Don't Miss the (Next) Starting Gun…
Wow. Is it REALLY 2010 already?
I can remember when the clock struck midnight on December 31, 1999 like it was MAYBE four or five years ago.
I am reminded of one of my all-time favorite songs, “Time,” from Pink Floyd, in which the following lyrics appear:
And then one day you find, ten years have got behind you, no one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.
Those lyrics have always resonated heavily with me, because they are so true. Time DOES get behind you. There ARE no “starting guns” or people telling you “NOW is the time you must do THIS.”
And I know it is so cliché, but the ONLY thing that is truly constant in this life is change.
A year ago, I thought my Blackberry was cutting edge. This coming week, I will replace it with a DROID that makes the Blackberry feel like a rotary dial phone.
Less than a year ago, I thought Twitter was a joke. Now, it’s my primary source of business development, and it works so much bigger and better than any other method I’ve ever used that I have no idea how I existed BT (“before Twitter”). I’ve received several national level real estate awards in recognition of what I’ve done in Social Media, and at the start of 2009 I honestly had no idea what Social Media even was.
Less than 11 months ago, Century 21′s largest franchisee in the world- which happens to be based in our home market – filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Less than 5 months ago, local power franchise Coldwell Banker Schweitzer was acquired by much smaller local player Weir Manuel.
Because of the prior two points, the competitive landscape in our market heading into 2010 looks and feels almost NOTHING like it did at the start of 2009.
All that, in one year.
The glaringly obvious point: A LOT can happen inside of a year.
In my humble opinion, the job of selling real estate – or the job of being a real estate broker, for that matter – at the start of this new year looks and feels very, VERY different than it did even a few short years ago.
The impact of the internet just keeps growing.
The collapse of the economy changed everything.
The rise of Social Media is being hailed as the biggest cultural shift since the Industrial Revolution.
Technology keeps growing and morphing and impacting how, why, when and even where we do just about everything in real estate.
And if we look back at how the pace of change just keeps accelerating, and we project that pace forward, it’s safe to assume that 2010 will be just as crazy and dynamic as 2009, and probably more so.
And here’s another cliché, this one from Thomas Alva Edison: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
So, as we bravely enter a new decade, the “elephant in the living room” question for everyone in the real estate industry is this: What are YOU going to do differently from this point forward to stay ahead of – or at least keep pace with – all of the changes in real estate?
The one thing you cannot do is nothing.
That, my friend, would be insane…
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