I’m moving.  Getting prepared is kind of a pain. Packing means digging through some family history. Last night I took a trip down memory lane.  Memory lane is a place where I advise one to be very cautious.  It’s fraught with detours and lots of baggage you thought you’d rid yourself of years ago.  I did have one or two pleasant surprises in the form of a couple of video tapes from yesteryear. Remember the Beta format?  Thank God, Flying Spot, the video transfer house in our building, remembered.  One of those videos went up on our website this week.  It was more than nostalgia.  It was a wake-up call.  Back in the late 1980s, Puget Sound Energy (then Puget Power) hired Bruce and I to help develop a marketing package to encourage home builders to voluntarily adopt building standards producing above code energy efficiencies.  We came up with the ComfortPlus brand and the video I’ve posted here shows highlights of our completely “over-the-top” promotion, combining a show-street of energy efficient ComfortPlus homes with a “live murder mystery.”  Over 7,000 industry influence leaders attended “Who Dunnit at Eagle Ridge.”  We received top honors for the promotion in that year’s The Nationals competition.  Kudos to our very courageous clients:  Deborah Gohrke and Jerry Lehenbauer for aiding and abetting this madness.  In light of the green movement, global warming, our continuing dependence on foreign oil, perhaps it’s time to be bold again when it comes to getting the green building and sustainable development messages in front of our builders and buyers.

These buttons were showing up all over town following the "Who Dunnit at Eagle Ridge" ppromotion. Usually on waiters and waitresses. There were no baristas back then.

Come June 18^th, the tension in the air in the San Francisco Convention Center will be palpable as the finalists and industry leaders await final word on who will take away this year’s Gold Nugget awards in various categories. The Gold Nugget Awards, established in 1963 and for a long time known as “Best in the West,” have gone international and are now considered by some to be the most prestigious award for architecture and building. In acknowledgement of the growing ties between the U.S. and its neighbors who also touch the Pacific Ocean, the competition now includes major Pacific Rim participants such as Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Singapore and Thailand.

The judging was completed at the end of last week with 375 entries reviewed by a blue ribbon panel. As always, Lisa Parrish of Peter Mayer Productions carefully watched over the proceedings! All finalists are presented with a Merit Award.

Winners in Fusionhappens�� backyard include:

Architect Ross Chapin and Conover Commons, a great example of sustainability, planning and a ‘less is more’ approach to living with their amazing right-sized homes. Conover Commons received Merit awards for Outstanding Neighborhood Site Plan up to 20 Acres, Outstanding Single Family Detached Home – Any size on a Compact Lot under 3,200 Sq. ft., and Sustainable Residential Neighborhood – Detached Home.

Weber Thompson’s Fifteen Twenty-One Second Avenue by Opus NW Development L.L.C.,
 a classy condominium using GREEN quite strongly in its marketing, received two Merit Awards. One for Outstanding Attached Project – High Rise For Sale and the second for Sustainable Residential Neighborhood – Attached Home. This 440 foot tower is aiming for LEED® Silver, and according to their website, has been selling at the rate of one home per week since January.

The full list of finalists is now on posted on the Gold Nugget Awards website, along with information on how to register for the awards luncheon, if you’re headed to SFO for the Pacific Coast Builders Conference.

Social Media in the Workplace

One of the perennial questions for large companies these days is what to do with the emerging Social Media phenomenon. With the advent of Web 2.0, larger IT departments have placed some very strict limitations on the access their employees have to outside Internet sites. Being strong proponent of hiring adults, and then treating them like adults, puts me immediately at odds with that Old Skool line of thinking. (Of course, I disclaim: I have never had to manage an organization that numbered in the many hundreds, if not thousands.)

With that said, let’s get specific. You are running a new home sales team and now have to decide how approach a brand new tool: Social Media. We’re all familiar with the oldest tool, the intake form, registration card, welcome form, or whatever you call that sheet of paper where you try to capture information about your prospective buyer. We ask for a name, and some contact information. Maybe a price range, a number of bedrooms, an ancillary preferred feature or two. Where did they hear about us? Was it the website? Our expensive newspaper ads? But, of course, the only box most of them check is the one about “the signs.” Our next tool is discovery — the process in which we attempt to bond and learn more about the customer so we can professionally direct them to the right home at the right price. Here we want to know about interests, family, commute, favorite recreation activities, etc. Only when we do the discovery process correctly are we best equipped to serve our customer.

Now imagine the value of knowing even more about our prospective clients. Maybe before they visit, or when they return for a second or third look. What if they wrote us a long personal letter, shared who they were friends with, displayed photos of their last vacation and the awesome 10^th Birthday Party for their grandson? I’d venture that a new home sales professional would jump at the chance to glimpse that deeply into the lives of their customers.

What I’ve just described is Facebook! Now add to that the family videos posted on YouTube, the photo albums displayed on Flickr.com and the professional contacts shared on LinkedIn.

When a builder of new homes, a planned community or condominium community enters into a professionally managed Social Media campaign, the doors are opened wide to new kinds of relationships with their best prospects. Because of the public nature of the medium, those relationships extend beyond the prospects to include their best friends, family members and the people to whom they turn for validation. If you’re now thinking that sharing all that personal information is a little creepy, note that Facebook, if it were a country, would be the be the 5^th largest in the world, with 200 million active members who have an average of 120 friends each. One hundred million visit Facebook every day.* Remember that the information users post about themselves is voluntary. They want YOU to know about their lives.

Facebook (and Social Media, in general) can help you get to know your customers. As a two-way conversation, Social Media can help them to get to know you as well.

Now, back to the IT staff which wants to restrict access. My advice: it’s time to embrace Social Media, give employees access and open new doors for your company. Let senior management set some reasonable expectations for representing the company online and in public, then encourage your sales teams to get social. It’s the next step to getting more business.

For a wide angle view of integrating the Internet into the daily flow of business, I suggest reading Groundswell, by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff.

* Source: http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics

Six years ago George Johnson arrived at work to receive his birthday greeting. He's still showing up for work. (If housing market doesn'te get better soon, we'll all be working at 96!

The real estate marketing world is changing at a fiber-optic space. The newest uses of technology invented yesterday are spreading like a viral video of Susan Boyle.

New business models are being designed around Twitter, which itself is only a little over two years old. (I blogged earlier this week on “what” Twitter is.)  Ponder for a moment these life questions: Are you ready to change everything?  Are you mentally and emotionally agile enough to plunge into the Internet age with wild abandon?

If you’re in your 40s, 50s or 60s do you sometimes question your place in the Internet era of marketing and selling new homes?

To find the answer we had to find America’s oldest realtor.

Our Internet maven, Carleigh, lives in a charming Seattle neighborhood called Ballard.  It’s known for its roots in lumber and fishing, both industries attracting a hardy Scandinavian stock from the Old Country, particularly Sweden, Norway and Finland.  I grew up there in the 50s and 60s when a Volvo was known as a Swedish Cadillac.  Our high school yearbook listed many Erics, Ingas, Svens and Torvolds.

It just happened that Carleigh spotted a local Ballard blog article and television feature about George Johnson, 96 years old, and still going strong.  George has been selling homes since 1937 and still shows up at his Ballard office, dapper as ever in a suit and tie. He lays claim to being America’s Oldest Realtor.  Who’s to argue?

George Johnson has a website and an email address.  I do believe therein lies the answer.  It’s not chronological age, it’s mental age and an understanding of the principles of real estate and people — principles that transcend technology.  People want the honest truth.  So if the Internet helps you provide the facts faster and more completely, embrace the technology.  People want prompt, polite, caring human interaction.  If email, instant messaging and text messages make you a better communicator, claim it!  Can a Tweet from you on Twitter about a new listing, or open house reach your following of several hundred local agents — then become a Twit!

I encourage you to read the My Ballard blog article about George, and watch the KING TV interview.  George is a cool guy and an inspiration to all of us!

A world famous reader board on a peek joint about a block from my office, across from the Seattle Art Musem and next door to the brand new Four Seasons hotel and condos.

Most of us love metaphors. They are a tool to help us understand our world better by linking new and complex ideas to something much more familiar to us. When Steve Jobs introduced the Macintosh computer in 1984, his team deftly built the interface around our very familiar desktop, complete with file folders, documents, adding machine keypads and more. It was an idea his team borrowed from the Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center. Now there’s Twitter, still in its infancy and now, according to A.C. Neilson, 7-million users strong, up 1,300% from last February. Twitter is a very limited form of communication, allowing a blog-style message that maxes out at 140 characters. Some “tweets” are as mundane as “Had a great meeting today with al_doyle.  Follow him and learn good marketing” to “KOGI is at NB 5 Fwy at Whittier Bl First 10 peeps get free Echo Park Blackened Quesadilla”. The first “tweet” was obviously from someone who was trying to butter me up, the second “tweet” from KOGI Barbecue, a Los Angeles based Korean Fusion Taco Truck that tweets its location and specials each day and has gained a huge following relying on only Twitter as their marketing medium. How is one supposed to describe or relate to a new medium like Twitter? Short messages displayed for an entire community? My brilliant friend, Kris Hoots, nailed it last week. Kris and her partner, Steve Thomas, run Oneicity, a fast-growing start-up consulting firm helping non-profits raise income. In a recent oneicity.com blog post, she used a stunning metaphor for Twitter!  The Reader Board.  According to Kris “So…while not everyone knows or understands Twitter, most everyone knows about reader boards. You’ve seen them in front of schools, stores, theaters, etc. for years. And essentially, this is what Twitter is. And like a reader board, you have a limited amount of space (characters) to communicate your message. And like a reader board, it’s very public.”

There you have it. Kris said it first, Twitter is the reader board for your community.  Who is your community?  Like a town, city or neighborhood, you decide who you follow on Twitter, and your community decides to see your reader board by choosing to follow you back.

Now, for the sake of all of us, keep those reader boards relevant and interesting!  Keep track of me at www.twitter.com/al_doyle.

Photo from jdbones photo stream on flickr by Steve Keiser  protected by a Creative Commons license.

I have had my worst fears confirmed. There truly is a missing link in the evolution of new home sales. At least in the Seattle market. For my out of town readers, I’m checking up on you as you read this, so don’t get too smug…yet.

New homebuilders spend tens of thousands of dollars on websites, and even more on media ads and internet campaigns in search of those increasingly elusive buyers. One of my worst fears as a provider of marketing advice and services was the thought of how many buyers get lost through the cracks of a well planned marketing campaign? A few weeks ago, I realized I was in the market for new home. After 19 years on Bainbridge Island, it was time to make the move back to the city, perhaps downsize, find a cool neighborhood, explore the options of condo convenience or single-family privacy. Here was my chance to do some first hand research. I had everything a “live one” needed: motivation, a price range, a timeline and questions. Here we go, I thought. I’ll use this opportunity to see who is doing the most outstanding job of following up on leads.

To even the playing field, I established some rules. I would look in the Seattle Times New Homes Saturday two times. First on March 22, and then two weeks later on April 5. I chose the Times because it was the most expensive place a new homebuilder can go to generate live ones…leads that is. We’re talking about ads that cost from about $1,500 to well over $6,500 for single run. That’s how important new leads are. Second rule, I would only respond via the builder or building’s website. I would completely fill out the form, answer all questions, and only initiate the test if the project fit my price range and other criteria. I would then proceed to answer questions, etc. as the bubbly sales agent followed up on this live one. So, on week one, eager to meet some exciting new people and see some wonderful new product I began my quest. I had some great places to choose from and even knew quite a bit about many of them. Here’s who I signed up for more information with: Caymus Townhomes, Veridian Cove, Cooper Creek (Centex), Berrywood (Quadrant), Element, Trace Lofts, Bellevue Tower, Ruby, San Juan Passage, Front 9, Verdeaux, Canal Station, Brix, diModa and Centerra. I would have signed up for a cool project in Columbia City, a neighborhood I love, but the listing agent only offered his phone number, not even an email. I guessed he didn’t want me to call him after midnight, the dope! Two weekends later I added The BelBoy, 5^th and Madison, Polygon at The Point, One Main Street, The Vue, The Parc and Olive 8. If you or your client are represented above, you might want to stop reading right here.

The scorecard:

Eric Jones of Centex. You’re my hero. Centex sent an auto-responder and Eric followed up with several polite emails and phone calls, engaging me in conversation about my needs. The agent for San Juan Passage sent an excellent personal response within hours after my inquiry. Sean from Ruby followed up with an email wanting to know more about what I was looking for. OK, that’s three out of twenty five! The rest of you? Pretty much missing in action.

Williams Marketing rocks in the auto-responder department, every project I inquired about netted me a quick robot reply. One auto-responder even promised me a 24-hour personal follow-up. That was March 26… I’m still waiting. I got few other auto-responder messages, and on more than half—thirteen out of twenty-five—of my inquiries, I received absolutely no acknowledgment or follow-up.

The lessons learned? Before we spend a builders’ hard-earned money on ads, search and outreach, all of us have to sharpen up how our sales teams get the resulting leads and think long and hard about effective follow-up and lead tracking systems. Each lead, in these current market conditions, is costing builders and developers in the high hundreds or even thousands of dollars each. The least we can do, from the marketing and sales side, is make sure someone invests in at the minimum a phone call and a personal email.

If anyone mentioned above has some lame excuses to offer or would like to bust my chops, that’s what the comment box below is for.

We’ve been sending copies of Groundswell to our clients now for about two months. What’s been happening in the new home industry is a large burst of interest in what people are calling “Social Media” or “Networking” sites. Groundswell is such a good starting point for discussions around this topic because Groundswell provides an overview of a change of behavior among the general public from a management perspective. This is not a hands-on tutorial, or a “how to”, or even “Social Media for Morons” title. This book gives us all a quick fly-over of the whole scene from blogging to Twitter to Facebook to Flickr with a good look from a business point of view at why you should care, when you should get involved, and how to allocate your resources to make things happen. The part I like best are the short case histories of real companies facing the questions you and I face every day. Like what do I tell my clients to do with all those Facebook friends?  We have found that reading this book with our clients gives us a common ground from which to move forward.  Right now were starting some exciting new projects (of modest means) using what we call the Core Four of Social Media— Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitter. We’ll keep you posted on the results.

Bruce, Diana and I just had a great time with Dave Porter formerly the Countrywide maven in these parts. He’s on to some very exciting new ventures and we wish him the most success. His passion for Green in all aspects of the New Home industry from lending, to sales, to construction is inspiring. We remember when Dave worked with us on the Puget Sound Energy Built Green Idea Home at Issaquah Highlands. Back then, green was just another color. —Al

On January 21st, I attended The Nationals awards banquet at the International Builders Show in Las Vegas. Since I had the privilege of helping judge this year’s entries, I was very eager to see and meet the people who did the great work. While surrounded in a sea of glitzy cocktail gowns and spiffy suits, I was reminded of what a powerful motivator recognition can be.

Peter Mayer and Lisa Parrish are the producers of The Nationals, PCBC and similar awards competitions and black tie extravaganzas all over the country and are recognition experts. They continue to teach to the fundamentals: recognition may be the most cost-effective form of motivation.

Recognition can be as simple kind word, a sincere note or card, or thoughtful gift. This is one time when you can rely on the old adage: “it’s the thought that counts”. Even the simple phrase “good job” or even more powerful “thank you” can pay huge dividends no matter what the market conditions are. And when market conditions are like they are in the new home industry this year, recognizing the hard work of ALL our team members is more important than ever.

To see some “over the top” Watch Mary DeWalt, Mary DeWalt Design Group, Inc. (nice dress!) introduce Adrienne Albert of The Marketing Directors, Inc. who was named Legend of Residential Marketing as part of The Nationals 2009 Awards Ceremony.

What random acts of recognition have you seen lately?

PS:
This is the inaugural edition of Sq. Ft. the Fusionapartners blog! We’ll be covering topics related to the creation and marketing of new home communities, with an emphasis on stewardship. We encourage you to comment, dissent and elucidate. This is intended to be a two-way conversation.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1071330550325&oid=47126317707

http://www.thenationals.com/