Waking, I touch the lamp next to my bed, illuminating the room. Subtle pulses of colored light begin to dance on the lampshade intermixed with real time images from around the world, as the lamp bases subwoofer reverbs to the sounds of music created and uploaded by the newest online artists while I slept.
Heading to the bathroom, with one touch half of the ‘mirror’ flashes to CNN while the other half of the flatpanel television remains a mirror. I touch my toothbrush holder and Ultraviolet radiation briefly bombards the bristles, sterilizing any unwanted microbes. After brushing, another touch and I rotate the now complete flat panel tv toward the bathtubs edge so I can watch financial reports from the shower.
After a few minutes I am ready to head out, with a host of gadgets in my bag. My daughter is dressed and wearing her GPS enabled tennis shoes The last thing I grab is my universal power adapter so I can charge all of my devices, including my car.
Sound futuristic and far fetched? Actually all of these gadgets already exist, and were displayed this week at the Berlin IFA Electronics show. I will admit that I gave them a few soon to be seen enhancements in my brief narrative.(http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070903/tc_nm/electronics_fair_gadgets_dc)
To say that electronics are inundating our world is understated; in reality the transformation goes deeper than that. Electronics are meshing with and in some cases becoming our world. Hi-Tech is undergoing a familiar revolution as it ‘matures’ from the simply useful to the sublimely ‘necessary.’ Low cost manufacturing of high tech devices has met the connected global network directly in the middle - at you, your clothing, your accessories, your vehicle, your home, your career, and likely your life.
Obviously this is impacting the world of real estate. So what are the practical implications for you and your business?
Someone I once worked with was fond of catchphrases, especially this one: “The future of real estate belongs to agents who embrace technology to improve their service.” Like most proferred truisms, somewhat trite. And not particularly meaningful. Rather, as I was fond of responding, “the future of real estate belongs to whoever sells the most real estate. Period.”
If technology is not your thing, don’t kill yourself or your business trying to integrate it. And don’t let anyone tell you that you have to. You do not have to go ‘hi-tech’ to buy and sell real estate. I often liken technology to a monster, albeit a sesame street monster - if you let it in your door unattended it will devour your resources, lay waste to your home and reprogram your tivo.
Technology should not be adopted for its own sake, but it should also not be rejected as such. In this competitive world, if you are going to pass up a tool, you do need to know what you are passing up.
The question becomes, how to use technology wisely, so that you can get a satisfying return on your technology investment (ROTI). Real Estate in particular is increasingly suffering from a lack of clarity in calculating and maintaining ROTI. Consider this - even free tools have a ROTI to calculate. In this case the investment is your time and effort. When we start paying for services, and passing those costs on, the questions simply multiply.
For instance, does your website return the value that you are putting into it? Are you with the right hosting and data provider? Did you buy the right laptop, the right tablet, the right desktop? Was that guy telling the truth when he told you you had to pay him to dispose of your old computer? Did you need that software, or the other one? Did you want the phone with the network that sounds like an old Soviet Block country, or the one that rhymes with that 80s band?
I am increasingly of the opinion that there is room for a ROTI adviser position within the Real Estate Association service structure. Member Services are not enough, and even technology services fall short… REALTORS are facing more business technology decisions on a daily basis.
Mark has already written to the point that Association services go far beyond ’simply billing.’ The fact is that the traditional REALTOR association has tried, and often struggled, to provide relevant information and technology services. It has not yet really been our charge to do so. That may be changing as well, as staff are increasingly relied on to either evaluate and recommend services, or actually engineer, promote and maintain such services to help member professionals get a decent ROTI.
As you evaluate your ROTI, try to remember that 21st century tools, digital tools have their own particular accounting - their own math so to speak. This has real world implications on what you pay for the services that you receive, and what you charge for the services that you render. This is what I term the Digital Retrun on Investment Dilemna, or DROID.
REALTORS in particular are facing a bad case of ‘DROID’ due to the easement into their business space by young, digital technologies. The ability for the average consumer to quickly gather large amounts of information that was previously only accessible to a real estate professional puts the REALTOR commission structure in plain relief. Consumers are asking in increasing numbers, ‘why do I have to pay the same commission I always did when the landscape has changed so?’
To answer these questions the real estate professional has to look to their own investment, their own service levels. The dilemna that they face is that, at least according to the consumer, the ROI has changed dramatically but the savings or increased services are not being turned around to them. The reality may be quite different, but the perception is really what matters.
So what are you to do? I have no easy answers - at least not today. This first article on the subject is intended to challenge you to look hard at your technology investment, and the return on that investment.
I do have few suggestions to get you started.
Be demanding of service providers - there is a great deal of variety in the quality and cost of services available out there. Establish a simple, real world goal for what you hope to achieve. For example “I want to double the number of quality leads that I receive as a result of my new web presence.” Having a goal that can be quantified is very valuable. Actually measuring performance, of course, requires an additional round of effort and examination.
Consult a professional that has no vested interest in your decision. Once you have done that, take the next step and look at how you are passing this investment on to the consumer, and what you are doing to highlight the fact that YOU have invested to bring them this value.
Finally, be prepared to do it all again as the landscape changes. A technology investment has a life of its own. By keeping an eye on that investment, you can ensure it doesn’t grow into a monster.
Please look for future practicums in this theme, beginning with a detailed look at how to evaluate and improve a websites ROTI through search engine optimization, traffic analysis and lead generation/qualification.