Just this week I attended a "social networking" seminar with four-hundred of my favorite local realtors. It was a company event sponsored by our principal broker, Long & Foster. I'm not sure what was anticipated by the other agents in the room, but I was quite frankly surprised by some of the presentation.
I consider myself to be relatively computer literate. Computer savvy may be pushing it, but I manage myself online fairly well, and I'd venture say, as well or better than a lot of Realtors who do it themselves. I manage & maintain accounts on Facebook, Trulia, Active Rain, Blogger, Zillow, Craigslist, Visual Tour, and a number of personal web pages - wow, that's a lot of stuff now that I think about it!
And that leads me into the next question; if you are a "private contractor" managing a single proprietor real estate sales business, how can you effectively manage your income-producing business AND the endless points of contact recommended for social media networking? This is, not to mention, in addition to all the marketing, meetings and general business management beyond that of the world-wide-web. Oh, did I mention my wife and three children . . .
OK, so I'm being a bit of a baby. I love real estate and all the nuttiness of this business. I can choose to involve my self with the periphery of distractions available to us online, or not. I suppose in the long run, I can continue to run my business the way I have for the last seven years without much change. I do, however, want to be competitive and grow my business; I want to offer my clients all the advantages of buying or selling a home that I possibly can; I want to be better at what I do than the majority of people in my field.
So, how far do we need to go in order to do all of these things? Before you know it, I've begun to expand by hiring enough people to manage all the things I like to do occasionally because I need to be out doing what I do best - selling. Now I'm working not just to support myself but the half dozen or so folks I currently need to run my business.
So now I'm asking myself "Is this really why I got into real estate sales?"
John VanderSyde is an Associate Broker with Virginia Properties, A Long & Foster Company, and is also a Licensed Architect. You can learn more about John and Ann by visiting www.InSydeHomes.com or by calling (804) 282-7300
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