Keeping up with the advances in technology can be daunting, however, it's becoming more and more prevalent in the real estate industry. "I'm more of a relationship type of agent" you say? That's awesome, you can't replace authentic human connections with an AI Bot, but you also can't escape the fact that 97% of all home buyers start their search on the Internet, some of those may even be your past clients. Technology has the ability to take those past clients on a journey where they end up in another agent's orbit, then what?
Today's tech stacks are integrated, automated and designed to help you be more responsive and best of all save you time! Over 76% of agent's either don't have a website or one is provided by their broker. That means they are likely working two steps behind their clients using outdated technology and that's putting their client experience at risk.
The 5 essential tech tools a real estate agent needs in today's marketplace are:
Branded IDX Website - This is your dedicated website, with your branding and domain name, that has a live feed to your MLS. It will show available properties in real time so when the market is hot and listings come and go in a matter of hours, having direct access to the MLS is critical.
If you are going to spend money and resources into actively marketing yourself, you need a place to direct prospective customers where they can find value. Think of your marketing as a quarterback and your website as the receiver. Once a prospect lands on your site, you will have more options to engage and remarket to that person across social channels and the internet. The content on your website is also instrumental in building up your SEO so when prospects look you up, they can find you. Make sure your site is ADA compliant.
CRM (Customer Relationship Management) - You likely have some type of CRM either from your broker or one you subscribe to. This tech gives you a central location to manage your client relationships and interactions with both current and potential customers. You want to make sure your CRM can house all the basic contact information plus consolidate all contact attempts including calls, emails, texts and meetings. The more you can integrate your CRM with your website, lead sources and social channels the more time you'll save and most importantly the less chance prospects will fall though the cracks.
Marketing Automation - The best CRM's will not only be utilitarian as a data library they have the tools to harness and automatically nurture that data to generate marketing campaigns. Automation simply takes the guesswork and time investment out of the marketing process for lead generation, pipeline and the transaction. With robust data such as birthdays, anniversaries etc. you can increase the touchpoints of your sphere, instead of missing the opportunity to connect. With artificial intelligence (AI) added on, any cold lead that comes into your CRM will experience concierge service without impacting your time. You can step in personally any time but you won't have to waste time chasing leads that are not qualified.
Branded Comparative Marketing Analysis (CMA) - Make a great first impression with clients with a nicely branded, CMA when you estimate the property and provide an in-depth comps evaluation.
Social Media Marketing - At minimum, you should have a consistent presence on Social Media. If you love making videos and posts, great, there is nothing better than local, relevant, interesting and fun content, but are you consistent? There are a plethora of social media marketing tools out there, some completely automated with real estate content, so you only have to supplement your feeds when you have time. There are so many apps to choose from it is really a matter of style and content choice. That will have to be a dedicated blog post, so stay tuned. There are turn-key solutions where you pay more and they create real estate type content and post everything for you, then there are content only providers where you have to download and post yourself. It really depends on how much time and creativity you want to devote to the task.
Where Do You Start? - That's a good question there are a ton of software, apps and vendors out there, all touting they are the next big thing. There are solutions for everything you want to do, but it gets a little gangly managing different tools and platforms. The next big thing, I believe, really is the fully integrated marketing tech stack. There are a few front-runners in integrated tech stacks, such as Chime, Ylopo and KVCore that pretty much manage everything you need to do to grow your business from one dashboard. They centralize Website, CRM, Email, CMA's, Texting, Social, Digital Advertising and AI / Marketing Automation. I'm a big fan of Chime as an all-inclusive, robust and streamlined solution. Click here to be my guest for a no-obligation VIP demo to learn more about it, if you decide to subscribe this link also qualifies you for special pricing.
So here's my pitch! I can help you decide what you need right now and what you might need in the future and then help you pull everything together to get up and running. Click Here to access my schedule and set up a call to discuss. No cost, no obligation. Let's talk about your business challenges and how you want to serve your customers, then match you with the technology that works best for you and your budget!
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