Real estate marketers mob networking group

Kendra Kolvet, marketing specialist at Alliance Commercial, expected maybe 20 people to attend a networking group for real estate marketing people. Fifty turned out to mob the tight space.

"I felt there was a need for an exchange of ideas," says Kolvet. "There are groups for brokers, but none for those who deal with the marketing. We needed a place to exchange ideas."

Sure, they had promotional venues on which to showcase properties, such as LoopNet and individual company Web sites. But Kolvet wanted a venue where she and her peers could vent a problem and ask for ideas. For instance, "I have a property that's not moving. I've done all the usual. What else can I do?"

So she asked Dave Archer, president of the Reno chapter of the American Marketing Association, if the AMA would be willing to back the networking group she envisioned. And he said yes.

Kolvet was invited to make a presentation to the AMA board.

"They gave me a green light and a budget," she says.

And permission to do all the work herself.

"With volunteer groups, what you do is a function of who you have to do it," says Archer.

The Reno chapter of the AMA is now considering forming similar breakout groups for casino and health care marketers.

The concept of the special interest group is well established in the AMA, says Archer. "In other cities, technology and health care have breakout groups. But nowhere in the country was this (real estate) ever tried before."

The national American Marketing Association is watching carefully, he adds.

At the kick-off meeting, Surveys showed that attendees wanted to hear a speaker, followed by breakout groups for discussion. The second meeting will take place within the next two months.