Kick off the fall with Marketing and Branding Month at Inman. We’re going deep on agent branding and best practices for spending with Zillow, realtor.com and more. Top marketing executives drop by to share their newest tactics, too. It’s all you need to take your branding and marketing game to the next level.
If your business is booming due to the healthy market activity over the past two years, and you’re feeling stressed about that growth and maxed out, burnout could be in your peripheral.
Implementing automations, often called systems, in your business can help take stress off your plate so that you can focus on working with more buyer and seller clients.
The ability to leverage systems to scale growth is what elevates top producers from every other agent. Follow these tips to automate your business, fuel your growth and avoid burning out.
Don’t kick it old-school
Today’s agents are more technologically equipped than ever before — and your customer relationship management (CRM) software could be putting you behind your competition by default.
CRMs can track copious amounts of data and metrics while keeping everything organized and visible for easy delegation to your team, but a good CRM shouldn’t be bulky and unusable.
Rudy Kusuma
A common problem with most CRMs explicitly designed for real estate agents is they try to solve all your problems and, in the process, create new ones when it comes to useability. If you find yourself spending more time fiddling with your CRM’s settings and features than actually using the information it stores, it’s time to get a new one.
“Now more than ever, real estate is a competitive business, and the best way to stay competitive is to use technology better than the next guy,” Rudy Kusuma, founder and CEO of Your Home Sold Guaranteed, said. “Leverage existing technology to work for you so you save yourself time and stress, and ensure that you’re ahead of the competition.”
If there’s one thing that sets a great CRM apart from the rest, Kusuma added, it’s cloud integration. Shifting your relationship management to the web allows you to access data from your phone, laptop, office and anywhere in between.
It should make it incredibly easy to share and communicate with the clients whose relationships you’re trying to manage. It should simplify your ability to analyze and engage with data.
Don’t get comfortable
Don’t allow yourself to stagnate by setting up automation and then resting on your laurels. As they say, don’t set it and forget it. If a better system comes along, don’t be afraid to adapt or go in a new direction.
And don’t underestimate the value of “old-school” solutions to augment these systems. Although many facets of the real estate industry run best on the latest technology, there will always be some holdovers from the past, particularly when it comes to searching for properties.
Word-of-mouth still goes a long way, and we all know by now that the MLS listings don’t show every home on the market, and if you can find those homes that aren’t online, that automatically makes you a cut above the rest.
Accessing your network, working with local investors and fellow agents, and networking with homebuyers and sellers are all done best the old-fashioned way. Depending on your local market, it’s up to you to figure out what strategy works best for you. Just don’t write off the old way of doing things even as you begin to level up.
Practice task compartmentalization
Everyone in the real estate business wants to do it all — and we’re good at it. But if you’re scaling quickly or poised to do so soon, breaking down everything you do day to day and identifying where you can automate and outsource is likely the smart move for your growing business.
“If you’re a one-person show and you think you can do all these jobs, you’re going to burn out,” Kusuma said. “Machines don’t get sick, but people do. The solo agent model is impossible.”
From online showings to all-digital signings and closings, the digital transaction of real estate is so easy to compartmentalize and delegate.
Focus on doing what you do well, and find people and systems that will support you and augment your skills. You are only as successful as your mindset allows you to be, and you only have 24 hours in a day to harness that success and make your business work for you.
Victoria Kennedy is CEO of Atman Real Estate. Connect with her via email.
