Marc and I were driving north on I-5 back to Portland from a day out of the office when we saw this: On first pass, I dismissed it as a basic attempt at branding. A car wrap? Goes right along with all the terrible headshots, cheesy slogans, bus benches and ads on supermarket carts. But … Continued

It’s not like I lie to myself on purpose. It’s just, as a human, I tend to have some beliefs ingrained in my mind that I don’t question much until a conversation comes along that jars my thinking. A few big themes have swirled around real estate since my first days in the industry 17 … Continued

“Disruption starts with unhappy customers, not technology” – an interesting read from the HBR blog, but the headline kind of says it all. And I think it makes sense, in most cases. For example, Uber and Lyft started in San Francisco, a city where getting a cab had always been a famously awful experience. But … Continued

“I have nothing to write about.” That’s what I said to my partners during our daily standup call this morning. I rarely feel this way. And it doesn’t really make sense given all the exciting things going on in the industry right now. But, it’s funny. I went to the NAR Midyear this week and … Continued

It’s pretty simple: Every website, every page, every ad, every email, every marketing piece, every sales presentation needs a compelling headline. What is the job of that headline? One thing: Get me to read more of your copy, move further into your website, stick around for your entire presentation, etc. And yet… Recently, I was … Continued

Let’s pretend there is a Choose Your Own Adventure book called Compass. There are lots of choices you can make about the plot, and lots of possible endings. What fun. Here are the choices you can make: You decide that spending tons of money on brokerages and agents only ends up penciling if you sell … Continued

We’re at an inflection point in the evolution of the MLS. Regional alliances are being formed. Consolidation is happening. New and hefty players are again calling for a national MLS. Off-market networks are popping up all over the country. New business models are challenging the very idea of cooperation and compensation. All of this raises … Continued

Big brains. Big rounds. Big balance sheets. A tornado of money and ambition building on the plains. It’s producing a strange vibe in the industry — a combination of fatalism, dismissiveness and mortal fear. Some people are down in the root cellar with fresh water and last year’s canning. Some people are upstairs having tea … Continued

A logo is the tip of a strategic iceberg. It’s a solution to a problem or the salient in a push toward a new opportunity. It should reflect sound design principles, of course. It may either meet or redirect the expectations of those who encounter it, depending on the job it has to do. And … Continued