Choosing A Real Estate CRM
I get asked these two questions a lot, "what CRM do you use?" and "what CRM should I use?"
The answer is never simple so I usually go with the standard, "select a CRM that you will actually use and not one that sounds glamorous." For those of you new to investigating CRMs, a CRM is a Client Relationship Manager. Basically it is software that helps you manage contact records in a variety of different ways.
I go into a little bit of detail in the video above (longer than my usual videos) about the process I use when evaluating and selecting a CRM. After recording this I realized that there is a heck of a lot more I could have talked about on this topic so if you want more information or would like to hear more about my thoughts on this piece of real estate tech, feel free to reach out.
Here is a brief summary of what I discuss above...
A CRM can have three primary functions:
- Relationship Management
- Pipeline/Transaction Management
- Lead Generation & Management
In my opinion, if a CRM does not have a true "RM" component, it's not a CRM, it's a marketing or operations tool. So if you don't have something you currently use to manage existing relationships efficiently and effectively, don't even bother with the other two functions at the moment.
A CRM can also have a variety of integrations, apps and functions that support the primary purpose. Looking for something that automatically syncs with your contacts, email and phone can significantly improve your efficiency and prevent a lot of double entry, tireless reporting and manual tracking.
Before investigating CRMs, it is important for you to have your database organized in a central warehouse (like Outlook or Google) and understand your own processes around communication. This will help you evaluate which CRM will work best for you and also will help you eliminate many from the list requiring you to do less testing.
A CRM is just a part of your greater ecosystem so make sure your tools work together for you. Here are the tools that make up my current system (with a few additional tools thrown into the list).
- Contactually but also investigating Cloze
- G-Suite by Google (more secure than free Gmail)
- BombBomb
- MailChimp (although pretty much exclusively using BombBomb now)
- Dropbox (I do use Google Drive in G-Suite for a lot of stuff too)
That's my foundation and I'm sure it will change but this has been my core for years now and don't see a change happening any time soon with the exception of Cloze. On a side note, I do also use Microsoft Office365 for some of my business but significantly prefer G-Suite.
Have a CRM or other software that you really like in your ecosystem? Let us know!