Do realtors have to justify their existence? OR An ode to lemonade stands

Click here to read a short conversation about how little value buyers/sellers often place in realtors.

I think the problem is that realtors, like all the marketers out there, are dependent on controlled marketing messages. “I want to control what people hear about me.” In an online world —- where blogging, wikis, social applications/networking, etc. are the new norm for conversation —- you’re not going to retain that control. Not for the long term. You can fight it right now… but social reviews and social marketing is actually the future. It just plain is.

So give up the control. In a controlled way.

Invite your best clients —– 50 of them! —- to review you on www.what-customers-say.com. Invite them TODAY, before that guy who bloody HATED you finds the site and leaves you a review that you can’t undo. (You can’t undo it if it’s legitimate; you can only have negative points about your personal self removed from the site.)

Manage your online reputation, realtors. It’s YOUR reputation. And it will be out there for potential clients to see —- if not on our site, then on another site.

The days of sharing information of all sorts —- including info about your realtor —- are here to stay, even in Canada. You’ve depended on the Web to help you sell homes (MLS.ca + your personal sites)… so now depend on the Web to help you get more clients. You can’t just take the good of the Web (again, MLS.ca + your personal sites) and get mad when a little bit of potential negativity shows up.

If you think of www.what-customers-say.com as your lemon, then it’s up to you to make it into your lemonade.