Last week, we discussed why brokerages in commercial real estate should invest in CRM technology. Brokerages and companies who already use CRM are ahead of the curve, so what’s holding others back from joining the front?
Answer: data migration.
Brokers who have been in the game for a while without a CRM have built up an empire of their own data, albeit on a shoddy foundation of Excel spreadsheets and other aged forms of documentation. We acknowledge that relentless hours of work went into collecting and storing company, contact, and property data. However, this is exactly why CRM should be implemented because it just shouldn’t be a painstaking process.
Of course brokers who have built up their empire, made up of islands of information, are hesitant of it collapsing in attempt to migrate to a better structured data house. They’re afraid they’ll lose data in the process. The concern is real, but it shouldn’t stop anyone from making the switch.
Take our client from Cresa New York for an example. In his recent Client Success Story, Rob Sattler explains his concerns and the positive outcomes of migrating to his CRM solution:
“Regarding the data importation process, my working assumption going in was that I would only be able to get an accuracy rate of around 75-80%. On one of our first calls, Wes Snow [CEO of Ascendix] stated that we should shoot for a much higher rate than that if we follow a methodical process, perhaps approaching 100% accuracy. My first thought based on previous experience was this not going to happen. Then Wes said, ‘we can definitely do better than 75%.’ In the end, we achieved much closer to 95% data accuracy.”
You can read the full Client Success Story to see all he had to say about his CRM solution, xRE Foundations for Salesforce.com, and his tips to brokers who are planning to make the move.
CRM helps the success of brokers. Like we brought up last week, the CRM market is growing every year. In 2014, the worldwide CRM market revenue totaled to a whopping $23.2 billion, a 13.3% increase from 2013.
There are 2 key takeaways from this data.
The first is the simple fact that CRM and data is needed and used in all industries. CRM is a platform that is easily accessible, both from a mobility front as well as from a transparency perspective.
The second is that more and more companies, including commercial real estate brokerages, are making the move to CRM. It’s 2016…join the movement!
Want to know how you can power your CRM into a data monster? Look for our new post next week.
If you’d like to learn more, contact us and we will get back to you shortly.