Why your real estate business needs Skype

By Gregg Cohen

If there’s one thing we’ve found after 5 years or so in business, it’s that the willingness to embrace technology – rather than avoid it – has been a key factor that has contributed to our success. And if you’ve ever met me, or any of my teammates here at Real Estate Proven Profits or Progress Home Buyers (our real estate development company), you know that we ARE NOT techies!

Basically, I really like when technology works, and I get really bent-out-of-shape when it doesn’t. I’m talking annoyed, crabby and generally in a bad mood. So what do I do? I don’t put myself in a position where I need to be the one to figure out how to get the technology working. I ask others for help. And guess what? They’re usually pretty excited to show me exactly how to make it work for me.

This allows me to continue to embrace technology and keep my business growing at a fast rate, rather than lagging behind the times.

If you're not using skype in your business, you're crazy!

A good example of this was when our team upgraded our inter-office communication and switched to Skype. We had been using AOL Instant Messenger before, and it was okay, but Skype completely blows it away! Here’s some of the really cool features Skype has:

• instant messenging
• video chat
• calling with one click (just like paging someone in another office)
• share your screen with your teammate
• organize a group conference call
• organize a web meeting (gotomeeting) where everyone can share their screen (and record for later too!)
• send files instantly

All of this is absolutely free. All you have to do is set up your teammates (both in your office and outside your office) with Skype accounts. We’ve only been using Skype a short while and I already can’t remember life before Skype!

Grandpa on Skype!

I’ve been so excited about Skype that I’ve been telling everyone about it. I was just up visiting my grandfather in South Carolina and I got him on Skype too! (better way of keeping in touch with the grandkids). If I can get my grandfather (who just turned 80) on Skype, don’t give me any of your “I hate technology” excuses!

So do your real estate business, or any business you have for that matter, a favor and get your team set up on Skype today…you’ll thank me later!