Let’s not beat around the bush…I’m a relatively young Realtor. Generally, if I am at a meeting or training session with lots of Realtors, I am one of the youngest in the group. It is up to me to either let this become a hindrance in my career or use it as an advantage. I choose the latter. One of the primary ways that I feel that being young has helped me be successful is that I tend to be on top of new technologies and embrace new trends. I am quick to check out a new website or online resource.

The biggest problem with this is that I sign up for multiple things weekly…most of which I use for a couple of days…decide it will not help me in my business and then ignore it. In the meantime, some of these sites after 6 months or a year begin to grow and I try to revisit them…only to realize that I have no idea what log-in or password I used. I now can either create a second account or work hard to figure out how to get into my original account. I was reading something yesterday and realized that I am not the only one who has this problem.

I found that article quite enjoyable as I could connect with what she was saying on many levels. Recently I got an email from Yelp that another Realtor friend of mine had requested to be my friend on Yelp. I didn’t even remember setting up a Yelp account! However, I figured out my log-in and began clicking around and actually liked some of the changes. I did some reviews and placed it in my favorites deciding to visit more in the future.

However, many times I find these new technologies and trends a simple waste of time. I can spend an hour or two in the afternoon in front of my computer researching a new website and playing around with all the features…only to accomplish nothing that will actually benefit me or my clients.

But, there are many tools and resources out there that have proven to be a benefit to me and/or my clients. Facebook is a networking site that I had been using since my college days. When I jumped into Real Estate I quickly jumped onto the bandwagon…long before many other Realtors began to use it. I can actually attribute two of my clients to the time I spent on Facebook. Not bad for a website that costs me nothing and was already a fun hobby of mine.

I believe that the key as a Realtor to effectively embracing technologies is to figure out what will actually help you in your business. To do this, there are a few factors to take into consideration. First, who are you reaching while utilizing this website. Let’s face it…most websites have a very small audience with an even smaller number of potential clients using it. My work and time on Facebook is spent on two things: 1) networking and staying in contact with friends and business contacts, 2) finding and targeting potential buyers. With all of the people on Facebook it is really important to spend your time in the networking areas that actually have potential buyers. Then, when they find you give them a reason to contact you.

Secondly, you must decide what message will appeal to this audience. The audience viewing your profile on Realtor.com or Trulia is going to be very different than the audience on Facebook….therefore the message should be different too. Too many Realtors put the same message in every single advertisement in a variety of publications. Just because your message appealed to the newspaper reader in your local community paper does not mean that someone browsing listings and searching for local Realtors on Zillow is going to contact you based on the same message. It is a completely different audience.

Personally, I like spending much of my marketing time and money online as my target customer is much more available online. I have chosen to target a younger client…often condo buyers. Many of the younger clients are not reading the community papers…but they definitely spend a great deal of time searching online real estate listings and neighborhood sections on Facebook.

There are still technologies that I have wasted many hours playing with but haven’t been able to effectively utilize yet. I have spent lots of time on Twitter and Jott but have found no ways in which I believe they will help me enhance my business…especially for the amount of time a service like Twitter requires. I am finally developing ideas on Youtube which is sad because I have been experimenting with it for months. My next listing coming up soon will actually be my first attempt at video marketing through Youtube and other means. It could be interesting but I do believe it is a key to the future of Real Estate marketing.

A slow economy will force innovation and change to all industries. As a Realtor I must stay on top of these changes to survive. People are finding ways to save money and time. People want something new and fresh…and I want to provide that. Those Realtors who embrace innovation in a strategic and methodical way will survive in the next year or so…the others won’t. When the economy picks up again…Real Estate will be something completely different than what it was a year ago. Is your Realtor going to change with the industry?

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This entry was posted on Thursday, June 19th, 2008 at 2:43 pm and is filed under Real Estate Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.