As the economy and real estate market becomes ever-so challenging for real estate agents/brokers; finding desirous sellers is of no challenge, but finding committed and ready Buyers is of more importance right now to many RE professionals.

Buyers Who'd Like To...

There are Buyers (especially in my social circle) who want to buy the next dream home as some have the perspective that the "Get'ns Are Good" given drastic price reductions by Sellers. However, (a) what to do with their current home and (b) general unease in the ecomony...creates a Buyer Who'd Like To... where dialogue with such Buyers may consume your time and energies.

Buyers Who Have To...

Given current economic conditions, there are consumers who are relocating given career changes or relocation within their respective companies. These are Buyers Who Have To.

These are "Buyers of Circumstance"...the ones who will do their best to offload and take a loss or rent their current home...who will find 10% down (doing whatever it takes) to go with a conventional and immediate loan for the next home. They are the ones who will make sacrafices because they "must" move and feel they "must" buy. How do you find them?

Get Out There and Network

We see today with Web 2.0, real estate professionals connecting with other real estate professionals across town and across state lines. Good, as you may get "leads" of consumers relocating to your area...but let's expand the efforts.

(a) Major Local Businesses - get a list of whose in your area...

(b) HeadHunter / Placement Firms - get a list of who services your area...

(c) Military, Government Facilities - get a list of whose in your area

(d) Network with HR Professionals - Given (a), (b), (c) expand your social network with those who are in-the-know of those "moving into town". Get relationships established on a first name basis...because they can refer you to these professionals in-need of a new residence in your area.

Sites like LinkedIn can be considered an expansive "yellow pages" of such professionals, finding by keyword search like "Human Resource", by Company search, etc.

We need to expand establishing relationships within this Web 2.0 era to go beyond just those in your field...but connecting those who ride alongside (and are in close contact) with consumers you'd want to know, and conversely, for consumers to be given a personal referral, recommendation about you.

Recently I was in contact with one of our REW candidates, Kim Desroches-Noel, a virtual assistant with the REW technology partner Team Double-Click. I had a chance to catch up with her and ask her how her life as a VA is going (clients, technologies used) and how REW is playing a role.

KIM: "I am still with Team Double-Click and using my [REW] knowledge as I am working for a Real Estate company through them. I am working in LeadTrax CRM and online platforms through Yahoo. Currently I am using IM programs as we work in a team of three per shift and we use the conference functionality to keep in contact throughout the shift. I am now in the process of using RELAY with my new job for online transaction coordination and have a local realtor who has me doing his quarterly newsletters for him."

"Your [REW] certification has been wonderful in increasing my knowledge and allowing me to serve my clients in a more productive way. I have recommended it to many colleagues and I hope they take my suggestion and pursue the certification."

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Thanks for the feedback Kim and best wishes with your continued success!

Recently, discount brokerage, Foxton's, announced it laid off 90% of its work force, essentially signalling it's demise. Inman News' Scott Einbinder wrote an excellent article entitled "After Foxton's, a 'real' real estate story" covering the news, adding an interesting take on the reaction of this brokerage's downfall . To see the original Inman News post, please click here.

The emotional reaction to this event in the real estate community is extremely revealing because it demonstrates an unfortunate trend that has existed in the industry for ages. That is the industry is too often focused internally on itself, rather than on the customers it is supposed to serve. You constantly hear and see Realtors spend untold sums of money splashing their pictures and logos on everything from park benches to refrigerator magnets, but ask a brokerage or an independent realtor how much they have invested in themselves and their education, and more often than not, the answer, is very, very little.

And the reasons for not continuing their education don't always revolve around the expense of it. You often hear "I'm are too busy to educate", or "I don't see the real value in it". Real estate professionals regularly talk about service, and "placing the customer first", but a shockingly small percentage of them actually follow through.

Thankfully with the advent of Web 2.0, and the continuous flow of "need for technology education" articles originating from the most popular real estate news sites has changed this attitude significantly in the last few years, but many professionals still sit on the side line.

Real Estate brokerages, Realtors, and assistants need to realize the value in investing in their skills - the skills and techniques that will help them better serve their customers. In the current real estate landscape, that means utilizing web-based technologies. These technologies were created to make our lives easier, to more successfully serve our customers - so why do we not utilize them?

Benjamin Franklin wrote that the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result". Maybe it's time, as a community, we realize that the same old RE practices are merely producing the same old results. Maybe it's about time we learn some new ones, not only to benefit ourselves, but for the benefit of our customers...

In recent years there has been a big push to learn how to better and more efficiently obtain leads. Volumes of literature have been written and a myriad of software and social techniques invented. After so much effort has been exhausted to generate these leads, eventually folks realized that transforming suspects into prospects is as difficult as finding them, if not more so.

So how DO you get people off the phone and email, and through your door? One thing you must constantly be aware of is your responsiveness to your prospect's requests. Most first time home buyers are Generation Xers, 20s and 30s-somethings brought up by the "www" - a virtually immediate gratification device. There's no more waiting for the morning news, traffic, or weather reports - it's all there when they want it, at the click of a button.

Moreover, in a recent California Association of Realtors (CAR) publication entitled "Internet versus Traditional Buyer Study", 63% of traditional home buyers felt agent responsiveness to be either an "extremely important" or "very important" aspect in selecting the right RE professional. These numbers climb even higher - up to 83% - when polling internet home buyers.

To keep up with what consumers are expecting, agents are going to have to continue to decrease their response time, and mobile technologies is their vehicle. With almost any standard PDA, an agent can use the mobile technologies available to boost his or her availability to nearly 100%. These technologies take you to the next level, from answering phone calls, responding to agent or single property website inquiries, or even browsing the MLS.

Those agents who are successful know a quick response time is part of the complex recipe to winning more listings turning their leads into clients. Have you gone mobile yet?

We had the pleasure of interviewing Roxanne Tidmore, a recent REAL ESTATE WEBOGRAPHER™ (REW™) certificant and Virtual Assistant with EliteREVA, based in Cincinatti, Ohio.

Roxanne is a National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) certified Real Estate Professional Assistant (REPA) and a certified Point2Point Virtual Assistant (VA). She is able to support a number of Real Estate agent and broker activities, such as Lead Generation, New Listings coordination, Marketing, Online Transaction Management, Point2Point services, and much more.

Roxanne has completed the REAL ESTATE WEBOGRAPHER™ (REW™) certification recently and we asked her a few simple interview questions on her thoughts of the program.

1) What is your background?

My background, before I became a Real Estate Assistant, was working as an Executive Assistant for about 20 years. I then decided to research the Virtual Assistant industry. I chose the Real Estate Assistant niche because I have strong administrative skills and I have always had an interest in selling real estate.

2) Why did you undertake the REAL ESTATE WEBOGRAPHER™ (REW™) certification?

I undertook the REW™ certification because I liked the concepts offered and wanted to learn more about them through the training. Prior to hearing about their training, I had not throught of creating a seamless web presence through a series of different software programs and it interested me to see how it all would work together.

Also, I am always looking for outlets to improve my skills as a Real Estate Assistant. Webographers has classes that I could learn from and then immediately apply those skills in my services to real estate agents and brokers.

3) What are your impressions of the online experience

It was great! Big piece for me was the ability to engage and play with various products as well. Simply stated there is no other vessel that allows assistants to engage ZipForm, which is used by hundreds of thousands of Realtors, thus opening the doors to new clients and more hours.

I liked the self-paced learning which made it perfect for my situation. I was able to fit the training into my schedule and still have time to take care of my clients. Also, if you need technical assistance, you can always contact the Webographer support team. They have always been very helpful and courteous and able to solve any technical issues that I encountered.

4) How long did it take you to complete the certification?

The training took about 10 to 12 hours, spread over my spare nights and weekends.

5) What would you tell those who are considering this certification?

Do it! If you do not have real estate experience, it gives you a foundation to build your knowledge about real estate. If you have had previous training, this will definitely add to it. You really can never get enough training!

Also a big help for me was the book that accompanied the training. I would read a chapter and then take the online portion. The lessons really made more sense to me that way - I could see them in action.

REW™ contains techniques and technologies that are another series of valuable services you will be able to offer to real estate agents and brokers.

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Thanks Roxanne and all the Best!

Technology is streamlining operations, transforming neighborhoods into global communities, and enabling real estate agents to go mobile. You can now do things that practitioners could only fantasize about only 10 years ago. Mobile technology, blogging, agent and single-property websites, on-line transactions - these were mere figments of the imaginations of early adopters’ in 1989 and that of the technology speakers that were granted platforms in the 90’s.

Technology is the new segway to building your returning customer base, and customers can be realized learning the technology just as easilly as adopting them. Taking classes will motivate you and provide you with information you can utilize while you learn. Some classes afford you direct networking opportunities in person or grant you access to large online communities while others present PR opportunities that can be leveraged in your marketing efforts. Knowledge with a bonus!

Technology can save you time! Streaming your marketing process provides you with more client-facing opportunities and allows you to foster what is of the utmost importance, your client relationships. Technology enables one to more quickly interpret information and facilitate a transaction, all while providing extraordinary service and care; not only fulfilling requests made but excelling and exceeding them and others only imagined. Digital solutions will assist you in maintaining meaningful contact with past clients for years to come.

Building an ongoing referral network need not be an expensive or time consuming process if you’ve learned which technologies to deploy. With some programs, REW™ for one, you can “try before you buy”. This allows you to work with various technologies to determine whether they meet your needs, without spending your hard-earned money on trials and subscriptions you may not really want.

Many RE practitioners feel the relationships take too much time away from transactions. Utilizing technology can provide smoother transactions, from beginning to the end. This ultimately creates a better client experience and affords you the opportunity to grow client relationships into clients for life. With the stakes rising, so does the cost of customer acquisition - technology will lower that cost.

Pursuit of knowledge and becoming certified also lends itself to credibility. Of course, displaying your certifications proudly, and having the know-how to explain them is definitely important, simply demonstrating to your clients that you have the motivation to achieve for yourself will tell them volumes of what you are willing to do for them. As stated in a recent RIS Article, ”How to become a lifetime Learner” (RISMEDIA, 7/19/2007), becoming “certified” in a particular field or subject area makes you an instant expert. The more classes you take, certifications you garner, knowledge you obtain, the more trust you will engender with potential clients and your fellow Realtors. With technology rapidly changing the RE landscape, Confidence is King, whether you are a new or seasoned agent.

Provide more than your clients expect. Although the technology solutions available may be new to you, your clients may have come across it already while shopping on line. If you are one step ahead, and you can show them what's under the hood, you make a niche for yourself. Provide a complete package as a differentiating factor.

Be able to say with confidence, ”I use these client-facing technologies for each and everyone of my clients…and I exceed their expectations everytime."