Role of Social Media in Property

[Andrew Waller]

Before social media achieves "business as usual" status there needs to be sufficient momentum in each industry for people to try it out. Too many experienced RE people are failing to engage with these new communication methods - they'll be missing out as conversations go online.

Look at the skeleton staff that the big newspapers now employ compared with the growth of blogs - sad if the broadsheets stop being published - but can anyone stop "progress"?

We hope we have taken a balanced approach in the paper we prepared for the RICS. RE professionals need to be prepared for the good and bad of Social Media - you can't control it so try to understand it.

What do you think? http://bit.ly/4XA0r9

[Duke Long]

I enjoy the no rules approach to SM. Refreshing and conversational are not the first things you think of with Commercial Real Estate. A true response to you post would take thousands of words. I will keep it short and simple.Engage,converse have a personality,show your expertise, put a face on Commercial Real Estate in your market. I'm just a CRE Broker.

[Jean-Claude Goldenstein]

For CREOpoint members who may not know, RICS (The Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors - 100,000+ members in 150 countries), is the largest CRE association in the world. They have again demonstrated their leadership by commissioning this groundbreaking report.

It was written by REMIT Consulting Partners Andrew Waller (2nd from right) and Bob Thompson who also are our very own CREOpoint members. Andrew is like me a former Ernst & Young executive. It was good comparing notes with Andrew and some of his RICS counterparts last month at RICS HQ in London after meeting Max Croft, RICS President.

What do you think of the risks and opportunities this report uncovered? How could we as a community accelerate adoption? Please share your ideas directly in this post so we can build on this groundbreaking report. Now is the time!

By the way Dave Lewand (who took the initiative to lead CREOpoint Twitter Group) asked whether the report can be shared. It's OK as long as you give attribution to RICS/REMIT Consulting and link back to www.creopoint.com/forum/topics/role-of-social-media-in.

Thanks and have a nice Thanksgiving weekend for those of you in North America.

[Jonathan Price]

I'm afraid to say that I am unconvinced by the idea that the RICS shows leadership in the use of social media or much else in property. On the contrary it is partly a result of the RICS's failure to lead that the real estate industry is so backward compared to almost any other industry in both its systems and structures.

[steve felix]

I skimmed through your pdf Andrew and it looks very, very thorough; just the kind of work that I would expect from you guys. As someone who embraced the internet from it's early days I appreciate your thesis and how 'social media' is important in the CRE industry. i noted with interest in our piece that the company i work for uses Facebook in the management of one of it's funds and to interact with tenants. I am also a big believer in collaboration and also used Google Docs instead of Word. I also am a fan of JC Goldenstein and Creopoint but what we're talking about here is behavioral change, one of the most difficult things to accomplish. All that your paper describes will be adopted by the majority in time. Right now the challenge is two things as I see it: the generational issue and the idea (I think it's a fact) that not all that many people in our industry either see value in 'social media' or spend time on it. Real estate is an old-fashioned business. I wrote an article many years ago, B.I. (Before Internet) but not before computers that I didn't think the real estate business would 'ever' be controlled by computers and software programs as they cannot negotiate (at least I don't think they can). But that doesn't mean that the internet cannot provide excellent value-add capabilities in terms of sharing information and, again, collaboration. With the industry having become global, it's more important than ever to use vehicles like Creopoint to share ideas about what is going on in other markets, etc. I just think that it's not a 'push' think but rather a 'pull' thing that will get people through the window and get them to engage more in the types of things suggested in your paper. At the least, I encourage my colleagues to read (or skim) your paper as there is definitely food for thought.

[Andrew Waller]

JC, Steve, thank you for your kind words.
You are right in what you say about adoption. We saw a very similar pattern of behaviour in the dotcom boom (gosh, I feel old, now). We had evangelists... and the rest. Property Companies spent (not "wasted") millions of dollars experimenting with new ideas and then they all went away - well, they became invisible when we all started using them.
This time, the difference is that fewer people are looking at the upside of social media - it is more ephemeral. And, of course, Twitter has polarised popular opinion at the basic level of understanding. I am concerned that to get engagement, we have to emphasise the negative side of SM and then we all become security or insurance salesmen. I have already seen a viral campaign by MessageLabs saying "Reasons why you should ban FaceBook NOW"
First, we have to bridge the gap between the more mature members of the profession and students. Students are not alien beings. They are increasingly clever.
Second, we need to concentrate on the areas that SM can provide some quick wins for our entrepreneurial industry. Marketing isn't going to cut it.
Third, we need to work at it - hopefully it will start to become invisible.
BTW nearly 400 people have looked at the paper in the last few days - that's fantastic. Thanks for CREOpoint's help in this.

[Martin Skinner]

Hi Andrew,

Just a quick post to say great job on the report - very thorough and really great to see some switched on people in the industry taking the lead on the subject.

Stepping up to the plate in what is still quite an institutional sector is not easy - it's not like 'buying IBM' so the perceived risk of being a Social Media convert is still quite daunting.

You've provided a good balanced view and some great suggestions for many to get started.

I've posted a couple of great videos on the subject from Erik Qualman in our blog.

And here are a few words from social media evangelist Seth Godin:

What works for social media:
Earn a reputation. Have a conversation. Ask questions. Describe possible outcomes of a point of view. Make connections. Give the other person the benefit of the doubt. Align objectives then describe a better outcome. Show up. Smile. Be authentic. Be consistent. Lead. Converse. Engage.

Love the CREOpoint site (thanks JC, keep up the good work) and hope to contribute increasingly over time.



:) Martin
Inspired Asset Management

[John Corey]

Building from a point Martin made above, Social Media can be nothing more than a way to amplify one's reputation. A platform where you can share what you know and what you do with more people. SM becomes a way to plant seeds in the minds of others that you are the go-to person when they need something specific.

SM might be a bigger benefit to the individual than it is to a company. Individuals can establish their brand, their market value, independent of the company they are with. This means companies will need to manage a portfolio of talent rather than assume the staff are faceless outside of the office.

Commercial real estate is an old field that recognizes it is who you know that matters. If a person has a high quality rolodex they while will command more attention or a greater value in the market. SM lets a person build their rolodex without some of the friction of the 'old' ways of doing so.

John Corey
Follow me on Twitter-> www.twitter.com/john_corey
www.ChelseaPrivateEquity.com/blog

[Jean-Claude Goldenstein]

Executive Summary of CREOpoint London member meeting 6th January 2010

I. Scene setting

1. 30 minute networking over breakfast by about 20 attendees who braved lots of snow (see list at the end)

2. Welcome by Paul Danks from BNP Paribas Real Estate, host of the meeting:

- Important growing topic: "we innovate or we die"
- Refreshing gathering of CREOpoint members representing a diversity of professions, understanding/use of social media and age
- Looking forward to conversation

3. Thanks, welcome and introduction by JC Goldenstein who founded CREOpoint after heading up NAI Global Solutions where Paul was his UK counterpart

Many attendees had asked why JC founded CREOpoint in spring 08:

- "Commercial property professionals will need to know what’s around the corner and gain access to must have intelligence and best in class networking without wasting their time.
- Marketing, tradeshow and travel budgets will be trimmed, leaving little choice but the internet.
- The best and brightest did not have a safe ‘go to’ online meeting point to share wisdom, find experts in unfamiliar markets and people met at events, best practices, deal flow, regulatory updates, bad loans, what’s underlying deals, market data... Personally tired for email clutter or one-way self promotions.
- Felt it was going to be a proven business tool: companies that use Web 2.0 say they've seen clear benefits, according to a 2007-2009 Mc Kinsey survey of 1,700 executives: “69% said their use of social networks had increased innovation, improved their marketing plans and given them access to new information. - Companies that made the most use tended to see the largest benefits… This expertise is becoming a required skill for all enterprises.”
- Many organizations who don’t want to miss out had tested LinkedIn and FaceBook groups but quickly learn that there is no guarantee of control, user friendliness, traffic, returning quality members, useful and searchable conversation threads, rich media live videos or industry ‘buzz’."


4. Presentation by Andrew Waller of Remit Consulting of part of recent RICS paper, covered different types and purposes of different Social Media sites & applications:

- Humbled by talent who get and use Social Media in the audience
- Social Media more like a conversation rather than the “letter writing” of email
- Use dedicated tools for news, networking, events, blogging, sharing, collaboration tools, crowdsourced content, photos, videos etc (see the wheel 3rd chart of presentation)
- One of many ways of marketing. However, when it works (e.g, an item goes "viral” by being retweeted by trusted aggregators like CREOpoint), it can be far more effective at reaching large numbers of quality people. Example: the RICS paper was downloaded more than 900 times in a few weeks from an initial Tweet to 65 people compared with traditional email/newsletter response rates of 7%.
- Everyone needs to understand Social Media, at a minimum to connect with younger people who don’t use email
- Firms need to set up internal social media policies similar to IBM’s policies http://bit.ly/8AOPdl


II. Continued group discussion


JC asked attendees what they wanted from the meeting and most were interested in 1) more knowledge 2) best B2B practices 3) more adoption in the property industry 4) continued networking within the group and other like minded professionals on CREOpoint

Among others we discussed:

* Generational differences. Younger people will have a big impact as their influence grow in organizations. "As an industry we must adapt or die" (Paul Danks)

* Cultural differences – US uses Twitter, France likes blogs, UK uses texting heavily.

* Sector differences – Commercial lags residential in adoption of new technologies.

* What, where and when is work – changes in perceptions of these are changing the technologies and work practices we use. JC commented that CREOpoint was designed for SmartPhones

* How can businesses harness the power of individual’s “personal brands” which are now being built much earlier in an individual’s career, allowing them to move freely and take their ”brand” with them (Paul Danks). Contact/client lists become something that exists outside the company and is more tied to the individual than ever before (John Corey).

* Importance of credibility of content. People now want opinion from a credible source, not just lots of noise. Expect more curated insights like on CREOpoint and focused platform like the one he just launched www.retailpropertyanalyst.com (Mark Faithfull)

* Role of leadership. The recession has forced some to consider new ways of doing business. It was noted that those who are either older or more established with traditional communication methods are very interested. Example should be provided by people at top of organization to gain credibility as this should be a key part of brand strategy, not delegated to less experienced people.

* Barriers to adoption: confusion, preconceived ideas ("for kids, nonsense"), lack of time due to other activities, failure to understand the ROI (but who challenges the ROI of the phone or email?), fear of reputation risk, IT restrictions, first fax syndrome (which is going away as hundreds of millions of people have adopted these new tools).


III. Next steps in 2010


* Continue this conversation in dedicated CREOpoint forums and in person mid March at or after MIPIM

* Further engage to strengthen early mover advantage ("we should actively contribute to CREOpoint" Paul Danks - "Collaboration is the way forward and CREOpoint helps differentiate between professional and social tools" Stephen Spooner - "This is becoming my office" Bonnie Wong)

* Map out a clear strategy based on your audience, strengths and objectives

* Identify pitfalls and avoid mistakes (e.g., develop social media policy for your business)

* Better understanding of what makes customers and competitors tick thanks to new social media monitoring tools

* Arrange industry-specific training for leaders and staff

* Create accountability and authenticity

* Save time by focusing on the right social media tools (professional Vs social, restrictive invitation/high standard of members, not blocked by IT like increasingly FaceBook, LinkedIn and YouTube are) as well as true influencers by topic

* Share what works or not

* Anticipate less tactical, more strategic industry transformations


IV. Feedback from participants about CREOpoint and the member meeting


- "Great idea"
- "Very good"
- "High standard"
- "Excellent global forum"

Thanks again to Paul Danks of BNP Paribas Real Estate for sponsoring the event and to Melita Thomas and Andrew Waller of REMIT Consulting for their contributions before, during and after the event.

To see what's on your peers' minds or continue the conversation, go to www.creopoint.com/forum/topics/role-of-social-media-in


Attendees:

* Melita Thomas. REMIT Consulting

* Liz Wheeler. BNP Paribas Real Estate

* Bonnie Wong. Composition Advisory

* Miles Harvey. Fitzroy Group

* Mark Faithfull.CNBC

* David Perry. NAI Global

* Jonathan Price. FIABCI

* Martin Skinner. Inspired Assets

* Paul Danks. BNP Paribas Real Estate

* Marc McConnell. BNP Paribas Real Estate

* John Corey. Chelsea Private Equity

* Nick Corey. Georgetown University

* Stephen Spooner. OSCRE

* Andrew Waller. REMIT Consulting

* JC Goldenstein. CREOpoint


JC also enjoyed catching up with Greg Cooke, Chairman BNP Paribas Real Estate U.K. at the beginning of the session

Apologies from people who could not make it due to snow:

* Nick Brown. Ernst & Young

* Carey Dodd. Qube Global Software

* Mike Williams. CDC Intelligent Buildings

* Nigel Wright. Mirland Development Corporation

* Robin Marriott. Private Equity Real Estate (but Robin and JC had a good meeting the next day)

Stay tuned! We'll have other CREOpoint member get together in March in London, Paris and Cannes during Mipim. Please let me know if you are interested participating and/or sponsoring. Meanwhile do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or comments, JC

[Jean-Claude Goldenstein]

Posted with permission from Paul Wilkinson, whose critique is also at http://pwcom.wordpress.com/2010/02/05/the-role-of-social-media-in-c...

"Being unable to attend Monday’s SMW Be2camp event (see post), which I had organised, meant I missed Remit Consulting’s Bob Thompson’s talk about the RICS report, The role of social media in commercial property. However, as well as his presentation (here), he also forwarded me a link to the report and I have finally been able to sit down and read it. As far as I am aware, it is the first time that a UK built environment membership organisation has commissioned a report focused on social media and its relevance to its professionals, and – hurray! – it stresses the need to engage with Web 2.0.

The report describes the Web 2.0 phenomenon and looks at two ways – the Scoble starfish and the Solis/Thomas conversation prism (which I used in my presentation to the SMAEC event on Wednesday) – to classify the different types of applications. Remit then provide a simplified version of the prism – dubbed the ‘coffee cup’ – that puts marketing and sales, plus assets, individuals and companies around the core: transactions. Different forms of content creation are then outlined: blogging, micro-blogging (Twitter), sharing of images, sound (podcasts), knowledge (wikis), RSS feeds and forums; and the report also describes the principles of tagging, crowdsourcing and networking (eg: Facebook, Linkedin).

According to Remit, while the real estate industry has a reputation of being “the last of the late adopters of technology”, because networking has always been an important part of the industry it is “probably better placed than many others when it comes to dealing with social media and Web 2.0″.

How the different platforms might be used for different RICS professional groups is summarised in a diagram (above), along with a commentary (necessarily, probably for reasons of brevity, rather simplistic in places) regarding applications for use in Agency, Professional Services, Building Surveying, Development, Property & Facilities Management, and Marketing scenarios. Some industry-specific examples are quoted (the US-focused Real Estate Wiki in relation to professional services, for example, and Facebook for P&FM), but others could usefully have been mentioned. For example, the P&FM example could have been ResidentsHQ; as well as (Ning-based) CREOPoint, Reorb and the Property Network are UK real-estate industry-specific networks; and there are innovative uses of environmental sensor data by surveyors and premises managers (Pachube).

Thankfully, the report says companies trying to block access to social media “is almost certainly a fruitless strategy”, continuing:

“Social media offers extraordinary opportunities for individuals and small businesses to grow their brand capital. It has never been easier for individual employees to network with their peers, create content online and comment upon anything they find in the virtual world.”

It goes on to add: “Trusting individuals to act as brand ambassadors is exactly what corporate use of social media demands“.

I beg to differ with Remit’s opinion that getting to grips with social media “can present significant barriers, particularly to a small surveying practice.” In my view, small businesses often have much more flexibility than larger corporates when it comes to adopting Web 2.0, and the benefits can mean that a small business punches well above its weight in creating brand awareness, opinion leadership, etc.

Nonetheless, the suggested “where next – first steps” section is sensible in its recommendation of creating an RSS feed and on using a blog to add colour to a website – although the associated diagram about re-use of content may take a while to interpret. I was also irked by the repeated stereotyping of junior personnel as more social media-savvy than senior colleagues (in my experience, younger team members can sometimes be no more clued-in than their managers!).

In summary, I am pleased that professionals characterised as conservative, late adopters of technology are being encouraged to grasp the social media opportunity rather than try to block it. The report’s brevity means it is somewhat simplistic in some of its coverage and it only fleetingly mentions the need for an organisation to develop and enforce social media guidelines on responsible use, but it will be a useful starting point for many real estate organisations. I also reckon most of its findings would apply equally to people in the mainstream architecture, engineering and construction professions.

[Brian L. French]

The global property industry members aren't all that great at free - CRE is a business that charges for knowledge and expects to pay for it - while passing around volumes of free data tables. Can the social media tradition of free exchanges of knowledge hold up?

I think social media will need to provide an economic benefit to its community members, likely in the form of knowledge exchange. I think that a community can have subscription members that connect to unique sources of knowledge and be able to buy knowledge products at a discount. Looking at the sub-sets of big generic social networks, one big area of activity is in posting Qs and As. Another is jobs. Both of these should be strong aspects of a property community.

But community won't happen without someone working in the back rooms and this costs euros and dollars.

I went at this the first time in 1995 - before "it" even existed. I got together with a web-based multimedia interactve databasing company from Atlanta and we began building models for something branded as "Real Intelligence".
Supplementing simple BBS communications platforms with more complex interfaces to databases and RSS-like news feeds we were able to come up with something that commercial real estate people "really needed" (as one CRE Exec said).

The tech and info companies were also keen - they saw it as a knowledge intensive vertical and a natural for them.
Only one out of five commercial realtors, though, had access to a computer then. Likely a fifth of that number had email.
But when we got down to brass tack discussions, there was only 3 ways to monetize the site - micro-fee on item use, subscription and ads. Things haven't greatly changed from that financial model - the difference is that there are likely 10,000 greater orders of magnitude in number of users.

I've got a copyrighted article somewhere on "The Death & Life of Journalism" I'll see if I can find it.

[Jean-Claude Goldenstein]

Interesting Brian. Now with ten years of free information on hundreds of millions of computers and smart phones, there's too much noise. A new service we have developed is data mining to help companies with their market and competitive intelligence.

[Duke Long]

First off ..the conversation is engaging...pondering...Sm is not the street or the real street....data is GOLD...but what is real data? Maybe a little more ...comments to come...