Why I think you should attend an REBarcamp

I’ve had fortune to attend the outstanding REBarcamp experiences  in the US over the few years and I gotta say I’ve loved every minute of them.

They’ve been a great networking experience, but most of all they’ve been a great learning and sharing experience. What I’ve found at the Bar Camps I’ve attended is that there’s been at least 10 other people in each break out session that have had the same or similar questions or ideas that I have.  (Read on)

How cool to learn and share with your peers that are faced with the same challenges. They say 2 heads are better than 1.. Well, Try it with 200. Its AWESOME!

In April 2011 I shared a few ideas on why I think you people should have registered to attend the Inaugural Australian REBarcamp we held in Sydney, Australia held on May 24.  They were to:

1       to network with fellow real estate practitioners seeking to increase their knowledge particularly in the area of the effective use of technology and social media.

2       to engage in healthy debate around industry trends with industry peers, leaders and key stakeholders.

3       to be exposed to cutting edge ideas and concepts around where the new tech tools of  today can take a business today and beyond

4     to be challenged about whether your business practices of this year will cut it next year.

5     To enjoy the opportunity to share in a social, no pressure, brand agnostic environment.

6     To engage in healthy debate in a peer to peer environment.

7     To network with like minded professionals.

This is a great opportunity for you to join in a great ‘Think Tank’.

In that post of April 2011 I shared what is a key fundamental:

If you’re thinking of coming to Bar Camp (and we really hope that you are!) its really important to remind you that REBarcamp is a ‘Participatory’ event. Make sure you come with an attitude of preparedness to share, learn and generally participate. If you ‘give’, I promise  that if you ‘participate and give’ then you’ll get at least 5 times what you gave in return. If however you sit on your tail bone, then you’ll get nothing other than a sore tail bone.

 

Peter Brewer with Jeff turner at NAR 2009. San Diego

And our first REBarcamp in Australia became truly International:

Of particular note in our wonderful list of attendees is a colleague by the name of Jeff Turner who I met at the 2009 NAR Annual Conference in San Diego.

Jeff came all the way from the USA join us and to launch the REBarcamp concept into Australia. Jeff is one of the most highly sought after presenters and true thought leaders in the USA, particularly in the area of social media in the real estate community. We are honoured that Jeff came out to join us.

Our hard working organising team of Peter Fletcher, Lara Scott,  Greg Vincent, Tatiana Mijalica, Ben Stockdale and myself worked busily behind the scenes to ensure that our first REBarcamp was an absolute hit. We were that confident it was going to be a roaring success that we already mapped dates for Perth, Brisbane and Melbourne for mid year.

Was it a success?  Absolutely!  Here’s what others had to say!

Ian Campbell, former head of marketing at Ray White in Australia wrote here.

We kept an interesting Tweet analysis of the day here;

We even made a video to be sure we met the expectations of the people who came: Watch it here:

And I shared a post afterwards on what I saw of the day here:

If you’re thinking of running an REBarcamp in your community, be sure to call on the wisdom and experience of the great people at this site.  In Australia we were lucky enough to have some amazing support from people like Mike Mueller , Todd Carpenter, and Jeff Turner.   Don’t be afraid to ask a question. There’s some damn fine people here to help you get started.

Peter Brewer

I'm a proud Aussie living in Brisbane Australia. I've had a very priveliged life and enjoyed a 30 year real estate career up til 2008 from where I took my passion for the real estate industry, added my love of technology, the digital world and my love for good people and today I'm the luckiest guy on the planet! You'll find me hanging around REBarcamps in Australia and the USA when the opportunity arises. If we share the same passions?.. I'd love to connect! Hit me up!

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