The campaign has exceeded realestate.com.au’s expectations and reached its target in just two weeks of going live, with thousands of Australians taking part in the integrated corporate social responsibility campaign.

The campaign has been a joint partnership with Habitat for Humanity Australia, which is the world’s number one provider of housing for low income families in need.

Spokesperson for realestate.com.au Joanne Whyte indicated that support for the cause has been overwhelming, with many online users embracing the concept since the campaign went live in early October.

“Deciding to integrate Facebook into the campaign was a clever way to engage consumers who want to help make a difference in this world.  We are really pleased to see the general public get behind this cause and embrace the Fresh Start Project,” said Joanne.

“As part of our ongoing commitment to making a difference, realestate.com.au has contributed $130,000 to Habitat for Humanity Australia that will go towards building a house for a low income family, with construction commencing on 8 November 2010,” she said.

Two thousand three hundred fans have had their photos published on a ‘supporters wall’ sharing Fresh Start Project with family and friends.

Established in the United States in 1976, Habitat for Humanity is a global not-for-profit organisation with a presence in over 90 countries and has changed the lives of people all over the world building more than 400,000 houses and sheltering more than two million people in 3,500 communities including almost 100 homes in Australia.

Habitat for Humanity believes in giving people a hand up rather than a hand out by building homes in partnership with families both in Australia and overseas.  The families put in labour and a deposit, and Habitat for Humanity assists with the expertise and financing and importantly, as the no-profit loan is repaid, it goes into a revolving fund to help finance even more homes for people in need.

Habitat for Humanity’s recent projects include its work in helping rebuild homes in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and in Haiti with the support of celebrity A-listers such as Brad Pitt, Bon Jovi, Barack and Michelle Obama and Oprah Winfrey.

Between now and 7 November 2010, members of the public keen to follow the Fresh Start Project can keep up-to-date with the latest campaign developments via realestate.com.au’s Facebook page and the microsite as the next phase of the campaign unfolds. Consumers can continue donating social bricks via the realestate.com.au home page to help raise awareness around housing affordability for low income families.

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How do you propose to a girl in real estate?

In a press release issued today, realestate.com.au helps hopeless romantic pop the BIG question online

realestate.com.au has helped one lucky beau pop the BIG question on RENT section of its site.

Some guys like the face to face approach but Frankston local Clinton Hosking wanted to propose in a memorable way – something his bride-to-be Hayley Smith would not forget in a hurry.

“As Hayley works as a Property Manager for Harcourts in Frankston, she is obsessed with real estate continually checking out the competition online,” said Clinton.

“I thought what is one thing Hayley really loves and one thing stuck out, she loves real estate so I thought why not stick an advertisement on realestate.com.au for her to find – l really wanted this to be a genuine surprise,” he said.

Joanne Whyte, General Manager Marketing Communications and Insights at realestate.com.au said the company was thrilled to help Clinton seal the deal in an unusual way.

“We wish Clinton and Hayley every happiness. Less than two hours of the marriage proposal going live in the RENT section of realestate.com.au, nearly 500 people viewed the property listing come marriage proposal,” she said.

Check out the marriage proposal on realestate.com.au: Property ID: 404807547

http://www.realestate.com.au/property-house-vic-frankston-404807547

Note: At the time of posting this article their had already been over 3600 visits to the marriage proposal.

Congratulations to the happy couple. I wish them all the very best for the future.

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Have you ever wished you knew how many people are opening your e-mail’s, or one better… see exactly who clicked on your links?

I used Vision6 recently to send out a price adjustment on a property, and then called every person who clicked to see ‘more information’ on the property. The response was great! Everyone knew what property I was talking about and thanked me for the call. I was touching base with people who actually cared.

I then decided to explore it a little further and consider other ways I could implement this system. Some of the uses I have already adapted include the following;

1. Send every new registered buyer a link to ‘the buying process’ with a link down the side to ‘tips on how to prepare your home for sale’ – as this will provide an early tip as to who’s selling.
2. Send all my database a quarterly report and again add the ‘tips on how to prepare your home for sale’ link
   In the process of allowing users to sign up to my e-newsletter automatically using the forms feature.
3. Will offer my next vendor an improved e-brochure service which allows us to track who clicks on the ‘more info’ link. Then call anyone who did not attend the open for inspection to understand why not or possible encourage them to attend the next one or discuss similar properties coming onto the market.

If you use Vision6 or similar systems what do you use them for?

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Think of a sales or rental department as an elite sporting team. Each member has their specialty position and skills, and as such, the coaching methods used to ensure their success should be tailored to their individual functions.

Too many principals implement training based on general sales or property management needs, where they should be focusing on individuals’ strengths and weaknesses, and the skills that these people require to excel in their specialty area.

For example, would it be beneficial for Jarryd Hayne to spend all his time training to make the big tackles and hard hit ups? Of course not, because he doesn’t play in the forward line. It would, however, be ideal to use those training methods for a front rower such as Petero Civoniceva.

Is it really a good idea to implement a standard training regime across the whole sales team? Or would it pay to take the time to identify each member’s role, and their strengths and weaknesses, and then tailor training to suit their individual needs.

The reason that players in a sporting team are chosen to represent their country is because they are the best player for that position. The winger is quick, the forwards are tough and the fullback is agile.

In a sales team, the best lister is confident and empathetic, the best seller is great at negotiating and the support staff have an eye for detail. Therefore, tailor training to enhance these skills. Make them market leaders in your area.

Consider joining strong members of your team with other strong members. Cameron Smith & Cooper Cronk are good players in their own right, but as a duo they form a force to be reckoned with. Likewise, band together a star performer with a weaker player in your team. Just as Darren Lockyer can make anyone look fantastic and inspire his team mates to perform, the weaker player will be driven to lift his game.

Another mistake some principals make is not ensuring the sales team sticks to their core market area. In a slow market, it is easy for sales staff to take on listings as business outside of their local or specialty area.

Roger Federer is the greatest tennis player of the 21st century, but he would probably get slaughtered if he ‘laced up the boots’ and ran onto the rugby field. As the old adage says ‘Stick with what you know and what you do best’.

But how do you put this training into practice? By conducting a simple training needs analysis. Sit down with each member of the team and discuss with them what they think their strengths and weaknesses are and what they can do to improve. Then implement training to suit their needs.

It can be something low scale like role playing scenarios they have trouble dealing with, or specific skills based training to broaden their knowledge of their core area. With the introduction of compulsory CPD, the popularity of skills based training has decreased dramatically. But as any proactive coach will tell you, training is the key to producing great staff that get results and remain a cut above the competition.

Just as all elite athletes aspire to be the best and represent their country, does your sales staff aspire to be the best and represent you?

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Young agents Eddy Piddington, Jessica Thei and Adrian Wilson are all recent REINSW Awards for Excellence winners and will share what drives them to succeed.

Come along to the Young Agents’ first event for 2010!

Thursday, 15 April 2010 at The Loft in Sydney 4.00pm – 6.00pm (includes a short panel discussion)
$35 REINSW members / $55 Non-members (cost includes drinks and canapes)

To book your seat or learn more Click Here

I’m looking forward to attending this event and catching up with many of the dynamic young agents who are part of the REINSW Young Agents Chapter.

If you’re not in Sydney, there’s a great event being held for Young Agents next week (Friday 19th March) by the REIV on Creating A Successful Future.

This looks like being a great event, featuring one of the GenYre = energy contributors Braden Walters.

Here are the details of that event.

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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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Late last year I was given the opportunity to come down to Ray White NSW in Sydney and find out what would be involved in the role of Chief Auctioneer. I have since decided to take up this opportunity and I’m living in Sydney and loving it but on this trip I was just getting the lay of the land and talking to people.

One day I was on an office visit with the CEO of Ray White Corporate NSW, Stephen Nell. It was late afternoon, about 5:30, and the Principal offered us a beer and we of course accepted. Three beers were put on the table – a Carlton Cold, a Tooheys New and a Corona. I was given the option to pick first and straight away I picked the Corona as it is my favourite beer and was the best on offer by far. The CEO was amazed and pointed out, not in a rude way, how times had changed and that there is no respecting your elders. He said that if the situation had been reversed he never would have picked the Corona.

I thought about this for a millisecond and took a very quick sip of the Corona so neither Stephen nor the Principal could have it.

Now, the whole point to this story is that as a generation, we do respect our elders a great deal. We know that we can learn a lot from them. However, this does not mean we are going to let them have our favourite beer or stop us speaking up when we think something is wrong. Although they have the experience, we can often offer a fresh perspective on things and we should never underestimate the value of that.

In my opinion I think it is really important to know exactly what it is you want in business and life and if you go for it you will be amazed how many times you will get it. At the end of the day I know what it is I want and where I am going and, when a choice of beers is in front of me, I will always take the Corona.

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The response to date has been very interesting & has provided a great insight into what’s happening out there in the current marketplace.

Yesterday, I had a radio interview about this issue with Kevin Turner from REUncut about some of the feedback that I have received from real estate agents thus far, here’s the interview…

Click here to listen to the interview – Future Of Agents Commission – 2010

To have your say about this important issue affecting our real estate industry, make sure you share your view by clicking the link below & completing this quick survey (easily completed in under 90 seconds).

Please Click Here to access the Future Of Agents Commission 2010 Survey

Note: The survey will close on February 19th 2010 and results will be compiled & posted out shortly afterwards.

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I’ve been reading some killer reports recently on 2009: the year that was, but now the challenge lies in navigating through the unchartered waters of 2010.

Who is expecting a market recovery?

Will the rate rises at the end of 2009 lead to a stagnant market place for you locally? Nationally?

How are buyers reacting to recent rate rises and the potential / reality that there may be more to come in the first quarter of 2010?

Are you noticing a return of investors to your marketplace?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts/comments.

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This year I’ll be adopting a new approach. I’m taking advantage of an online system to help follow up on leads and to keep in touch with clients.

Last year I saw myself making lots of phone calls to keep in touch and thought this year I would mix phone, text and email to help keep me in touch with my clients (both existing and new)

I’m looking forward to a great year and wish that all the young agents have a fantastic and rewarding 2010 as well. Lets make the most of it.