Inman News has been gracious enough to extend a $450 discount to their New York conference coming up in three weeks. If you have not already purchased your conference pass, you can buy one on this special webpage for $650.
The conference is January 11th-13th, 2012 at the Marriott Marquis Times Square. WAV Group will be arriving on the 10th. They had a schedule change and Brad Inman and other keynotes are speaking on the morning of the first day of the conference. Here are some other sessions I am excited about
Bill Lublin – Whose Brand am I building? – With Franchises, brokers, and agents all communicating on social media with different themes and messages – it breaks the message
The broker summit workshop looks ok, but could be better – tops include operating a virtual office (I am not a big fan of virtual brokers). Celeste Starchild (MOVE) is talking about using property view data to find the sweet spot for pricing a property. Realogy leaders Rick Turley (CB President) and Jamie Goldman (ERA Marketing) are talking about transitioning your brokerage to the cloud. Katie Lance (Inman) and Tassia Bezdeka (C21 Award) are talking about how to make your brokerage social. These are all great topics – but I think brokers face more serious challenges in their business today.
ConnectTech workshop sponsored by Onboard looks really good. It is always great to hear Krisstina Wise of the Good Life Team. I was just with Krisstina and her team in San Diego for the Real Estate Marketing Summit. They are a small company but they do amazing things – like every agent must sell 24 homes a year. Every agent is on the same 50-50 split. Every agent must show up for role call when the company has a meeting. Every agent must go through a boot camp to join the brokerage. They have 100% adoption of all of their technology resources. There is also a session with Trulia, Zillow, and Corelogic talking about sales data (NAR is suspicious by their absence).
The best track on Wednesday afternoon is sponsored by Wolfnet – MLS Solutions group. Brian Boero of 1000Watt is talking about supporting the broker with data access. Rebecca Jensen of UtahReal Estate and Michael Wurzer (FBS Data) will be talking about the ongoing development of data standards (RETS and RESO), which are finally taking hold in our industry thanks to the efforts and investments of many.
I am very excited for Thursday’s General Session with Alex Perriello (Realogy) and Margaret Kelley (RE/MAX) talking on The State of Real Estate. Franchises are struggling to survive profitably – their comments are sure to be sincere). The Broker 3.0 track is sponsored by Marketleader. Looks pretty good for small to mid-sized brokers. Eric Stegemann is leading a pannel on the future of search – should be pretty good. John Lim (Mobile Real Estate ID) and Jamie Wilson (Zip Realty) will be talking mobile too.
The Consumer Insights track looks good too. I am especially looking forward to Upgrading your Consumer IQ, moderated by our own Marilyn Wilson, with panelists John Heithaus (MRIS) and Marc Siden (Onboard). Rusty Weston, Managing Editor, Yahoo! Real Estate will be delivering their real estate consumer research.
For me, Friday’s highlight may be Cary Sylvester, Executive Director of Technology of Keller Williams. They have a lot going on right now. It will be interesting to learn how they are pulling off so many product launches at one time while supporting legacy solutions. Her goal is to build online effectiveness for 70,000 agents. Not an esay task with so many moving parts (she is courageous!)
Let us know if you want to get together for a meeting during the show. Also, RE Technology and friends are having a gathering on Wednesday night – music, snacks, outrageously great band. Its by invitation only because of the location size. If you are going to Inman, let one of us know and we will make every effort to accommodate you.