Pausing on Purchasing

Millennials are waiting much longer to sign the dotted line on a house because – surprise – it’s more expensive! A report by SmartAsset claims that in larger cities, it takes nearly a decade to save up for a 20% down payment for a home. Student debt, which has hit an all-time high, is another key factor in saving for this generation as well.

Because of this, millennials are renting longer – and most are doing it on their own. Milestones like marriages that are associated with home buying are happening later. When they are ready to purchase a home, most are skipping starter homes and going straight for the luxury properties. 

Commuting and Suburbs

Millennials are moving to areas with strong employment and wage growth. Some of these areas, however, have too big of a ticket price for even modest homes.

To remedy this, millennials are instead becoming super-commuters: individuals who resort to commuting 90 minutes or longer each way to work in exchange to live in suburbs with lower housing costs.

Take a look at the top 10 cities millennials are migrating to. Do any of these come as a surprise?

Using Trends to Your Advantage

Some of the top areas may come as a surprise, but you can use these to your advantage. Are there any luxury condos or high rises near the companies who are drawing top talent that have the option to rent or buy? Are there suburbs that have lower costs for properties, but higher ratings for public transportation? How do the homes rate for energy efficiency?

ake some time and get to know your potential clients. Marketing towards these current trends and investing time into studying what’s hot can only come as a benefit to you and your business.

The post Marketing to Millennials: Identifying Trends for Future Homebuyers appeared first on WolfNet.

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Most businesses struggle when it comes to fast response times. A lead response study by Harvard Business Review of 2,241 firms found the average lead response time for B2B companies was 42 hours, and 23 percent of companies never responded.

We’re a little better in real estate, but still nowhere near where we need to be. An agent responsiveness study conducted by WAV Group for Weichert Realtors found the average time an agent took to respond to a lead was 917 minutes. Nearly half (48%) of buyer inquiries never received a response.

There’s an enormous chasm between how fast businesses are responding today and how fast customers want a response. Researchers say 41% of US consumers admit they are more impatient today than they were five years ago, due to their over-reliance on technology to complete everyday life activities.

On social media, 84% of consumers expect a business to respond within 24 hours of a posting. On Twitter, people who are complaining to a company expect a response with an hour. It’s the same for email. And if they call you, a consumer will only wait on hold for an average of 11 minutes before hanging up.

Fortunately, three trends have rapidly emerged to specifically address your client’s need for speed: automation, digital conversations, and artificial intelligence. Let’s take a look at how each of these can help you grow your business faster by tackling the speed issue.

Automation

Automation has become more than a time-saver for businesses and their sales forces. It’s also become a way to improve how we incorporate technology into our daily business lives. Take the CRM, for example. Automation has accelerated adoption of a well-designed CRM, like Salesforce, because it makes a CRM a more powerful business tool.

For example, a study last year by Introhive revealed 58% of users found a CRM was more helpful when the CRM automatically inputs data from other sources. Nearly half (47%) said a CRM was more helpful when it automatically surfaces important insights on contacts, accounts or deals. And 46% said a CRM was more helpful when it can automatically format important insights for easy communication with customers or prospects.

Automation is also helping to turn data into customer trust. Automation improves four crucial areas when it comes to mining data: speed, consistency, accuracy and scalability. Because the automation process helps to ensure data consistency and accuracy, the reliability of the data is enhanced.

The deeper insights that automation helps draw out of the data lead to better understanding. And increased understanding can translate into greater empathy from your customers. The ability to provide this experience with warp speed, and to do it again and again, builds customer trust.

Digital Conversations

Conversation interfaces are changing how we think about technology. How our customers interact with technology on a daily basis has also changed. The good news is: This is a space where your company, large or small, can help close the speed gap in meeting customer response requirements.

The first area of digital conversations you can apply to grow your business faster includes the world of bots. A bot is simply a software program that can execute commands, such as reply to messages or perform routine tasks, typically automatically. In real estate, the most common use is for agent websites, where chatbots often are used to conduct a text conversation to answer basic customer questions. Chatbots are typically used when a popup is deployed, inviting questions a website user may have.

Today, there are all kinds of bots with specialized purposes. Information bots use chatbots, the same technology that agents use, for everyday consumer requests. Application bots are used to build interfaces to mobile applications. Enterprise productivity bots help streamline work activities and improve efficiencies. And Internet of Things (IoT) bots enable conversational interfaces for device interactions.

Today, messaging bots powered by AI are huge timesavers that make business more profitable. Facebook Messenger alone has 110,000 bots.

Remarkably, 44% of consumers say they prefer chatbots for customer service, according to a research study by Aspect. The study also found that 65% of consumers feel good when they can resolve a customer service issue without a live person. That’s up from 57% in a year. And 70% of respondents prefer to use chatbots to interact with companies for simple to moderate interactions and transactions. As chatbots get smarter, consumer preference is swinging towards digital conversations.

The other area that businesses can leverage to grow faster is in the voice-activated speaker world of Amazon Echo and Google Home. Your customers are embracing this new technology. These voice assistants are the most likely technology to be used by consumers, and 56% of all consumers say they like the latest technology, according to research by Fetch.

More importantly, 72% of people who own a voice-activated speaker say that their devices are typically part of their daily routine. And this number might scare you a bit: 41% of people who own one of these devices say it “feels like talking to a friend,” according to a Google/Peerless study.

How can you tap into this new tech? Customers want to access information about your business on these devices:

•  52% want information about deals

•  48% want personalized tips and information that can make their lives easier

•  42% want information about upcoming events and activities

•  39% would like options to find your business or your hours of operation

•  38% want to use these devices to access your customer support

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

The last top trend that can help you grow your business is one we’ve already covered at a surface level. Artificial intelligence (AI) is what is makes automation better, chatbots smarter, and Echo and Google Home devices work.

But AI will do even more to help you grow your business if you let it. A great example is OJO Labs, a real estate AI startup from Austin. Like Siri or Alexa, OJO’s AI assistant answers questions that some consumers searching for a home may be hesitant to ask an agent. Consumers in the very early stages of a home shopping process often don’t want to bother an agent with questions, while others fear asking an agent questions could result in sales pressure. OJO’s AI assistant solves both problems.

By tapping into WolfNet’s vast database OJO is already pretty smart. A home shopper can text OJO and ask if a property has a certain feature, like a backyard. OJO AI response? “Yes, it has 4 large oak trees for privacy and shade around the back patio.” Right now, OJO is using image recognition software and AI to quickly learn what a home buyer likes and doesn’t like about homes. It then searches through millions of photographs in seconds to find the homes that match the buyer’s personality and style.

Another example is using AI that most business can relate to is for lead scoring. Over time, AI gathers and analyzes data to learn things about your leads. It starts to discover which leads are most likely to convert and then scores your leads. This allows your marketing folks to figure out which channels are delivering the highest-scored leads. And that will lead to improving your ROI on your marketing spend.

Most importantly, AI gets better over time because it gets smarter. If you have an AI for your CRM, such as Salesforce Einstein, then the more it learns, the better insights and suggestions it can provide your business.

In the end, these three trends — automation, digital conversations, and AI — can all help you increase your response speed. That will help you grow your business more rapidly because customers not only want better service, they will also pay for it.

Gladly’s 2018 Customer Service Expectations survey indicated that 68% of customers would pay more to the company that provides great service: 33% would pay 1-9% more; 27% would pay 10-20% more, and 8% would be willing to pay over 20% more if the service was great.

Jump into these trends, provide your customers the speed they need, and they will reward your business for the enhanced service you can deliver.

The post Three Trends to Help Grow Your Business Faster appeared first on WolfNet.

Abstract of Title

This document includes all written history related to a particular property, and may include information on liens, transfers, sales, tax liens, Home Owner Association restrictions, easements, and more. The Abstract of Title is held and maintained by local municipalities and includes financial details, notes, and information on the involved parties regarding each transaction, lien, or other circumstance. This document is extremely useful for buyers and should be a must-read for them before they buy a property.

Appraisal

An estimate of the true (or fair market) value of a property’s worth. It takes into account the property and its condition, local and neighborhood data, and the larger regional housing market to represent the actual worth of a home in its current state. An appraisal is done by an appraiser, a listened or certified professional who has had training in determining home values. Appraisers can be hired by sellers to determine an accurate selling price for their home or by buyers to ensure accuracy and price in the mortgage, but in most cases appraisers are contracted by lenders.

Assessment

An assessment determines how much a home-owner will pay in property taxes for their home. It is determined by the local government and varies depending on location, but it usually includes a 1) legal description of the home and 2) separate listed values for the land and structure (assessed value). It is important to help buyers compare this to their appraisal—if the house isn’t valued the same on each, something may be flawed in either document. The value of a home in a legal assessment is typically determined by a comparison of recent sales of comparable homes or calculating what it would cost to rebuild the home and adding that number to the land value to come up with a total.

Breach of Contract

Words that no agent, buyer, or seller want to hear. A breach of contract is when a seller or buyer backs out of the transaction or doesn’t follow through on their part of the deal. Examples are if a buyer doesn’t pay the seller on time or a seller gets a better offer and rescinds the original buyer’s bid after agreeing to it. Depending on the type of breach of contract and on the parties involved, they often spur on legal action from either party. A breach of contract can also be on the agent’s side—when an agent doesn’t follow through on their fiduciary duties (see definition #13), they can be just as liable for issues as a buyer or seller in breach of contract.

Buyer’s Agent / Seller’s Agent

Congratulations, you’re a real estate agent! But, what kind are you? A buyer’s agent represents the buyer in the transaction, helping people find homes they want to buy. They are paid by the seller’s agent or brokerage after their client purchases a property. Most agents start out as buyer’s agents because they have more deals than seller’s agents and it offers you the ability to learn more about what buyers want and the challenges of home buying. On the flip side, seller’s agents represent home-sellers, which means being responsible for promoting their clients’ property, showing their homes, and other selling-related tasks. Seller’s agents usually get fewer but more lucrative clients compared to buyer’s agents.

Closing Costs

After a home transaction makes is closed (closing: the period of time it takes for both parties to agree on everything, which can range drastically from a day to several weeks), buyers have to pay for several closing costs associated with getting access to their new home. There are several potential closing costs that vary depending on location, including fees related to the application, appraisal, closing, home inspection, and more. Closing costs can be avoided by the buyer if they get a no-closing-cost mortgage, because the fees are typically either incorporated into the total of the mortgage or the mortgage has a raised interest rate.

Commission

It’s the money you are owed after a deal you are a part of closes, paid for by the home seller to their agent or brokerage. Most commissions are around 6% of the home’s final sales price, split between the seller’s agent and buyer’s agent for a grand total of 3% for each side. While 6% is the average there is no fixed percentage, as commissions are negotiable and depend on the type of property being sold and the effort an agent will have to put into it to sell it.

Cost Sheet

This sheet is for your buyer clients, it includes a list of all of the closing costs and associated buying fees they will have to pay once they purchase the home. This sheet is given to them by their lender, and while some of the costs may be deferred to the seller, most of the costs will fall on your buyer client. On the flip side, sellers receive a seller’s net sheet, which is given to them to present their assumed net proceeds from their sale after expenses.

Disclosure

Home sellers and those representing them in the transaction must disclose everything about the property—disclosing all problems with a property is a must-do for sellers. It’s important for you to help your sellers know which issues they have to disclose and encourage them to disclose them. If sellers don’t disclose every problem, it can come back to bite both them and their agent in the form of reputational damage, lost revenue, and even legal disputes.

Fair Market Value

The fair market value, or FMV, of a home is the calculated total worth that factors in things like appraisals, assessments, and real estate agent expertise. The fair market value should not be influenced by how much money is left on the mortgage or what the buyer wants to pay, it should be impartial. The fair market value is used when a property is transferred or for tax or insurance purposes.

Fiduciary Duties

No matter whether you’re a seller’s agent or a buyer’s agent, you have what are called fiduciary duties to your client. These are legal requirements that you must uphold whenever you work with a client. The duties include loyalty, confidentially, disclosure, obedience, reasonable care and diligence, and accounting, as well as anything included in your client contract.

Grantee and Grantor

A grantee is the person buying a home and receiving the deed and a grantor is the home seller transferring their deed. Grantors have the power to alter a deed before (and sometimes after) it is transferred, including directives on how the property can be used, sold, or reclaimed. Deeds are legal documents, and it’s important to note that title officers and real estate agents aren’t lawyers, so they are prohibited from providing legal advice.

Home Equity

Home equity is the value that a home owner has paid into the mortgage. Equity can increase over time depending on the local housing market, any improvements made to the home, and if the loan balance is paid down. Helping your sellers maximize their home equity when selling by enlisting the help of a photographer to take great photos and videos of their property is a great way to get the highest value out of the transaction.

Listing

A listing is how a seller’s agent promotes their client’s home online, in person, or otherwise—it is the legal agreement between a home seller and whoever is representing their property that allows the brokerage, agency, or real estate agent to promote it and receive a fee or commission for their services. Using an IDX property search on your website and knowing how listings are added to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) are both important checklist items for seller’s agents. There are several types of listings, from open listings that may be handled by several brokers or agents simultaneously to exclusive authorization to sell listings, where only one agency or brokerage is given the go-ahead to list a property.

Real Estate Agents, Brokers, and REALTORS®

Real estate agents (aka you) are professionals who are licensed to negotiate and arrange the buying and/or selling of properties. A broker is a licensed real estate agent who then goes on to pass their state’s brokerage exam. They can work on their own or with other real estate agents under them. An associate broker is an agent who has passed the brokerage exam but chooses to work under another broker. A REALTOR® is an agent or broker who is a member of the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR), which requires them to uphold the NAR’s code of ethics and abide by their standards—real estate agents and realtors are not the same thing.

Title and Deed

The title is the legal way of saying you have ownership over a property, while the deed is a group of legal documents that transfers a title from one owner to another. To make a deed legally binding it needs to be signed by a judge or by someone at an assessor’s office, and it must also be signed by both the buyer and the seller. Titles can be insured with title insurance, which can help buyers mitigate legal problems like previously unknown liens or issues. Sellers can also have title insurance to ensure that future issues with buyers are taken care of.

Real Estate Scholar Status Achieved

After diving into these 17 need-to-know real estate terms, be confident in your knowledge, and further your journey as a new agent.

For more tips and information for new agents, read WolfNet’s free Guide for New Real Estate Agents to learn the ropes of real estate licensing, marketing, and more.

The post 16 Definitions Every New Real Estate Agent Should Know appeared first on WolfNet.

Company retreats aren’t just for big corporations. Brokers can have them for their employees, too! Your employees will be happy to know that you value them enough to take them on a trip, near or far, and invest in their growth at your company.

No matter if your retreat has intense team-building activities (like white water rafting) to more laid-back fun (like relaxing at a resort), a retreat can renew and invigorate your employees’ connection to your mission, values, and goals.

Here are our top five reasons why you should plan a retreat for your employees:

1. Boost Morale

Everyone needs to know they are valued. Employees who feel valued at work report higher levels of engagement, satisfaction, and motivation, compared to those who don’t feel valued by their employers, according to the American Psychological Association. When your employees feel valued and you create a culture of positive thinking morale goes up and so does productivity. A note on productivity: If your agents need help being productive, we have a few tips that can help in our blog “How to Be Productive During the Summer Months.”

2. Uncover Unique Skill Sets

Sometimes we all get caught up in day-to-day tasks, and often only exercise the skills we need to get the job done. A retreat setting removes the day-to-day grind and allows for more skill learning and growth that you never knew your employees had. New scenarios let people open up, try new things, and uncover skill sets they (and you) didn’t know they had.

3. Communicate Goals

A summer retreat is the perfect time to refine your direction and renew your firm’s sense of purpose. Removing the distractions that bog people down can help you communicate important messages and receive crucial feedback on your firm’s goals and aspirations for the future. When your employees feel involved in the process they will also be more committed to achieving the goals you all create together.

4. Deepen Employee Connections

Many of your employees might not interact with one another. If they work on different teams, or work semi-independently as many agents do, they might not have a lot of experience talking with one another. Summer retreats can create a stronger bond through shared experience and communication in a new and fun environment that isn’t the office.

5. Increase Understanding of Different Perspectives

Each group dynamic is different, but being together for several days means your employees are bound to disagree on any number of topics and decisions.Understanding and respecting why people disagree is great for creating a culture of mutual respect. Even those who are very similar will have minor disagreements with one another, and these areas, the gaps where they don’t agree, can provide learning opportunities and can help people bond once the discussions are over.

It’s plain and simple: summer retreats can be a lot of fun and offer a new atmosphere for growth, renewed sense of purpose, and revealing skills and attributes you didn’t know your employees had. For more real estate tips and tricks, follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

The post Why Brokers Should Plan a Summer Retreat for Their Employees appeared first on WolfNet.

We’re providing you with several helpful tips to help you make it through the workday and beyond that – to be more productive throughout summer.

Reframe the Way You Think of Work

Before you even step foot in the office picture yourself at work: getting things done, calling clients, making sales. Don’t imagine your day at work as just you, sitting at your desk. If you reframe the way you think of work before you even get there it will set you up to be more productive and you’ll value your accomplishments more. Once you’re at work declutter your desk and add photos and decorations that you like. Surrounding yourself with positive images and memories can help you stay positive even when the workday feels long

Create Attainable Goals

Have you ever had a goal that reads like this?
I will respond to every email by the end of the day.

There are two things wrong with this example. One is that, depending on your inbox, this goal will be very difficult to accomplish. Two, this goal isn’t measureable, it is either “Yay, I did it!” or “Darn, I didn’t make it.”

Day-to-day goals need to be more specific and ranked by priority. Here is our revised, narrowed-down do example:
I will respond to 25 emails from leads in the purchase phase of the customer journey by Friday at 12:00 pm.

Now you have a goal that is measurable, specific, and set within a time frame. Stay on track and motivated by creating bite-sized goals throughout the summer.

Remove To-Do List Items that Don’t Help You

You have a challenge ahead of you as a real estate agent: 52% of buyers in every generation said that finding a property was the most difficult step in their home buying process (according to the National Association of Realtors). You’re the guide who will help them through the most difficult part of the process, and to be successful you need to be focused on that goal.

To get to the end game you have to remove all of the distractions on your to-do list that aren’t helping you convert leads to buyers. If something isn’t helping you earn revenue, don’t do it. Now that isn’t to say you should completely abandon all improvement projects that don’t directly impact sales, but definitely table them if more pressing things need to be done. There are several projects, like updating your website or IDX property search, that directly impact your sales numbers and customer experience even if they seem like less important tasks. The point is: remove anything you don’t need to get done right away and prioritize what you have left.

Celebrate Your Accomplishments

After all of this hard work reframing your workday and creating goals that are worth being on your to-do list you have a reason to celebrate! Each time you check something off make sure to reflect on the positives and what you learned from the experience. Celebrate the small accomplishments and the big ones, and when you accomplish especially difficult or large tasks, give yourself a reward. Don’t scold yourself when things go wrong: be happy when you have a breakthrough and keep on keepin’ on.

The post Productivity Tips to use During the Summer Months appeared first on WolfNet.

There are many components to success in real estate. From networking to marketing and everything in between, it can feel like you aren’t sure which things you should be doing now, later, or at all. This is where a mentor steps in–an experienced, successful agent who can show you the ropes is a great asset to have in your corner, and a highly recommended plan for any agent looking to grow their business.

But before we explain how to obtain a mentor, we’ll lay down some ground rules.

Mentor/mentee relationships are mentee driven. You have to find and reach out to your mentor–not the other way around.

Unfortunately, your mentor doesn’t have all the time in the world to mentor you (or others). Respecting their time and not calling them at every chance will help keep your relationship strong.

Mentors can’t teach you everything you need to know. They are there to answer your questions and provide feedback, and they expect that you will already know the ground rules about real estate selling.

Before you find a mentor, you need to define what your goals are, have a year or more of experience under your belt, and know which questions to ask your mentor. Mentors want to help you learn and grow, but they can only do that if you are prepared to drive the relationship and show initiative. Know where you want to go from where you are right now. If you don’t have goals and aspirations, how can a mentor help you improve your professional life? If you’re hurting for actionable goals we have a few ideas: start your own real estate blog, increase your lead generation through video, convert more leads using marketing automation, or update your outdated website.

The Importance of a Mentor

Mentors can give you crucial feedback to help you avoid mistakes, improve your strategy, grow your business, and so much more. You can also learn a lot by watching what your mentor does: what they write about on their blog, which professionals they work with, and how they manage their time. Applying some of the techniques they use to stay on top can help you rise to their level someday.

You’re all fired up and you understand the ground rules of mentoring, now it’s time to get practical. Up next: learn how and where to meet a mentor.

Meet a Mentor and Start the Relationship

Start by attending local events in your area, real estate-oriented and not. Do some research before you go; Google “location real estate agent/broker/investor,” and read through the websites of experienced real estate professionals in your area. When you find someone who you think could be a good mentor match try to see which events they might be attending and start talking to them there.

If there aren’t many opportunities in the real world to meet your mentor, a cold call or email is always possible, too. Just make sure not to start it with “Hi, I’m a new real estate agent looking for someone to mentor me…” because you want to position yourself as someone with experience who wants feedback, not someone who has no experience who wants a real estate teacher. Showing that you know who they are and what they’re about is a must. An example of this would be including an aside about their work you’ve seen online, that you’ve heard about them from a mutual contact, or if you have met them in passing, remind them about it.

It’s a Two Way Street

Once you’ve connected with a mentor and had a few coffee meetups and phone calls it’s time to double down and assess what you can offer your mentor.

Many agents, brokers, and other real estate professionals are extremely busy and could use someone to help with small tasks like photography or writing website pages. Not all mentors expect this as a part of the mentor/mentee process, but the ones who do will be grateful. Before you offer up your services make sure to figure out the balance between how much time you have to give and if it’s worth it to keep your mentoring relationship afloat. Mentors who expect you to spend too much time or effort helping them are not mentors you want to have.

Stay the Course

There will come a time when you and your mentor are very comfortable with one another, meaning that you might receive difficult feedback that you weren’t expecting. While this feedback can seem harsh, it’s important to remember this is exactly what a mentor is for. They will know you and your business better than most, and they give you feedback to help you succeed.

If your mentor relationship is really working out remember to keep it fresh and driven. Keep asking them for feedback and insight, and most of all keep meeting them halfway. A mentorship is a partnership. Each of you give and take and you both become better for it.

Browse the WolfNet blog for more helpful how-tos and tips.

The post How to Find a Mentor in Real Estate and Grow Your Relationship appeared first on WolfNet.

Does your day feel like a cascade of tasks with no breaks for solving some of your larger problems? Do you feel overwhelmed and like you could really use either a) more hours in the day or b) less projects to do? Then it’s time to learn and master new time management skills.

Let’s start at the beginning: addressing your daily activities as a real estate agent.

Define Your Day

Jumping from task to task might just be how you’ve always done things. But we’re here to say: there is another way. Instead of going into your workday unprepared and ready to react to whatever tasks come your way, create actionable plans, block time out on your calendar, and define how you want to spend the next 8 to 10 hours.

Defining your day means thinking about what goals you want to accomplish, how you’re going to accomplish them, and actually going through with it. Taking the time to plan and define your time might not come naturally at first, but it has big payoffs for those who stick to their goals. Having more time to prepare for the future, research your local market, improve your digital and in-person marketing, and grow your business are just a few of the rewards that come with defining your day before it happens.

Assess the Big Picture

Addressing your short-term goals is a step in the right direction to long-term time management success.
But to really be successful, you have to make time to look at the bird’s-eye-view of your real estate business. Making time to analyze the gaps, or know what you don’t know, is crucial to unlocking your potential as an agent.

So how do you find your pitfalls so that you can improve your time management skills? Take note of everything that happens in a day, what your clients say about your process, and where you feel the most inefficient.

Do your clients complain about your outdated website? Do you spend too much time reposting ads on Craigslist and not enough time generating leads? Do you tend to fall behind on emails? Documenting your challenges and scheduling time to address them will take your business from okay to amazing. While this isn’t a traditional time-management tip, and it might seem difficult because it adds even more work to your busy schedule, looking at the long-term issues save you from painful slip ups and time-wasting activities in the long-run.

Utilize Technology

Organizing leads manually or working through a report line-by-line aren’t efficient methods for getting technology-based tasks done. Good technology speeds up and simplifies every process a real estate agent could find: from updating your website to include lead-capture triggers to having automated email campaigns, there are several ways to utilize technology and save time for other projects that can’t be simplified.

Outdated websites can cost you. Not only can they drive away potential leads by being clunky and not working on mobile devices, they also might not have fully functioning IDX capabilities and lead capture abilities. Whether you’re looking to update your online presence or start from scratch, WolfNet offers custom real estate agent websites that include capabilities like lead capture, responsive design, embedded IDX property search, and other helpful attributes. If you have one of our awesome websites and want to take things to the next step, read our article on how to leverage marketing automation for lead nurturing.

There is another type of tech that can help you save time and work more efficiently—customer relationship management (CRM) systems. CRMs (like Contactually, LionDesk, Top Producer, and others) integrate with your website’s data to strengthen business relationships with your customers, which in turn drives revenue and customer retention over time. Utilizing a CRM instead of an Excel database can save a lot of time, especially for those who aren’t Excel wizards or Google Analytics experts.

Now that you know how to define what you need to get done in a day to be successful, analyze the big picture, and harness technology to add extra time to your day you can get out there an excel as agent, grow your business, and never stop selling. Want more tips like this? Follow us on Facebook.

The post Time Management Skills to Master for Real Estate Agents appeared first on WolfNet.

This guide is split into four parts and is meant to be used for your starting year as an agent. It includes 1.) Must-do’s for before you become an agent; 2.) Once you become a new agent; 3.) When you are a growing agent, and 4.) When you are an established agent.

1.) Before You Become a Real Estate Agent

Study For Your Real Estate Licensing Exam (and Ace It)

Nothing great happens without a little hard work. Before you take your licensing exam, you have to take a state pre-licensing course. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) explains that your pre-licensing course can be taken in-person or online, which means you can learn the ins and outs of being an agent anytime.

Your pre-licensing course will teach you all about the rules, regulations, and codes for being a real estate agent. Once you’ve completed it, take your state’s real estate agent licensing exam. Licensing exam questions focus on calculations related to selling homes, federal, and state laws. For the steps that come after getting your license but between joining a brokerage, read the NAR’s step-by-step walkthrough on how to be a fully-licensed real estate agent.

Define What Type of Agent You Want to Be

Now that you’re a licensed agent, it’s time to research and define what kind of agent you want to be. This includes understanding your local market, what types of properties are popular, and where you fit in the mix. How can you differentiate yourself from the competition? Sometimes this means having a fresh approach — like using social media to promote your listings when others in your area don’t — or focusing on a specific type of property.

2.) When You are a New Agent

Create Your Personal Brand

Beyond the outer appearance of you and the homes you sell is something more that your customers and contacts will recognize. That is your personal real estate brand. Working to develop and present your brand to the world will gain you new leads and help you excel in your local market.

Your personal brand could involve the types of properties you sell or it could be centered on your excellent customer service. No matter what type of brand you go for you have to stick with it and promote it in every way possible — through your website, the way you interact with customers, and through your other online and social channels.

Get a Custom Real Estate Agent Website

Speaking of promoting your personal real estate brand through a website, it’s time to get one! You need a website with IDX property search to start your selling journey off right. What is IDX, you ask? IDX stands for “Internal Data Exchange.” If this sounds unfamiliar to you, head over to our What is IDX? page to learn more.

WolfNet can design a custom website for you that represents your personal brand. Our websites are responsive and look beautiful on computers, tablets, and phones. Being mobile-friendly is incredibly important, as “one fifth of all real estate related searches happen on mobile devices,” according to the NAR.

Your website is the face you show to the online world. Consider all aspects of your personal brand and local market use language and design to tell your story through your WolfNet website. To figure out these digital details, ask yourself the questions below:

• Who is my audience?
• How do I fit in the market?
• What unique skills do I bring to the table?

Start a Budget

Budgeting isn’t just for money, it’s for time, too. Once you’ve been working as an agent for a few months, you will start to see trends in how you spend your time and money. Make sure to keep track of everything you do during the day and what you spend on:

• Field and digital marketing
• Transportation
• Insurance
• Other fees
• Technology

Try to over-budget for both time and money, especially when you’re just starting out.

3.) When You are a Growing Agent

Organize Your Leads

Build a contact list of people you already know in person, on social media, and through email. Collect their first and last names, phone numbers, and emails and store them in Excel file. Whenever you meet a new lead, make sure to add them to this list. Read our detailed instructions on staying organized and converting leads for more information.

Network and Promote

Networking with others is how you promote yourself in person, but you also need to promote yourself online. Find local business owners and other agents with experience to show you the ropes, then head into the wild jungles of meeting potential customers the digital way.

Double-down on getting leads by creating and using a real estate blog, LinkedIn, Facebook, and/or Twitter. Don’t forget to share your listings on Craigslist, too. Persistence is key for finding lead-generation success online and in person.

4.) When You Are an Established Agent

Nurture Your Leads

You’ve created an excellent website that generates leads, now you should try a few other methods to really up your game. To hone in on your target market, use local search engine optimization (SEO) to make sure your listings and website show up when people search things like “Brooklyn homes for sale,” or “Real estate agents in Minneapolis.” Check out our “Five Ways to use SEO to Drive Real Estate Leads” to help you get started.

Use the analytics tools available for your established social media sites to determine what type of content works. Change up the designs you use (while still being in line with your personal brand) and post some ads on Facebook. There are many ways you can try new things without disrupting your existing marketing strategy. Read Buffer’s blog that is full of helpful examples of social media experiments for ideas.

Start Strong

Congratulations on starting your real estate agent journey. Following the steps above will give you an edge on the competition and set you up for success. For even more real estate agent marketing tips, download our free Real Estate Marketing 101 ebook.

The post The Guide for New Real Estate Agents appeared first on WolfNet.

Being productive has a lot of meanings in the real estate marketing world. On a given day you could be calling clients, writing blogs for your real estate website, posting your listings on social media, or all of the above. No matter what your day-to-day tasks look like, every agent could benefit from better time management. We’re going through our top 5 tips for making your hours count.

1. Focus and Simplify Your Strategy

When you’ve got a full plate and a full email inbox, simplifying your strategy can feel like a glass of fresh water. Part of simplifying is starting off with a great Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system and website, but simplifying what you do every day in a more straightforward sense is also a must. Write down what you want to accomplish in a day, a week, and a month, and schedule it in the calendar of your choice. Holding yourself accountable with reminders and pre-scheduled blocks of time takes away any guesswork and keeps you on task.

Another part of simplifying is not wasting time on clients that aren’t responsive or aren’t bringing in enough revenue. This might sound like a no-brainer, but it’s necessary to reduce your effort on leads that aren’t going anywhere.

2. Utilize a CRM

Keeping your customers in an organized system saves you time and gives you large-scale insights on your success rate and other metrics.

Integrating a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system like Contactually, Follow Up Boss, IXACT Contact, and others with WolfNet’s IDX property search forms the complete package to help you manage your interactions and relationships with customers.

Focus on the individual, not the group. Use a CRM to narrow your view and do one thing at a time. You can get more tasks done if you go through them methodically and individually. While multitasking has long been praised as a positive, the American Psychological Association explains that “Doing more than one task at a time, especially more than one complex task, takes a toll on productivity.” Even though it is tempting to address several leads at once, know that concentrating on them one-by-one leads to higher productivity levels.

3. Automate Your Lead Nurturing Process

Automation has many benefits, but the main one is freeing up precious time for you to convert leads. Get your leads to follow your calls-to-action by setting up drip campaigns that email them strategic messages depending on how they found you, what properties/locations they are interested in, or other specific characteristics. Read our blog “How to Leverage Automation for Lead Nurturing” for a deeper explanation.

4. Get Rid of Distractions

It might be tempting to take quick breaks by checking social media or reading the news, but we recommend that you remove these time-sucking distractions from your work day.

Make things easier for you before you get trapped in infinite scroll mode and remove apps from your work phone, use browser extensions to block the social sites you waste the most time on, and be strict with yourself on how much time a day you want to dedicate to distractions.

5. Stay Ahead of the Game

We mentioned this in tip #1, but planning your process is the cornerstone on which productivity is built.

Start by evaluating your productivity strengths and weaknesses. Are you great at planning but bad at execution? Time for calendar reminders. Are you great at getting leads but not following up? Use marketing automation to remind you to get out there and contact them.

Finding the gaps in your process and planning solutions before they happen can save you a literal headache. To be proactive instead of reactive and stay ahead of the game you should research the latest trends, create a plan for generating leads, and try out apps to make your process flow more smoothly.

You’re already on the right track for staying ahead of the curve. After all, you now have five excellent productivity tips in your toolkit! Good luck being the most productive version of yourself that you can be.

The post Five Productivity Tips for Real Estate Agents appeared first on WolfNet.