Professional One Franchising

At #ICSF (Inman Connect San Francisco), held July 13-15, 2010, Sherry Chris, the CEO of Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate, presented a list of 24 brokerages she termed “Beta Brokerages,” or the next generation of innovative real estate brokerages. Professional One was selected as one of these “next gen” brokerages. Chris stated the following: [...]

At our office meetings (we don’t have “sales” meetings), we use words like “service,” “excellence,” “communication,” “under-promise” and “over-deliver.” We discuss topics like “managing expectations” and “providing value-added service” and “becoming the trusted expert.” We talk about challenges we’ve had with clients and situations…and we share what we’ve learned from those experiences with one another. [...]

Over the course of the 20 years I’ve been in real estate, and in particular in the 14 months I’ve been immersed in Twitter, I’ve heard Realtors say something over and over and over. And every time I hear this thing being said, it’s like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. Really? REALLY? Really… Every [...]

On summer mornings, I used to often be awakened by the zigzagging cadence of the newspaper delivery vehicle coming down my street… *accelerate* *PLOP* *accelerate* *PLOP* *accelerate* *PLOP* I haven’t heard that sound in two years… I used to go the mall a lot. To buy things I don’t need. Now I buy things I [...]

Financial Reality… Many real estate professionals feel caught in a financial vise right now.  We’ve all been there.  Most are there right now. Client Expectations… Your selling clients DEMAND great exposure in order for their listing to stand out in an already-overcrowded market, while you struggle to pay for that exposure with a declining income [...]

Imagine there’s no office It’s easy if you try No empty desks around us We’re all roaming with Wi-Fi Imagine all the Realtors Working a better way Imagine there’s no desk fees It isn’t hard to do Nothing to waste our money And no print ads too Imagine all the Realtors Leveraging technology You may [...]

My favorite book is “Atlas Shrugged.” I don’t know anyone who’s read it and not been impacted by it in some way. In fact, in 2009 the Wall Street Journal featured a story that talked about how eerily prescient this book had been more than 50 years earlier in predicting so many things going on [...]

NOTE | This post was written by Marc Davison of 1000Watt Consulting and published in August of 2005. It was re-published with permission. PREFACE | This post includes many great suggestions and common-sense, “Business 101″ financial recommendations that are still as relevant in April of 2010 as it did when it was originally published nearly [...]

Sometime in September of 2009, before I ever saw or heard of the #RTB hashtag on Twitter, I had a lengthy Twitter exchange with Stefan Swanepoel (@Swanepoel). We were talking about the need for an increase in the level of professionalism in real estate. Here’s my best recollection of the conclusion of our dialogue: Swanepoel: “I [...]