Recruiting or Retention of Agents

In a recent meeting I attended of broker owners, there was a questions posed: What’s more important in your business – Recruiting or Retention of agents? There seemed to be an overwhelming lean toward recruiting and it is hard for me to understand why. When we look at operational effectiveness in a brokerage, we look at things like brand, leadership, and culture. Brand is measured by the opinion of agents and customers. Leadership is measured by the popularity of executives among staff, managers, and agents. Culture is the happiness measurement of executives, staff, managers, and agents. The common goal of [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:45-07:00April 30th, 2015|Broker-Agent Information, Main category, Marketing|1 Comment

Broker Public Portal Elects First Board of Managers

Arroyo Grande, CA – April 28th, 2015 – A nationwide group of leading Multiple Listing Services (MLSs) and real estate brokerage firms supporting the creation of a national property search portal have elected their first board of managers. The initiative, known as the Broker Public Portal, was launched in January and includes a cross section of participants from 37 MLSs and 39 real estate brokerages representing the interests of 826,000 agents. WAV Group project consultant, Victor Lund explains that MLSs have long provided regional consumer facing property search websites. In December of 2014, a group of likeminded MLSs and real [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:45-07:00April 29th, 2015|Main category, Press Releases|0 Comments

Major Changes In Real Estate

Behold, changes are taking place in real estate. We are seeing significant efforts like Project Upstream, RPR AMP, Broker Public Portal, Fair Display Guidelines, and RESO mandates that are shaping the future of our industry. It makes you wonder what is driving this explosive cocktail of industry wide initiatives. At the heart of many of these developments are brokers. When they survey the world around them, they rue the existence of poor data management and profit taking by others. Poor Data Management I believe that it was MRIS CEO, David Charron who coined the term Overlapping Market Disorder. He was [...]

Are You International?

Sophisticated real estate companies in metropolitan areas do a lot of international business, or at least aim to do international business. To facilitate international business they belong to networks like Christies, Leading Real Estate Companies of the World, Luxury Real Estate, or international franchise organizations. International is also a significant strategic development initiative for brokerage firms with strong relocation departments. The trigger to securing inbound referrals from abroad is relationship building. If you are not reaching out to international corporations with locations in your area, or taking trips to develop referral relationships with feeder markets, you are not likely to [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:46-07:00April 27th, 2015|Main category, Marketing, Strategic Planning|0 Comments

What should we look for at NAR Midyear?

Real estate’s annual May pilgrimage begins in a couple of weeks. Its formal name is “REALTORS® Legislative Meetings & Trade Expo,” but I’ve never met anyone outside of NAR that doesn’t call it NAR Midyear. Even the url for the location on realtor.org labels it “midyear” (http://www.realtor.org/midyear.nsf). For several days – this year May 11-16 – local associations as well as state and regional associations leadership descend on Washington D.C. It’s a time largely filled with policy meetings, committee confabs and a full-court press for face-to-face meetings with legislative reps. Tucked in the middle of all this is a trade [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:46-07:00April 23rd, 2015|Our Services|1 Comment

Trend MLS Case Study On Excellence

I was at the Swanepoel T3 summit a week ago and battled the misanthropic attitude toward MLS that bubbles up from agents and brokers. My commentary was specific. Not all MLSs are alike. Most MLSs with more than 5000 subscribers are excellent. Some MLSs with more than 10,000 subscribers are constantly improving their service levels to brokers and agents. One of those MLSs is Trend MLS. Case in point – Mobile image uploader Mobile image uploading is no simple task. That is why so few MLSs have this service available today. There are plenty that offer the ability to add [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:46-07:00April 23rd, 2015|Main category, Marketing, Strategic Planning|0 Comments

Coming Soon Listings Revisited

Last summer, the issue of Coming Soon listings hit a peek of interest among the nation’s MLSs. As our industry is naturally prone to do, the issue was well vetted for more than a year thanks in part to the efforts of Mountain View, CA based MLS Listings CEO James Harrison and his Chairman Robert Bailey. It was discussed at every MLS conference and forum and MLSs created a new status to handle Coming Soon listings. Leading MLSs understood the need for this field and brokers learned about the inherent concerns of this listing type. Today, most of the leading [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:46-07:00April 23rd, 2015|Main category, MLS Insights, Our Services|0 Comments

Enabling an Ecosystem of Innovation for Real Estate

The MLS technology model has been relatively flat-footed for some time now. Many MLSs offer one MLS system, one Public Records system and other services like showing appointment software, document management, and they call it a day. In Part IV of his blog series last Thursday, Bob Bemis outlined a vision of a brand new way for MLS platforms to operate. A new program called AMP™ or Advanced Multi-List Platform™ that would leverage RPR is a very interesting and even scary concept to some. In its simplest definition, AMP would be the “back end” of an MLS. It would provide [...]

Size Matters

Bigger is better. At least that's what Apple discovered when it unveiled larger iPhones. The sales numbers stunned everyone: 74.5 million iPhones in the first quarter of release. That’s more than 34,000 phones an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Even Tim Cook was taken aback, telling analysts the “Demand for iPhone was staggering,” adding, “This volume is hard to comprehend.” Every major smartphone vendor has discovered that when it comes to consumer preferences, they are turning to larger screens. The bigger story But what is happening here goes beyond record sales numbers for Apple, Samsung, Google, [...]

Zillow/Trulia Executive to Headline San Diego REALTOR® Expo

Largest REALTOR® Event in San Diego County Explores Industry Changes SAN DIEGO, CA--(Marketwired - April 22, 2015) - With the recent Zillow-Trulia merger and changes to real estate listing syndication in San Diego, what is the future of online real estate search portals? That's the big question to be answered by a panel of real estate marketing heavyweights -- including Zillow/Trulia Vice President Curt Beardsley, WAV Group Consulting Partner Victor Lund, and Move/Realtor.com Vice President Russ Cofano -- at the annual San Diego County REALTOR® Expo & Conference on Friday, April 24. WHAT | The annual San Diego County REALTOR [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:46-07:00April 22nd, 2015|Main category, Marketing, Press Releases|0 Comments

Lone Wolf Scores Investment Capital

It is always welcome news whenever fresh capital comes into the real estate industry. It’s the fuel for innovation. Lone Wolf joins the list of private companies like DocuSign and others that are getting the support from investment capital. WAV Group partners Marilyn Wilson and Victor Lund had a phone interview with Lone Wolf CEO, Lorne Wallace to talk about the strategy of bringing on an investor. “We are in an unusual time in our company’s growth,” says Wallace. Through growing core products like Broker Wolf and strategic acquisitions, Lone Wolf has grown revenue to over $25 Million in sales. [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:47-07:00April 16th, 2015|Main category, Press Releases|0 Comments

RESO Announces Executive Director

Jeremy Crawford joins RESO from MLSListings, where he has been Chief Operating Officer since 2012. He was responsible for all aspects of Enterprise Information Technology, including infrastructure, design, development, implementation, and management for MLSListings, Inc. Crawford has more than 15 years of information technology experience in the real estate, financial services and education sectors. Since 2013, he has served on the Board of Directors of the Real Estate Standards Organization. Crawford also serves on the DocuSign Executive Advisory Council, the Interop Advisory Board, and is the lead for the Council of MLS technology sub-council.  Crawford was awarded San Diego’s Information [...]

By |2018-05-03T21:23:47-07:00April 15th, 2015|Main category, Our Services, Press Releases|0 Comments