It’s not exactly hard for the real estate agents of today to get in touch with clients or other agents. They have Instagram, Facebook Messenger, Whatsapp, text messaging, and the most analog tool of all – the old fashioned phone call. But managing these different platforms, at times, can be a real challenge. Out of this struggle, AgentLoop was born, said Jay Thompson, the company’s co-founder and director of outreach.
“The vast majority of real estate sales have two agents involved, so a lot of communication has to happen to even just get a property under contract,” Thompson, the former director of industry outreach at Zillow, said in an interview. “It is a very cooperative industry, so the networking and communication between real estate agents is super important. There are lots of communication tools out there and it’s hard sometimes for real estate agents to remember where they are communicating with someone.”
AgentLoop is a nationwide interactive networking, listing and communications platform, available to agents and brokers regardless of their brokerage, franchise or team affiliation. Roughly 895,000 agents are currently on the platform, which Thompson said has been operating in “stealth mode” for a few months now.
“It is brokerage agnostic so to speak,” Thompson said. “You don’t have to belong to a certain brokerage or franchise to use the platform.
Through the AgentLoop platform, which is available as both a desktop website and a mobile application, agents have access to an internal chat feature and click-to-call or email functions. When agents sign up for the application, they will see that they have a basic “profile” already set up on the site, which will include their name and contact. Thompson said that this data was compiled from various public sources. Once into the app, agents will be asked if they would like to import their existing agent and broker contacts in their phone to their “network.”
“It is almost like a Rolodex of agents, with a way to contact all of them built right in,” Thompson said. “You click a button and their phone number pops up, you don’t have to search through anything to find it.”
At the moment, AgentLoop is unable to sync with an agent’s Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp messaging platforms. In an age where social media is playing a larger and larger role in agents lead generation, this could be a potential turn off for some users. Thompson said AgentLoop would explore the possibility of adding such integration if they see demand for it.
One of the selling points of the application, however, is agent’s ability to send MLS-like listings directly to other agents through the platform and gain immediate feedback.
“When an agent gets a listing they’ll push it out to their network of sometimes upwards of 500-1000 agents and that is great, but they frequently don’t get any feedback,” Thompson explained. “They don’t know who has seen it or if anyone is interested. With AgentLoop, agents can pick and choose who to send a listing to based on filters they can select and then the agents who receive the listing can click options to notify the sellers agent if they have a client who is interested, one who might be interest or do not have an interested client.”
Thompson noted that while agents sometimes get bogged down by detailed feedback about location or specific features in the master bathroom, the feedback offered through AgentLoop is quick and to the point, enabling agents to pursue more fruitful leads.
The app currently requires agents to import photos, specs and a brief description of the property manually, but they are looking into syncing the platform with MLS platforms.
“The data the listing agents put into the app is not super robust,” Thompson said. “We aren’t trying to replicate the detail of the MLS or a listing platform. But it really takes you through step by step and all the important details – number of bedrooms, bathrooms, square footage, etc., – are there. It only takes maybe two or three minutes to generate a listing.”
The app and corresponding desktop site are currently available to all licensed agents in the U.S. Agents who sign up for the application have access to all of its features for free one-month trial period after which, agents who wish to maintain their account will have to pay a $10-20 monthly fee depending on their level of listing volume.
Although the listing feedback capabilities and lack of brokerage affiliation make AgentLoop stand out from other CRM and communication platforms, at a time when many brokerages, like Keller Williams and Compass, are launching their own apps, it is an open question whether agents will be willing to sign up for yet another communication service.
“There is so much technology out there available for agents, but the developers don’t primarily have the agent in the forefront,” Thompson said. “We really strongly believe that this industry can’t work without real estate agents. We are trying to come up with a product that agents can easily use to build their business.”
