Like it or not aesthetics play a very big role in the realm of luxury real estate marketing and the marketing of most luxury goods and services in general. Millions of dollars are spent each year on package design because it is human nature to make “snap” judgments based on outward appearance.  In our time-starved world, people often do not take the time to look below the surface and make decisions, even unconscious decisions, based on aesthetics alone.   As a luxury real estate marketing professional, you are doing yourself a tremendous disservice if your website (which may be the first point of contact for potential clients) does not reflect both your inner beauty and your competence.

You may recall the story of The Ugly Duckling by Hans Christian Andersen.   The cygnet’s egg rolled into the nest of a duck and the hatchling was mistaken for an ugly duck.  The “duckling”, who later transformed into a magnificent swan, was teased, criticized and ostracized. This classic story, among other wonderful lessons, points out the aesthetic cultural biases that most humans have been taught or have absorbed in the absence of unconditional love.

For better or for worse, aesthetic cultural biases exist.  Why not turn this to your advantage?  The internet has created an unprecedented hyper-condition known as “competition for attention or eyeballs”.  Your competition’s website is just a click away. Never have consumers had such a plethora of choices.  A stunning website that makes your competition’s site pale in comparison can not only capture attention, but also has a higher probability of capturing the lead.

Few luxury real estate marketing professionals pay enough attention to their “personal packaging”. Nor, do they realize what is at stake.  We often hear the excuse “if my website is not broken, why fix it?”  Your website may work, but if it is not remarkable in appearance and eye catching, it may not be used by potential clients in the first place.

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There are some positive news in Luxury Real Estate. This weekend, Barron’s which is part of Wall Street Journal came out with this report that bodes well for the second home market.  This is uplifting for all the luxury real estate marketing professionals at large.  If you are not mentioned, the up tick is on the way, you are next!

Barron’s Magazine just released this article for the 10 Best Places for Second Homes.  These are the places where the market is rebounding.

1. Maui

2. Kiawah Island

3. The Hamptons

4. Park City

5. Aspen

6. Pebble Beach

7. Palm Beach

8. Captiva/Sanibel

9. Ashevile

10. Gasparilla Island,

To read more

Have a fabulous week!

December 2009 saw the demise of Editor & Publisher Magazine, which had been around since 1854. It lays claim to being the chief chronicler of the American newspaper industry and has presided over the business for 125 years and is a clear signal that an era is rapidly drawing to a close.

NEWSPAPERS

Daily newspapers have been losing between 2% and 5% per year of their circulation base during the last 10 years. In 1940 there were 1,878 newspapers in the U.S. with a total circulation of 32.4 million. While the number of newspapers continued to decline — 1,611 in 1990 — their circulation increased: 62.6 million in 1990. But by 2008 the number of newspapers had dropped again by a little over 200 to 1,408 while circulation crashed down to 49.2 million.

In the first half of 2009 alone another 105 newspapers closed their doors — 10,000 jobs were lost. Even among the leader board 23 of the top 25 newspapers suffered between 7% and 20% declines in circulation this year (the worst slump since the Depression), and advertising revenue could be down as much as a 30% for 2009 when all the data is finalized.

One of the most critical statistics revealed that only 27% of Gen Y read a newspaper, compared with 55% of the Silent or Greatest Generation. And as the consumers change so do their preferences so other print related industries as well.

MAGAZINES

There are no reliable industry-wide magazine ad revenue numbers that are publicly reported (for obvious reasons), but according to a report compiled by The Magazine Publishers of America’s Publishers Information Bureau, automotive ads for the first six months of 2009 were down 21.3% and technology down 17.5%.

MAIL

The number of pieces of first class mail has steadily decreased and according to CEO Pat Donahoe, the USPS estimates a decline of 10 billion pieces in each of the next two years, dropping from a high of 213 billion pieces in 2006 to 170 billion in 2010. They are trying to cut costs in all areas to stop the bleeding: asking Congress to authorize reducing mail delivery to five days a week (approval unlikely), offering buyouts to 30,000 workers in 2010 to save $500 million and reducing the number of collection boxes across the country, of which in the past 20 years over 200,000 have vanished, more than the 175,000 that still remain.

SPAM

But it’s not just first class mail that is migrating to the Internet. The junk mail business is moving in that direction as well. Today there are 100 billion pieces of junk mail sent in the U.S. every year and 44% of it is discarded, unopened. Consumers respond to only 2% of all the junk mail sent and as a result one of the biggest producers of junk mail — the banking industry — has made getting out of the mail a high priority. Meanwhile it is estimated that 200 billion spam emails are sent every day.

DIECT MAIL

Revenue from direct mail is also expected to fall from $48.7 billion in 2008 to $29.8 billion in 2013 — a decline of 39% — dropping it from the #1 ad revenue generator to #4, behind the Internet, broadcast TV and newspapers. In a mid-2009 study, Anthea Stratigos, CEO of Outsell, Inc., a media research and advisory outlet, predicted that $65 billion would be siphoned away from traditional advertising channels in 2009 and be spent on companies’ own websites and Internet marketing.

The Shift in Real Estate Marketing

THE SHIFT

According to Pew Research, fewer than half of Americans (43%) say that if their local newspaper closed it would hurt their community “a lot,” and even fewer (33%) say they would personally miss reading the paper. Over 68% indicated that they get their news from local television or television websites, 48% from print, 34% from radio and 31% from the Internet.

INTERNET

Ninety trillion emails were sent in 2009 – that’s 247 billion per day. Twitter send 27 million tweets per day, You Tube serves up one billion videos per day and Facebook enjoys 260 billion page views per month. No wonder the Internet is redefining every industry, including real estate brokerage. Real estate professionals have to redefine what they do and how they do; where they find their customer and how they stay in contact with them.

Many progressive Realtors® have and continue to adapt every day uncovering new ways to use the Internet in their profession. However hundreds of thousands if Realtors® still remain stuck in a paradigm that is dead. The jury is still out on how many will survive and how many will retire over the course of the next few years.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

The changing arena of real estate marketing is but one of the key trends detailed by Stefan Swanepoel in the 2010 edition of his Swanepoel Trends Report. The 172-page annual report (www.RETrends.com) was published in February and is a must read for all Realtors® and real estate professionals.

]]> http://realblogging.com/stefan-swanepoel/is-print-finally-dead-read-all-about-it/feed/ http://realblogging.com/stefan-swanepoel/is-print-finally-dead-read-all-about-it/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/realblogging/wUIp/~3/qRqVsasZjTw/ http://realblogging.com/matt-jones/max-bang-series-become-a-new-home-specialist/#comments Fri, 05 Mar 2010 10:06:12 +0000 Matt Jones http://realblogging.com/?p=6730 The last installment was more geared toward brokers and team leaders so I will make this one for agents.  I’ll warn you: This strategy will not make you friends, but it will make you money.  If you are like most agents today, you are struggling for sales opportunities.  You know what to do when you find a new customer, and hopefully, you do a great job.  The problem is finding enough customers.

Here’s a great way to find new customers, and it costs almost nothing.  It works best if you have a pickup truck or mini-van, but that isn’t necessary.  You will be working out of your vehicle, so it is important that it be clean and nice looking, whatever it is.  Here is your investment:  Go out and buy some magnetic signs that say “New Home Sales” and your company name as required by law.  Contact local builders and tell them you are specializing in new construction sales, but would like to represent buyers.

Almost all builders (regardless of their listing agent) will be happy to supply you with floor plans, feature sheets, subdivision maps, pricing, etc. that you can put together into a three ring binder.  Now all you have to do is be driving around in those new construction neighborhoods about the time people come by to look at homes.

You are an “expert” since you have the specifics on every home, you have a builder key, and you have your sign on your vehicle telling the world you are!  So every evening (from about 4:00 to 7:00, you troll for new home buyers.  You have a mobile file cabinet with all your forms and supplies, and you can write an offer from the home or from your vehicle.

The listing company will often not appreciate your trolling for buyers in “their” neighborhood.  Tough!  You are not representing the builder, they are.  But you have every right to represent buyers of new homes.  What’s particularly cool about this strategy is that at about the same time most agents are going home from spending the day in the model home, the traffic in the neighborhood begins to pick up as buyers are cruising around after work looking for their next dream house.

You have the expertise, the key, the flashlight (if need be), and all the paperwork to make it easy.  Your lender is on call.  Nobody else is around to help them, and you just got an easy sale by being in the right place at the right time.  Plus, it’s new construction so there won’t be problems with appraisals, inspections, or unmotivated sellers.  Better yet, the prices will be higher, and your clients will be thrilled!  How cool is that?!  That’s Max-Bang!

The hedgehog concept was derived from a fable about a fox and hedgehog and illustrates the strategic difference between the two.  Foxes are dispersed strategists.  They will try any strategy that they believe will give them the immediate competitive edge. But, these strategies will not yield sustainable results.  Hedgehogs are focused strategists.  They fend off predators (think competitors) by rolling up into a ball which fully exposes their sharp quills or spines.

In business, hedgehogs have identified their winning strategy and their authentic brand identity. And, they stick to it with unwavering consistency.

Here is the competitive advantage that hedgehogs have over foxes:

1. Hedgehogs identify a market niche or an approach to marketing that they can master and be better at it than anyone else in their marketplace.  They feel like they simply have the natural talent to be the best at this.  To hedgehogs, it feels like this is what they were born to do.
2. Hedgehogs select something that they are passionate about.  They love what they do and feel lucky that they also get very well paid to do it.
3. Hedgehogs are not predators. They mind their own business. While your competition is constantly hatching new plans to out-fox you, your hedgehog strategy renders your competition irrelevant.

In our strategic branding and marketing consulting practice we help our clients to identify their hedgehog strategy.  We help them to bring their authentic personal brand identity into full focus. And, we coach them to stay in focus, by minding their own business when they execute their hedgehog strategy. Although, we call this journey the unabashed pursuit of market leadership, the real prize is the inner certainty that comes from knowing who they really are and from living a life of passion.

It is this inner certainty and the focus of the hedgehog that consistently attracts an abundance of ideal clients. This is one of the most important marketing principals of all time.  It is what separates the good from the great!

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Luxury real estate marketing professionals, it is time to turn up your nose to the template website and invest in a luxury website makeover!  If market leadership is your quest, owning a template website is tantamount to cutting off your nose to spite your face!

When we lived in Los Angeles, there was a plastic surgeon (pseudonym, Dr. Quirk) that became quite famous.  His specialty was nose reconstruction.  For quite some time he was extremely popular among the Beverly Hills beauty seekers.  However, all his “nose jobs” looked alike, as if he used a template.  He had a penchant for the upturned nose look regardless of the face it was on.

A template website is like a Dr. Quirk nose.  It defies your individuality. It shows a lack of marketing savvy and imagination!  Your website should be your silent salesperson. Do you want your silent salesperson dressed in the same uniform as your competition? This is the antithesis of luxury!

Recently, we researched the websites of one of our client’s closest competitors.  This is part of the competitive analysis that we do in our strategic branding and luxury website design services. We came across two identical web sites in the same city! The only difference was the background color; one had a blue background and the other was green.  What does this say to potential high net worth clients?

The French author, Philippe Mihailovich, defines luxury as “the very best that human beings can make, give or receive.” Does your website represent the best that you can be? Or, is it luxury website makeover time for you?

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First impressions are almost always irreversible and can make or break your connection in a matter of seconds, and how you connect on and offline will make determine if you will win or lose!

What can you do differently than you have been doing?  Are you relying on the same old things, systems, and habits…. or even more concerning, doing the same things your competitors are doing?

Today’s savvy consumer knows what they want, and are not willing to pay for services that do not meet their need. The largest buying segment of housing is GenX, and they are especially good at finding another professional who is willing to do it “their way” and fast!

So, how about tune up for your presentation program?  Whether you are presenting to a buyer or seller, creativity, expertise and delivery will boost or beat your chances.

Here are 3 key tips on how to fine tune your connection:

1) Speed of Response:   How fast are you responding to your lead requests?  If you don’t have systems in place to respond in a nano-second, your prospects are moving on to the next agent who does have a method to  respond  in real time with targeted information …and that is what it takes to make a first WOW impression!

2) When you are meeting face to face, have you revamped how you personally “go to market”?  Are you “market” presentable? Are you fully focused on your client? Have you anticipated their every need?

Before your meeting, are you equipped with a with deep needs analysis pre-written questionnaire that demonstrates you are prepared, interested and focused to authentically discover and fulfill their real objectives? 

Unfortunately, this is an area where many of us have slacked off. Having left a fast and furious marketplace, we didn’t have the luxury of time or the need to build trust bridges with our prospects. 

A slower market is loaded with multiple opportunities to engage, connect and earn the right to provide our services to those in need and a great time to demonstrate strong differentiation from our competitors.  As an example, if you are still running a paper CMA from your local MLS and showing up with a worn out one size fits all presentation, you might need to start looking for another job! 

NAR reports that in 2009 that 34% of the properties sold were purchased by GenX. Translated that means they are driven by their own core values and preferences.  Those preferences include real time response, deep expertise and real accountability.   Think about investing some time in a marketing makeover and don’t wait another minute to re-design how you go to market while you still can! NAR’s Learning Library offers some free and almost free online webinars to help you do just that.  Check them out at: (http://budurl.com/MurphyMktgMakeover)

 3) Get rid of the old tools and get good with the NEW ones!   You are right to be confused, frustrated and downright stubborn about trying to figure out what’s in what’s out/what’s hot and what is not, but that is no excuse. 

You might be able to connect with prospects, but keeping all the updates consistent and valuable takes help from techno tools.  Set aside some time or ask the experts what tools are recommended to help you service 24/7 without working all those hours.  

Learn how virtual tours like OBEO.com will do the reporting on activity to the seller automagically for you and engage an interested prospect with interactivity on the tour. 

Your time is your money, so employing automated, customized drip systems that offer opt-in/opt-out options integrated with your IDX information is the only way to provide real time information as it is listed to prospective buyers or sellers considering to market their home. 

NAR reports that approximately 98.9% of prospects search for properties on the Internet BEFORE engaging an agent. Surprisingly only 60% of agents even have a website!  Do the basics, but do them right. Get a full web marketing website that does the work for you. Check out  www.RealProSystems.com  and get the whole enchilada:  Podcasts, blogs, drip systems, automated campaigns, back end training and the list goes on.  You can’t afford to be the jack of all trades, so figure out what systems can best support your goals and go for the gold. 

We’ve heard if you keep on doing what you’ve always done, you’ll keep on getting what you’ve always gotten…and that’s just not true anymore!  We know we can no longer do what we’ve always done to even stay even with what we’ve generated in the past!   If you are truly serious about making money by leveraging your time and expertise, get with the program.   Very few customers or clients say I don’t want to work with that professional because they are too good at what they do, too eager to help me get exactly what I want and too much of an expert at their craft….just ask them!

Bio: Terri Murphy, Communication specialist is an author, speaker, communication consultant, and author of 5 books, including her latest with Donald Trump. She is the founder and Pres. of WomensWisdomNetwork.com and serves as CIO of U. S. Learning in Memphis and one of NAR’s GAME CHANGER 2010 Coaches. Email: Terri@TerriMurphy.com - And for more webinar resources visit: http://budurl.com/NARFREEWebinars

Social Media:

www.Facebook.com/TerriMurphy

www.Linkedin.com/in/TerriMurphyCommunications

www.Twitter.com/TerriMurphy

The creation, control, and conversion of leads determines the revenue and success of your business.  Most Speakers, Trainers, Coaches, and Authors focus a lot of their time on the creation of leads.  They try to sell you their “lead generation system” – the system that creates thousands of leads for you!  We have all heard of these third-party Internet companies that, in most areas, are charging Agents lots of money for low quality and low conversion rate leads.  The only people who are making money out of this deal are those Internet companies.

Champion Rule:  Creating leads is easy!  It’s managing and converting them that pose a challenge.

The real barrier in the equation isn’t lead creation, as everyone believes.  It’s in the management, conversion, and commitment of the leads.  Now, if you are an Agent reading this and don’t have enough leads right now, you might think I am wrong.  Bear with me as I present the evidence and truth.

There are literally thousands of ways for Agents to generate leads.  The list is really endless with new avenues being created all the time.  We have farming, cold calling, direct mail, expireds, direct response advertising, FSBOs, pay-per-click, calling our sphere, our website, calling past clients, REALTOR.com, calling current clients, relocation referrals, strategic alliances, open houses, IVR systems . . . you get the idea.  The list is really endless with unlimited sources from which to create leads.  Each with its own ratio of success attached to it.

I know Agents who generate all (or the bulk) of their business from only one of these sources, not a combination.  I had a friend in Portland sell as many houses as I did while I was selling real estate . . . over 150 a year.  He could connect over 80% of his sales to open houses.  He did them every Saturday and Sunday.  He was a master at meeting the people, connecting with them, and converting them to clients.  The truth is I would rather have my skin eaten off by ants than do open houses, but it worked for him.  The problem is not lead creation.

I get the same magic lead generation schemes daily via e-mail as you do.  I received one the other day from one of those “magic guys” who is an Agent and Speaker in Canada.  He was touting his latest protégé who did sixty transactions a year and generated over 1,200 leads a month.  This all happened his third year in the business.  By my third year in the business, I was doing over 100 transactions, so I wasn’t that impressed.  I realize, however, that the average Agent would be frothing at the mouth for 1,200 leads a month.  The whole focus was to promote this Speaker’s direct response advertising system that would create 1,200 leads a month for you if you followed his system.

I did what any good Coach would do and grabbed my calculator as I read the glowing copy of his marketing piece.  This “new superstar” Agent generates over 14,400 leads a year!  That means he has to invest his time and resources to manage, track, call, mail, e-mail, and try to convert over 14,400 leads annually.  If their claims of that lead volume are true, that’s a lot of leads to properly process.  The key word being, properly process.  The net result, in his case, of 14,400 leads is a mere sixty transactions.  That represents a conversion rate of .004167.  That is less than ½ of 1%!  In other words, he has to talk with, mail to, e-mail to, send information to, track, and manage 240 people to get one person to buy from this magical, easy, instant lead generation system.

An intelligent person comes to one of two conclusions (or a combination of both).  The first is that the quality of leads is poor (keep in mind that conversion rate is a function of the quality of the leads).  The cost of conversion runs so high that, by the time the advertising and marketing expenses are paid to generate the lead and run all 240 through a lead follow-up process to get one transaction, there is little (if any) net profit left.  The other conclusion is that the leads are better than his ½ of 1% personal conversion rate, and this Agent, like most, doesn’t know how to control, convert, and commit the leads.

It is also quite likely a combination of the two.  In any instance, the net result is vast logs of leads and few transactions.  I have a client in Toronto, Canada who is one of the best Agents in North America.  He has built a wonderful business with a large volume of production and a solid team.  He has eleven Buyer’s Agents who work for him.  Soon after we began working together, we were evaluating the numbers and ratios of his Buyer’s Agents from the previous year.  In that year, the team generated 5,537 leads that indicated some level of interest to buy.  They closed 276 transactions on the Buyer side from those leads.  Again, I instantly reached for my calculator and found that their conversion ratio was less than 5%.

During our discussion, I asked my client what he needed to do to increase his sales by the 100 units he wanted in the next year.  I had not yet shared with him the conversion number I had just calculated.  He said, “I will need to increase my leads by roughly 30%.”  That would be the natural response from most Agents, even great ones.  Why process, manage, pay to create, mail, e-mail, and invest staff time to deal with 30% more leads when there is a better way?  When I asked him if there was another way, he was stumped.  I said to him, “That’s why you pay me the big bucks!”  I shared with him that if we raised the conversion ratio a little less than 2%, he could add 100 units to his sales volume without the additional cost to generate another 1,661 leads.

This Agent’s situation was certainly much better than the “magic guy’s” example, but it isn’t where we should be as salespeople.  To have that many leads with that low of a conversion rate is really unacceptable; my client agreed, as well.  The truth is most Agents don’t know the number of leads they generate, much less the conversion percentage of those leads.  They have no idea what is really working in their business because they don’t source or track their leads well.

Champion Rule:  Each lead costs money to create.

Don’t think for a moment that there is not a cost attached to each and every lead generated.  There are costs to acquire that lead in advertising, marketing, your time, etc.  No matter what source you acquire the lead from there is a cost.  You can determine your hard costs to generate a lead by tracking the dollars invested to create leads and divide that by the number of leads you create annually.  That’s just the per-lead cost to create it.  Now, you have to manage it, track it, call it, and send stuff to it to convert that lead. 

Just think of the investment we have in each lead…and my client thought he needed 1,611 more of them!  Actually, all we had to do was increase his conversion rate by 2% to reach his goal.  It was a measly 2%!  We could and did do that – and more. 

I had him give me one more number that clenched it.  I asked him for the conversion rate of their Buyer Interviews versus their closed Buyer transactions.  In other words, how many interviews did they conduct and how many sales did they make?  The worst Buyer’s Agent had a 46% close rate; the best Buyer’s Agent had a 68% close rate.  All the others were somewhere in between.  So, the team had a less than 5% conversion rate for leads, yet an above 50% close rate on average, once they got them face-to-face.  The barrier for most Agents isn’t lead generation; it’s lead conversion from the initial contact to the face-to-face meeting.

I would venture to say that wherever you are in your career today, whether you are a new Agent, struggling, or trying to break through to the Champion level, you can easily achieve a 50% conversion rate once you get face-to-face with a Buyer or Seller.  Leads are the lifeblood of your business; but managing, controlling, and converting them to face-to-face meetings is the heart muscle of your business.  Do you have a healthy heart?

I have been preaching and teaching this message for the last seven years.  The real estate community is finally starting to get it.  Your lead follow-up is like the hub of the wheel in your business.  All avenues of lead creation lead to the hub of lead follow-up.

The ability to define, categorize, systematize, follow-up, control, manage, process, convert, and commit the lead is far more valuable and far more challenging than creating it in the first place.

Ironically, it seems that this crucial step, that builds strong rapport, has all but dropped out of our digital lives.  Phones have become “smarter” and smart people need to use them more often while networking professionally.

This guy really understands the power of networking and is very well-connected.  While we were on the phone, he opened up his list of contacts on Linked In (remember the Rolodex?). Like a matchmaker, he specifically looked for people that he felt we should meet (and vice versa).  He offered to make introductions and we gladly accepted.  He did not expect us to do the same for him right then and there, because he understands the power of “giving first”, which is all part of the art of networking.

Needless to say, we were both impressed and appreciative. And, we are in the process of following up on all of his suggestions.   There is no question that we will reciprocate, if possible, and match his generosity.  At the very least we will “pay it forward”, meaning we will do the same for someone else.

This scenario has been going on in one form or another for as long as humans have transacted business together.  It is professional networking at its best.

Linked In is simply a very efficient professional networking TOOL. It does not replace the phone!   It makes it easier for our new friend to search his contacts and recommend connections. All we need to do is request an introduction and he simply passes it along to his friends with a single click and a brief note.  The tool of Linked In makes this age-old process quicker and easier, smoother, actually effortless, once you get the hang of it.

As a luxury real estate marketing professional, are you deliberately expanding your sphere of influence on a consistent basis, through professional networking?  The more contacts you make the more commissions you earn.  Whoever has the most high trust referral relationships wins!

So, if you are hesitant to learn the mechanics of professional networking tools like Linked In, snap out of it! . And, remember to pick up the phone!

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Note that the title uses both of the terms CRM and Contact Manager. The fact is that the following bullet points can not all be accomplished with a contact manager. The reason for the title is that a significant percentage of agents have either never heard the term CRM (Customer Relationship Manager) at all, or they have heard it but do not know what it means, or they do not understand the difference between a Contact Manager and a CRM. Therefore, if the words Contact Manager are not in the title, they may never find this post!

An example of a Contact Manager is Outlook. Examples of CRM’s are Top Producer, Agent Office, AdvantageXi, Active Agent for Outlook, etc.

It comes down to recognizing what you want to accomplish with a CRM , and then purchasing according to your needs. Following is a list of what you can accomplish with a good CRM. The more of these things you do within your CRM, the more efficient you will be. If you want to do all or much of what is on the list, then you need a CRM as opposed to a Contact Manager.

• Prospecting - Get suspects, turn them into prospects, and turn them into sales, by knowing who they are, what they want, and when they want it, all in significant detail, and by being reminded to capitalize on that information automatically.
• Lead distribution and tracking - The ability to give out a lead to a team member, and then follow-up to see if that member is doing what you want them to do to capitalize on that lead.
• Lead source tracking - Knowing where your business is coming from and spending your marketing time and money accordingly/wisely.
• Referral tracking - Knowing who is referring you the most business, so you know who to do more for in return.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              
• Contact management - That means everyone! Suspects; prospects; clients; vendors; friends; relatives; neighbors. Knowing how to find any information on anyone, even from many years ago, with a few clicks virtually instantly.
• Mail merge­ - Do all print or e-mail merging from within the CRM eliminating redundant external databases.
• E-mail management - How many e-mails are in your inbox? They should be with your contacts, or with the property, where you can find them, quickly, not in your inbox.
• Document management - Store all documents and photographs relevant to a transaction with the transaction record and/or the contact record. Having a complete paper trail all in one location is invaluable if you are challenged.
• Appointment management - The ability to not only track when and where you had an appointment with someone, but also the ability to note the substance of that appointment.
• Listing coordination - The biggest complaint lodged against Real Estate agents has always been poor communication. A comprehensive, automatically executed listing plan enables you to turn those complaints into praise effortlessly, automatically.
• Closing coordination - Too many details can fall through the cracks. The busier you get, the more details you have swimming around in your head. And each day you have to make many decisions regarding what actions you need to take for which transactions. Even the best paper list and file methods are rife with bottlenecks and inconsistencies. Having all the information you need in one place and a to-do list automatically posted on your calendar makes your job far easier and more stress free.
• Communications documentation - Also known as History, there is a place where it all comes together. Tasks, phone calls, e-mails, letters, post cards, fliers, and appointments. A contiguous record of everything that has happened with that contact or transaction.
• Time management - Having automated to-do lists, and organized methods of consistent follow-up. Decide what you want to do, once, and automatically follow up that way every time from then on.
• Risk reduction - Knowledge is power. If you use a CRM properly and consistently, you will automatically gravitate towards centralizing the huge volume of detail with which you work every day. It can not be overemphasized how important it is to have a contiguous chronological accounting of any contact you have with clients and even prospects. You can be challenged at any point about a myriad of issues from Fair Housing Violations to Mortgage Fraud, Procuring Cause, and any number of other things. A CRM can easily and automatically organize you. Having complete records of; phone calls, letters, e-mails, appointments, etc., insures that you will enjoy a much better position from which to defend yourself if need be.
• Post closing follow-up/client retention - Not staying in touch with past clients is one of the single biggest causes of loss of income in the Real Estate sales industry. Never lose another referral due to your failure to stay in touch.
• Staff training and accountability - Personnel retention is a problem that never goes away. Having a system in place with notes built into the CRM task lists significantly diminishes the impact of a lost staff person. It enables you to have the new person step right into a tried and true system, and none of the details are lost in the transition. Additionally, it provides a clear picture of exactly who is doing what each day with regards to each individuals responsibilities.

If this list has you interested, it is likely that you are ready for a comprehensive CRM solution. Just realize that the dollar investment in the CRM is the easy part. The time investment is the tough part. But the rewards are more than you can appreciate until you get there.