Yesterday, I attended a meeting with one of the reps from realestate.com.au & talked about their new site update which has taken place today.

The new site looks very impressive.

One of the major things I got out of the presentation was how the ‘Local Voices’ section will be adapted into the site and ways that I could possibly use it to help promote me as a local area expert more effectively.

The ‘Local Voices’ site is something launched by realestate.com.au to allow anyone registered to write and respond to reviews on streets and suburbs, which is then shown on the search pages of realestate.com.au.

They have also set the site up to be somewhat like a social networking site. It seems to me that this application which will be nested in the realestate.com.au search pages will quickly become popular with new buyers and potential sellers alike.

Once in the site when analysing suburbs the site displays the ‘top local experts’. This, from what I can see and was told is based on the amount of reviews and responses to a local suburb. My aim (and at this stage I have only registered my profile and explored the site) is to become the local expert within my target areas. I plan to do the following;

• Create a professional profile on the site with contact details.
• Create a professional suburb profile (some of you may already have these) and load it to the system.
• Create an rss feed for my local suburb and respond to any reviews by others in a constructive way.
• Add any person that appears to live within the suburb as a ‘friend’.

With time (and at this stage as its new it doesn’t appear it will be too difficult) I should become the top local expert for my target suburbs. This will hopefully generate leads as local sellers start to investigate their suburb prices and local agents, and are naturally attracted to what others have said about their suburb.

I’d love to hear if anyone has already started using ‘local voices’ and the way in which they are doing so.

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Last week I presented at A Morning with Australia and New Zealand’s Top Agents and had the absolute pleasure to catch up with my friend Julie Ryan, whom I regard as one of the world’s best real estate trainers.

When connecting with Julie on LinkedIn, I happened to notice one of her recent presentations was available on SlideShare and thought I’d share some of Julie’s insights with GenYre = energy readers.

Whilst I appreciate that the SlideShare presentation isn’t anywhere near as effective as it would be with Julie presenting it, I believe that you can still gain a lot out of her presentation slides.

There are some great points that Julie shares about appearing different in your market place. She is also a big believer in using the internet more effectively to help build your profile and make the right first impression.

Julie has also included some very interesting stats about Social Media and a great insight into Dominant Buyer Motives,  plus lots more…

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I’m currently reading a book by Jason Jennings & Laurence Haughton, titled “It’s not the BIG that eat the Small…it’s the FAST that eat the SLOW – How to Use Speed as a Competitive Tool in Business”. It’s a fascinating book.

In Part 2 of the book they discuss Fast Decisions…

“Fast thinking won’t get you very far unless you’re able to quickly process your thoughts and make a decision. Nothing slows down an organization more than paralysis by analysis – the inability to make even the smallest decisions quickly.”

And when reading this paragraph, it made me think of the road blocks that so many of the Gen Y real estate agents are facing each day due to committee meetings & old-school methods being used by lots of agents and the frustration some young agents are experiencing.

Whilst I’m not taking anything away from the wealth of knowledge that the Baby Boomers & Gen X agents can share with the Gen Y agents ( I’m a Gen X agent myself), but the slow uptake of real estate technology & Social Media that exists within our industry means that in many offices Gen Y agents are sent out into the field to do time consuming, ineffective hit & miss ‘old school’ prospecting to build networks.

Gen Y are the greatest networking generation ever.

As a kid growing up my friends either lived in my neighbourhood or were classmates,etc from school. Whereas, Gen Y have hundreds of friends online from all over the place. As I said before, they are the greatest networking generation ever and yet some agencies won’t even let Gen Y agents use a computer.

C’mon!! We are talking about a generation who were literally born with an email address and a mouse in their hand.

If only you could see what I’ve seen some Gen Y agents doing you would be blown away…

The leverage that some Gen Y agents are applying to real estate sales has to be seen to be believed.

They use the internet & Social Media to do a task once and then leverage marketing strategies around that task or use other marketing tools (eg. Personal Profile Video, Blogging, Facebook Fan Pages, etc).

It’s time that Baby Boomer & Gen X agents sat up and took notice of what can be done.

This year Gen Y will out-number Baby Boomers for the first time in history and for the older, more experienced agents, there will need to be a significant shift in thinking & marketing strategies to ensure that they remain relevant within their marketplace and find ways that they can deliver a more streamlined approach to help retain high performing Gen Y agents and at the same time make sure they appeal to the ever growing Gen Y customers.

When you think about it, this is the first time in history where parents have had to ask their kids how to do things. Like, how do I program my new phone, how do I do certain things on the computer, etc, etc, etc? And, this same situation is now happening within real estate agencies & other businesses throughout the world.

Bosses are recruiting to fill in the gaps for their weaknesses in technology, but in the main they aren’t seeking the knowledge required to ensure that they have a better than basic understanding of how online real estate marketing really should work.

This means that operating systems within the agency are developed around old methods which normally make things less efficient and leads to frustration from employees and customers.

I understand, for a lot of agents, learning about computers is one of the last skills sets they are interested in learning.

I’m not suggesting agents need to turn into computer geeks, but they need to get a basic understanding of why web 2.0 is important and the psychology of the internet and embrace internet marketing strategies so they can use them to leverage their time & resources more effectively.

Plus, at the same time, find ways that they can use technology to deliver a better end user experience so that customers will want to deal with that agency and/or recommend them to their friends.

It’s not enough to have your listings uploaded to the major portals, having a company website and database software. you need to understand why customers aren’t doing business with you & what you can do to build more trust over the internet and use strategies that help to convert website visitors into clients on an ongoing basis, 24/7.

I feel disappointed when I hear about good young agents leaving our industry or going out on their own simply out of frustration and a lack of vision from their leader.

I know of a number of agents who have left companies simply because they felt held back due to lack of vision from their boss and have ended up opening up an agency down the road as competitors. Which is something that is becoming easier & easier for agents to do, especially with the emergence of virtual agencies & the current National Agency Licensing regulations.If an agency wants to move forward and retain their Top Performing Gen Y agents, they really should sit down and spend time listening to some of the ideas of the Gen Y agents rather than sticking in the comfort zone of “this is how I did it when I started out in real estate so that’s the way Gen Y agents should do it too.” (Wrong)

If agents continue doing the old things they will simply frustrate the good new recruits out of the industry and end up employing a team of people who lack innovation, inspiration and will find themselves heading down the wrong track where there is only a dead end.

Gen Y’s love being part of a fast thinking business that embraces change.

Step out of your comfort zone and don’t hold your Gen Y’s back and stop killing off their enthusiasm by using those boring ‘old school’ strategies that all your competitors have all gone back to doing simply because that’s all they know.

Look for new and exciting ways. Innovate, Inspire & Embrace Change Faster.

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Aside from what Google have been doing with real estate on Google Maps, there is a real ‘buzz’ happening in the world of email, because Google has just released Google Buzz.

Recently, I’ve met with a number of progressive agencies who are using a range of Google’s free tools & applications for their office intranet.

These agents are storing documents, brochures & promotional material in Google Docs. Using Google’s calender for scheduling appointments and Google reader for keeping up to date with what’s happening within their marketplace & real estate in general.

Agents can still run an email adresses linked to the domain name of their company website, but I see a time where agents will use a @gmail.com address instead.

When you look at ‘Buzz’ you’ll see that Google has now developed a whole new user experience with email.

I believe that the sharing, mobility, social networking capabilities and the whole end user experience of ‘Buzz’ will start a surge of users over to gmail, which in turn will provide a greater opportunity for agents to network and build extensive, engaging databases.

When you look at what gmail has transformed into, it’s no wonder some IT consultants are suggesting agents use Google’s tools to help run a real estate agency, rather than wasting money trying to reinvent the wheel.

I’m interested to hear what the Gen Y agents think about it & whether they would switch to gmail or not? Or alternatively, whether they already have gmail & what the think about ‘Buzz’..

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One of the continual topics in real estate is ‘marketing’, however do we really utilise all knowledge out there to achieve the best results? You may think of marketing only as selling and advertising, this however is just the tip of the iceberg. When marketing correctly you will be able to attract new customers by promising superior value, and keep current customers by delivering satisfaction.

What is marketing?

Philip Kotler, one of the leading marketing academics describes it as ‘a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and managing customer’s relationships in ways that benefit the organisation.’ It includes market research, product development, distribution, pricing, advertisement, personal selling and online-social interaction just to name a few elements. It should be the central core of your business and shape the way you service and communicate to your clients.

How does marketing help us?

As discussed in the following video, Barrack Obama conducted a very successful marketing campaign that ultimately won him the presidency.

If Barrack can become president through effective marketing, imagine the results we could affect locally.

Where to from here?

Over the coming months, I invite you to reinvent your personal marketing with me, to complement your businesses infra structure. Having just completed a course at university I am pretty excited to explore the possibilities available. I will be starting at the base, researching what my marketplace wants (through door-knocking etc a prospecting method in its self), to creating a new ‘product’ based on consumers demands and finishing with pricing, promotion & customer retention.

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