TECHNOLOGY
By SAM GROBART and EVELYN M. RUSLI
The camera had been a great hardware start-up success, but it lost traction as the smartphone came on the scene.
I never thought I would read this headline in the New York Times. But there it was this week. The unfortunate and gradual death of the ever popular Flip Video Camera because it's obsolete?
The Flip video camera that had been a truly great hardware start-up success, lost huge traction with the consumer as the smart phone came on the scene.
Ouch! All this just as the use of video online surges to unbelievable levels of adoption.
Everything technology seems to come and then as quickly go if it is not eventually integrated and constantly enhanced.
In this case a micro video camera that stayed a micro video camera lost out the a more integrated consumer device – the smart phone.
Too bad the Flip camera wasn't chosen to be the video part of the iPhone.
Too bad the Flip camera wasn't chosen to be the video part of the iPhone.
OK. So why then has the integrated Garmin phone failed as well? You know, the GPS device with a phone added on. That's integration, yes?
Not really.
Garmin's attempt at creating a smart phone is an example of when a sum of the parts is worth less than the whole. Apple and others were capable of creating amazing integrated personal handheld devices that “did the job” and were fully integrated. Like the Flip video camera, the Garmin GPS functionality was not unique enough to be chosen by Apple to power the iPhone and others.
I liken what Garmin tried to do to simply duct taping a phone to a Garmin GPS device. Not so.
I liken what Garmin tried to do to simply duct taping a phone to a Garmin GPS device. Not so.
Integration like this doesn’t really pass the test of the consumer. And that brings me to a similar parallel in real estate. Namely, the real estate transaction.
Why is it that today a real estate transaction looks a lot like a fully disassembled airplane? A bunch of parts that if you can figure out how to assemble them, could become an airplane and might even fly.
More importantly, why is the consumer in most cases left to piece the transaction together?
Somehow we think that the consumer enjoys assembling the transaction on their own while at the same the REALTOR association professes the REALTOR to be the center - the hub - of the transaction.
Where’s the integration? The streamlined experience that is predictable, a reliable process that is a standard that is duplicated in every transaction?
Where’s the integration? The streamlined experience that is predictable, a reliable process that is a standard that is duplicated in every transaction?
For as long as I have been in this business – all 32 years – I have doubted the wisdom of having 1.2 million ways to do deliver the services associated with the real estate transaction. A unique way for each agent in the business.
How can that be good for the consumer?
Most of what we deliver today is one part of the transaction literally “duct taped” to another. And the worst thing is that most of the transaction is organized poorly to avoid consumer frustration and stress.
If we were like the airplane example, the real estate transaction has integrated the engines inside the fuselage, the flight deck in the tail and the landing gear installed most times backwards.
How can that be good for the consumer?
Most of what we deliver today is one part of the transaction literally “duct taped” to another. And the worst thing is that most of the transaction is organized poorly to avoid consumer frustration and stress.
If we were like the airplane example, the real estate transaction has integrated the engines inside the fuselage, the flight deck in the tail and the landing gear installed most times backwards.
My opinion?
The days of sustaining an industry on 1.2 million different ways of delivering disintegrated real estate services are over. The challenge? Figuring this out as an industry before someone else does and offers the integrated services alternative.
It is about the effective management of the data, it is about the relevance of a company and its products in search, it is about having good people, it is about creating a brand that stands for something real and at the center of all this IS the organization of the transactional process.
A basic standardized business process is needed for the integration of services in a transaction in an orderly, logical process - delivered by 1.2 million very personal, each unique and creative customer service experts.
The days of sustaining an industry on 1.2 million different ways of delivering disintegrated real estate services are over. The challenge? Figuring this out as an industry before someone else does and offers the integrated services alternative.
It is about the effective management of the data, it is about the relevance of a company and its products in search, it is about having good people, it is about creating a brand that stands for something real and at the center of all this IS the organization of the transactional process.
A basic standardized business process is needed for the integration of services in a transaction in an orderly, logical process - delivered by 1.2 million very personal, each unique and creative customer service experts.
The only question is who will be the "Smart phone of real estate" to emerge and reengineer the real estate transactional process and order? To create the new standard of delivering services to consumers?
Maybe it's you?
Maybe it's you?
On your mark, get set, remove the duct tape . . . . and integrate.
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