely to engage and add on additional resources to my Facebook page if they make it easy for me! This is a great tip for real estate agents – make it easy for people to contact you, to navigate your site, etc. Keep it simple, right?

What admin tools do you use the most from Facebook? I’d love to hear your thoughts – please post a comment below!

Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

I received a really exciting email in my inbox this week – there are some awesome new developments that just rolled out for HootSuite.

As you probably know by now, I am a huge HootSuite fan. In my opinion, it is the best product, hands down, for managing multiple social media streams, for managing your social strategy, for monitoring multiple conversations, and so much more!

Here are two of the cool new highlights HootSuite announced:

1. HootSuite Publisher

One of the best features of HootSuite has been the ability to post social updates to multiple streams with the click of a button. With one “copy and paste,” you can post a comment to Twitter, then re-work the verbiage a little to post it to Facebook, then re-work it again to post it back out to Twitter a second time the next day, and then post it to LinkedIn. Of course you could just post it once and have it go everywhere but to really be socially smart and savvy – you won’t be posting the exact same post to every social network!

According to the HootSuite blog you can now:

“Slice and dice the destination profiles for each message and drag-and-drop your updates into timeslots to match your editorial plans. While the whole power of daily/weekly/monthly calendar view is available with Pro and Enterprise plans, everyone can take the advanced scheduling functionality for a spin to see how calendar views can manage complex campaigns.

This publisher tool takes the place of the former Pending Tweets column – to get started, click the paper airplane in the Launch Bar and plan (and edit) your posts across networks.”

So instead of seeing all your pending tweets in separate streams, you can view them all at once; see how they overlap, and if you have any gaps anywhere. Great idea!

As a real estate pro you live and die by your calendar right? This new format makes it super easy for a real estate agent to view what posts they have scheduled, write additional posts, move things around as needed, and then move on to selling more houses and closing more deals. This new tool will definitely help you be more efficient with your social media planning and execution.

By the way, HootSuite does have a free plan, but I really recommend you look into their $5.99 a month plan – with extra tools and the analytics available are worth the extra expense. You can’t even go out to lunch for $5.99!

2. Limited Profiles

This new feature allows someone on your team to write social media updates and then save them in draft mode for you or an authorized team member to approve. I love this idea for real estate agents who want to hire an assistant to help with social media updates. This way, the assistant can write the posts and the real estate agent or Broker can review them before they go out to ensure they are in line with their brand, their voice and the message they want to get out. It also offers you an opportunity to give that assistant (or intern) guidance on what you’d like to see posted. I think this is a great new option for real estate agents.

What do you think of these new updates? Are you using HootSuite? I’d love to hear your feedback, post your comments below!

P.S. Shameless plug, but I am SO excited to see Ryan Holmes, CEO of HootSuite onstage for Real Estate Connect SF next month. His company has changed the way companies manage social media and I can’t wait to hear his take on the future of social media. If you can make it down to the Bay Area (my stomping grounds!) – I’d love to see you! Tweet me up or leave a comment below!

Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

Guest post by Maura Neill, CRS

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of speaking at Inman’s Agent Reboot in Atlanta. The topic: Facebook Business Pages. The title of my presentation: Your Facebook Business Page is Worthless. It’s a little unnerving to take the stage and to start off by looking into all those eager faces in the audience and tell them that their Facebook Business Page is worthless. But it’s true – most of the time.

The majority of the agents I speak to express frustration with Facebook as a lead generation tool or as part of their marketing plan. But that’s because, to quote one of my favorite (terrible) movies of the 80s, Mr. Mom: “you’re doing it wrong.”

It’s not enough to log in to Facebook, create a business page, upload your photo or logo, and wait for the phone to ring. Like any piece of your business plan puzzle, your Facebook Business Page needs to be monitored, it needs your attention and – at the risk of sounding a little more touchy-feely than even I am comfortable with – a little TLC. In short, it needs your time* – and if you have time to give it, it may just end up being one of the best referral tools in your arsenal.

Here are a couple of tips to help you revitalize your Facebook Business Page and turn it from drab to fab:

1. If you work heavily in a particular area or neighborhood, create a Facebook Business Page for that market. This doesn’t mean create a page for every neighborhood in which you’ve ever sold a home (please refer to paragraph 3*).  REALTOR® Raziel Ungar started his Facebook Page BurlingameBuzz last spring and had an immediate following in the town of Burlingame, CA. According to Raziel, since starting the page just over a year ago, the page has “impacted my business in a huge way.” Though it’s not a huge lead-generator, it has validated Raziel to his clients and potential clients and given him a huge competitive advantage over other agents. The City of Burlingame has even linked to BurlingameBuzz.com, which they would not have done with RazielUngar.com.

2. Consider making your Facebook Business Page be about something not someone (i.e., not you). Do you have a hobby or an interest that you are passionate about? Bobbi Howe, a REALTOR® in St. Joseph, MO, started a page on Facebook to support a running group. Her small town didn’t have a running club, so she started her own – in under three months, she has already had two calls from members who want to work with her as their REALTOR®.

3. Think long and hard before you make your Facebook Business Page about YOU. Keep in mind that the average consumer is looking for information – not just a page that feeds your ego (I can’t tell you how happy I was to see the “Become a Fan” button disappear!). If you start a Facebook Business Page that is named for yourself or for your team, make sure that you still keep it consumer-centric. A great example of a group who does this well is The Corcoran Group in New York City. Their Facebook Business Page is a wealth of information: about New York, about real estate, about technology, about events…but very little about them. Feel free to post the occasional tidbit about an award you’ve received or other personal tidbit – it makes the page feel, well, more personal. But be cautious of posting those items too often.

4. Integrate your Facebook Business Page into your other social media and online marketing platforms. By itself, you will probably only attract people who already know you – and if you work purely by referral, this may not be a bad thing. However, most of us wouldn’t argue with a new client every now and then, so integration is key. Put the Facebook LIKE Button on your blog and/or website, so that people who discover you on the web can immediately like your page and enjoy your updates into their news feed. Post links to your blog posts as you publish them on your Facebook Business Page, so that they appear in the news feeds of those who like your page but may not be subscribed to your blog. Tweet about your page when you’ve posted something new. Post a link to your latest YouTube video on the page so it can be viewed directly from Facebook, without interested parties having to leave the site and go to YouTube. The possibilities are endless. Just remember to be polite and consider your readers: don’t post the same links over and over ad-nauseum – that’s a good way to get people to click the UNlike button. Post once and move on – if they’re interested, they will click.

5. Finally, remember to interact with those who want to interact with you. It’s a two-way street, after all. If someone takes the time to post a comment to one of your posts or links or to ask a question, by all means respond! It’s a great way to connect with your readers, you know, those people who took the time to click LIKE and are now taking the time to write something. Even if you’re just saying “thank you” to someone who wrote “great post!”, you’re still making a connection – and perhaps opening the door to a deeper connection down the road. If a person feels a connection to you, he or she will most likely be back…and they may turn into a client or a referral source down the road.

About the author: Maura Neill, CRS, is a REALTOR® in Atlanta, Georgia, and the creator of 365Atlanta.com, a hyper-local travel site for Atlanta newcomers and natives which has become a rich referral resource for her business. She is also musical theatre geek, dark chocolate aficionada, lover of dark beer, and shoe addict.

Share on Facebook

Many call LinkedIn the “set it and forget it” social media. It’s a great professional network, but not as fast-paced as Twitter, and not as fun and interactive as Facebook. But, we all love LinkedIn for the professional quality it brings to the table. There are however three really cool things about LinkedIn that not a lot of real estate professionals seem to know about.

Here are three of my favorite LinkedIn “secrets” that are ideal for real estate professionals:

1.. Export your connections and add to your database
This is a fantastic feature! Did you know you could export all of your LinkedIn contacts? Go to “My Connections” to view a list of all your LinkedIn contacts. At the bottom of the page click “Export Connections,” which will put all this contact info in a format that works for your address book (Microsoft Outlook, Yahoo! Mail, etc.). This is an easy way to add 50, 100 even 500 people to you database. Add them to your drip email marketing campaigns, send them an invite to join you on Facebook or Twitter – the possibilities are endless!

2. Customize your URL
This is huge – instead of having a long URL that no one remembers, secure a custom URL on LinkedIn. Visit the “Edit Profile” tab and click “Public Profile” at bottom left. Once you’re on this page, on the far right you will see “Your current URL.” This is where you can customize your LinkedIn domain name so you can better brand your account. Your URL may want to be your name or your business – I recommend staying consistent with how you are branding yourself on your website, Facebook page, blog, etc. You can think take this custom URL and add it to your Facebook page, blog, website and email signature.

3. Check out “Signal” and read relevant news and updates
There is a new feature on LinkedIn called Signal which allows you to monitor updates within your network.  You can also filter information so you can also see what people in your extended network (2nd and 3rd connections) are posting. You can also do the same filtering by industry or location. I could see this as a really useful tool for real estate agents who are trying to build their business and meet people outside of their inner circle. This is the new way to meet “a friend of a friend.”

I know there are so many more great ways to use LinkedIn – I only covered these three lesser-known facts. I’d love to hear from you how you are using LinkedIn. Leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

Guest blog post by Daniel Weisman

The question on everyone’s mind these days is, “how can I use SEO to get more rental bookings?”

The idea of Search Engine Optimization is that ranking highly in search results will lead to increased traffic and sales. While reaching the top of the Google search results seems to require black magic, keep in mind that it’s magic you already know: promotion. Doing SEO for vacation rentals and real estate mainly requires applying the promotional skills you already have to the tools available on the web.

The original references for all things SEO can be found here and here. For an approach tailored to vacation rental marketing, here are 5 steps to creating an SEO strategy:

1. Define Your Goals

As with any marketing campaign, SEO requires clear goals in order for you to work at it effectively, assess your results, and develop your strategy. Remember: Your ultimate goal is to book more rentals and increase your bottom line; NOT to be number one on Google.

The value of the #1 is intangible, but ROI is a reliable metric of success. Keep track of the time and money you spend on your SEO efforts, and you will be able to calculate the return on the campaign based on increased bookings.

Good SEO Goals:

• More bookings from search results
• Increased site traffic
• Lower bounce rate

2. Build a Website

You can’t have SEO if you don’t have a website! If you’re starting online marketing from scratch, then the first thing that you’re going to want to do is build a website. For vacation rental owners and property managers, Web Chalet, a new company, provides hosting and industry-specific site templates. Their product provides a quick and easy way to get all of your important information on a website with your own domain name and branding. For those who want more customization, wordpress.org offers a free solution for building robust websites.

Think of a website like a shop. You want a great location (domain name), an attractive façade (design), and a great product. Choose an address that’s easy for people and search engines to find. For example, if Paul owns a vacation property in Lake George, then he will be better off with a domain name like LakeGeorgeVacationRental.com rather than PaulsPlace.com. Be obvious and descriptive, and make it clear exactly what your site has to offer.

In addition to making your shop easy to find, you also want to make it inviting and pleasant. Make your site easy for people to navigate and you will be rewarded with love from the search engines and bookings. In their webmaster guidelines, Google esplains, “Create a useful, information-rich site, and write pages that clearly and accurately describe your content.” Keep things simple with clear content and easy navigation.

While we’re on the subject of building sites, we should talk about keywords. Keywords are the phrases that people search to find your site. Before you create any content for your site, think about the keywords that potential customers would use to find you. If I were searching for a rental in Lake George, than I would probably enter “Lake George vacation rentals,” or “Lake George cabins.” These keyword phrases are much narrower than a term like, “vacation rentals,” and they target more relevant traffic. You can do keyword research on Google by using the wonder wheel and related searches tools.

3. Provide Valuable Content

Search engines try to provide users with the best inforamtion, so make sure your site contains highly relevant, up-to-date content. Be sure to include a well-written description of your rental, high-quality photos, an availability calendar, guest testimonials, area information, pricing, and contact information. It’s also a good idea to keep a blog on your site with regular updates about the property, changes and improvements, area news, and special offers. The search engines like to see that a site is actively maintained.

If you already list your vacation rental on sites like FlipKey, then you may not need to create and update entirely new content for your site. FlipKey provides owners with widgets that display the booking calendar and guest reviews, among other tools. You can easily install these widgets on your site and keep all of your information up to date just by managing your FlipKey account.

4. Promote Yourself and Your Site

Even the best shop can fail if no one knows about it. You need to go out and do the legwork to get other websites talking about your site. Most of all, you want to get other websites to link to you. The search engines see these links back to your site and have an easier time finding your content. How do you get people talking?

Listing Sites

Most listing sites, like FlipKey, will provide you with a link to your personal website. You want to list on some of these sites anyway, so make sure that you take advantage of their authority and provide them with a link to your site.

Chambers of Commerce

Chamber of Commerce sites are good places to get noticed on the web. Join your local Chamber and make sure that they include a link to your website in their accommodations section.

Destination Marketing Organizations

Find the local destination marketing or visitor and convention bureau website and see what the options are for getting your site listed. Sometimes all you have to do is ask. You may also find local travel guide sites and directories – if they are ranked highly in search results, then it’s worth talking to them about getting a link to your site.

Local Bloggers

Bloggers are a tougher community to crack, but also a valuable community to be a part of. Think of blogs as your shop’s neighbors. Many of your customers are going to have lunch at the restaurant next door and then ask for a recommendation for a place to shop in the afternoon. If you’re friends with the maître d’, then he’ll recommend your store and not your competitor’s. Get to know the bloggers who write about your area and they will be happy to recommend you to their readers.

Social Media

As I wrote in my article on Social Media for Vacation Rental marketing, Facebook and Twitter are great platforms for promoting your property. As with bloggers, these sites are all about being social and not about hard-selling. Claim a Twitter handle and a Facebook page and get involved in conversations that interest you. You’ll meet some interesting people and find some great supporters to spread the word about your awesome rental.

5. Track Your Progress and Adapt

Finally, make sure you’re tracking your progress. There are plenty of tools available for keeping track of website traffic, but the industry gold standard is Google Analytics. You can create a free account and install Analytics on your website just by following Google’s instructions.

Once you have Analytics up and running, it’s easy to get carried away with the numbers. If you want to see how your SEO efforts are doing, then you will want to pay attention to the Search Engine traffic, which you can find under “traffic sources.” There’s a lot of information to take in here, but if you see the traffic generally trending upwards, you’re on the right track!

About the author: Daniel Weisman is a Social Media Specialist at FlipKey.com, which features more than 100,000 vacation rental properties around the world.  You can read more of his writing on The FlipKey Blog and connect with him on Twitter @flipkey.

Share on Facebook

In the last few months I have done quite a bit of traveling with Inman News for our Agent Reboot “roadshow.” Every hotel has its perks, but the hotel we stayed at yesterday, The Westin Bayshore really impressed me with their social media savvy. It started a few weeks ago. I was tweeting for the event and I noticed that The Westin Bayshore was tweeting and promoting our event! They posted welcome messages and tweets about how excited they were that we were coming. I was blown away! At all of the hotels and convention centers we have been to for Inman events – this has never happened – not once!

If that wasn’t enough – when I checked into my room, there was a surprise waiting for me!

On my dresser in my room were three shortbread cookies – one with the Facebook logo, one with the Twitter logo and one with a QR code!

I was so excited to see the hotel engaging its guests in social media! I quickly scanned the QR code with my iPhone app and received a custom message to me personally welcoming me to the hotel and wishing me luck as a speaker at Agent Reboot.

I was impressed.

Not only that – but all the speakers were buzzing about it. Nicole Nicolay who has over 14,000 followers on Twitter mentioned from the stage (as emcee) how impressed she was with The Westin Bayshore. Then Stacey Harmon who has over 4,900 followers commented and re-tweeted it. Then Chris Smith, our new Chief Evangelist with 8,700 followers tweeted it out. Numbers aren’t everything – but in just minutes nearly 30,000 people on Twitter heard about what The Westin Bayshore was doing!

So what’s the lesson here? Honestly – it doesn’t take a lot to use social media in a fun and creative way. Because of this simple gesture – The Westin Bayshore had a dozen of the top people in real estate technology talking about their hotel and how great they were.

That’s why I know that social media is one of the best forms of word-of-mouth advertising. Imagine what The Westin Bayshore would have had to paid to get that type of buzz at one event?

So what’s the lesson for real estate professionals? Don’t miss the boat with Facebook and Twitter. It’s not enough to just throw a page up and post something here or there. Be committed to building your sphere online as much as you have in the past face to face.  Be creative with social media! How about handing out Facebook cookies at your next open house to promote your page? How about making it a point to comment on 5 of your friends/fans posts every day? How about tweeting your local chamber or downtown association to build a relationship with them?

The possibilities are endless – and the opportunities are there because so few people are really doing this.

The real estate industry is ripe for this type of out-of-the-box thinking!

Thank you Westin Bayshore for a great experience, fantastic room, welcoming staff and for the awesome social media welcome.

I’m impressed.

Written by: Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

Share on Facebook

Guest post by Jeremy Blanton

This past week I had the pleasure of joining a great lineup of speakers at Agent Reboot in Charlotte. Many of these people like Daniel Rothamel, Chris Smith, Heather Elias & Sherry Chris I call good friends. This being my first Agent Reboot, I did not exactly know what to expect. I figured there would be some good content shared to help real estate agents grow their business. I was definitely not disappointed.

As a social media speaker who has traveled the country speaking to thousands on how to use technology, I must admit that I was very impressed by the Agent Reboot event. Many times I go to these events they are unorganized and have 90 minute sessions where you lose your focus within the first twenty-five minutes. The 10-25 minute sessions keep the event moving along quickly and give you plenty of information on a full spectrum of topics. Time between sessions is also at a minimum. There was never a long lull between presenters to bore you. Also, the quality of the speakers and the content they were providing was top notch.

One of the big takeaways that I brought home from this event was something that Darin Persinger mentioned during his session on QR codes. At first I thought of it as a big joke, but as I reflected on what he said, I believe he may be onto something. Darin drew a very good analogy between technology & Star Trek. What he said was that the new technology we see today was originally used back on Star Trek. In essence, Star Trek were the pioneers to current technology. The point he made is that you NEVER saw them use a QR code. So, do you think they will ever become mainstream? That I will leave up to you to decide.

My other favorite session of the day was Sherry Chris sharing on lifestyle branding. She shared on how consumers connect with a brand now is different than the way they did years ago. We in the real estate industry must begin to recognize these changes and be willing to adapt as needed to connect with new potential clients. We need to become the Harley Davidson of real estate. It is a brand known by the world and recognized by many. In fact she said it is the most branded tattoo in the world! Anyone want to get inked?

Overall, I really enjoyed the rapid fire of sessions with great content continuously flowing. Before I knew it, we had reached the wrap-up with Daniel and the event had come to a close which was a nice change from some of the events I attend. There have been many times I sit there wondering, when will this reach the end.

So if an Agent Reboot comes near your town, I would highly recommend attending. The amount of information shared to help your real estate business is second to none. Many of the agents I talked to in attendance at lunch had already felt they received their moneyʼs worth out of the $49 investment they made to the potential in front of them. They were excited how the things they learned would lead to so many future business opportunities.

But, donʼt take just my word on it, take a look at what others thought of Agent Reboot Charlotte:

For me, I enjoyed this event so much that I decided I was going to attend the next one in Atlanta. I hope to see many of you there!

About the author: Jeremy Blanton is the co-founder of 210 Consulting- Social Media Advisors. They help individuals understand how to use social media platforms to increase their business and also build custom WordPress sites.

Share on Facebook