Real estate brokers are not a shy bunch, and in local newspapers around Maine, the nation, on buses, billboards where they are allowed by law, you see smiling, jovial agents, REALTORS holding a phone, ready to serve.
Pick me pick me. The smiling pose slid in to the local newspaper and left there for years. Outdated, selling the agent, broker, brand. I always thing, gee, the expense of that ad and only showcasing the real estate practioner over and over, week after week could have had some property tagging along. Sharing the spotlight, some of the fame and attention. Or better yet, less broker, more property or a rotation that shakes it up, gets it noticed, more bang for the buck. More cow bell. Something rotated in and out property wise, or even local event wise that piggy backs on that 52 week Little Jack Horner smile insertion.Maybe it is the image itself that seems unnatural or that all of the images seem to have the same stepford broker, crazed and dazed look to them?
American Idol birds of a feather and do it this way. Only this way. I ran in to one Bangor Maine agent at a REALTORS state convention last year that I did not know and that did not look anything like the image that has been playing, showing in her local newspaper for the last five years. Like a Hollywood actor, actress without the makeup, stage dramatics? Kind of a let down, not what I expected reaction up close and personal.Maybe if the image was seasonally changed like real estate home images are. St Patricks day the broker has an irish hat on, holds a four leaf clover and says "You'll have the luck of the irish too if you can Jimmy Da Broker today at 555-1212." Or a cowboy 20 gallon hat, a rope and byline that "Howdy partner, let Cowboy Jane lasso you a real estate bargain...ride into the office today at 123 Morning Glory Circle".
Did a blog last week about being one of the herd of REALTORS, real estate brokers doing things because everyone else in the pack does it that way. The weekly image when you are not the only one but part of a sea of images loses something in its luster, newness, creativity. The portrait, image just parked there like a road side that weathers, gets dinged, or forgotten because it never changes. Becomes part of the scnery as the newspaper reader scans for new developments, something different to read with his wheaties or grape nut and grapefruit. Do you say "cheese", pick your POSE and lock it in for the world to see reading that local paper? Is your image bigger than the brand, the logo and is it all about the eventual jumping ship and distancing yourself from the agency, brokerage house you list, market, sell local real estate out of? In Maine, it seems debate over the size of the font, its placement on a website for the real estate agent, associate broker is argued, changed or brought in line with and made smaller than the agency's header, billboard, propaganda. Placement on the mls, what to do with "teams" that have websites that give the impression they are the agency on their own and not a satelite operation within the designated real estate broker hierarchy. It's not unique to Maine right?
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