Lake Martin Voice and John Coley were honored recently by two of the nation’s top real estate blogs.

RETechVideo

RETechVideo.com is a site focused on giving you real estate news in a video format. Their topics include news, insider tips, success stories, and more, gleaned from the top agents, mortgage folks, and industry thought leaders from around the nation.  RETechVideo is associated with RETechSouth, which is (hands down) my favorite real estate conference. Dean Ouellette is the driving force behind RETechVideo. Dean is well known nationally and respected in the real estate industry as an innovative agent and real estate tech trend spotter.

Needless to say, I was very surprised and honored when Dean asked to interview me about my niche marketing efforts here at Lake Martin. He was very complimentary, which I thought was pretty funny because (as I told him) I get a lot of my ideas from him and the agents he interviews.  I don’t think I said anything really ground breaking,  but it is very nice to reflect upon the fact that by using available, mostly free (Facebook, YouTube, Twitter) technologies, that we in small markets like Lake Martin can help people just as effectively as large cities like Phoenix or San Francisco. Here’s the embed of the interview:

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/17251026[/vimeo]

Please go to Dean’s site to see more of his interviews, or follow him here on Twitter.

If you are a homeowner that is trying to sell your Lake Martin home FSBO, you will get a lot of great ideas from his site. I don’t even pretend to be an expert, merely a student. So thanks again to Dean for allowing a padawan like me to be broadcast to such a large audience.

MacSavvyAgent.com

Another surprise to me was that Chris Smith of MacSavvyAgent printed a blog post and video of mine as a guest post on MacSavvyAgent.com.  MacSavvyAgent is rapidly becoming one of the hottest real estate blogs out there, mainly because it’s a new venture by Chris.  Chris also produces TechSavvyAgent – which is such an industry force that he was recently recognized as a winner of Inman News’ Top 100 Most Influential Real Estate Leaders for 2010.

I forget exactly how I stumbled on MacSavvyAgent, I am sure I was following a link or tweet from TechSavvyAgent. I am really excited about the new site; Mac based realtors like me will have an outstanding resource and a place to discuss. Like RETechVideo, MacSavvyAgent has several regular contributors and all of them are industry heavy hitters.  Out of sheer joy about the site launch, I emailed Chris to let him know I was an instant fan.  I also mentioned this post I did a couple of months ago, highlighting a video testimonial for Lake Martin that I filmed with my iPhone.

I was so flattered to see that Chris used it on MacSavvyAgent, on this post: Capturing The Real Estate Moments: iPriceless. Once again, I found myself as the country cousin among real estate stars. I don’t think I deserve that stratum, but I am humbled to be included in a group of very inspiring agents and experts.

Much to Alex’s chagrin, that video is one of my most popular testimonials.  I think a large reason for that is that it is about Lake Martin, not me, and not about something in particular that is for sale.  So many realtor websites or marketing is all about them: how cool they are, how wonderful their team is, or how many awards they have bestowed upon themselves.  People don’t care.  They care about the lake. Whatever so called “success” I have enjoyed has been from realizing this fact – I try to get out of the way and help them get to the lake as best I can.

Back to MacSavvyAgent and Chris Smith – if you’re an agent, a Mac fan, or both – do yourself a favor and follow him on Twitter or read his blog.

I’d like to go ahead and nominate RETechVideo and MacSavvyAgent for the 2011 Inman Awards!