Selling Time as a Competitive Strategy

Clock Wise... As technology increases the velocity of our lives, the hours in our day grow ever precious. Information is arriving so fast that there isn't time to sort through the complexities of the decisions we need to make. The sheer abundance of e-mails and downloads from the web is beginning to overwhelm. A recent essay in Business2.0, by marketing mavens Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, talks about how businesses can leverage this paradox between finite time and unlimited choices on the web as a competitive advantage.

Peppers and Rogers' commentary can readily be applied to the commercial real estate industry. "Time is becoming a critical variable in differentiating value... The new competitive edge for businesses is helping customers manage their time. Consumers will come to regard a handful of companies as their gatekeepers. These gatekeepers will know their customers - values, preferences, interests and goals - and use the knowledge to increase their [market] share."

As a sure-fire business development strategy, focus on selling your ability to be an effective information gatekeeper. Fight the instinct to captivate your clients for as long as possible. Instead, market your efficiency by narrowing their field of choices. All real estate transactions have two costs: the price paid directly for the land or building and the indirect time costs in finding the location, completing the due diligence and closing. It's the total cost to the client that matters, the hard asset purchase price plus the transaction cost. Service providers that deliver the best-combined package of price and speed will flourish.

This universal need for time compression bodes well for several forthcoming transaction management platforms (set to launch in 2001) with significant participation by national brokerage firms: eStaubach (Staubach Company), TenantNet (Julien J. Studley, Inc.) and Zethus (Cushman & Wakefield). NAIDirect.com (NAI) is an early-to-market competitor in this space with its time-saving application, REALTrac Online, a subscription-based secure intranet for facilitating client activities.

--Eileen Circo