I received a Google Wave invitation yesterday. After tinkering with it for about 10 minutes, I am now convinced that technology is moving at an even more rapid pace than I had previously thought.
I am certain that there is an opportunity for the early adopters of the technology.
With the wave of change {pun intended} shoring up and the recession comes to an end, here are 5 platforms every luxury professional ought (at least) explore.
Squidoo (SquidZipper)
SquidZipper is a co-brand of Squidoo.com. If you haven’t explored Squidoo.com, you ought to, if for no other reason than because you will be able to curate your own content and point it towards your site… for free. With SquidZipper you can literally put your own zip code in and populate your brand through Squidoo’s site. Squidoo (fyi) was founded by Seth Godin and is currently one of the highest ranked websites in the world. This is organic SEO.
Ning
Ning.com is a way in which you can develop your own personal network. For anything. Anything imaginable. If you want to create a place where you have a community. It is here. It also ranks very high in the search engines. Here is our nascent group: duPont REGISTRY Online Community
Google Wave
{First, you gotta get an invite, though} I can’t really speak too much about this because I just became involved in the preview stages of Google’s latest genius. It is worth noting that after spending 10 minutes with this tool, I can tell you that it is absolutely amazing and the power that is in it could revolutionize (even more so) the way we communicate.
Wordpress.org
Dot ORG, not the dot COM one, though you can do both. The Wordpress.org is a place where you can create your own professional site. You will need a little bit of technological assistance, but it’s worth either a) asking me to help you with or b) figuring it out on your own – which I can help you with, too.
Adobe
Ok, this isn’t really a platform, but learning Photoshop and some other of the Adobe tools is another valuable way to communicate. These tools become more and more a part of my daily life, mainly because of the previously mentioned platforms. To have the ability to do what used to be left to graphic artists can save you lots of money. While you may never be able to design an amazing platform like the Thesis Theme (this blog’s theme), you might be able to put your personal flair into all that is your marketing, which is YOU.
There you go. Platforms for luxury agents. What more do you need. One more. I would suggest that you find a powerful media outlet that can help you leverage these platforms—maybe that was a shameless plug, but I did just give you a wealth of online marketing information . . . for FREE 
