Eric D. Colburn, PLS

San Diego, November 13, 2009

Aided by the home buyer tax credit, the outlook for housing and the economy appears headed for a sustainable recovery, according to the National Association of Realtors®.

Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said the projections are enhanced by a tax credit expansion to more home buyers through the middle of 2010. “Given the success of the first-time buyer tax credit to date, and the need for qualified buyers to continue to absorb inventory that will include additional foreclosures over the coming year, we are hopeful about the impact of the expanded tax credit because it will stabilize home prices,” he said. “In fact, the credit is working better than first projected – it now looks like we’ll have 2.3 to 2.4 million first-time buyers this year.”

A large consumer study being released later today, the 2009 National Association of Realtors® Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers, shows first-time buyers accounted for a record 47 percent share of home sales over the past year, up from 41 percent in the 2008 survey. The share has risen steadily since a cyclical low of 36 percent in 2006.

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Let’s start off with two sides of the value proposition, external and internal. External value is what you’re striving to provide your clients and the perceived value, in their minds, your clients receive from your services. Internal value is everything that improves and grows your professional land surveying company, which most of the time your client never sees and often doesn’t fully appreciate, but is extremely important nonetheless and is often ignored.

Your Clients Want it All!

Hey, your clients just want their survey done cheaper, better and faster: That’s not asking too much, is it?

The internal value of your professional land surveying practice needs to be cultivated and grown. I’m making the distinction, between internal and external value, but they’re tightly connected and while the internal value at first may not be all too important to your clients, I still recommend that you include the benefit of this value when marketing and promoting your business.

The real value in any professional land surveying business is often overlooked. Too often we equate the procedures employed, the equipment we use and the paid for outcomes to completely define our value.

Much of What We Do Has Remained Unchanged.

Much of the mathematical concepts we use is ancient and hasn’t changed in centuries. The equipment we use, while constantly being updated and improved upon, mostly reinvents solutions for largely unchanged tasks. The outcomes of our work or deliverables if you will, while having changed in format and medium are still, in the end, the expression and explanation of the professional land surveyor’s opinion and judgments.

It’s all important. You have to know the math, you will see improvements from using newer, more modern, equipment and using the latest and best CAD program to produce good looking quality work is very important. However, I believe that you need to look at your business from a different perspective that holds those core external values intact and transcends your current perception of your professional land surveying company’s value.

Your greatest value is in your processes and in your data. Simple.

5 Business Value Concepts for the Professional Land Surveyor:

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BASKING RIDGE, N.J. - Large businesses and government agencies will be able to immediately initiate conference calls from some of the most popular enterprise instant messaging (IM) applications, using new capabilities unveiled Wednesday (Feb. 4) by Verizon Business.

The company is one of the first global service providers to integrate audio and Web conferencing services across multiple leading IM services, including IBM Lotus Sametime Unified Communications and Collaboration, Microsoft Office Live Communications Server  2005 and the Cisco Jabber XCP. As a result, businesses and government agencies will be able to initiate virtual meetings on the spot, thus speeding decision-making and helping to enhance productivity as they make the move to unified communications (UC).

The new tools are available immediately for U.S.-based organizations and are scheduled to be rolled out internationally later this year, along with Verizon audio and net conferencing integration with Microsoft Office Communicator 2007.

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