DISQUS

Brian, can you give another link to the Bloomberg article. This one is broken. I'd be interested in reading the whole thing.

thx, k.

The top site only has less than 7% market share...means there is lots of room for us little guys specializing in our local markets.

Good ideas, Brad. My personal opinion is that until the inventory of foreclosures and "builder specials" is absorbed by the market, traditional resale sellers are going to continue to have a hard time selling unless their home is spectacular. Everyone seems to want a foreclosure these days, which is code word for "I want a screaming deal!"

And they are getting them - sometimes - but remember, there are other people wanting "screaming deals" too and more often than not in this market we are getting into multiple offer situations with foreclosure homes. Go figure.

The good news, though, is that the buying has begun. Investors and buyers just looking for a deal are starting to snap up these foreclosures, which is the frist step in returning the market to some notion of normalcy.

If you are particularly interested in foreclosures in North Fulton, that is, Alpharetta, Roswell, Johns Creek and Milton, I put together a little search engine to help you find not only Foreclosures, but also Short Sales, which are also know as "pre-foreclosures". Goto http://www.LiveInAlpharetta.com/scripts/testidx.... It's not too pretty yet, but the data is all there.

@Jim Whatley "We need to do a better job with our information then the zillows. You can ether let them market your info better than you or you can market your info better than anyone else."

You hit the nail on the head. Realtors have little pathetic idx solutions that do very basic searching and all look the same from one realtor website the next. The zillows or the world - and to an extent realtor dot com - have created better search solutions because they understand search...brokers don't understand search. Most of them wouldn't even know what to do with the data even if they got it. You're exactly right: we have to build better search solutions than the zillows...yes, little old broker me has to do a better job than zillow with its deep pockets and scores of developers. Pardon me, i've got to get back to developing!

Mark, I added a Resource Box similar to yours at the bottom of each of my blog posts. I hope you don't mind, it is a knock off of your design. I'm not thrilled with the copy, but it is in place and can always be modified going forward.

Thanks for the idea...good one.

got it...actually you gave me an ever better idea. I need to add a "resource box" to the bottom of each post on my blog like you do. I have a little signature now, but yours is better. That is step one for me.

Interesting idea, Stomper Leader. I went to ezinearticles.com to check it out...i don't see this "Resource Box" that you refer to at the bottom of submitted articles.

Am i looking in the right place?

No, i just called Sprint. They charge you 20cents per minute for forwarding calls. This is independent of your service plan. They call it a network usage charge not a billable minutes charge, in which case it would have been covered in your plan.

Once again, foiled by the monster telco companies...shame, i wanted to try out this service.

Hey, you forgot to mention the 500 pound gorilla of open source software: WordPress. Replaces: Gutenberg's Press

I'd be interested in reviewing your ppt from REBar Camp...always looking to learn and pick up a tip or two to add to my business.

Cool...are you going to use video on your tour? Did you have to get permission for the HS to do this? I'm interested in doing this for some North Fulton County schools. It will be interesting to see how this turns out and maybe i can learn a thing or two from your example.

LinkedIn recommendations are nice social proof. If it is at least posted on LinkedIn there is less chance that it was just a forged or coerced recommendation letter. I trying, but should do a better job of having my past and current clients join my linkedin network.

Brad: Thanks for the warm welcome. We are not joining Maxsell and leaving a major national brokerage without giving the decision some serious thought. However, after all the careful analysis - and quite frankly some apprehension about leaving the comfort of a big brand - we decided that the future of real estate is in the hands of those who embrace and understand technology, web 2.0 and real estate 2.0.

Brad certainly "gets it" and we are glad to join forces: 2 + 2 will = 5 in our joint efforts I have no doubt. We look forward to growing the Maxsell presence throughout North Fulton County in Alpharetta, Milton, Johns Creek and Roswell.

Brands definitely have power and help consumers make decisions when they have no other criteria on which to decide. I think the problem with most national real estate brands is that they have done nothing to distinguish themselves from the noise. Century 21 arguably does the most national advertising along with Remax but it is all name recognition marketing not product differentiation marketing.

Consumers are so convinced that there isn't a dime's worth of difference between any of the national brands, that it creates space for boutique brokerages and agents strong enough to articulate a real (service) difference.

don't think i necessarily have a marketing gene, or that i'm even very good at it, but i do think i should be since i believe it is a large part of the business.

Maybe i just have a 'do-i-yourself' inclination or am a control freak or both.

I will say, though, that marketing is one of the more enjoyable aspects of the profession because it is the creative part...i wouldn't want to give that away.

Now bookkeeping, accounting and taxes...i'll gladly outsource. ;->

@ bawldguy I hear you, but i could outsource everything in my life including cooking, cleaning and driving. If i'm a realtor, i could outsource all aspects of my business, and good for the team you reference who does.

But as a realtor and a professional, i think you do have to bring some game. You should have some primary skills including communication, negotiation/sales, and marketing. If you don't want to implement the marketing ideas, at least have them and outsource the implementation.

Sure, you can get away with getting all your marketing knowledge from other idea sources, however, i view marketing as a core competency. If you don't have it you had better have another skill that more than makes up for it.

My $.02

@bawldguy Your analogy of a car driving being able to drive but not needing to know about fuel injection doesn't parallel a realtor being able to function without being able to market.

You MUST market as a realtor even if your only marketing is to put the listing in the MLS. Now that is pretty lame, but actually what most realtors do. You have to "inform the market" somehow, someway. You don't have to know anything about fuel injection to drive a car.

Mark, good job sticking to your guns on this one. Most realtors ARE marketing idiots and wouldn't know a USP if it hit them upside the head. You can call them idiots because you are a marketing guy, it is harder to call your colleagues idiots.

And bawldguy, i'd submit that for the track home that is one of four floorplans, the USP is condition, lot, location in the neighborhood and PRICE. I'd start with those. Maybe there is a better view from the porch, too ;-> but price is definitely a part of the USP and more so in commodity homes.

Happy selling...I mean marketing.