This week, 2019 HAAR / ValleyMLS.com Treasurer Isaac Winkles, along with CEO Josh McFall attended the Inman Connect conference in Las Vegas. Inman Connect is a twice a year gathering of real estate leaders, technology companies, association/MLS leadership, brokers, and agents from across the world. Inman Connect is produced by Inman News.
The Week’s Big Takeaway:
Collaboration and Partnerships. Real Estate’s long established leaders are partnering with new technology companies to, as one speaker said “reduce the friction” in the real estate transaction. The theme of 2019 so far has been finding ways to partner to strengthen the market for all agents and ultimately the consumer.
Other highlights and takeaways:
10 Things Every Real Estate Agent Must-Do in 2019
- You must have a recent professional headshot.
- You need a professional promotional video — not a selfie with bad lighting.
- You need to know how to use Facebook Ads Manager to promote listings and your brand on Facebook.
- You need at least 10 reviews on all of your portals.
- You must master your CRM and ACTIVELY market to your sphere.
- You must hire a professional photographer for listing photos.
- You have at least 3 sources that generate leads in your pipeline
- You understand the importance of instagram’s “stories” feature and use it as part of an established social media presence across platforms.
- You must have a defined professional brand including a logo.
- And you must know how to actually use your phone.
The Fundamentals Still Matter –
What are the Fundamentals?
- Online leads are only converting 1%-3% of the time – but online leads consumes 20% of an average agents time in a day.
- Mail to your neighborhood once a month – and then call them as a follow-up
- Open houses still matter. One speaker suggested 3p-6p open houses during the weekdays as an alternative to the norms.
- If you sit on a lead or client referral — some other agent is plucking your business.
- Don’t forget the fun of the business.
- Feed your mind with information that inspires you to keep going.
Top 10 Tech Trends to Watch in Real Estate Right Now
- Voice activation in real estate – powered by Amazon’s Alexa, Apple Siri, and Google Home.
- Predictive analytics in real estate will help you to predict buyer/seller behaviors.
- Your “tech stack” is expanding – Be sure to take inventory consistently – all in one platforms are helping to reduce the need for separate systems. Ask yourself, what does my “stack” look like? Am I using it? What do i need to change?
- Customization and personalization using data is becoming the norm. This makes the consumer feel personal with tech.
- Open Houses are being “techified” — not just with sign-ins but allowing consumers to take virtual open house tours, schedule private appointments during open houses, and even chat directly with an agent who’s sitting in the open house online.
- Podcasts — 73 million Americans listen to podcasts monthly – 700,000 podcasts on the web and available – Realtors can reach a new sphere through the podcast platforms
- Alexa Flash Briefings are exploding in popularity – agents can use “Flash Briefings” to update consumers on market trends, tips about the market, or even just community info. It’s a new touchpoint.
- Tech Acquisition – 48% of real estate firms cited “keeping up with tech” in the coming years as their biggest concern — they will either build the best or purchase the best.
- Video is a major player — Agents are ramping up content strategy with video to capture more consumer attention.
- Block Chain Technology is connecting all pieces of the transaction to empower the consumer and reduce the friction in the home purchase or sell process.
More big takeaways from the week:
- Nearly half of all agents in America work another job to supplement their income.
- According a recent study, career satisfaction is currently negative for most agents, with most citing the income inconsistency as the #1 factor leading a negative view of their career. The current median income of a 25k-50k median income of a REALTOR.
- None of the top 4 real estate tech companies — Zillow, Redfin, Compass, OpenDoor — turn a profit. For example, Since the launch of their “Zillow Offers” program Zillow spends $1.40 to bring back $1.00 to the company. The speaker citing this called the new norm of real estate tech “Sustained Unprofitability.”
- The iBuyer / Instant Offers programs across the country make up 0.2% of the overall real estate market place.
- Many firms are using iBuyer / Instant Offer programs to generate leads for their agents. In the markets with agent referral programs from companies like OpenDoor, Zillow Offers, and RedFin Direct — around 30,000 instant offer offers to consumers resulted in 900 sales directly to the companies, the rest were lead conversions or listings to agents.
- Team production has tripled in the 3 years in transaction sides produced — including 145,000 sides in 2018 just from the top 250 teams — This stat is according to RealTrends Data.
To see full recaps, videos, and in-depth reporting on the event you can visit Inman.com
If you have any questions or want more information about the conference or anything in this recap, feel free to reach out to Isaac Winkles, HSV.AL.REALTOR@Gmail.com , or Josh McFall, josh@ValleyMLS.com .
Founder/Publisher of Inman News, Brad Inman, interviews CEO of Zillow Group, Rich Barton
Day 1 of Inman Connect featured a conversation among industry leading brokers and agents live on stage.