I was putting together a Yigdigs exclusive “Faces of Real Estate” piece on Realtor.com’s president Allan Dalton, and in doing my research, I found myself growing rather aggravated and irked, thought I couldn’t really figure why. Then, as I sat back and let out an exhausted, yet curious sigh from my swiveling desk chair, I could see: the word “realtor”, which is printed 11 times in Allan Dalton’s bio, was capitalized at every opportunity.
It seems a bit excessive, a bit over-promotional, verging on the side of propoganda than simple site branding. After all, I’m already on the site, do I really need to be inundated with the word “REALTOR” and “REALTORS” and the phrase “NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS” over and over and over and over?
As a For Sale by Owner advocate, I find this repetitive self-aggrandizement, a little much.
Look for the “Faces of Real Estate: Allan Dalton” later this week. Maybe we will find some answers.
Tags: Allan Dalton, Fastidious Rant, Realtor.com
I agree with your point about the excessive use of the capitilization of Realtor, just so you don’t look out of touch Dalton and the wntire Homestor executive team left over two years ago. Is there anyway you can write about what is happening now, no one seems to know.
The term “REALTOR” is a registered trademark owned by the National Association of REALTORS. As such, the NAR seems to have some preferred guidelines concerning how their term is used. See http://www.realtor.org/realtororg.nsf/pages/whoisarealtor and http://www.realtor.org/letterlw.nsf/pages/mmmparttwo for more info.
Whether or not such makes sense to an individual is, of course, highly subjective.