Using the Web and social media to sell real estate

Yesterday was my second Columbus day in America. It creates always a peculiar feeling being Italian and participating in a holiday where such a great number of people celebrate another Italian for having discovered such a great continent. I also have the intention of bringing something new and important in this country and therefore I have decided to set October the 12^th as a benchmark date for my activities in the future.

Yesterday it was indeed a very important one because I have brought to the next stage a relationship that I have been cultivating since February of this year and that has required lot of patience and nurturing to foster and to bring to its current strength, but that has tremendous potential for the future. They say that the bamboo tree takes 2, 3, 4 years to fully develop its roots: it only grows a few inches, but then it can shoot up 47 inches in just one day, and they develop to their full height (up to 250 feet) in just 3 months.

It all began with an event about Internet Marketing and how to build a joint venture here in Tampa. I had been in the US for approximately six months and I had already met several types of gurus and investors, but no real match for me.

Me and Mark on stage at his latest event in Atlanta, September 2009.

I had a clear idea on how my business was going to develop, but nobody I had found was patient enough to wait for it to unfold fully and to find common activities to share in the meantime. They all wanted the bamboo now, without waiting for it to grow. Everybody was kind of looking for business opportunities right here, for the low hanging fruit. No commitment, no depth of relationships.

The event was organized by Dan Stojadinovic another European from Serbia who has built a very strong presence in Internet Marketing and real estate investing. Dan always invites several speakers to his events and makes sure that they deliver solid content. He is also a very strong promoter of the idea of joint venture so I was sure that I was going to meet somebody special at this particular event, and I did.

Meet Mark Jackson

He was one of the speakers of the event: his presentation was about private label systems, more precisely Internet based evaluation tools for establishing the real value of any property anywhere in the US. Systems that other investors could use for supporting their own coaching students and that they could market with their own brand. Mark has an extensive appraiser and real estate investor background, so he know what he is talking about, and he is a man of God, so he really hold back no information. But foremost he is a coach and he has been training many people to reach financial independence and self respect in real estate and now is ready to widen his scope and become a life coach all together. And I will be part of the project, by allowing him to mix the best tools and strategies available online and offline, in America and Europe, to create something totally unique and unstoppable.

We have been delivering this type of support with my partner Daniele Bogiatto throughout Europe with great success and now with Mark we will integrate the power and speed of the US world to embrace not only real estate but many more areas. It is a new discovery all together.

But let’s go back to our story. During the event in Tampa, Dan Stojadinovic made a promotion of me and of my business as an international real estate investor to the whole audience. Remember: it is not important what you say about yourself but what other people say. You need friends who can speak up for you without you asking.

So Mark approached me after the first day and we scheduled a meeting for the following day at breakfast in the hotel of the event. It was a funny feeling because just two months before I had been in Tampa for yet another breakfast meeting with another US investor from Phoenix. This gentleman had German origins and I expected it would have been easier for me to work with another European. We had a project we could develop together and it all seemed fine, but then he became convinced he could do it all alone and didn’t need to partner with anybody: a very, very dangerous frame of mind in this age and economy.

Yet I was hopeful about this meeting with Mark: my wife Maria always tells me that when an opportunity seems to fade away it is just for giving way to a bigger opportunity that is waiting just behind it. So I met Mark in the hotel’s restaurant and we immediately began to talk about family and his next trip to Italy. I found out about his family, his visit to Japan to see his one of his sons serving the US and for meeting his grandson! I was amazed that at his very young age he would already be a grandpa.

We talked very little about business, yet I found out that he liked to working with others: his partner, Sam Jackson, was also there at the event. I also found out he was fascinated with different cultures and foreigns lands. Something clicked between us and we scheduled another meeting the next day where we immediately decided we could do something together (we recorded the following video on the fly).

The first video recorded on the fly in Tampa during the JV event, February 2009.

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We staid in touch over the phone: he wanted some advice about his imminent trip to Italy and we met again one month later in Miami: he was returning from a cruise in the Caribbean with his coaching students and I drove all the way from Tampa to Miami to meet them at the docks. He had told me about his coaching activities and I wanted to see the people and talk with then: the only real way to judge a man is by looking at his fruits. The only real way to judge a coach is by looking at his students.

We spent good part of the day together on Miami Beach and the uniform feedback I got from the students that had been on the training cruise, doing virtual investing from the Caribbean, was that he really cared and took the time to make sure everybody was going to make it. We parted company in Miami airport by deciding we were going to do something something big.

He soon left again with Sam and their families for a long cruise in the Atlantic. It was with Costa Crociere, an Italian cruise line, and they were scheduled to arrive in Italy and touch Savona, Naples and Venice. Funny that I am talking about all this sailing just after Columbus day. Isn’t it?

Mark arrives in Savona, near Genova the original city of Columbus, on his cruising ship after crossing the Atlantic.

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So I flew down there and with my partner Daniele we organized in no time a surprise event in Monte Carlo with some important European investors. I still remember the surprise on Mark’s face when I met him in Savona with a rented coach, my wife Maria who had come with me to Italy, and another relative of mine and we all drove across the Maritime Alps to France and to the Fairmont Hotel in Monte Carlo. It was a success and he was deeply touched when we passed by the central square of the casino.

Mark, Daniele and me meeting key investors at the Fairmont hotel in Monte Carlo, April 2009.

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Fast forward: we have been developing the relationship since then, with my partner Daniele coming to the US and me participating as a guest twice to Mark’s events in Atlanta. I have been using Mark’s evaluation systems and techniques to develop my own real estate business and I believe I have also developed a true friendship. Now a major leap is waiting all of us and 2010 will be a crucial year.

He will become one of the top life coaches in the nation and I will be a key part of the process. I simply can’t wait.

Roberto Mazzoni