You are never too old to learn new tricks – I am living proof of that!  I have been in the industry long enough to remember when we used carbon paper in our contracts, two-way radio to communicate (before mobile phones) and property photos were developed at the photo shop. My how things have changed.  I sometimes wonder though, why more agents don’t embrace technology faster and use it to get more efficiencies.

I recall when I decided to get a mobile phone.  Not that it was all that mobile.  It was a Telecom Traveler and was fixed in the car, but I guess it was mobile in the sense that the car moved.  “You will go broke!” they said.  “An agent can’t afford to have a mobile phone.”    And then I bought a computer and set it up in the office and took up almost all the desk.  This was just after Expo in 1989, so it was ground-breaking stuff.

Why am I telling you this?  Because that was just over 25 years ago and look at what has changed since then.  We have mobiles, laptops, iPads, digital cameras, internet, email, message bank, social media, ‘virtual’ anything (even people) and software for every function in the business that can be run from anywhere.  It has never been easier to be in the business and produce huge results.

Technology, in all its forms, will help you work smarter if you don’t become a slave to it.  Look for technology tools that will allow you more time to spend getting face to face and more time doing the dollar productive activities.  Then, use them as leverage to get more time not use more time as a distraction. Ask these questions:

• Can it really help me become more productive?
• How will I use it to get me more productive time not use more productive time?
• Do I have to run it or can someone else do it for me?

One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary people.  No machine can do the work of one extraordinary person.