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INNOVATION
& DESIGN Home Page Architecture Brand Equity Auto Design Game Room SMALLBIZ Smart Answers Success Stories Today's Tip INVESTING Investing: Europe Annual Reports BW 50 S&P Picks & Pans Stock Screeners Free S&P Stock Report SCOREBOARDS Hot Growth 100 Mutual Funds Info Tech 100 S&P 500 B-SCHOOLS Undergrad Programs MBA Blogs MBA Profiles MBA Rankings Who's Hiring Grads | | OCTOBER 27, 2000 NET JOURNAL By Scott Kucirek Moving On Up Just two years ago zipRealty.com was the new kid on the block. Now we're the old guard
 I am writing this column live from Real Estate Connect. This is the leading online real estate conference that occurs every 6 to 8 months and brings together property companies looking to improve their buying-and-selling process using technology. Sitting here, I find it almost unbelievable that this is my fourth Connect, just as I marvel at the major changes my company, zipRealty.com, and I have experienced since the first confab.
My first Connect was in December, 1998. At the time, Juan (zipRealty's CEO and co-founder) and I were short of cash and trying to figure out how to get the $500 fee we needed to attend. We ended up convincing Connect creator and HomeGain CEO Brad Inman to let us participate in exchange for our labor. This turned out to be a great move. WE'LL BE BACK. Working the conference allowed me to understand what it takes to put a large event together and gave me access to all the key people in this new industry. After sitting through numerous panel discussions and talking with the chiefs of companies we had researched, it became clear that a few online real estate outfits would be launched over the coming year -- and we should be one of them. At the close of the conference, we thanked Brad for the deal and told him we would be back at the next confab with the world's first online property brokerage. Seven months later, we arrived at the 1999 Connect as zipRealty with a booth where we could demonstrate our initial service. We were in the "innovator room," where the industry's new companies were gathered, and had brought every member of our 15-person company to the three-day event. One team member, Michael Tien, actually spent his first day as an employee at the conference and did a wonderful job at our stand. Just getting the materials together for the booth was a challenge. Much of its artwork, and the booth itself, did not arrive until the day before the conference. Talk about stress! Luckily, it all came together. During the conference, Juan and I were invited to speak on panels, and our booth was filled with people wanting to learn more about zipRealty, and how we aimed to change the industry. It was a magical time, and we left the conference inspired to push even harder to get our service to market. The next Connect was in February, 2000, and we hit the big time as a co-sponsor. Juan and I were again invited to speak, and we were mentioned at the event's many other panel sessions. We also participated in high-level, behind-the-scenes meetings where the industry's future was discussed. By that stage, we were beginning to expand nationally, as well as attracting attention from larger companies looking for partnership opportunities. GETTING ESTABLISHED. It was also a good time to catch up with old friends from smaller companies that had prospered over the last year and were now becoming leaders in different property sectors. We were becoming the old guard in this crowd, no longer the new bucks. Today, it took me three hours just to get to our booth. Between interviews with the press, discussions with partners, and introductions to new companies, I barely had time to get this article done (and this is before the conference has officially started). The next three days hold great promise, and I'm happy to be a part of it. What a difference time has made.  Scott Kucirek is president and co-founder of zipRealty.com, an online real estate brokerage. The company's Internet site and online real estate agents let people complete the entire purchase or sale of a house via the Web. The company's Web site is www.zipRealty.com, and you can E-mail Scott at Scott@zipRealty.com.  | | |
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