The Vendor and the iPad

The Vendor and the iPad

This is part II of my thoughts about the iPad and real estate.  You can read my first post on W&R Studios‘ blog Lightning|Twice = >The Realtor and the iPad

Seems like there are a lot of people on both sides of the argument of whether the iPad will have any impact on real estate.

One thing I agree with is that MLS systems are pretty much DOA for the iPad. A lot of today’s MLS systems require Internet Explorer and don’t work well (or at all) with other browsers.

The future doesn’t look bright either, since most MLS Vendors, to solve their browser compatibility issues,  are running to platforms like Adobe’s FLEX or Microsoft’s Silverlight.  And as we all know by now Apple doesn’t like Flash, much less anything from Microsoft.  ( One interesting side note is that FBS’ MLS System, with its ironically named “flex” MLS isn’t jumping on the Flash bandwagon.)

But lets look at the iPad as a sales tool for Vendors.  I think of it as a mini projector.  Something you can hold in your hands that you can easily demo a web app or run a slide show.  Think about a trade show floor, where your space is limited, now every person is essentially a “demo station”.  Or at a broker preview meeting, where you are causally meeting groups of Realtors, now you can just carry it around like a sales binder.

Or how about taking orders?  A recent startup called Square announced an easy way to accept credit card and Paypal payments via an iPhone.  So this seems that it will easily translate to the iPad  Check out this short video about their service.

One danger here that I said I would mention in my previous post is that the device itself might outshine your product.  Meaning you might end up answering more questions about your iPad than your product.  I believe this will be short lived as the iPad and iPad like devices become more mainstream.

I would be interested in hearing your thoughts about how you might use the iPad as a sales device.  It will be interesting to see how many iPads we see at NAR Midyear and the other trade shows and conferences coming in 2010.