As much as we Realtors, the NAR and Realtor.com try to deny it, ignore it, or close our laptops to it; like it or not; Real Estate 2.0 is here, and here to stay. The Internet Genie is out of the bottle. The Real Estate World has changed forever.
Real Estate 1.0 is dead! Long Live Real Estate 2.0!
As Google led the world into Web 2.0; Real Estate now needs a leader to take us into Real Estate 2.0. Microsoft missed their chance to buy Google until it was too late for Microsoft; but not for us. Google didn't make the same mistake with Video Search and bought YouTube. Will the NAR, Move Inc. and Realtor.com make the same mistake for Real Estate?
As a Realtor, I wish more of my NAR dues would go toward the transition to Real Estate 2.0. But the NAR, with a Real Estate 1.0 closed mindset, is too busy "protecting" our data by hiding it on the Invisible Web. Why fight the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and Zillow and the other Search Engines? If we're not first-to-market with the best Real Estate Search, we're doomed to be a Google and Zillow wannabe.
Can a Real Estate 1.0, closed minded approach with hidden data, eventually beat the Web 2.0 credo and Google's stated vision: "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful"? In Web 2.0 and Real Estate 2.0, a closed mindset can't compete. "Closed" and "Open" aren't even in the same game.
For Real Estate 2.0: "Open" Is The New "Closed".
Just as there is one first-to-market with software (Microsoft) and one first-to-market with keyword relevant search (Google); there will be one first-to-market with Real Estate Search. That first-to-market will be Google-Like Search for Real Estate. Will this Search be from the NAR, Realtor.com, Google or Zillow?
Surprisingly, Google doesn't even have Google-Like Search for Real Estate. Zillow is the only company using Google's Business Model: Free Content > Drive Traffic > Sell Ads in the Real Estate Space. Will Google buy Zillow's traffic like it bought YouTube's?
The Mantra of Real Estate 1.0 was "Location, Location, Location". While Real Estate 2.0's is "Traffic, Traffic, Traffic". Real Estate 1.0 is all-about-the-house. With apologies to Lance Armstrong, In Real Estate 2.0 "It's Not About The House". it's about The Relationship, The Internet Relationship.
Defending our data with NAR buggy whips just doesn't cut it anymore. The buggy whip of Real Estate 2.0 is the Google-Like Search buggy whip. It can drive and stampede the teams and herds of tech savvy buyers and sellers to our lead corrals and stables.
If you're not there, at the home buyers or sellers first thought and first action toward buying or selling a house, the likely-hood is low you'll be there when they sign the "Exclusive-Right-To-Sell" contract. The first action of over 75% of today's home buyers and sellers is on the Internet, either searching for a home or searching for a home's value. In Real Estate 2.0 the most important Real Estate is at the Top-Of-The-Mind of home buyers and sellers.
If Realtor.com doesn't stop reading from the NAR Playbook and start taking pages from the Google Playbook, we'll concede Real Estate 2.0 to the Search Engines.
If Google, Zillow or some other Search Engine has the biggest, best, cheapest, and most User-Friendly Real Estate Search, why will Realtors stay with the NAR? For the Conventions?
If Agents can get the biggest, best, cheapest, and most User-Friendly Real Estate Search, why will Realtors stay with big Brokerages? For the free coffee?
Happy Searching.
WebHomeUSAblog; The Blog of Real Estate Search Marketing
Techno Realtors will be comfortable making the transition to web 2.0 and are already doing so by participating in this exciting business opportunity. I really think that all the big boys, NAR & brokerages (the real middleman) are feeling the pressure that their business is being taken away from them! Guess What? - It is, because they don't get it! Last week, Keller Williams is requiring all agents to enter in their website our own listings and then they have to approve them! Their software does not work and why don't they just write a feed and get from the MLS?
They say that you will have control of your listings and they will be international???
What a bunch of bull! That is the mentality of the big boys and they will not go down easy, I believe they will make it harder for everyone...most of the brand name brokerages searches don't do anything like Trulia or Zillow.
P.S. I'm getting my brokerage license.
Posted by: Terry Smith | November 27, 2006 at 02:34 PM