Summary:  Awesome, with a couple tiny exceptions.  You can stop reading now.  Or not!

 

I’ve been to my fair share of Real Estate Seminars over the years.  Star Power, Brian Buffini, BarCamps, Local MLS events, and State Conventions, so I know a good conference when I see it.  THIS was a good conference.

 

It was the 3^rd RETechSouth (although only my first) and it was first class.  First, the Venue.  The Gwinnett Center in Atlanta (well, Duluth) GA.  Wow – what a facility!  The Hotel was walking distance, and one did not have to stray more then 5 miles for any of the scheduled evening events.  If you’ve ever sat in traffic in the heart of Atlanta, you know why I was happy this was not in the heart of Atlanta!

 

They had networking events set up every night.  Night one featured a Tweetup, and I think over 100 people showed up.  The venue (@ArenaTavern) was great as were the people I met.

 

Night 2 was the MVP party at Wild Bills’ Crown Lounge.  Once again, a great event with Casino Tables, a Karaoke Stage, and pulled pork bar-b-que.  Night 3 was at Dave and Busters.  I can’t comment as I was on the way home as this event got under way.

 

But how about the Conference? 

 

I love conferences with options.  By that I mean you are not stuck in one large auditorium, forced to hear one person drone on for hours.  To me, this felt more like a BarCamp.  Somewhat casual, with several sessions going on at once.  You had choices.  Choices are good. 

 

I can’t comment on every session, and I won’t bore you with details on every session I sat in, but I do want to highlight some of my “light bulb” aka – Wholly Crap, THAT’s Awesome (WCTA) moments throughout the two days.

 

My first WCTA moment was in Gahlord Dewald’s “Social media improvement via web analytics” session.  I had not seen Gahlord speak before and I will go out of my way to see him again.  I love analytics and stats – and he delivered.  He talked about Google Website Optimizer, URL Builder, and my homework assignment for this week, which is figuring out what Gist.com is all about.  If these are foreign to you, look em up!  I know I will.

 

Second WCTA moment was in Jeff Turner’s “Wake up and Smell Your Brand” session.  Jeff comes from a different planet from the rest of us.  They’re smarter then us earthlings, and they see our future. Jeff is a visionary and is usually the first one to lecture about social media topics the rest of us have not thought of yet.  Paraphrased – (Your brand is not what’s on your website, its not your company logo, its not your mission statement.  Your brand is the way people FEEL when they think about your business – it’s the way your business is perceived.  How do people feel when they think about your business?) I’m sure I didn’t nail that exactly, but suffice it to say that Jeff got me thinking.  There was more – much more – you should really try to see Jeff speak for yourself.

 

Next, Brian Copeland and his “Leveraging Yelp to Grow Local Influence and Track ROI” Session.  Brian is a great speaker.  He has a wit and an edge about him that I think he could teach Multi-variable Calculus and make it fun (no offense to any mathematicians out there).  I had not previously dabbled with Yelp, but after seeing what Brian was able to do in his local area with it, I’m getting on board.  Wanna know more, www.Yelp.com

 

I had another WCTA moment in Garron Selliken’s “Empowering Your Agents to Optimize Web 2.0 Tools” session.  He clued me in to something I have been interested in pursuing for a long time, which is an IDX Solution for WordPress Blogs.  I will be definitely taking a closer look at homequestgroup.com

 

DAY 2

 

Home Run Derby – You just had to have been there!  Come next year and see for yourself

 

I had to hear what Jeff Turner had to say about “Transparency is for Amateurs” and he delivered.  Everyone (myself included) preaches transparency in social media.  Jeff (again) took the discussion to the next level and made it crystal clear that too much transparency in social media is NOT a good thing.  He showed example after example of actions taken by “business professionals” that were shooting for “transparency” but delivering inappropriateness.  There were no new revelations here, but Jeff has a way of delivering a point in such a dramatic fashion, he made a room full of professionals really think about their own actions. 

 

I had heard Pat Kitano speak at VREBC, and loved his session, so I wanted to check him out at RETechSouth.  He did not disappoint.  He’s another one of those guys who seems to have a window into the future as to what to implement now.  His session on “Community Engagement using Twitter” showed us how to use Twitter as the curator of breaking news in a hyper local marketplace.  I’ll be checking out http://breakingsfnews.com/ to investigate this further!

 

I went to another session with Brian Copeland to see what he had to say about Real Estate Video.  Even though I do video for a living, it’s always important to see what other people have to say on the topic.  Brian and I have very different approaches to video for real estate, but I still learned a lot.  Brian has a way of connecting with people that can only be described as a gift.  He (literally) had the whole room in tears as he described one of his accidental viral video stories.  He is truly a pro, and I’m guessin’ one hell of a great Realtor.

 

Next, I hung with Ginger Wilcox and Hal Lublin to see “Selling Without the Shamwow”.  Hal is hilarious and delivers the goods in a way that is unrivaled.  Ginger keeps it all on track – together, they are great presenters.  What I got from this session:  Check your sleazy sales pitch at the door, and don’t come walkin into this social media scene wearin your used car sellin leisure suit and snake oil hat. 

 

I capped the whole thing off with Nicole Nicolay’s session on “10 Tips for creating more meaningful Social Interactions”.  I’ve conversed with @nik_nik on twitter before, and she’s one of those (all to rare) social media super stars that has large following, and will still slow down and make time for a newbie.  She delivered in her 10 tips session.

 

So what were the tiny exceptions that I mentioned way up in the beginning of this post book?  The only bad part (and it was very small) was that there are still some speakers that just don’t get this format.  A couple sessions seemed like infomercials where the speaker was only interested in showing off their wares, and the teaching was secondary. 

 

The good thing is that with so many sessions going on, you can bail out of a session that degenerates into a sales pitch.  With this casual format, as long as you are polite, and quiet about it, I don’t see any reason to not get up and go find another session that is more about the education than the pitch.

 

So that’s it.  My experience in a (not so) nutshell.  Hope you liked it!  Special thanks to Brad Nix and his RETSO crew for putting on such a great conference!

 

 

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