Where Owners Need Help
April 21, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
It’s nearly impossible for a broker/owner to effectively manage all of the industry changes that are occurring at breakneck speed.
After all, the vast majority of brokerage firms lack the resources and expertise to implement things like social networking, total market recruiting, merger and acquisition initiatives, franchise refinement and all of the other actions necessary to remain on the cutting edge of profitability.
e-Partner is the premiere company that has been dedicated to broker/owners success for more than a decade. After all, e-Partner was created by an owner, for owners…and, this statement is more than a trite marketing tag line.
Discover the range of affordable consulting services offered to broker/owners by e-Partner.
Barefoot Owners on the Razor’s Edge
April 6, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
Owners are engaged in the delicate balancing act; walking on the razor’s edge, barefoot.
Slicing into Profit
The razor upon which owners must balance themselves is now slicing so deeply into revenues that profitability is now proving more and more illusive. Today’s Broker/Owners are confronted with an economy that is not rebounding fast enough to enable them to survive.
e-Partner has long held that Broker/Owners are the financial backbone of the real estate industry and that their survival should be one of the top priorities of our industry through 2010.
Our Bleeding Feet
The razor’s edge takes no prisoners and yields no concessions to owners who are struggling to meet their ever increasing general operating expenses. Trapped by the same economic factors faced by other businesses, owners are looking for ways to decrease fixed and personally guaranteed obligations.
e-Partner talks to owners from every brand and those who are independent and the story is generally the same. There are simply too few closing and too much bricks-and-mortar operating expenses. “There is just not enough transaction commission to meet the monthly demands we have,” one broker/owner told us.
Mandatory Agility
Agility, created and sustained, is the first of the Ten Commandments of the New Real Estate Economy.
Although we are not quick on our feet, the razor’s edge is sensitizing us to perils of standing still for too long in one place. Our bloated organization body weight presses down on the sharp stainless steel edge and this slices away large chunks of capital required to sustain retail models.
New principle: the razor’s edge is now an owner’s continuing reality and he/she/all of us will learn to walk on this edge nimbly and quickly or, we will be cut to pieces.
Hungry? Read more and comment…
Real Estate & the Social Media Explosion
April 1, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
Blogs, blogging, commenting, posting, authoring, YouTube, LinkedIn, FaceBook, MySpace and Twitter; What does the social media explosion mean to the real estate industry and its business models?
More than 100,000,000 people use social media each day! More and more real estate agents are joining the social media explosion. Are brokerage models utilizing social media as a means to capturing consumer loyalty and brand recognition?
How does your real estate company engage social media as a component of its business model and how can social media tools create revenue relationships? These are big questions that need to be answered by Broker/Owners who want to develop and maintain relationships with consumers who are increasingly utilizing interactive online media as a communication and business tool.
Listen to Real Estate and the Social Media Explosion podcast by Donald Teel, the Founder of e-Partner.
Need help with your Internet business model. Call e-Partner toll free at 1-877-380-1000 or use our contact form.
Can NAR Save Us?
April 1, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) is without question the dominant national force that holds the real estate industry in place.
NAR provides the industry with a huge lobby influence in Washington, D.C. and a national platform for Realtors® that includes training, support and association leadership.
Is the role of NAR still relevant? Should the mission and contribution NAR makes toward Broker/Owners change. After all, we believe the backbone of the industry is Broker/Owners who take on most of the risk and guarantees in thousands of communities across the U.S.
Check out this e-Partner Podcast entitled Can NAR Save Us?
Need help with your Internet business model. Call e-Partner toll free at 1-877-380-1000 or use our contact form.
Horizontal Recruiting for Cash Flow
April 1, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
Recruiting is always a buzzword and hot topic in the real estate industry and Broker/Owners who understand that the best way to build a successful, profitable and sustainable company is through successful recruiting strategies.
Too much of the time Broker/Owners are recruiting from a crowded pool of candidates in their core market, i.e., where they operate their traditional brokerage company. Horizontal recruiting means targeting “new” markets for “new” from home-based (e-Partner) agents who deliver “new” revenue to the Broker/Owner’s bottom line without the trappings of bricks and mortar.
Listen to this podcast by e-Partner Founder, Donald Teel, as he addresses Horizontal Recruiting for Cash Flow.
Need help with your Internet business model. Call e-Partner toll free at 1-877-380-1000 or use our contact form.
Factor 1 – Agent Centric Cultures
March 24, 2009 by e-Partner · Leave a Comment
The emergence of the new real estate economy has been fueled by the agent-centric cultures created by brokerage firms during the past two decades. In the past the "Broker" provided all of the fundamental tools necessary for an independent contractor to operate his/her business in the local market. The power of the broker/owner enabled a favorable economic relationship that would ensure profitability.
Four events changed this economic model, turning it on its proverbial ear. What was not so predictable was the replacement of the Broker as the controller of the real estate transaction with the modern, tech-savvy, home-officing agent.
The first trend was a real estate information distribution shift and it entailed the move away from the distribution of property information via a printed model (the MLS book) toward the automation of the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) through server-based technology.
This event launched a new era in real estate, one where the Broker would no longer be able to control what real estate property information. The new server-based technology loosened the Broker’s grip on the central controlling factor that empowered them, property information control.
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