What Is a Real Estate CRM and Why Do You Need it For Your Business?

April 23, 2022

As a real estate agent, you have a lot of responsibilities on your plate. From hosting open houses and generating leads to closing deals and marketing your business, these are just some of the tasks you’re in charge of on a daily basis. However, there’s one common factor between all of these duties: customers.

As a realtor, your customers are your lifeline, and when the market picks up, you may have more clients than you can handle. That’s where a real estate CRM comes in, also known as a customer relationship management system.

Investing in a CRM for real estate can help you and your business in a variety of ways. But what is a CRM in real estate? In this guide, we’ll explore real estate CRM systems, including their benefits and how you can incorporate one into your practice.

What Is CRM in Real Estate?

A CRM in real estate is a customer relationship management system that keeps track of all your client information to help foster relationships, boost productivity, track lead generation campaigns, and more. The goal of a real estate CRM is to improve your client relationships to help grow and scale your business.

CRM for realtors is software that helps realtors with a wide range of daily functions pertaining to customer management. This can include marketing, sales, customer service, online commerce, and other elements of the sales funnel. With a CRM in place, you can manage all aspects of the life cycle, from generating leads to communicating with colleagues and vendors. Now that you know what real estate CRM is, let’s get a better understanding in the next section.

Understanding Real Estate CRM

A real estate CRM allows realtors to manage client relationships, but how is this done? A CRM will collect important client information, including their name, phone number, email address, mailing address, and other personal information depending on your needs, such as social media information or their website.

Once these personal details are collected and imported into the CRM system, the information will be organized based on the client’s preferences. You can then send targeted emails, new product information, updates on their transaction, and more.

A realtor CRM acts as an all-in-one communication tool that follows clients throughout the life cycle. For example, the marketing team can create marketing campaigns with the right message and send them at the right time. Or, the sales team can make more accurate forecasts to boost profits, while the customer service team can respond to any inquiries to manage the relationship.

There are several key components of a CRM that can help you and your business, such as:

Cloud-based software: One of the top features of a real estate CRM is that it’s cloud-based. By storing information on the cloud, which are servers accessed over the internet, data can be accessed any time, anywhere. This means you can manage your clients in-office or on the go, as long as you have a reliable internet connection. CRM software can even be used on smartphones and devices, providing accessibility 24/7.
App integration: When looking for a real estate CRM to invest in, look at its integration capabilities. Most CRM systems can easily integrate with your favorite business tools, such as document signing, surveys, billing, and other tools to streamline operations and improve your workflow.
Artificial intelligence: Today, one of the newer features you can find in some CRM software is built-in AI, which can help with mundane administrative tasks like data entry, so you can allocate more time to more important responsibilities, such as generating leads.

CRM for real estate is easy to use and can help you scale your business, improve productivity, and more. If you’re wondering whether you should invest in a real estate agent CRM, explore the benefits in the next section.

Benefits of Using CRM Software for Real Estate Agents

Real estate CRM software offers a host of benefits that can help you and your company. From optimizing workflows to personalizing marketing campaigns, take a look at some of the reasons why you should invest in real estate CRM below:

1. Optimize workflows

There’s a lot of information flowing around in the real estate industry—addresses, phone numbers, bills, emails, open houses—you name it. If you find yourself losing track of important information, a CRM for real estate can help. CRM can help you optimize your workflows by organizing information in a single platform that’s easy to use and highly accessible to you and your team.

2. Boost lead generation

Knowing how to generate leads is one of the top qualities of any successful real estate agent. Whether you’re just getting started in the industry or are a seasoned veteran, a CRM system can help you add more contacts to your database. A CRM system allows you to create reports to track leads and new opportunities.

If your CRM software has app integration capabilities, generating leads becomes even easier. By integrating website data or social media channels with your CRM, you can collect information on a client’s interests, behaviors, and demographics. From there, you can create targeted marketing campaigns to encourage them to convert from a lead to a client.

3. Automate business processes

Accounting, client management, email interactions, and phone calls are just some of the daily business processes that can be eating away from your valuable time. By taking away manual tasks, such as updating client information or importing data, you can boost workplace efficiency. CRM software can help you automate these business processes to allocate that time to more important tasks that can help you take your business to the next level.

4. Improve client relationships

One of the top functions of a real estate CRM is to help realtors improve client relationships. Often, it can be easy to become overwhelmed with the number of tasks to handle as a realtor. With that said, falling behind on emails, being late to a showing, or falling back on lead generation efforts can become easy.

A CRM for real estate can help you improve client relationships by collecting all relevant client information and organizing it in one platform. This way, all client communication gets directed to one area that’s easy to manage, so you can stay on top of emails and messages, as well as provide clients with new and engaging information that may be relevant to them. In turn, fostering your client relationships can boost trust, referrals, and brand reputation.

5. Enhance security

As a realtor, you have access to highly personal information, such as names, addresses, phone numbers, and finances. The last thing you want is a security breach or scam to leak confidential client information that puts your business in a difficult position. Rather than storing client information in filing cabinets or in easily accessible online platforms, invest in a CRM.

CRM software has enhanced security features to ensure personal information isn’t at risk. By storing information on the cloud, data is more difficult to access thanks to encryption and monitoring, and it’s backed up regularly to ensure information doesn’t go missing.

6. Personalize marketing

A key component to any real estate business plan is having a marketing and sales plan in place. CRM gives you the capability to create personalized and targeted marketing campaigns that can help convert leads into customers. With a CRM, you can build customer profiles, gain insights into social media interactions, collect data on the effectiveness of email campaigns, and more. By having access to key metrics, you’ll be able to make informed decisions based on real data that can help you make the right business decisions.

7. Boost productivity

No matter the business or industry you’re in, it can be easy to fall behind on projects and tasks. With so much to keep track of in the real estate industry, it’s important to have productivity systems in place to hold you accountable.

A real estate CRM can automate mundane tasks, keep important information organized, and keep confidential data secure. These crucial functions of CRM software free up time, so you can remain productive and allocate resources to more pressing issues, such as cold calling to find leads or creating top-tier marketing campaigns.

Wrapping Up: What Is CRM in Real Estate?

CRM in real estate is software that keeps track of client information in one central database to improve customer relationships and increase efficiency. There are plenty of reasons to invest in CRM for real estate, such as boosting productivity, creating targeted marketing campaigns, and automating business processes.

At Tom Ferry, our team of real estate coaches can provide you with real estate agent tools to help you grow your business and reach your goals. They can also provide information on useful productivity apps, local real estate market news and trends, and effective marketing strategies that can take your business to the next level.

Learn more about Tom Ferry’s real estate coaching programs — contact us today!

I want
Great Listing Brand Awareness More Time Less Stress More Commission Better Marketing More Leverage

What Is a Real Estate CRM and Why Do You Need it For Your Business?

What Is CRM in Real Estate?

Understanding Real Estate CRM