If you are in real estate marketing and sales, you have probably heard of the term Real Estate CRM. Do you know what a CRM is and how to use it to make your business more profitable?

A CRM is simply a piece of software designed specifically for customer relationship management. CRM software built for real estate professionals typically includes a heavy reliance on email autoresponder marketing techniques to stay in touch and nurture your relationship with returning prospects, clients, and leads.

Using a CRM package usually starts with a lead capture website. While there is an art and science to lead capture, the basic process is to offer a website visitor something of value in exchange for their contact information. The item of value could be a free report, such as a digital download, a book, or access to an MLS home search tool so buyers can search for properties.

Once a prospect contacts an agent, the CRM is set up to stay in touch using automated responses, also called email drip campaigns. A series of emails can be written in advance and sent to prospects in a fixed sequence to nurture their relationship with the agent and build trust.

At some point during the process, calls to action are relayed to the prospect to help turn their email contact, which is less personal, into a phone call, which is more likely to result in a sale. Agents who receive a phone call from such a qualified prospect should be able to escalate the relationship to a face-to-face meeting and/or purchase agreement to begin the real estate search process.

From the agent’s perspective, a real estate CRM consists not only of the software to automate the lead nurturing process, but also the content of the emails that do the heavy lifting of building the relationship. The agent typically receives regular updates from the software about leads that are captured in the system, as well as tasks that the agent must perform that cannot be automated.

For example, studies have shown that a phone call during the process (perhaps one that follows an automated email telling the prospect to expect a call the next day) greatly improves conversion rates. of potential customers. The bottom line is that the success rate of marketing using a CRM always comes from the combination of sales automation technology, human-written content, and well-placed follow-ups and calls-to-action during the sales process. A well-designed real estate CRM can dramatically increase conversion rates and sales figures for real estate agents.