We took some time away, but Active Community is back! Having just returned from the Inman Real Estate Connect Conference in San Francisco, our next series will introduce major themes we saw at this year’s event. Below is an overview of the top 5 takeaways from the conference that we will be expanding on in more detail over the next several weeks. So make sure to keep checking back on Friday afternoon’s to find out how to apply these topics to your business.

Looking back on last week’s conference, it was a pleasure to see that our innovations and predictions over the past year have been sought out by others in the industry. Inman was an affirmation to what Active Website has been trying to instill in The Enterprise Network. With our conference last year focusing on creating a customer-centric business model, it was encouraging to see Inman starting to drive home the point that we need to find ways to better meet the demands of today’s consumer.

Which brings us to our top takeaways from Inman this year:

1. Moving towards a customer-centric business model: This was our theme for our Annual Enterprise Network Conference last October. Again it was great to see Inman reiterating the need to increase the focus on our customers. You’ve heard us say this before, but with a user’s experience on our websites playing such a vital role in the success of our companies, it’s important that the needs of our customers come first (a lot more on this next Friday).
2. Email marketing is back: As an industry, many of us have lost touch with email marketing and have disregarded it as an outdated form of communication. However, in today’s fast paced world where we’re constantly being bombarded with campaigns, a well tailored email marketing strategy is still a very effective method for reaching our customers.  It was great to see the people at Inman discussing ways to get back to our digital marketing roots.
3. The release of WordPress 3.0: Speakers at the conference discussed the release of WordPress 3.0 this past June and a variety of cool new enhancements including multi-user integration, plug-ins and how to use your WordPress site for additional SEO value. Always striving to stay ahead of the curve, The Active Enterprise Network, had already made the switch over to this unified enterprise blog system prior to Inman. We have learned a lot utilizing this new platform and would love to share our experience with all of you.
4. Home prices do not appreciate, they stay up with inflation: Another key point made at Inman this year was based on the housing market and our infatuation with price. While not a lot of time was devoted to this topic at the conference, this hit home with us and we feel it’s important to discuss further.
5. Three major areas are moving the industry: We’ve all been watching these trends, but the conference reiterated the importance of mobile, search and social integration (or as we call it, personalization) to build your online brand. No longer can we rely on just our websites to be a main point of contact with our customers. To be successful in our ever-evolving industry, we understand the need for a strong digital presence – including social and mobile sites – in order to increase search ranking. Staying up-to-date on new advancements in the technology world gives The Enterprise Network an edge over the competition and ensures our members’ place as market leaders.

While we gained a lot of valuable information from the conference, it is our goal to expand further on these topics to showcase how we can apply this knowledge to our network and beyond. So again, check back with us next week as we explore our first topic, the importance of a customer-centric business model.

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By Amanda Stephan