7 top challenges facing realtors in 2023

There are 7 top challenges facing realtors in 2023. These are not necessarily unique to the industry but impact real estate professionals worldwide. In this blog, we look at the main issues affecting agents today and the ways to solve them.

Table of Contents

  1. Amplifying property listings to attract a wider pool of buyers
  2. Generating and managing enquiries better
  3. Following up on sales enquiries more efficiently
  4. Quick and easy access to marketing material
  5. Streamlining communication with customers and partners
  6. Developing and cultivating a database
  7. Strengthening brand visibility online

1. Amplifying property listings to attract a wider pool of buyers

Promoting property listings to global homebuyers is an ongoing challenge facing realtors everywhere. Noteworthy is that according to a recent 2021 NARS (National Association of Realtors) report is that “97% of home buyers used the internet to search for homes.”

In addition, as this NYC article states, “in the pandemic, first-time buyers have the tech-smarts and now the tools to do all or part of their purchase online, sometimes even before seeing their new houses in person.”

Having a strong online strategy is critical in getting your real estate portfolio seen by prospects.

The ubiquity of listing portals and the rise of homebuyer and rental applications has reduced but not eliminated the role of agents. The success of these customer-focused companies with digital home buyers is a definite indication of what the future of real estate holds.

Solution: Become active online and on listing platforms

Real estate software like Qobrix enables you to add your properties to global directories like ZooplaZillow and RightMove, etc, directly from the CRM. Through this integration, you can expand your reach and amplify your listings to a significantly larger audience worldwide. Getting your name and brand known by a lot of people helps you become visible when there’s a general or specific search for agents.

2. Generating and managing enquiries better

A real estate professional is constantly looking for ways to acquire more real estate leads. This requires the use of a variety of tools and techniques. Generating and managing enquiries is a challenge facing realtors everywhere. CRM integration with several real estate marketplaces exposes your property listings to more homebuyers. This increases the likelihood of generating more enquiries. These can then be recorded and managed in your real estate CRM.

Solution: Using tools like Zapier

Using a tool like Zapier will push enquiries generated via channels like Facebook, Instagram, etc., into your real estate CRM , hence removing the need for manual entries or lists. This frees up time for your sales team to focus on managing and converting those enquiries into homebuyers.

Solution: Integration of your CRM with your website

This useful technique will help you better track and manage leads. The data of visitors to your site who complete a contact us form, a DEMO request form, etc, can be fed back into your CRM. Your sales team can then quickly follow up on the leads generated to close more deals.

Qobrix Real Estate software offers a variety of integrations to help you generate enquiries and manage them more efficiently.

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3. Following up on sales enquiries more efficiently

A major challenge facing realtors is properly managing your daily real estate activities.  This is a vital part of converting an enquiry into a sale. Prospective homebuyers need to be nurtured throughout the entire purchasing journey. To be effective at this so as to close deals successfully requires a high level of efficiency.

Solution: Use your CRM for task management

Qobrix Real Estate CRM software enables your sales team to manage their daily activities in a way that’s impactful and profitable. For instance, the software helps improve task management as follows:

  • Simplifying the creation of tasks and assigning those tasks to others
  • Prioritising of tasks by level of importance or due date
  • Easy filtering of tasks to gain a comprehensive overview of who’s working on what
  • Customisable dashboards and reporting for a more in-depth analysis of the status of all tasks.

Solution: Manage property viewings with your CRM

  • A viewing can be quickly added into the CRM, given a subject name, linked to the relevant property, and assigned to a team member
  • Viewings can be grouped by property to track status
  • Qobrix’s advanced search functionality also enables you to group viewings by salesperson and dates to monitor overall number of viewings as well as total number of viewings per salesperson

Monitoring entire call histories and keeping a tab on all comments are additional functions that Qobrix offers to streamline day to day workflows.

Request a Free DEMO of Qobrix and discover how to elevate your real estate business!

4. Quick and easy access to marketing material

Real estate professionals want the ability to easily produce and distribute marketing collateral as quickly as possible. This includes brochures, leaflets, and any other type of useful material that will boost your chances of making a sale.

Solution: Instantly generate marketing material

With Qobrix’s Brochure Creator, you can create brochures instantly, choosing from a free, ready-made template which can be easily customized with your company’s logo and branding. Content can be added to the brochure, modified, when necessary, and then emailed to your client directly from the CRM.

Find out how to create instant marketing material with the Qobrix Brochure Creator!

5. Streamlining communication with customers and partners

Good communication and fast exchange of information is key in establishing quality, long-term relationships with customers and partners. A positive experience is also one that earns you trust and increases the likelihood of a customer referral. This is one of the most impactful forms of advertising in the real estate industry and a main challenge facing realtors today.

Qobrix Real Estate software was built specifically for the industry to address these challenges.

The solution: Give customers quick and secure access

Qobrix’s Client Portal for example gives customers quick and secure access to all documentation regarding their property, reducing the need for a constant exchange of emails. This includes:

  • Floor plans
  • Site plans
  • Property images
  • Progress photos
  • Contracts and agreements
  • Financial statements (balance, payments due)
  • Service statements
  • A listing of their extras purchased, etc.

client portal overview

Through the Client Portal, customers can also monitor the progress of their property and view the surrounding area using WEBCAM access. A weather widget can also track the weather forecast of the property’s location.

Client portal

Discover more about the Qobrix Client Portal!

The solution: Simplify communication with external partners

The Qobrix Agent Portal gives brokers and external agents 24/7 access to their own personal space to obtain marketing material and project information generated by you.

Through the portal, you can share branded and unbranded sales and marketing material like presentations, flyers, videos, etc. You can also upload useful documents such as pricing, signed contracts, agreed commissions, etc.

Agent portal

The Agent Portal also gives external agents and brokers access to your property listings. Other features are an advanced search functionality to easily search for properties that match client requirements, and access to pertinent property information like price, floor plans, availability, specifications, photographs, brochures, and more.

Agent Portal

Find out more about the Qobrix Agent Portal!

6. Developing and cultivating a database

Having a database is one thing.  The difficult part is successfully utilising it. The majority of agents are unaware of how important regular interaction with contacts is. This highlights a major challenge facing realtors. Inexperienced agents tend to prioritize closing deals quickly over keeping in touch with their clients after the sale. Only 25% of agents regularly ask their present current connections and former clients for referrals. As a result, they miss out on referral business, which may account for almost 50% of your yearly earnings!

According to Brian & Buffini’s research, 25% of agents get more than 50% of their yearly business only from recommendations and 88% of homebuyers say they would recommend or use the same agency again. On average, referrals account for 42% of an agent’s revenue and referrals account for 82% of ALL real estate purchases!

So how do you leverage the relationship you have with previous customers to get them to refer your business to their personal contacts?

The solution: Create successful email marketing campaigns

Maintaining communication with dozens or even hundreds of connections takes some time! Automating your email distribution will save you time. When used properly, marketing automation can also help you target your messages more effectively to the right market segments.

An intelligent real estate CRM should offer you the tools needed to design and deliver impactful email marketing campaigns.

Segmenting target audiences

Use your CRM to segment contacts into groups based on common characteristics and where they are in the sales pipeline. These contacts could be comprised of hot or old leads, property buyers, property sellers, first-time homebuyers, etc. Then create customized email campaigns through which to serve content that meets the specific real estate needs of each group. The Qobrix CRM contacts module records and filters the contact details of all individuals or organisations with whom your real estate enterprise does business with. Contacts can be easily managed by linking them to corresponding leads, opportunities, clients, agents and other relational data.

After-sales promotion

Your real estate CRM software is filled with the names of people who have purchased property through your organization. With Qobrix CRM, use the dashboards function to generate a report of all previous customers and send those people personalized emails that include useful post-purchase insights. Examples include blogs or articles on how to maintain a garden, tips on redecorating or upgrading your home, getting the most out of small space, local real estate trends, etc. In this way, you are demonstrating that you still care about the needs of those to whom you have already sold, making them more inclined to want to share their experience with others

Marketing automation and email marketing

Once you’ve identified who you are marketing to, you’ll be better able to create content that appeals to each customer group. This should be based on customer needs or where your customers are at in your sales pipeline to drive lead conversion and sales. Once you’ve established the type of content to distribute, create the necessary email campaigns to send to your target audiences.

Qobrix Real Estate CRM software offers agents the ability to send emails to customers directly from the CRM. In fact, with the software’s ability to quickly match properties to leads based on property specifications and client needs, your agent can choose which properties to email to leads through the CRM in seconds. This reduces reliance on external email systems to communicate with customers.

Qobrix CRM software can also be integrated with automated email platforms like MailChimp, making it easy to send multiple targeted email campaigns to the predefined customer groups, as and when you need to.

7. Strengthening brand visibility online

To stand out in what is an incredibly competitive global real estate market requires that you have a robust, visible online presence. Especially if one considers that 97% of homebuyers search the internet for properties.

So, what features attract visitors to a real estate website for long enough to convert into qualified leads?

According to the NARS report, “the most important website feature was photos for more than nine in 10 buyers under the age of 55. Detailed information about properties for sale was also very important to all age groups.”

Rothmore Property Website mockup

Other important features include:

  • Advanced search filters – you want to make it incredibly easy and quick for prospective homebuyers to search for properties on your site
  • Responsive design across all devices – approximately 50% of homebuyers conduct their search on a desktop/laptop and 50% on a mobile device(s). Those aged 40 and younger were more likely to use mobile devices, and those 66 and older were more likely to use a desktop/laptop.” (NARS)
  • Easy navigation – visitors to your site want an intuitive user experience that makes it simple for them to find what they need
  • High quality photographs and videos – don’t compromise on the visual aesthetic. First impressions are formed within seconds, and anything less than stellar will see visitors quickly moving onto another website

Solution: A great website design team

While not a website feature per se, you want a team that intrinsically understands the needs of the real estate market and those of homebuyers worldwide. A team that can build you a website can meet these needs. They can improve your visibility online, amplify your property listings, and attract visitors to your site. At Qobrix, we have a team of developers and creatives who’ll work with you to design a beautiful website that meets today’s industry and customer requirements. A website with must-have features and functionalities to boost client acquisition and retention.

Conclusion

Every industry has its challenges. However, adopting a technology solution like Qobrix, that’s been specifically built for the real estate industry, will help you solve the main challenges facing real estate professionals today. From amplifying property listings, generating and managing queries better, nurturing leads, following-up on and closing sales, Qobrix real estate software streamlines every step of the process.