Opinion: How real estate comes back stronger

The latest commotion in the real estate industry feels like our world has been turned upside down again. But underneath all the madness, I see a real opportunity for us to turn this into a positive and come back even stronger than before. I often think of the term ‘Anti-fragile’ from the book of the same name by Nassim Taleb. The principle is that people and organizations can build their success on the ability to come back even stronger after a blow, rather than just withstanding the impact. Now is the time for real estate to become even more anti-fragile.

Own our value

Almost as soon as the committee After the verdict was announced, most industry voices came out with marketing campaigns and webinars on how agents can demonstrate their value. While this is all a helpful start to the new normal, we don’t need to demonstrate our value. We must own it too. Because we now require a signed agreement with our buyers before we take them on tour, we are more likely to have an opportunity to have a longer conversation with them and sell ourselves. I predict that these “buyer presentations” will be as in-depth as our offer presentations. This means we need more marketing materials and visible evidence of our performance that are attractive to buyers. But we cannot risk these materials being taken by others and used for their marketing purposes. Whether it’s our research into soon-to-be-available homes or our hard-won tips and tricks for navigating the market, it’s time to embrace digital tools that give us ownership over the deep knowledge we all have about our markets.

Improve our approach

As independent contractors, we must continually sharpen and refine our approach. I often tell my agents that we are the Swiss Army Knife of the real estate industry because we have so many different skills. With such a variety of skills comes the need for different tools, but I feel like we have gotten carried away with so many technology platforms and software. We need to ease the burden while keeping up with the level of professionalism that other industries bring to their clients. Our differentiator no longer has to be the latest shiny app, but software that shows our customers that we have higher standards in protecting every step of a digital transaction.

Strategic CRMs

We can also become much more strategic in the way we use our marketing materials. Before the digital age, we had an idea of ​​their customer appeal because we were often there in person as some of our potential customers viewed them. With so much being sent digitally, we need to use tools that give us deeper, more detailed insights into how others interact with them. We can choose tools that tell us whether they downloaded the material we sent them, forwarded it to others (and to whom), and spent longer than average time viewing specific parts of our websites that indicate where they are interested. provide a fuller, more three-dimensional view of what our customers are thinking, giving us stronger ideas about how we can be ready for their needs.

There have always been huge shifts in the real estate industry, and we have always responded and adapted in ways that strengthen us. With digital tools we can work our way towards an anti-fragile profile, so that we are not only resilient, but also immune to all the ways in which people outside the real estate sector try to erode our interest.

Allen Alishahi is the president and co-founder of ShelterZoom.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of HousingWire’s editorial staff and its owners.

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