Zero

by Kris Berg

Realtor, Associate Broker

Author website

I suppose I should care more than I do about the failed ransacking acquisition of Active Rain by Move.com. What’s less than zero? (Big-shot math geniuses should desist from an argument involving negative numbers).

From my overly-simplistic corner, this seems not so much like big news, but like more of the same. It is human nature. Carpetbagging capitalism is enjoying a feeding frenzy in the online real estate world right now. Meanwhile, forward thinking agents and their (reluctant) brokers are eagering jumping at every new opportunity to demonstrate their technical prowess in an attempt to stay relevant. We can’t give our stuff away fast enough. For zero.

Unless an Internet venture wants to do the real work, and this applies equally to the brave new start-up and to an established, money-making web giant like Move.com who has their taser set on world domination, they have three choices: Do nothing but charge less and characterize it as something; offer something for nothing which you can someday sell to someone for a fortune so that they can monetize it silly; or, wait for someone else to do the work and then swallow their platform and their intellectual property whole.

For the entrepreneurial, real estate-minded, all angles would have been killer had the Internet explosion not coincided with what is shaping up to be the worst real estate market in a more than a decade. Just how hard our landing will be in historical terms is yet to be seen. The fact remains; the timing sucks. Yet, those with strength and staying power will ultimately prevail.

Had one well-know rebate company made their big push seven years ago, their ranking on the Success-O-Meter might have been more impressive: More impressive than zero. Russell Shaw spoke to this brilliantly. Their target was (is) the consumer, and it seems that it is the consumer who is ultimately being courted by all of the online portals. Sure, the pay-to-play vendors geared toward the agent population, offering business tools, marketing platforms, lead generation and a paralyzing abundance of other opportunities to achieve untold riches (we are told), are out in force. But, their long-term success is dependent on generating consumer eyes, and they too are feeling the effects of unfortunate timing. Their pitches would have been far more compelling had they not picked this market slump to hawk their wares. Agents are starting to recognize that they need to value engineer their web presence today just like they did they print presence yesterday.

For agents, there is no joy in Mudville. The profile of yesterday’s average American family (two and one-half children, two-car garage, two licensed real estate agents) is changing. Otherwise solid, hard-working agents are dropping from the business faster than home prices, while every day forty-seven new opportunities are born for the agent to improve their online presence. Last year, we all took each new toy for at least a test spin. Today, more agents are running out of gas. Where does the savvy agent direct his marketing budget when that budget reaches zero?

Maybe he blogs. The price is right: Zero. I have never participated on Active Rain, but the thousands who do have seemed to enjoy the agent social network there. While I too find value in agent social networking, I have always perceived more value in attempting to connect with the consumer directly, because that is how I make a living. Isn’t this Move.com’s angle? Sure, their revenue is derived from industry advertising, but absent a consumer audience, the advertising dollar will migrate.

So, I must presume that the value in Active Rain is the chum: The agents who provide the content for the voyeuristic or information-hungry consumer. The goal is that the agent fishies, when reintroduced in a new pool, will bring with them their checkbooks and their competitive spirit for points, page rank and recognition. Social networking becomes peer pressure, and peer pressure is viral. Just maybe Move.com realized that, rather than pay the restocking fee, they could actually do the real work, the work of attracting large numbers of agents serving to give tacit endorsement to their business proposition, and accomplish their goal. For zero.

It’s a vicious cycle. The online sites need large consumer audiences to attract the agents and their money. The agents and their listings are needed to attract a large consumer audience. The question is, do you build it or buy it? And, how do you sustain “it” in an environment where the participants’ numbers are waning and their checking accounts depleted? Ultimately, the answer will be in attracting the deep pocket advertising dollars (the brokers) or in successfully harnessing the power of thousands of individuals to find strength in numbers (Active Rain). Active Rain accomplished this, but where they failed was to convert the collective power into cash-flow. In either case, the individual agents are but bit players in the larger money-making game. They were invited to the party so that they would bring the food. So what if they just want me for my onion dip? Everyone’s going to be there!

Don’t get me wrong. Some of my “best friends” are Active Rainers, and I do feel for the Active Rain members who didn’t think through the something for nothing process. Of course, the most prominent participants also, and primarily, maintain their own blogs with their own content. Hurray for them! So many more, however, have only now come to realize that they sold their words, their intellectual property, and their souls. For zero.

This is much like we have all sold our listings to the world, and for the same price, but at enormous cost. We are all in some respect guilty of falling victim to peer pressure and the herd mentality. Individually, we have freely given of our “property” in an our attempts to be progressive, provide better service, gain exposure, or simply not miss out on the party, until our property is no longer in fact our own.

So, I suppose my intended “who cares” message has morphed into another. We should all care. Individually, we can hope to have little influence over the direction of our profession. Collectively, we wield power, as evidenced by the trouble Move.com went through in our pursuit. Unpopular as this next statement will be, this is where NAR comes in. While you may argue that they are mismanaged or misguided or even at times clueless, a collective voice, which NAR is at least in the position to provide, is needed – Our own voice speaking on our own behalf. The problem is that when we operate individually, relinquishing control and simply following the crowd, others will continue to capitalize on the real work that we have done. And we will be left with zero.

(Reprint or retransmission of this blog post is prohibited without the express, written consent of Greg Swann, who retains all ownership and copyrights. In other words, I’m screwed.) 🙂