November 30
For many weeks of the year Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday involve travelling to be face-to-face with our network members. I always come back into our Auckland office on Friday afternoon, principally to tidy up matters of the week and to also prepare for the following week.

As a ritual I generally attend to personally addressed incoming mail first. Of interest last Friday was a listing presentation document by Bayleys on my desk. I opened it up and began reading it and couldn’t quite believe my eyes. I went and got our listing presentation document to compare the two because I thought it looked similar but just in a different colour. Sure enough, when I looked at the Bayleys document and put our document next to it I was stunned at the blatant plagiarism and misappropriation of our intellectual property by Bayleys. When someone says that someone has plagiarised our own listing kit word-for-word you almost say “that’s not possible”. In this instance it is exactly word-for-word. It’s a great compliment to our company that we produce such outstanding material that is replicated by one of the other significant brands in the market; they even used our graphs. When I gave the two documents to my three year old he could hardly spot the difference, except he did point out to me that they used different men in the blue graph.  In all my years of leading our company I have never been so taken aback by such profound and blatant plagiarism of a document that is used directly by our sales team in the public arena. I have been told many times that imitation is the best form of flattery – we win the 2011 trophy.

Here are some of the pages of the listing presentation side by side . Advertising Funnel of Success, Marketing without a Price, General, Tender and Auction.

It’s been another week of new offices joining our network. On Tuesday night we had the opening of Ray White Pt Chevalier. This is going to be a really good business.  It has four local salespeople; the backing of great leadership through Bryce, Simon and Gower; and also the market dominance of the Ray White Ponsonby team. There will be a lot of energy around this business and we are looking forward to the progress in market share that this office will achieve. In Wellington, Vicki Collins has re-branded Wellington City Real Estate and they officially opened this week. Please see the online story as this is another business that will lift our presence through the Wellington region, with a 14 strong sales team who join Ray White with a significant listing base and marketing presence.

Part of my week was spent at the Flywheels Conference on the Sunshine Coast of Queensland. This is an invitation-only conference hosted byBrian Whiteand brings together the top businesses internationally throughout the Ray White Group. The sessions that were presented provided fresh thinking, tested our resolve going forward and set the plans for 2016 as to how the Group, through its leading members, will achieve increased market leadership throughout Australasia.

Wednesday morning I attended the REINZ Superstars Breakfast. I was proud to see Rohan Thompson as part of the superstars’ panel.  Rohan is the co-owner of Ray White Royal Oak and Ray White Mt Albert. His message on focused communication and the way in which he structures his day gave an excellent insight into how high performers achieve results in today’s market.

Last night we held our Auckland awards. Over 250 of our members attended to celebrate the quarterly achievements of our group and to recognise our Elite and Premier members. During the evening I spoke of our record growth of new offices joining the Group; the significant part in which my own staff play in these re-brands as well as that of our suppliers and partners. We have had a new office join every three weeks this year and we have kept remarkable pace with our growth; which is set to continue throughout 2012

November 11
I received an email early in the week with that perennial comment “I know you’re busy”.  When you think about that comment you don’t need to fear the day that you are busy; I think you need to fear the day that you’re not busy.

It’s been a hectic pace for our business during the past month with 10 new offices joining; half of those coming from recognised brands and the other half coming from start up businesses. Each of these offices has made a positive start into the marketplace. It is absorbing to see the culture of Ray White become part of these businesses, which provides us both with new thinking and ways to execute our skills into the market collectively. The offices to commence trading include Whangarei, Bream Bay,Tutukaka, Matamata, Hamilton City, Dargaville, Mt Albert, Wellington City, Sunnynook and Cambridge. The new Pt Chevalier office is due to open next week.

This has been a record year of growth for our company and the result of these new offices is a high level of new energy throughout the company that is spawning even more opportunities for growth. The new offices will collectively bring us to a network of 133 offices and given a number of these new offices are in Auckland, it will not only reposition our business (potentially stronger), but several of the new offices are in new locations for our company and that will bring its own rewards as we create more activity in markets that have previously not been part of our business.

One of the key events that happened for the Ray White Group in October is the annual Crows Nest Conference. It is the franchisor conference and one of the centrepiece components of the conference is the curiosity day, whereby each of the business development team (which now totals over 100) presents a curiosity about our group. This brings an environment of questions that one would never normally ask and our New Zealand presentations were again very insightful. Keith Ashkettle, our New Zealand head of technology, was recognised with the international group Cutting Edge Award. We make the statement in New Zealand that we are the industry leader in office and salespeople technology and Keith is right at the forefront of our continuing development.

This month Ray White New Zealand has integrated another major application into our website through Walk Score and Neighbourhoods (example) . This allows the public to comment on their neighbourhood and give real time information to potential buyers from a resident’s perspective about the property they are viewing on the website.

We have just about completed the final zone meetings throughout the country.  Christchurch and the Upper South Island zone meetings are to be held early next week. These meetings are a direct flow-on effect of our Queenstown business owners’ symposium, in which the Group created the strategy for our direction towards 2016. The strategy will allow us as a group to collectively make progress while working hand-in-hand with our business owners to achieve outcomes which create momentum for each of the stakeholders in the company.

On a lighter note, I was invited to an evening to hear Richard Branson speak. We have a new member in Wellington who knew I was attending the function and she said that she was a great fan of Richard Branson’s.  Our table was not far from his table and although much of the evening was an advertorial, his interview on stage gave great insight into the continual growth of his businesses. I thought I would purchase a copy of his book and potentially get it signed for the new member in Wellington. I went out and got a book and sat back down with the people at my table, and of course they were encouraging me to go and get the book signed. So I walked over and asked him to sign his book. He did so in a flamboyant way and turned to me and said “What’s your name?” and I said “Can you write ‘To Vicki’”. I turned away for a moment and he handed me back the book and it said ‘Best wishes Dickie’. I went back to my table quite sheepishly and opened the book in front of a number of my peers to be constantly mocked for the balance of the night to the point where I ended up getting another book and actually writing Vicki on the piece of paper and giving it to Richard Branson with the book. So the sum total of the evening was two Richard Branson books; one signed to Dickie, the other signed to Vicki and a lesson learnt that it doesn’t matter what you say or how you say it, it can always be misinterpreted unless you write it down.  I just want to acknowledge a few of my mates who still send emails and text messages to ‘Dear Dickie’.

September 30
Throughout the last month four words come to mind – repositioning, opportunity, momentum and change. These words have almost been a constant in our business, particularly given the announcements that have occurred within our group. As a leader you continue to seek opportunity but that has not for the Ray White Group come in the form of repositioning. Each day has almost been a different day and I have a very good friend who runs another business and we got talking about a number of case studies and he made the analogy when a dog is caught doing something wrong it actually knows it has done something wrong but if you come home and you have seen that a dog has done something wrong and you chastise the dog it’s got no idea why. The analogy was based on thinking about what has gone wrong, rather than getting on with what would be a positive position to reposition our group in an area which we now have opportunity. So regardless of what the dog did during the day, it only thinks forward, not back (apparently).

So it was with tempered excitement that we looked upon the Goodwin sell out to Bayleys as an opportunity.   Just on two weeks since the change over occurred we have confirmed a new office at Mt Albert; we have strong interest in a new office at Pt Chev and it also looks positive for the Sandringham area to have a Ray White office. The best news to come out of the Goodwin Group selling to Bayleys is that of the 18 sales staff, 11 have re-joined with Ray White members just over 60% of the Goodwin staff.  The key reason – de-personalisation and a lack of functional systems.

We have made the announcement that Goode Leith Realty who currently trade as Allens in Whangarei, Bream Bay and the Tutukaka Coast have made the decision to join Ray White. This is big news for our business. They are a very established market leading business and for the Allens Group to give us the privilege of working as their partner brand provides a high level vote of confidence in our structures and processes that are offered to our businesses going forward. John Monteith has written a personal blog on their decision to change to Ray White. Please see our press release.

One of the individual market leaders in Hamilton, Sue Hall, has joined us from Harcourts to become a partner in her own Ray White business. The word ‘opportunity’ sprung straight to mind when we were in discussions with Sue. She has an outstanding work ethic her level of trust and respect in the market is unmatched and her results in the local marketplace are outstanding. In herfirst week with Ray White, Sue and her personal team have listed 16 properties, with three sales already underway. We are privileged to have Sue place her trust in our company for her future. Richard Jacobsen has been a key part of the process as a personal advisor to Sue and a partner in the agency.

Another star but this time in the rural sector is Bill Tunzelmann, who is formerly of PGG Wrightson.  Bill has made the decisionto open up a Ray White office in Matamata to take his real estate career to an ownership level.  He is one of the most consistent performers in economic rural sales in the Waikato district and his business will be known to be one of the first Ray White Rural offices in New Zealand.

As we come into October we will have eight new offices joining the Ray White Group, with a further five areas under consideration. It will be a record breaking year for our company welcoming new members and our growth will continue through genuine people who join our group on the basis of their future, not on the basis of our future.

Our business owners’ symposium in Queenstown was first class.  We were joined by Steve D’Souza, John Wall, Brendan Skipper from Trade Me, Greg Hornblow from APN and Pat Houlihan from Property Press. The other invited guest was Helen O’Sullivan from the Real Estate Institute. The symposium raised a number of strategy questions which our group members understood and aligned those questions with their own business and our group’s direction collectively. 110 of our franchise owners joined together in what I would personally described as a leadership retreat that brought our group together and prepared the company for the next level of growth towards our leadership in New Zealand.

I would like to acknowledge Tony McPherson who has been elected by his peers as Regional Director for the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand.

Over the next weeks we prepare for our upcoming marketing statements to welcome our new offices and individual members together with our regular zone meetings which will be held around the country to review our strategy which has been put into place post our Queenstown symposium.

August 5
Last Friday was one of the sadder moments for our group members in Christchurch with the demolition of our Sumner office.  The most recent earthquake event on 13th June was the final straw for the ex-Ray White building which was deemed beyond repair.  Rae Manson started her career in this office and over the last 25 years had built a business at Sumner that came down before her very eyes last week.  Her business partner, Craig Prier, said that the office had been a real estate business for many years and was one of the first branches of his father’s business known as Kent Prier Real Estate Limited in the early 70s.  Hopefully the Prier Manson Group can return to Sumner and have their leading Ray White office re-established in Wakefield Avenue.

Much of our group is about who is re-committing.  A business that joined us in 1994 as one of the first offices outside of the original purchase was Ian Knox at Ray White Kerikeri.  He has a top reputation in coastal, lifestyle and rural with a market share of 26%. Our Paihia business, which is part of his group, continues to maintain a strong profile with Ross Robertson as the leader of that business.  It is significant for our group to have members such as Ian Knox re-commit their business for a further term.

The foundation of our group is as much with our leading offices in regards to profile.  No better example of this is Ray White City Apartments, who absolutely dominate their specialist field. The great news for our group is that Phil Horrobin and Chas Wilson have collectively re-committed to Ray White.  Ray White City Apartments are the number one business for the Ray White Group currently and Ray White City Apartments Rentals is one of our leading property management portfolio businesses. In the last quarter they extended their business with a new location at the Britomart that services sales and rentals in this growing area of the city.

The focus of our work continues to be on growth for our company. More exciting news with Tony Scheirlinck announcing that he will be opening a new Sunnynook business with Ray White. The office is under construction at the moment in a new development on Sunnynook Road. Tony had the foresight to put his hand up to be the first real estate office in this area.  When you put together vision and passion there are no better leaders than Tony to start up a new business for our group.

Further down the line in the Bay of Plenty, our Ray White Tauranga business run by Ian Grindle has moved location to The Strand and welcomed leading salesperson Rodney Fong, previously with LJ Hookers , as a partner to the business.  Ian continues to have a successful career within our group and mixing his knowledge with Rodney’s enthusiasm will create the platform for a dynamic business in Tauranga.

On the coastal strip, Ray White Mt Maunganui yesterday welcomed John Pasley and Rose Tondi, previous business owners at Premium, to our group. I mentioned in my previous comments a trip to Sydney to Brian White’s home which John and Rose attended and this gave them an opportunity to look at the Ray White Group which I believe was influential in their decision to join us.

Our July results reflected an increase in trading on the same period last year but was slightly down on the results from June. Controlled listings continue on a downward momentum but this appears to have been arrested in the last week.  One example of this is Ponsonby going from half a page in the New Zealand Herald to four pages tomorrow. Our top office for the month was Ray White Auckland Central Commercial. Remuera, Metro in Christchurch, Ponsonby and City Apartments featured in our top business.

There is a lot of good work that goes on in our group but one of the standouts is the commercial report produced by Bruce Whillans.  Bruce’s business completed $145 million in sales in their first year with Ray White, with a number of his sales being high in value including the Albany Home Centre, Soho Square and the Penrose Industrial Estate.  This is Bruce’s report.

We have announced our Franchise Owners Symposium, which is going to be held in Queenstown in early September.  Two business people I know very well, John Wall and Steven D’Souza, will be presenting to us and talking through their personal businesses and how they have gained market leadership in their respective fields.

On a final note, thank you to those who have congratulated Taryn and myself on the arrival of Zachary, who was born this time last week at Auckland Women’s Hospital.  Taryn and Zachary have arrived home, with big brother Chase excited by the new addition.  And while sleep is a little bit less, no doubt new routines will become the norm.

July 22, 2011
When you look after the Group there are many areas that individually take time, but when you work on a group platform it is pleasing to know that in response our members show appreciation. During the past month we have been in continual discussion with the Real Estate Institute and in the last fortnight we have been able to confirm that our group has total membership of the Institute and that each of our salespeople are also part of that collective membership decision.  This is a first for any franchise real estate company to take the lead in this regard and we believe it will assist us in continuing to maintain high standards and allow our members to see the increasing value that the Real Estate Institute offers going forward.

Also during the past fortnight I was fortunate to be able to host a number of New Zealand agency people who are considering Ray White at Brian White’s personal home in Sydney.  Brian opens up his property and welcomes those who are interested in joining the Ray White Group.  Similar to what happens at agency level, the brand has a distinct role to play but essentially, like for a vendor, the salesperson is the most important part of the transaction. It is similar that for the franchisor those who are in leadership are the ones who drive the company. It is so much more about people choosing people; that’s why being able to go to Brian’s home offers a unique experience that potentially no other group can offer. The following day we undertook a study tour of several high profile Sydney businesses; one of those was Ray White Double Bay and spending time with Craig Pontey, one of the owners of that office.

Our market share figures come out for the month and one of the interesting observations is where market share increases on the basis of new offices.  It would seem to be a given that you get more market share when you have more offices. But does that necessarily relate back to your existing network? The Queenstown region is an area we started business in just over six years ago with the conversion of Century 21 to Ray White Queenstown.  Then an independent office in Wanaka came on board, followed by Locations in Arrowtown, and just over 12 months ago a good independent business in Frankton joined us. Our collective market share in this area has gone up from 3% just over five years ago to now being 25%. By all measures this is double the productivity compared to the number of agencies in the marketplace.  It shows that collectively having a leading presence gives you increased market share that can’t be achieved by others.

Our North Shore owners are determined to make more progress over the next 12 months.  We have recently announced that we are going to be opening a new office in Sunnynook and this has been on the back of a determined drive to have new people join our business on the North Shore.  This week a careers evening was held at the Bruce Mason Centre which was attended by just over 50 people. The response to the professionalism and the information was outstanding. The group expects at least 50% of those who attended will consider joining the industry.

I have just returned from Sydney where I attended a CEO group meeting for Ray White.  Many areas discussed; however the increasing work in the area of technology and the use of data together with lead generation were the highest agenda points.  A group such as Ray White, who sells the most amount of property in Australasia, are consistently fielding requests to lead generate from existing property listings.  It’s hard to get answers on the role that technology will play in the future of real estate, but intermixed with this is the increasing evidence that individual salespeople are producing more results than ever before. The relevance of salespeople and the relevance of agency remain high; the need for value at each level is becoming even more important than it has ever before in consideration of technology.

There is continued polarisation across both sides of the Tasman. The news this week that Go Gecko have gone into receivership is further evidence that the real estate industry remains tough for many and that relevance in all levels of the market is a key to sustainability.

July 8, 2011
The highlight for any business at any level is growth.  The stamp of approval shown by Rod Corbett to re-brand the number one Re/Max office in the South Island to Ray White in Christchurch ticks a few boxes for our company.  To see the full story click here. The polarisation of real estate brands has never been greater.  The best people in this industry provide the best questions for their franchisor or their brand.  More so than ever people want to get value, they want to know that their brand is going forward and is providing thinking that is based on the future and not clouded by inherited protectionism.  The change of this business to Ray White shows dual confidence; one in that this business chose us to go forward and, two our ability to be a company that continues to have opportunity but is also aware that retention is a key element to growth.

I pick up little snapshots of information as I go around our network.  I was speaking with one of our Elite members this morning who was considering one of the new outside micro models that is on offer. He did a lot of research and he said his decision came back to the fact that Ray White is a family owned group and that the people within the company are the owners of the company.  Not something as a business we say much about, and I rarely say that about my position; but the fact that we are owners puts this business on an equal footing on the basis that we are probably potentially the only real estate group who has a best interest view rather than a self interest view.

Our group has made a commitment to provide a total membership with the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand.  In the past I have been a bit ho-hum on the value piece that the Institute had to offer. They area  re-invigorated group of leaders who are now running the Institute.  Like all people who are forming relationships, they do so on the basis of value.  The Institute are now providing that value and we have made  a decision to be the only franchise group to support that decision 100% at this stage and we would hope that being a front runner will enable other groups to give at least some consideration to fully supporting the Real Estate Institute and their leader, Helen O’Sullivan.

I was able to spend some time in the lower South Island with our Invercargill team last week.  Brendan Mason, who leads this business, has been a strong member of our company for the past 10 years.  This business has never been in better shape; it’s shown strong growth over the last 12 month period and is re-positioned to take a quantum leap in market share. We talked about personalisation and trust between the client and the salesperson and also some of the new template material that Ray White provides for individual agents. One of the high performers of the office, John Hawke, has proudly put together his submission and this is a wonderful testament to John’s commitment to the industry and it is good as a company that we can align our marketing with the best people in our group.

I went to Gore after Invercargill.  Ferg Nicholson has been one of our foundation members.  He and Drewe Carran have been business partners for many years and their business one of the consistent market leaders.  I was fortunate to join them to celebrate Ferg’s career.  We are very lucky to have such good people in our group and we wish Ferg and Trudie well in their move to Cromwell.  Drewe Carran has taken on the sole ownership of the office and he is charged up to take it to the next level.

The REAA have put out a new complaints procedure.  It’s more friendly to all parties and it definitely makes sense. I am pleased that Corinna Mansell has been able to play a role in the advisory board with the REAA to bring in such a positive change.

Our sales for the month lifted by 12% and our controlled stock was down 8%.  The two numbers work to bring down days on market and also potentially put some degree of pressure on prices.  Bruce Whillans of Ray White Auckland Commercial posted a record month for an individual office in New Zealand, with sales in excess of $45 million which included the selling of the Soho site in Ponsonby and also three major commercial buildings in College Hill.  Ray White City Apartments and Ray White Ponsonby together with Ray White Ellerslie and Ray White Remuera were the top five businesses throughout the country.

For those who follow our progress internationally, we are pleased to announce the opening of Ray White in South Korea.  The office is situated in the Central CBD district of Seoul, with the business owner being Paul Kim who was previously part of Coldwell Banker.