“Is it sufficient that you have learned to drive the car, or shall we look and see what is under the hood? Most people go through life without ever knowing.”
June Singer, Ph.D., Jungian psychoanalyst (1920 – 2004)
What challenges us? What holds us back? What brings out our resolve, our better side, our ability to endure?
There’s a fine line between taking pride in a “do it yourself” attitude and knowing your limitations. Homeownership is one of those areas where it can be a good idea to paint your own kitchen, but a really bad idea to decide to rewire your own house.
While we’re all for calling in the professionals when their time has come, we admit having a bit of a bias for trying to do things ourselves. That’s one of the reasons we feature so many tech tips in Tuesday Tactics. While it’s true, you could hire a web designer and an online marketing firm to handle the ins and outs of marketing a real estate business, we like to think that there’s real value in learning how to get “hands on” with the newest social media, tech, and web tools out there.
Do you consider yourself technophobic? Are you worried that if you try new things online, you’ll end up making a terrible error? It’s a natural attitude to have if you’ve been around for a long time and remember the days when a single keystroke (or let’s admit it, and accidental sigh) could crash your computer, taking with it hours of work. But the truth of the matter is, technology is more robust and forgiving than ever.
If you read Tuesday Tactics, but don’t dive into the tech tips, we urge you to make the move this week. Get under the hood. Register for some free accounts and play with the features. You might find that once the initial unfamiliarity passes that the experimentation is fun– even addictive.
We don’t recommend it simply because we think it’s cool. This is vital for your business. While you might not need to know how to program your own iOS app, the generations of younger buyers coming up will have been raised on technology. They’re used to hacking their own devices, personalizing everything, and expect agents who can keep up with the current forms of digital and social communication.
So which is scarier? Playing with new technology, or the idea of going out of business because clients are moving toward increasingly tech-savvy agents?
I think we all know the answer to that one. If you want to keep playing, go where the game is and get on the field.
Start tinkering now!
