I don’t know if Hell has actually frozen over. Even though I’ve been told to go to hell many times over the years, I’ve not actually gone there (in the literal sense). So I can’t say I’ve seen it frozen over. But if a year ago someone had told me that I would gladly and joyfully be sharing a stage with Glenn Kelman – and that I would have previously publicly stated that Glenn is not only brilliant but also a really nice guy – I would have said, “you’re nuts.” He won’t want to get on the same stage with me and neither do I. I would have been wrong. Glenn and I will be sharing the stage for our debate at BHB Unchained on May 20th. (None of this it to even imply that I won’t point out why Redfin, the company, is doomed to failure – but Glenn, himself, is destined for greatness.)
A year and a half ago, BHB was famous for bashing Zillow. Pointing out what was wrong with Zillow (and getting huge traffic, as a result). Zillow is now the main sponsor of BHBU. And David Gibbons, from Zillow, has practically become an icon in the area of how to win people over and get them to like you and your company.
But those two items above are just the introduction to what prompted this post. Jay Thompson has a blog called NAR Wisdom. When it was first started it didn’t seem Jay even wanted his name on it. But before long his name was on it and the blog consisted primarily of posts critical of and (rightfully so) mocking NAR. But check this out. I wrote there that I am impressed. I am impressed. And delighted.
East meets West.
Some things may take time but as far as I’m concerned this is the best news about the future of our industry I’ve ever seen. Now if we can emulate David Gibbons’ style (WWDGD?) we can get David Gibbons’ results too.
I’m all in.
Mark Lesswing says:
Communications are important to NAR. We are now engaged on platforms other than our own. Only good things can come of this.
March 7, 2008 — 6:36 am
Greg Swann says:
> Communications are important to NAR.
When will they be taking on my issues?
March 7, 2008 — 7:51 am
Jay Thompson says:
I think the fact the the NAR CEO (Dale Stinton) and NAR CTO (Mark Lesswing) are beginning to post and comment on blogs outside the hallowed halls of Realtor.org is a fabulous thing.
The wheels of any big bureaucracy turn slowly. “Baby steps” for now may lead to positive change in the future.
Thanks for the post Russell!
March 7, 2008 — 10:20 am
Russell Shaw says:
Mark, thank you for reading and thank you for commenting. You are not only welcome, please let me know if there is anything I can do to help you.
Baby steps ARE steps. Life is improved on a gradient.
Greg, in response to your question, I’m just guessing but I think NAR will address and resolve each and every one of Jay’s issues first. Then all of mine. And after all of those are taken care of, they will then look into your issues. For faster service, you may want to send Jay or me an email saying what you want and let us approach them. 🙂
March 7, 2008 — 10:54 am
Sam Chapman says:
Actually, Hell has frozen over. I’ve been to Hell and back – Hell, Michigan, that is and it does get cold there in the winter. I wonder if they gave the town that name just to attract attention and to that they could tell people that Hell literally has frozen over.
March 7, 2008 — 1:57 pm
Louis Cammarosano says:
Russell
In less than a year you will probably be able add HomeGain to the list of entities that once were shunned by BHB devotees and the re.net crowd and are now embraced.
Currently one thing that HomeGain already has in its favor is that unlike Trulia, Zillow and others, we do NOT take realtor information in the form of listings to drive traffic to our site, nor do we then try to charge Realtors to display it. We display no listings on our site.
We act as a marketing company FOR realtors. We serve no ads (other than where we do not have realtor customers)
Realtors are ALWAYS the exclusive show at HomeGain, whether they are featured in connection with our instant homevaluation product (we featured instant homevaluations on HomeGain more than 5 years before Zillow launched)or if we are driving traffic DIRECTLY TO THEIR web sites (our Buyerlink product) or soliciting consumers to find a realtor with our Agent Evaluator product.
We’ve got some stuff in the pipeline too…. ALL designed to help realtors be successful, not our advertisers.
March 8, 2008 — 8:53 pm
Robin says:
Anything NAR does to improve their image is good..albeit much too late in my opinion.
May 19, 2008 — 8:39 pm