Sun Tzu wrote, “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
Every MLS exec needs to be asking if MRED’s battle with Zillow is fundamentally changing the battlefield itself.
Sun Tzu warns leaders not to become so focused on winning individual engagements that they fail to recognize shifts in terrain. MLSs have strength from aggregation, cooperation, and completeness. Their power comes from being the place where everyone participates. This is so obvious it’s fucking wild that the MLS industry isn’t publishing full-page ads on INMAN signed by everyone to enforce CCP.
Every policy debate that encourages fragmentation, intentional or not, changes that terrain. When inventory, marketing, and consumer attention become distributed across multiple channels, the value of being the central marketplace disappears.
The AOW lesson is that fortresses rarely fall because of a direct assault. They fall because the ground beneath them changes. The greatest strategic risk isn’t losing a policy fight; it’s winning the battle while making the fortress less important.
If that happens, the eventual winner won’t be Compass, MRED, or any single brokerage. It will be whichever platform (guess fucking who) becomes the place where consumers and agents go to reassemble a fragmented market. If you’re company doesn’t start with Z then this is the most short-sighted battle I’ve ever fucking seen an MLS org participate in.
“The victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won.” — Sun Tzu
Best one yet!
Sun Tzu wrote, “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”
Every MLS exec needs to be asking if MRED’s battle with Zillow is fundamentally changing the battlefield itself.
Sun Tzu warns leaders not to become so focused on winning individual engagements that they fail to recognize shifts in terrain. MLSs have strength from aggregation, cooperation, and completeness. Their power comes from being the place where everyone participates. This is so obvious it’s fucking wild that the MLS industry isn’t publishing full-page ads on INMAN signed by everyone to enforce CCP.
Every policy debate that encourages fragmentation, intentional or not, changes that terrain. When inventory, marketing, and consumer attention become distributed across multiple channels, the value of being the central marketplace disappears.
The AOW lesson is that fortresses rarely fall because of a direct assault. They fall because the ground beneath them changes. The greatest strategic risk isn’t losing a policy fight; it’s winning the battle while making the fortress less important.
If that happens, the eventual winner won’t be Compass, MRED, or any single brokerage. It will be whichever platform (guess fucking who) becomes the place where consumers and agents go to reassemble a fragmented market. If you’re company doesn’t start with Z then this is the most short-sighted battle I’ve ever fucking seen an MLS org participate in.
“The victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won.” — Sun Tzu