I just finished with my post on the overview of my first year with ActiveRain. I received a great comment from my fellow Rainer and friend Jeff Dowler. In my response to him for his great comments about my first year here on ActiveRain, something occurred to me that I hadn't ever written about but that I had intended to. What motivates us to blog in the first place.
Being in the real estate industry and working for a living, it is often commented that most active REALTORS have no life. Meaning of course that many of us are on call 24/7 and we have to have some terrific time management to keep on schedule with our clients and potential clients and budget our time wisely.
When you are an active REALTOR Blogger, you can double that need for real time management. Perhaps more than just time management , we often forgo many needed hours of sleep to remain active with our posting needs and building relationships with our readers.
Underneath all this, there must be some motivation or a particular inspiration that makes us so dedicated. What is it? What is the inspiration that keeps us focused on the goal line of building our online business through our blogging.
As our world evolved through more advanced technology, it was real estate that dragged its feet for years resisting the inevitable. REALTORS for years fought the idea that technology ,at least the using if it, could help them build their real estate business and that things could be way more efficient than they were with just using snail mail for delivery of the communications that were needed. The MLS needed to evolve away from publishing weekly books of listings that by the time you located the house it was already in escrow.
Saul Klein, a long time friend and past president of our local association of REALTORS, was also one of my instructors when I was taking the Real Estate Principles class, back in 1989. I got involved with the association early on and I would listen to Saul tell us that technology was going to become a major part of our real estate life and that we should embrace it and encourage our members to do the same. Then Bill Chee, the then President of NAR, and his famous Lion over the Hill speech, he suggested technology would one day be the driving force of real estate and if we as individuals did not embrace it voluntarily, we would definitely not remain at the center of the transaction but that others leading the technology revolution certainly would. Then history happened.
Well, we all saw the writing on the wall and here we are using e-mail as a main communications vehicle, each of us and our companies have our websites in place, MLS's are online with accessible portals providing consumers the information, many of the essential real estate programs to collate the information is online and we are Blogging to the public in our efforts to remain as the first contact of the new Internet Empowered Consumer.
Is that then our inspiration for blogging? For some I would guess. But for others it is the premise that the consumer wants more specific property information, community information, and an edge to better understand the process involved in acquisition as well as disposal of real property. They want that information and lots of it. If we don't provide it , someone else will.
Here we are in 2008 and we write. Everyday we write our posts and look for ways to connect with the consumers with viable information, all the while building real relationships over time with our peers around the country. We write about real estate, mortgages, technology, our communities and some of us even go out to the fringes and write about religion and politics.
We write whatever will provide a connection to the consumers and clearly state that we want to be their first contact when deciding that they will either buy, sell or invest in real property. So it seems our inspiration is simple. It is called survival. We either do it or go the way of the travel industry. Some would say dinosaurs but I think that is stupid. We all know they just ate each other's flesh and the last one remaining died of old age. I hope that doesn't happen to us.
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44 Comments on What is the Inspiration that Motivates Us to be a REALTOR Blogger ?
Hi Kat, That is likely true for many. It does seem that each of us had something or some reason that motivated us. I certainly can appreciate that defining belief. I appreciate so much your willingness to share it. All the best as the market changes and business in on the increase. When we don't see you , we will know where you are, listing and selling homes. All the best!
Hello Lola-Audu, Thanks for stopping by Lola. I think you are right, that we are all surprised at how much we have to say. But it sure has been great info for all of us and the consumers as well. The friendships and the long term payoffs are the long term benefits that just keep giving and giving. So , we would all agree it has been a pretty good use of our time.
You honor me Sally and you also inspire me to always try my best. Look at the standards that you and others have set. Inside of me, at the gut level, I feel like I am improving. Somehow the right words just come into my brain and when I put them down, it seems to be OK and I send it out there. In some respect when it comes to what we all know most about ,those thoughts seem to flow pretty OK. But when it comes to inspiration and things of the heart, the words spill out faster than I can even write them. I wonder what that is telling me?
Hello Again Kat, Love the return visits, lol. You are so right about the friendship but also missing being out there in the field generating business. There is always fear associated with any career when everything we do has to be generated by us. No one standing by to bring on the business, it usually all happens when we make it happen. Blogging helps to build that reserve for the future, that we are indeed touching the minds of the consumers that we are found by.
Hello Daniel, How right you are. we all have lots to learn and the information is here for us just because we belong. In my life I have never had more people help me to learn and allow me to share what I know at the same time. I have learned my lessons best by teaching. That comes from internal passion and a love of what one does. Thank you for coming by and enhancing this post with your thoughts on the subject and welcome to the worlds best social and learning network.
Hello NRC, Thanks for dropping by and BTW, Welcome to Active Rain. That would be a great study. I suppose someone has thought of it and we will be reading it one day. Perhaps you? How about it? You seem to have the insight to attack such a challenge. Thank you again for being here and supporting this post and hopefully others as I bring them forward. PS, you should add you name in here somewhere in your profile. I hate calling you your comapny intials,lol
Sincerely,
William
Hi Cathy and Gary, Thank you so much for dropping by and adding your great comments. Most of us when we started also wondered about that. Since we are all given the same amount of time in life, then it actually comes down to how we choose to use, to spend, to invest or even leverage that time. I see you are newer to ActiveRain, Welcome By the Way, and as you do spend more time here learning from all the resources and sharing your insight in the business and what your local community and markets are like, you will see that the time here is more an investment than just using available time. It will become a focus and like a laser you will beam in and out at will and probably very often. Welcome to the Blogging world , once you are bitten, it only gets more fantastic!
Hi Lane, You know Lane, that hadn't occurred to me when I am writing posts. But I think you nailed it! That comment contains an incredible and truthful side benefit as we research our materials and the knowledge we gain from personally. An Amazing insight here Lane and Many Thanks for sharing it here.
Blogging... it snuck up on me. It has charmed me; not only the writing, but the lessons evident in so many blogs that I follow (like your blogs). Still being fairly new, I work every day to improve, and am convinced that blogging (and Twitter) provide more 'local' news for potential clients and visitors, and can be faster than the TV newscasts. Blogging is changing the 'news' world. The best is yet to come.
William,
I just like to blog to all venues...as you know my blogs are a mixed bag...listings..social and of course my main goal is for business...I also can be one sick mother!
William--If it were simply for business, every agent would be blogging. There must be some underlying need of bloggers to educate and assist others on a topic. A need to share information and connect with others. Blogging has allowed me to have more business but also make amazing connections with others in the real estate industry that I would have never met.
Hello Bob and Caroline- you are so welcome! And thank you so much for your comments.
Hi Suzie- the best is yet to come Suzie, and I suppose you and I will play a major role in bringing that about. Thanks for dropping by.
Hi Netta- you are so right about that- getting the point across to our consumers, does require diligence, doesn't it
Hi Neal- Your "mixed bag" is an excellent balance. Thanks for dropping by.
Hi Teri- great point Teri - The connections are a really essential part of all of this- the business , as I hear it, is often slow coming. In the interim, the relationship building also pays huge dividends.
Hello Terri -thank you for the compliment. Keeping with technology is one of the great advantages and along with referrals are both an excellent reasons. You are right about the info-It is endless.
Hi Joan- it's always wonderful to have you drop by. Kudos right back at ya, for all your excellent posts as well.
We're all unique individuals and some of us like to show off.
William, it's almost hard to believe that you wrote this in 2008. What you said still applies today - just add a few more types of social media into the mix.
I still find myself forgoing some sleep to make the time to blog and comment.
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