Heather Elias: Training Director for Century 21 Redwood Realty

At Century 21 Redwood Realty we take immense pride in providing our clients with the highest level of service through training and technology.  As such, it is with great pride that we announce that Heather Elias has accepted the position of Training Director for our firm.

Heather is one of the premier and sought-after trainers in the country and has been a featured speaker at conferences such as NAR, Inman, SMMCamp & Century 21's International Convention. When she's not on the road giving presentations, she is a stellar agent in our Ashburn office and generates loads of business through her blog, locomusings.com.  As our Training Director Heather will be conducting weekly training sessions in all three of our offices.

Here is a letter from Heather introducing herself in her new position:

Hello! I'm excited to be part of Redwood, one of the most technology-forward and progressive brokerage firms in the country. Our training program has been designed to help our agents understand and implement new technology tools and industry best practices. With weekly classes and new topics added each month, our agents have a buffet of informative classes to choose from.

As an agent who has used innovative technology tools and online marketing as the backbone of my business plan since 2005, I found myself teaching and speaking on technology topics across the country in the last several years. With technology moving faster than most agents can keep up with, there was a definite need for agents that use the tools in their daily business to step up and show others how to make it work for them. I answered that call. I've been privileged to speak each year at RETech South in Atlanta, at several Inman Connect conferences, at Blogworld, at Century 21's annual conference, and for NAR, VAR, and NVAR, among others. What I've found is that Realtors like you and I understand how the technology tools work, but need guidance on how to put them to work for our businesses in ways that will bring new clients, make us more productive, and save time.

I started using technology in my real estate business in 2005 when I set up my first website, highlighting my listings, providing my contact information and laying out some canned content on the real estate process. When I realized that my consumers' questions weren't being adequately addressed by that canned content, I started writing about real estate and life in Loudoun County on a blog I created: LoCoMusings.com . It's now grown into a fully developed community resource while still maintaining all of the real estate 'stuff' you expect: integrated home search function, contact forms, client testimonials, and market data. I use online resources like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and email newsletters to drive traffic to the blog and engage with my consumer. This marketing program accounts for 75% of my business. And now, I bring my experience using these tools to the agents in our three offices.

Our training calendar at Redwood brings me through each of our three offices on a rotating basis. This week, I'm teaching a new Working with the Online Consumer class in our Ashburn office. Next week, I'm in our DC office covering a hands on blogging class, where agents will bring their laptops and dive into blog post creation, getting all of their "how do I?" questions answered. Other popular classes include using Facebook for Business, Innovative Tools and Tricks, and Hands on Twitter. We add new topics each month, with some of the best class suggestions coming from our agents and the questions they need answered.

Interested in hearing more about our training program or working at Redwood? Please feel free to reach out to me at Training@c21redwood.com and ask.

Cheers,
Heather