About Grand Traverse County, MI

Energy efficiency is the very best way to create so-called green jobs -- yes, even better than subsidizing solar or wind power -- because it makes the economy more productive in the long run.

Energy efficiency improvement leads to an increase in jobs in a number of ways. First, there are direct jobs from producing, selling and installing energy efficiency measures. Among others these include energy-efficient lamps or appliances, energy management and control systems, or retrofitting buildings to make them more energy-efficient. Second, there are indirect jobs associated with producing intermediate goods such as the materials that go into insulation or the electronic components that go into energy control systems. Third, there are so-called induced jobs when households and businesses lower their utility bills as a result of adopting energy efficiency measures, and then spend the money that is saved on other goods and services in the economy. All of these factors are analyzed in energy efficiency and jobs studies.

Numerous studies have examined the energy, economic, and environmental impacts of a national energy strategy that emphasizes greater energy efficiency. America's Energy Choices, for example, showed that vigorous adoption of cost-effective energy efficiency and renewable energy measures could reduce national energy intensity in 2030 by nearly 50%, dramatically reduce our nation's petroleum dependence, save consumers more than $2 trillion net over the next 40 years, and cut carbon dioxide emissions in 2030 by more then 70%.

However, there are multiple hurdles that stand in the way of an energy efficient economy. First is among third party lines such as the NAHB and USGBC, REALTORS® and EcoBrokers^TM, Builders and Appraisers, Congress and special interest groups. We need national reform where all parties cooperate in a non-partisan effort, putting aside the millions of dollars spent on R&D and branding, to work towards the common goal of an energy efficient economy.

Another particular road block to an energy efficient economy is consumer habits. Americans waste energy for many reasons, all, in a sense, market failures. Owners of apartment buildings have little incentive to make the air-conditioning more efficient if tenants pay the bills. Buyers of new homes neglect to ask about the insulation's R-value, and quite frankly most REALTORS® won't take the time to know the answer. Working class people strapped for cash won't pay extra for more efficient clothes dryers, even if it saves money in the long run. There's a vast lack of knowledge, even in business, about how and where energy is consumed.

Energy improvements, especially in the residential market, come in lots of small gains. So the relative significance of any individual energy efficiency measure to a consumer or a business is small. This results in fragmented statistics that prevent efficiency codes and standards from being adopted. This also allows skeptics an opportunity to discredit the long term gains.

Unfortunately, the whole topic of energy efficiency is terribly complicated and fundamentally boring which is why reporters, if they're being honest, would prefer to write about electric cars or wind turbines or solar panels. This plays into the hands of those that do not have a vested interest in an energy efficient economy. As a buzz is created over the latest and greatest energy technology, the fundamentals that create sustainability are forgone; playing into the hands of the skeptics who fervently point out wind power is overly expense and can never pay for itself.

The rest of the story: well it lays with each individual. Every person has an idea; a reason to be energy efficient or green, and probably just as many reasons not to be. So here is your chance to be heard.

What can we do as a country to ensure we have an energy efficient economy? What steps should we be taking? After reading this blog and the article below, send me you thoughts, ideas and opinions. Tell me what you think is going right or wrong. What steps can we take to ensure a strong sustainable economy?

http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/electricpowernaturalgas/downloads/US_energy_efficiency_full_report.pdf

Architects, Builders, Consultants, Distributors, Energy Auditors, Green Verifiers, LEED AP's, Tradesman, and REALTORS®: You and I are the entrepreneurs of this world, and we must find a way to build / renovate the buildings that people need in a sustainable way. That's the future, and it's upon us. We can not afford to be in competition. We must come together regardless of designation or beliefs to meet the needs of the greater need.

Although there are still some tough times ahead in this tough economy, now is the time for leaders to stand up and effectively innovate, because "true opportunity appears at the market bottom, not at the top." While everyone else is getting conservative and worried and immobile with fear, true leaders will use available tools, find the important opportunities, and build necessary businesses. It's time to rethink everything. Shift your mindset, shift your skills, shift your home -- do whatever it takes to stay healthy and happy. Just as much as the economy has hurt many of us we owe it to ourselves, our families, and our clients to find ways to save money. Find a way to sell the home and not incur a deficiency for you or a client. Find a way to retrain yourself with new knowledge and skills. Find a way to be innovative. Find a way to pay your debts and not incur any more, show your clients how they can do the same. Find a way to educate yourself and your clients. Above all else learn to be nice. Just find a way to shift and adapt when the necessary time comes.

Going forward investments need to produce measurable results with a positive impact on the bank statement. If an investment, such as in a new windows, takes to long to payback or it is hard-to-quantify the benefit, it may not be a priority for the short term future. This is exactly why smart upgrades in terms of efficiencies and energy savings must be a high priority. A penny saved is a penny earned. Plus, some utility companies are willing to work with you and your clients to find cost-effective ways to save money. Why not take them up on that opportunity? If you can spend a hundred dollars today and know you will save a thousand over the year, won't you make that investment? I think you will. You should be helping your clients do the same.

Third-party certifications are only the beginning of where we need to go. Every house / project needs to have an impact label much like the MPG rating on a car; that tells you it's energy efficiency, water efficiency, and provides good air quality; you may even want to add the carbon footprint. You should be able to ascertain its actual performance as of "today". With that information, you will be able to compare it, apples-to-apples, with every other home / project in your neighborhood.

A good example of this scale is the new U.S. Department of Energy's E-Scale as seen below.

Thanks to the EScale, today's home buyers can make energy smart decisions. That is good news for quality driven home builders, firms that work hard to make their homes stand out in the marketplace.

When you see the EScale on a new home, you know that the home builder has taken the time to rate its products using processes supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

Some builders go even further - taking the DOE Builders Challenge. These builders commit to constructing homes that are the best in the nation - homes that rate 70 or lower on the EScale and meet criteria for comfort, quality, health and safety. Look for the "Meets DOE Builders Challenge" banner on the EScale of these high performing homes

A green/energy efficient home offers your client savings that are quantifiable. Lenders, Utility Companies, even the federal government is giving money to anyone who will make sustainable building/renovation/remodeling choices. Our job is to take advantage of the incentives, help your clients do the same and where your clients need a little help, try using this or other social networks to find solutions. You'll feel good about going the extra mile, and your client will be very thankful.

Everyone can benefit, when everyone works together!

Ok, so you are out shopping for insurance for that nice shiny new Ferrari you just bought yourself off that sweet deal from last month (ok... this is a dramatization) and you want to make sure that your investment is in the right hands. You have a choice of two insurance agents in town (it's a small town...What can I say?)

Insurance agent A: You walk in the office and almost scare the poor guy out of the nap he was taking. He moves his feet off the desk, shuffles papers around and sets to writing an insurance proposal. You notice, while he's fumbling with numbers, that his favorite pair of college tennis shoes is peering out from under the front of his desk adorned by frayed fragments of his dirty jeans and it seems that the last time his team baseball shirt saw a washer machine; he was walking past it at the home depot. As he finishes the insurance proposal, he knocks over what's left of his morning coffee, wipes the stains off the document with his hand, wipes his hand on his pants and then gives you the documents for your review. He then excuses himself, muttering something unintelligible as he walks out of the office and says he will be right back.

Insurance agent B: You start to walk into his office and are immediately greeted by a clean cut gentleman wearing a crisp white shirt, blue tie and black Dockers. His black dress shoes look like he spends the majority of his day obsessed with shining them, but from the looks of the neatly hung pictures of current clients & testimonials, you are quite sure he spends his days dedicated to his clients. He invites you to take a seat, asks you a few questions and quickly prints out a professionally prepared document. He then asks you if you would like something to drink and offers to go over your options with you.

Now... take a quick look at your profile picture and see what first impression you are giving to potential clients that are reading your blogs. Are you agent A or B? Does it look like you were fumbling with your phone when the flash suddenly went off? Kids did a drive-by ‘shooting' while you were working in the yard? (Camera shooting that is) You set the camera to delay on the kitchen table and missed the top of your head?

I have actually seen all of the pics that I mention above on profiles here in active rain, and wondered... what are they thinking? Isn't the purpose of a blog to attract more clients? Who in their right mind would entrust their biggest investment to agent A? ... I mean do you really want to project the image of agent A to potential leads?

- RTV Marketing & Team RTV

Visit our Virtual Tour Blog

In this economy of intense competition, it is easy to get stressed out at the thought of learning new techniques to getting real estate listings and virtual tours out in the public eye. But, there is no need to completely abandon traditional marketing strategies. The best advertising and marketing strategy is to diversify your marketing to reach a larger target audience. In order to do this properly, you must use all available means of marketing to draw potential buyers and sellers to one central place; most favorably, your website.

DIVERSIFY: The efforts of the agent or broker can seem like a monumental chore to undertake, but the benefits far outweigh the effort required in the long run. By diversifying your marketing efforts and funneling leads you can ensure that you are not left without steady business. Using a combination of traditional as well as modern advertising and marketing efforts can pay off for the savvy real estate agent.

LOCAL MEDIA: Many agents who use virtual tours also take out ads in the local paper and include the URL to the virtual tour web site. By using traditional media in the local real estate market area, the realtor can drive targeted traffic to the virtual tour web site, which will feature a variety of homes to choose from as well as virtual tours of the properties. Outlets such as news papers, magazines, local trade publications and free discount magazines are excellent methods of advertising the agent's active virtual tour web site to the world. Once visitors arrive at the agent's site, they can choose from various types of homes and locations to view online and view an interactive virtual tour.

MAKE IT EASY TO REACH YOU: Be sure to include SEVERAL means of contact, regardless of advertising medium. After looking at the virtual tour some users might opt to call the realtor directly for a personal showing. So be sure to leave your phone number in an easily accessible and prominent area on your online AND print media advertisement.

DISTRIBUTE FLYERS: Print-out fliers and brochures that advertise your single property website, your business and the online virtual tour. These fliers and signs can be printed and distributed locally.

USE UNIQUE ATTENTION GETTING MARKETING: Using unique marketing tools such as RTV's PanoRider(tm), emailable HitStats(tm), or even just using a professional photographer service for those dramatic night-time shots can help you stand apart from the crowd. Using these marketing tools not only makes your properties stand apart from the rest, but also says incredible things about your marketing strategy to prospective sellers.

TV and RADIO: The local effort to drive traffic to the realtor's site should include any manner of traditional advertising the realtor can afford to incorporate into his or her ongoing advertising and marketing strategy, even radio and television if the prospective URL isn't too difficult to remember.

OPTIMIZE, OPTIMIZE, OPTIMIZE: Once the virtual tour and the supporting web presence have been established and advertised locally, it is important to concentrate on web site marketing and optimization online. Optimizing your website, your blog and even your virtual tours maximizes your overall traffic and potential leads by allowing search engines to properly index your website and listings. RTV offers free SEO, Blogging, Social Networking, Social Back Linking training by way of our Social Ignition Course too all providers of our technology.

SOCIAL NETWORK: Getting the word out about your website and your virtual tours may seem like a daunting task, but if taken step-by-step, will prove to be quite easy. The trick is to get your network set-up and to get yourself into a routine that is easy for you.

Need help setting up your social network? Check out our 12 week workshop as announced in our last RTV Newsletter. Simply log into your TMS and click on the Social Ignition Course to sign up. Free to ALL RTV providers. A Sure-Fire Way to Beat the Economy!

RTV Marketing

Jason LaVanture

http://www.RealTourVision.com

Are you ready to completely dominate the search engines? Would you like to be the #1 ranking virtual tour company or real estate site in your market? If you answered yes to either of those questions then you are ready for the all NEW RTV SOCIAL IGNITION SYSTEM! We have been very busy testing this system out over the past twelve weeks with BlueLaVaMedia and we are now officially ready to release it to any Full Service or In House provider of RTV technology!

Over the last year while Jim Blue has been in and out of several hundred homes here in Northern Michigan, I have been busy working on something truly unique, that is so powerful, and yet incredibly easy to learn. In fact, every time I show someone what I am about to show you they always wonder why they have not been doing it all along.

I must admit that I used to plug my ears anytime someone mentioned Digg, Delicious, Furl, Facebook, Technorati, Backflip, or Twitter to me. But that was before I realized the sheer potential for literally ANYONE...in ANY business...anywhere in the World to maximize their online exposure. So yes, this does mean YOU!

Like you, I used to hear these new buzz phrases and ignore them.

I used to see little symbols like popping up all over the web and, yes, I simply looked the other way. Do you remember when email was the same way? Back when you could still run your business without a website? Times are quickly changing and once again you need to do the same.

Don't worry because once you learn a few of the basics this will be just as easy for you to do as it is to send an email. I promise! If you would like to find out how you can start to leverage the power of social networking and bookmarking I highly encourage you log into your virtual tour manager RIGHT NOW and sign up per the instructions of our July Newsletter. The course is a 12 week course that you will be able to take from the comfort of your home via the web.

The only thing that our program will require of you is a bit of your time and willingness to make some small changes in the way your conduct business online.

Sign up now by logging into your virtual tour management system and find the instructions in our latest E-Newsletter! Once you sign up for our free social networking, blogging, SEO, and back link building course you will receive one email every week for the next 12 weeks. This FREE course is open to all RTV dealers!

If you're an Inner Circle member you can log into our marketing center and download ALL 12 weeks right away and won't have to wait for them. Why would you want all 12 weeks at once? Because you can do just what Jim and Jason over at BlueLaVaMedia did and that's build an opt in email list incredibly fast! Simply let your current prospects and customers know that you now offer a free course that will teach them how to better use social media sites, build up back links to their site, and teach them the basics of blogging. This is working so well that the Traverse Area Association of Realtors has even asked team BlueLaVa to speak in August to a group of agents on the basics of the course.

Not using aweber yet? Well sign up now at http://www.aweber.com and you can drop our ready to go course in and setup a form on your site! This is a tested and very easy weekly course jam packed with SEO tips, social networking tips, and blogging tips. What a great way to be more than just a virtual tour provider or just an average real estate professional in your local market.

Either way know this: You will NEVER have to pay for this material because we have it all right here for you for FREE! To sign up now join the RTV network or if you are an existing provider of our technology simply login and read our latest newsletter for detailed instructions.

Watch this video below and see Social Ignition first hand:



Thanks and good luck out there!
RTV Marketing
http://www.realtourvision.com
Property Marketing That Works!