Here’s an example of what happens when we become complacent and fail to adapt to change.

Seth Godin made this prediction quite some time ago, that many service providers, including realtors and financial planners, would go the way of the dodo if they didn’t step up to the plate and give people a better reason to hire them than “that’s just what you do”. That doesn’t fly any more.

When we’re professionals, we are expected to be experts. Expertise means a mastery of your industry, not mastery of the sales process.
Margo and I, while searching for our mountain hideaway two years ago, dismissed many an area that had obviously boiled over (in reference to the oft quoted “hot” market). More than one realtor scoffed at our concern that the price of their listing in the middle of nowhere was completely over the top, and that we felt we were at the top of the market. I’m not joking; they literally laughed at us.

Now, I’m not writing this to jump on a high horse about how we were right and they were wrong; my intent here is to show that we entered the real estate game as buyers; spent less than 12 months researching the market (I say we but it was mainly Margo’s job), and saw somethign the “professionals’ didn’t.

That might have flown in a bubble economy; it wont fly now. If you’re in the service industry, and let’s face it, we all are to some degree or other, you best get your act together. Take the time to look at how to best bring value to your clients. If you focus purely on the sale, you’ll lose the trust of your customers.

Perhaps you already have…
Your move.