Technology For Agents

Ryan Ward, a real estate specializing in Atlanta, Georgia real estate, wrote up a nifty review for Microsoft’s Office 2007 Suite that many real estate agents I’m sure have contemplating using (including me). With his permission, I’ve brought his review over to TechForAgents.com.

His review goes into depth on his experiences with the performance of Office in his day to day business, and what you can expect by migrating over to the new version of office.

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If you’ve been a subscriber to Top Producer, you’ve inevitably heard from their sales staff regarding the new Market Snapshot software being rolled out to many markets in the US.

This product will allow you to get great looking market updates for both buyers and sellers, which include sold history graphically mapped on a dynamic map. The map looks to be built using Microsoft Live technology, and buyers are updated by zip codes where sellers are updated based on a pre-determined radius.

The Market Snapshot provides valuable and timely data which addresses at-a-glance additional questions that consumers may have. This ability to trigger additional questions and concerns helps to shape a valuable dialogue with the sponsored agent and the inquiring consumer. This positions the agent as the interpreter rather than the simple provider of data which helps facilitate the first telephone contact. - Top Producer Market Snapshot

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In the past, Top Producer 7i hasn’t been the greatest email platform provider. Using their software, you can forward all emails to your Top Producer inbox and send emails from there, but the system really isn’t as robust as Google or Yahoo Mail, even Microsoft Outlook. Probably the best thing about using Top Producer for your emails is that when searching a contact in Top Producer, you can view their history and see a list of all emails sent to that contact in the past.

Our cries have been heard! Top Producer has now introduce Outlook Connector. This piece of software links your Top Producer account with Microsoft Outlook 2003 (2007 not yet supported) and comes with the following features:

• Email features within Top Producer 7i automatically launch Microsoft Outlook 2003 rather than Top Producer 7i’s My Email.
• When sending an email from Microsoft Outlook, the message is copied to the recipient’s contact history in Top Producer 7i.
• Search your Top Producer contact list and add contacts as message recipients, all from within Microsoft Outlook.
• Manage your Top Producer email and all additional email accounts directly from Microsoft Outlook.

This functionality comes at a hefty price, unfortunately, at $149. Though this is a one time fee, I have been using Top Producer 7i and Microsoft Outlook for quite some time now interdependent of each other, and I personally cannot see spending $149 to link the two at this time for a system that has been working fine up to this day.

As real estate agents, we must analyze all expenses and make sure that will all new added expenses, a replaceable income can be accounted for. In this case, linking Top Producer and Microsoft Outlook will not increase my sales directly, thus I cannot justify the expense to my business budget.

It’s always puzzled me why Top Producer charges for upgrades to their software such as this one. The new functionality should be used to entice new agents to become a user of their system, not as a way to continually hit the wallets of agents eager to invest in technologies that may not necessarily benefit their business. Top Producer 7i is a wonderful tool to have in your arsenal. A pricey upgrade such as Outlook Connector, though a nifty tool to have, is not really required and shouldn’t be invested in without making sure it can TRULY help your business become more efficient and prosperous.

You can learn more about Outlook Connector here.

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After a day long brainstorming session with our market centers top agents, I have come to the conclusion that there are quite a bit of real estate agents that are not using databases to their advantage. To put it plainly: If you are not using a database of some sort in your business to manage leads, contacts, and follow up, you are missing a potentially substantial portion of your business.

The Rudimentary Database

Many new real estate agents do not have a plethora of capital available to start their businesses, and I completely understand. When I started my real estate career, after paying my personal expenses, I didn’t have much to invest. This is why I offer a solution to those not wanting to spend money on a database from the start of their business.

OpenOffice is a free “Microsoft Office” like platform released through the open source community (it’s free to use) and strongly mimics the programs that come with Microsoft Office. With the installation of OpenOffice, you will get (most pertinent to real estate):

• Writer - Word Processor
• Impress - Presentation Software
• Calc - Spreadsheets

I highly recommend that if you do not want to spend any money in your business, but would like to keep track of clients and when you contact each, that you use a free spreadsheet program such as Calc to keep track of clients. This is a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) on it’s most basic level.

It’s simple! In the first column, key in the names of everyone you know. I would enter in your family members foremost, then friends, their friends, doctors, dentists, everyone! Your next column could be dedicated to the date you contacted the client last, or possibly the date you plan to contact them next. You can then easily sort the spreadsheet by the date column to learn which contacts you must contact and when. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it?

Most agents do not use any system. I ask you: If you are not using a CRM to keep track of present, past, and future clients - what system are you using that is proven to provide positive results? You can’t possibly expect to remember everyone and every time each must be called!

A Step Up - CRM’s for Agents

There are currently a wide variety of customer relationship management tools available to real estate agents. There are three that I personally have experience with and can suggest you look into if you are looking to build a good technical foundation for your business.

Top Producer 7i

From what I hear from agents that I meet, Top Producer (7i is their latest edition) is one of the most popular real estate focused CRM’s available. I personally use this CRM in my day to day business, and I would highly recommend anyone to speak with a sales representative to get the ins and outs of what this software has to offer your real estate business. This software is 100% online and is purchase on a monthly basis ranging between $30-40/month for a single agent license (some real estate offices have negotiated a discount with Top Producer - ask you broker if your broker does).

Act

Act has been around for quite a long time, and is more used across different sales industries in the world. If you are looking to keep your monthly expenses to a minimum, you can purchase Act outright; it is a software that you must install on your computer and can only be accessed on the computer the software is installed on. Act is a great tool, but it’s not real estate specific. You are bound to not utilize many features that Act can provide to your business, simply because it’s probably over complicating what real estate agents need in a CRM. The regular version of Act is currently available from their site directly for $199 (one time fee for purchase)

Act has recently released a Real Estate Edition of their software and is definitely worth a look. I personally do not have any experience with that version of their product.

Basic or Advanced?

As a new agent if you have the cash flow to purchase a real database software such as Top Producer or Act, I highly recommend you make that investment. This will enable you to provide a solid foundation for your business, as you will be able to consistently feed your database and use it to market to past, present, and future clients (leads). I certainly have been using one since day one, and cannot understand how any real estate agent can possibly feel they can tackle the real estate business without one.

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Top Producer offers a handy feature for real estate agents in it’s 7i version under a tab labeled “financial”. Inside, you will see that you can track your working expenses and buyer or seller net sheets. I haven’t experimented too much with the business finance tracker, but I have been using the seller net sheets and have been pleased.

When opening this feature, you’ll first notice the blank space with headers labeled “contact” and “address”. Top Producer 7i will save each of the net sheets you calculate and keep them stored on their servers. I didn’t really realize the usefulness of this feature until one of my listings received a counter and I had to quickly adjust the seller’s net on the fly. It was very easily perform due to the saved records that Top Producer quietly stored for me.

After created a mock net sheet, you’ll notice that many key features are asked for such as price, address, and selling expenses. Selling expenses could be closing costs, prorated property taxes, commissions, or the owner’s title policy. Regardless, it gives you the option for each expense to enter a percentage value or a static numerical value.

It’s actually quite simple from here; you must enter each expense the seller plans to incur during the sale of their home or real estate investment. At the bottom of this net sheet you will see the total estimated selling expenses, along with a total estimated equity to seller. This of course provides you with the numbers your seller really wants to hear. How much money will I have at the end of the day?

The last feature I’d like to go into is the reports option. I wouldn’t think that Top Producer 7i would force you to do a print screen to show this information to your clients; and they didn’t let me down. You also have the option to print the information contained in your finance records for your seller in a nice, professional report. This is what I bring to the seller’s home when presenting offers. Doing so allows the seller to easily see the selling expenses calculated precisely. A tool such as this does nothing but add to your value proposition as a real estate professional and establish that you really know what your doing.

This quick look at the technology currently available to real estate agents is just a peek into what Top Producer really has to offer. I use it in my day to day business and it comes as a highly recommended contact manager or transaction manager. Now that I have been using the finance tools I can also say the finance technology is also a highly recommended tool.

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