I’ve got some good news for all you technical dinosaurs:
Don’t worry about it!
It’s just not very important to be up-to-speed on all the latest techie stuff, to be a great REALTOR®. In fact, if you’re continually re-inventing your business to accommodate the latest trend, it’s impossible to deliver a compelling and consistent message.
Real Estate is a relationship-based business, and you don’t need technical gadgets to build relationships.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t try your best to keep up with technical tools that can help run your business more efficiently. You should. Just don’t drive yourself crazy, adding technology for the sake of adding technology.
Sometimes, a low-tech solution could work better for you than a high-tech one. For example, I still keep an appointment book. That’s right; an actual book, made out of paper, that you write on, with a pen. ️
I like to be able to open my book and see everything I’ve got going on for the next week, all on a single page. Plus, I find it hilarious when I book an appointment with someone, and it takes me two seconds to write it in my book, and it takes them two minutes fumbling around with their phone. I sit and stare at them and chuckle to myself.
I’m not saying everyone should keep a written appointment book, like me. It has its drawbacks, too; for example, with recurring appointments. But overall, I’m very comfortable with my simple appointment book.
As for my “To-do List,” I do use a technical tool for this, but the name of it should give you a hint at what’s important to me. It’s called ‘Simpleology.’ It’s just a SIMPLE way to keep on top of all kinds of lists and to keep you productive and on-task throughout the day.
One of the best features of Simpleology is the ‘Dream Catcher’ function. This is where you write down whatever idea pops into your head and forget about it. This can be done on the home page, or with the App that works in conjunction with it. Then, you organize that idea the next morning when you go through the ‘Start my Day’ routine.
Before I discovered Simpleology, I used to send an email to myself whenever I thought of an idea. Just do whatever works for you!
I do highly recommend ‘Simpleology’ for REALTORS®, by the way. It’s a super-easy way to keep yourself organized and focused on what you need to get done.
Like I said, go ahead and use technical tools that you are comfortable using. And it doesn’t hurt to push yourself a little bit. For example, if you know you should be using a spreadsheet to organize a list, and you don’t know how, just go to ‘The Google’!
“How do I use Excel?”
I just typed this into ‘The Google’ and one of the top results was this:
“How to use Excel: A Beginner’s Guide to Getting Started.”
I clicked on this, and there’s a complete super-easy course that will tell you EVERYTHING you are likely to EVER need to know about using Excel. For free. You can learn the basics in less than ten minutes. ANYONE can do this.
For anything beyond this basic stuff, if you’re really not comfortable, then hire it out to a professional. You hire professionals all the time, right? For example, you don’t do your own photography, do you?
As I said, Real Estate is a relationship-based business. You should be spending more time establishing solid relationships with people, and less time driving yourself crazy, trying to implement technology that you don’t need.
More on building relationships next week.l
