From The Kitchen Table To The Oval Office.

Yesterday, President Obama sat down with Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff.

I mean, WHOA, right?

Now, I'm not going to get into any political discourse or spout any opinions left, right, blue, red, purple, green or otherwise, because this is most certainly not the forum for it.

What I *DO* want to talk about is the sea change in real estate that yesterday's event signifies. First off, the fact that the President was there (following his speech on housing reford in Arizona the day before) is just HUGE.

First of all, it's HUGE in that it shows the White House is actually listening to the concerns of consumers. They mightn't be able to fix everything as quickly as we'd like, but they're actively listening. Like I said, HUGE.

Second, the WAY in which the conversation went down was HUGE. Questions could be submitted by consumers via social media ONLY. Using the hashtag #AskObamaHousing, consumers could submit questions on Twitter, through Zillow's Facebook page, or along with videos uploaded to YouTube, Instagram or Vine. What this signifies for how business is getting done these days is not just huge, but SUPER huge.

It's this part that interested me the most, really. 

That the conversation took place in the way that it did was the strongest indicator I in as long as I can remember of where consumers really are right now. It ISN'T in the newspaper. It ISN'T on the phone. It ISN'T on notecards in their mailboxes. It's online and on mobile technology. And the fact that the meeting took place at Zillow, a non-traditional RE portal, shows that people are thinking outside the so-called box; they're turning to places they haven't in the past, because they are looking for new & innovative ways of getting things done.

That brings me to another thing.

If consumers are turning away from traditional marketing methods, turning away from traditional real estate stalwarts, doesn't it stand to reason that they're not going to respond to traditional marketing tactics either?

I'm betting they're not.

That's kind of the basis on which Happy Grasshopper was founded. We took email (which is certainly nothing new) and began to use it in a way that most people hadn't considered. We started using it to build RELATIONSHIPS rather than trying to make sales all the time. We started to think about it in a way that would appeal to CONSUMERS, rather than talking about how great the sender was all the time.

The times, they most certainly are a-changing. Happy Grasshopper can help you change right along with them and, in doing so, keep you where you want consumers to be: talking to YOU.