The ‘best’ CRM for real estate is…

March 11, 2015

This post submitted by Aaron Stelle, Director of Marketing Technology for WFG National Title Company in Portland, Oregon.

I am constantly asked by real estate agents; “What’s the ‘best’ CRM for real estate?” and I usually have 2 really quick answers to that. Answer number one is, ‘There is no best CRM” and answer two is, “The one you’ll use.”

Let’s dive into that a little further. The reason I say there isn’t a best CRM is because nearly every agent I talk to has a different way of doing business, and thus different needs from their CRM. With this in mind, here are some of the questions you’ll need to ask yourself.

Who is my audience? Are you looking to convert a massive amount of cold leads, potentially from online sources, or do you just need to touch base with your database / sphere more often?

How do I want to connect with my clients? Are you hoping to have your touches automated with drip campaigns, or do you want to be reminded to make a personal touch?

What type of content do you want to send? This is often the big question. Are you willing to give up a little control over content for the sake of automation, or do you want to generate all of your own personal content?

What is my budget? CRM’s can range in price from free to hundreds of dollars per month.

How much time am I willing to spend learning and implementing my new CRM? This is a big one. To actually use a CRM you are going to need time to invest in learning the new program. This CRM will need to integrate with your business model, or your business model may have to shift to flow with your CRM.

What do I want my CRM to do? Depending on which product you go with, CRM’s can do a lot or a little. Do you want it to have drip email campaigns, manage your calendar and contacts, have a shared database with your team, create a workflow for lead capture, auto-import leads, talk to other software applications, etc.?

There are other questions you may have to consider, but the most important thing is that the CRM fits your business model.

This blog post by Placester does a great job of breaking down several of the most popular CRM’s on the market for real estate agents.

If you need a more in depth conversation, contact your local WFG Sales Rep.