Matterport’s Narrow Moat and the Future of Virtual Tours
Founded in 2011, Matterport had already taken on more than $60 million in investment before launching powerfully in real estate by 2016. They have taken on substantially more investment since.
TAKING BACK CONTROL: Top Real Estate Teams Ditch the Big Portals for Their Own Branded Google PPC and Social Media Lead Generation Campaigns
The biggest and most successful agents and teams are reclaiming control of their own brand and marketing by working with real estate focused digital marketing companies like Ylopo.
Stop focusing on GCI and start Focusing on Success-Driven Activities
There is a lot of noise in real estate right now – brokerages are worrying about a host of external factors beyond their controls - Compass and its latest set of acquisitions, whispers of a recession, bad weather keeping buyers away from Open Houses etc. While we always have to keep our eye on the industry and economy, it’s more important to keep your eye on something much closer to home that you CAN control that WILL have a REAL impact on your business. Many brokerages closely watch transaction closings and Gross Commission Income (GCI). Both are very important metrics, [...]
Redfin Offers Method To Modernize IDX
“Let’s modernize IDX by linking to the listing broker!” IDX or Internet Data Exchange is a thesis that was developed by the collaboration between Brokers and MLSs that outlines a set of display rules for listings on broker websites. The idea behind IDX is that of cooperation among brokers. Fundamentally, the IDX policy states that a broker allows all other brokers participating in an MLS to display their listings on any broker (and usually Agent) website. Over the years, the IDX policy has evolved. And today, Redfin CEO, Glenn Kelman suggests a radical new change. Kelman would like the IDX [...]
CoreLogic Innovation Grows User Base To More Than a Million Real Estate Agents
IRVINE, Calif., September 11, 2017—CoreLogic® (NYSE: CLGX), a leading global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider, announced today that its focus on innovation in real estate solutions is helping drive its market penetration to record heights. Across all its solutions for residential real estate—which include listing, property information, and brokerage management platforms—CoreLogic now serves more than one million real estate agents throughout the United States and Canada. The most widely used CoreLogic solutions are Matrix™, North America’s leading multiple listing platform with approximately 750,000 users, and Realist®, the real estate industry’s most popular property information and advanced mapping system with more [...]
Understanding Push Reporting
Many technology companies fail to understand the value of push reporting. WAV Group works with many technology firms to appreciate push vs. pull, but so many fail to grasp the importance. Every broker should pay attention to this example to evaluate how the software licensed in his or her company should leverage push reporting to improve the value. For example, I would love to see data and analytic companies like Terradatum, TrendGraphix, and ShowingTime incorporate this type of push reporting to show market trends, office productivity, and productivity by agent (solds, pending, active). In another example, I would love to [...]
CRM Tools Solve the Problem of Agent and Client Retention
Real estate brokerages waste valuable growth opportunities by over-focusing on new client adoption and agent recruitment instead of implementing solutions for the retention of both. Industry research shows that repeat clients spend 67% more than first-time clients, so agent and client turnover reduces a brokerage’s potential return-on-investment (ROI) for marketing and training dollars. The key to capturing these high yield sales is enabling agents to efficiently communicate with clients throughout the sales process and beyond. A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solution significantly boosts the ability of agents to foster long-term relationships, driving repeat—and more profitable– sales. The potential benefits of [...]
How Much Does It Cost to Recruit an Agent?
The National Association of REALTORS® hosted a Power Broker Roundtable and their recent topic was about agent recruiting and training. What I really like about the large broker roundtable is that you typically get some relatively pure information. I think that is the case here. The roundtable members for this discussion included representatives from some of the finest brokerage operators in America – Nick D’Ambrosia, Broker of Record, The Long and Foster Companies; Lennox Scott, CEO of John L. Scott Real Estate Seattle; Chad Ochsner, Broker/Owner of RE/MAX Alliance Denver; and Linda Sherrer, President and CEO of BHHS Florida Network. [...]
CRM Impact on Recruiting and Retaining Agents
WAV Group has deep experience supporting real estate brokers on the selection and adoption of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) for their agents. Sometimes the best business strategy is a simple one. All research points out that successful real estate agents have 500 or more legitimate prospects in their CRM and they actively communicate with those prospects with a customer for life philosophy. Bearing this in mind, a broker or manager can better understand customer value of agent recruiting and retention. If you have been in the industry a long time, you may know the story of Intero Real Estate in [...]
How MLSs Stand To Benefit From Upstream
The pessimist MLSs among you will look upon the title of this article with raised hairs. The lens that we have adopted here is for a single focus. Namely, to search for specific context within the databases of Upstream that may be of value to MLSs. Remember, Upstream does more than manage listings, but it does start with the MLS destination in mind. The MLS does not need to change their business rules, or modify their data schema. They need only disclose to their brokers what their rules and schema are and accept a broker load as is common among nearly [...]
Real Estate in Crisis – Is Nothing Better Than Something?
Real estate is a fascinating industry when it comes to making choices about something vs. nothing. Again and again, we see individual agents, brokers, Associations, MLSs, and Franchises make choices to set something when getting nothing may be the better strategy. I doubt that this article will have any change on the bearing of the industry, but in some small way it may influence one or more decisions today or this week by a few people. Why Do We Sacrifice Long Term Success for Short Term Gain? In our industry, people too often say “yes” to a bad deal. An [...]
Reducing Agent Attrition – Marketing to your Agents
Brokers across America do a great job of promoting their listings to potential home buyers and sellers with attractive flyers, online promotions, open houses, and effective website promotion, not to mention MLS promotion. Most brokers have a well-oiled system for building attractive marketing materials to sell their listings quickly. In my view, there’s a hole in the focus of marketing departments. Very few of the brokerages that we work focus on promoting their OWN brand and service offerings to their OWN agents. Brokers like to complain about the lack of adoption of tools and technologies. They wistfully talk about the [...]