Texas Brokerage President Shares Their Agent Technology Roll Out Success
Real estate agents wear many hats in a single day, making the idea of adapting to new technology feel more like a burden than a relief, especially when they’re bombarded with new tools and widgets that each promise a certain result. This makes the adoption of new technology a prevailing challenge across many industries, especially one with constantly shifting plates like the real estate industry.
The principal challenges that we see real estate agents facing in the process of adopting new technology tend to be:
- A lack of knowledge of the tools available and their services
- Learning the tool’s functionality and its most effective use for their business
- Efficiently implementing its use into a business routine
For that reason, training is such an essential part of the adoption process. Agents must take the time to learn the tool, maximize its utility and measure its impact and success – but before beginning that journey, agents must ask themselves:
- Does this successfully impact the way I run my business?
- How does this benefit the level of services that I offer clients?
- What aspects of the real estate process does this simplify and consolidate?
As a brokerage company, to effectively motivate real estate agents to adopt new technology and tools, you must ask the same questions from the perspective of an agent. Over the past year, in my role as president of Coldwell Banker Texas, I’ve had the opportunity to be part of a great roll-out of new technology that we offer our affiliated agents that meet the need to consolidate and support their services, and essentially, make their jobs easier. Motivating real estate agents to adopt technology does not have to be difficult, but it is an involved process that must be supported on all levels, from the company’s leadership to the local teams.
For our Coldwell Banker companies in Texas, we have identified and implemented the following, to support and encourage our affiliated agents in new adoption of technology:
- Communication Is Key
This means getting the key message to all our staff and affiliated agents via a communications campaign. With the support of The Studio, the largest in-house marketing team in the nation, we can reach our audience consistently through a variety of platforms, both internally and externally. Identifying those platforms and the best reach to your target audience is essential, across any industry. Communication is key throughout every step of the integration process. When you begin training and educational sessions, consistent communication is crucial in promoting the efforts, reminders, tips and receiving feedback. - Focus on education
Education in the tech adoption process is the most vital step and it takes place on numerous levels, from training the local managers to providing ongoing classes for real estate agents. Training should be easily accessible and offer webinars and in-person opportunities. This also means identifying the areas in need of attention and reinforcement. Establishing a team that can focus and leads the way in the development of education allows for key organizational strategies to progress. A major incentive for agents that has proven successful is showing them not just the functions and usability of technology, but also the ways the technology can replace the tedious and time-consuming aspects of real estate. - Motivate and Integrate
Use the technology and share the successful results. The best incentive you can offer real estate agents is showing them how the product can positively impact their business. Real estate agents must be a part of the process, and integrating their feedback is as important as analyzing the data, and fundamentally leads to a greater response and adoption rate.
Author Bio
Charles El-Moussa was named to the newly created position of President of Coldwell Banker Texas in July 2018. In this role, he leads the daily operations and sales of Coldwell Banker United, REALTORS® in Houston and Austin and Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Dallas/Fort Worth. El-Moussa oversees 42 offices with more than 2,200 independent sales associates who produced $5.146 billion in sales volume and 17,042 transaction sides in 2017.
He joined Coldwell Banker® following a successful 15-year career of building and growing companies in the real estate industry. For 10 of those years, he served as Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel for RE/MAX of Texas.
