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Building a unique and powerful personal online brand in commercial real estate is essential for inspiring trust and connecting with your clients. It’s a part of creating an effective marketing strategy for your business and serves to demonstrate your competence, thought leadership, knowledge of the market and differentiates you from the competition.

You can use different outlets to share your ideas and knowledge on social media – from LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook to blogging on your own website or other relevant industry blogs.

We asked some of the largest CRE personalities for their insights and tips on the following question:

What advice would you give to build a personal brand in commercial real estate?

Understand, building a personal brand is not an option. We are all competing for attention. Try prospecting for new business while you are an unknown resource. Good luck! Building a personal brand requires an integration of personal involvement, physical mailings and digital presence. You need all three to compete.

Rod Santomassimo
CRE Coach, Founder and President, Massimo Group

When building a personal brand or the new popular term “personal”voice”, the most important thing is consistency powered by authenticity. Your brand or voice should be true to you so that you can be a consistent contributor to the CRE space and dialogue. Consistency is important because people know what to expect and then they focus on what you know and what assets you bring to the table. If you are one person on LinkedIn, another on Twitter and yet another in person, people get confused and tend to focus on the confusion, not your value proposition. The easiest way to be consistent is to be authentic.

Diane K. Danielson
Chief Operating Officer, SVN International Corp.

The most important advice I would give someone who wants to build a personal brand is to be authentic, consistent and responsive to your audience. If your brand doesn’t really reflect who you are and what you are passionate about, no one will remember you or notice your efforts. Be real!

   

Michael Beckerman
Founder, The News Funnel

I would suggest three things if you are interested in building a personal brand – especially marketing content.
Be consistent – whether once a day or once a month. You must commit to a schedule and never vary
Be authentic – folks want to connect with a real person – not a robot from Sri Lanka.
Produce great content – this doesn’t have to be original – but must be targeted to your audience.

Allen C. Buchanan
Principal, Lee & Associates

Building a personal brand is about being genuine and being consistent. If you focus on being yourself, rather than creating a public image, it should be easy.

  
Jeremy Neuer
Senior Vice President CBRE

The best way to build a personal brand is to be completely authentic. Your relationships in business and in life will flourish if stay true to being the best version of you.

  
Jonathan Schultz
Managing Principal Onyx Equities LLC

Know who your audience is and what they like. It sounds simple, but if you don’t care about who you’re talking to or what kind of content they like, they won’t care about you or what you’re saying. Also, don’t talk just to talk. People in CRE (and in general) can tell when you say anything inauthentic, so create and share quality content when you actually have something of substance to say. There’s enough filler in the world – find a way to rise above it.

  
Linda McDonough
Cushman & Wakefield

Email marketing is immensely powerful.

Despite being one of the oldest tactics in the digital marketer’s toolbox, it remains one of the most effective, driving $38 in ROI for every $1 spent (according to VentureBeat).

But those high returns don’t happen automatically.

How do you build a real estate email marketing campaign that ensures the kind of response rates and ROI you’re looking for from your digital marketing efforts?

We discussed the value of email and tips and techniques to achieve the best email open and click-through rates in a recent guide on commercial real estate email marketing, and in this post we’re going to dig deeper into what makes an effective email marketing campaign to ultimately generate interest and call backs about your properties.

Commercial Real Estate Email Campaign Structure

Let’s look at the most important pieces of a good commercial real estate email that speaks to your prospective and existing buyers and tenants:

1. Subject Line

Nothing listed above matters if you can’t get people to open your email, which is where a strong subject line comes in. This is the first impression you make with prospects and the initial call to action delivered to subscribers when trying to improve open rates.

Some of the most effective things you can do to improve those rates include:

Avoid Generic Headlines – Be as specific as possible in your subject line. Avoid statements like “New Opportunity” that doesn’t provide specific information relevant to the recipient. These vaguely spammy headlines that don’t fully describe what’s in the email are so common that people see them and expect junk.

Keep it Short – Shorter subject lines work better. The data bears out that 1-3 words is the ideal sweet spot for both open and reply rates. Part of this is related to nearly half of all email reads being on a mobile device.

2. Strong Images

Visuals are hugely important to driving engagement with any content online, especially newsletters and emails. A strong lead image at the top of your newsletter will capture attention and drive readership down the screen.

Include attractive photos of your property listings, blog post headers or other content marketing activities.

Make sure the images are the right format to display on all devices, the most common being JPG, PNG and GIF.

3. Headline

Your headline is the first thing recipients will see when they open your email. It needs to be immediately clear what your email is about and how it will benefit them.

Specifically, for commercial real estate customers and prospects, are you offering information about recent property listings, tips about the local market, general information about a building or location, or something even more specific based on your segmentation?

Have a clear answer for this question so you can customize your email’s introduction, matching it to the information contained in the message while enticing tenants and investors to keep reading.

4. Sub-header

Sub-headers in an email break up content and keep it from being overwhelming. If you plan on including several property listings, multiple articles, and calls to action, it should be broken up for easy scanning, especially on a mobile device on which there will be a lot of scrolling.

5. Enticing Content

Potential tenants and investors won’t spend a lot of time reading email. They skim and decide whether your property listings are of interest and then move on. Your copy needs to be more than just a summary of the property, but a highlight of specific benefits that property has to offer.

For newsletters, use benefits statements for all headlines and body copy to highlight why the prospect should click to learn more about the property, or read your article about the local market.

Drive traffic to your property listings with enticing copy that offers a reason for someone to click. Keep it short and concise with a clear purpose and you’ll drive much greater engagement out of inboxes.

6. Call to Action

Alongside that compelling copy, include call to action buttons or links that stand out from the copy and direct potential tenants and investors to act. Buttons perform better than text links in visual emails while factors like size, design, and color can all attract more attention and get the click throughs to your property websites you’re looking for.

Even a button that says “Learn more” below a photo of a new property listing is going to increase click throughs over a text link with the title of an article or property listing. Investors and tenants in the business world respond better to property-specific copy that drives them to a single action – clicking or calling to learn more.

7. Contact Information

Make it easy for your contacts to get in touch with you. Provide name, title, phone number and email where you can be reached and you can even link your phone or Skype so recipients can call you by a click of a button.

Include headshots wherever possible to connect on a more personal level.

What to Consider When Building a CRE Email

Responsive Format

On average email open rates on mobile devices are as high as 60% in many industries, including commercial real estate. Email is a mobile activity for most users, so your email needs to look clean and be compatible on iPhones and iPads, Android devices, and a wide range of different browsers and email clients on desktops and laptops.

Having a well-constructed real estate email template makes this much easier as you swap in your copy and images without having to worry about the code and compatibility of the actual email.

Make it Personal

Personalization has been shown to vastly improve transaction rates (by as much as six times) in email and all it takes is a first name and email address.

Doing your homework and segmenting your contacts by location, specific property interest or transaction type helps you send only relevant information to your contacts and improve your engagement and conversion.

One of the most important things you can do for your commercial real estate marketing strategy is to craft a budget to make sure expectations are clear for all stakeholders.

Without a budget, marketing spend can quickly spiral out of control, unexpected surprises can surface, and frequently leaves you with minimal metrics against which to measure overall success.

For this reason, even a simple one sheet budget can be immensely helpful in better understanding what works and what doesn’t for your property marketing campaigns.

Why a Real Estate Marketing Budget is Important

A marketing budget is important for several reasons, not the least of which is to measure success:

• Set Clear Expectations – For most commercial property projects (whether leasing or sales), there can be many stakeholders involved and the last thing you want is to renegotiate and enter into discussions in the middle of a marketing campaign. With a defined budget beforehand, you and all others involved know where your spend is going and who should be executing on each component.
• Limit Surprises – One of the key benefits of setting a budget in advance is that it forces you to think about all of the costs, vendors and services involved for your marketing campaign. This way you don’t have to scramble and create unnecessary stress because you might have missed something at the early stages.
• Ensure Ongoing Investment – Many commercial real estate companies slow or stop investment too quickly, put off by the large investment in a one-time campaign that didn’t provide results. A structured budget ensures a suitable period during which to test the efficacy of your efforts.

Breaking Down Different Categories of Spend

One of the many reasons a marketing budget is so important is that there are so many different categories in which you need to invest – many of which can be forgotten without a clearly established plan. These include:

• Tools – Email marketing software, your website design, website hosting, CRM, marketing analytics and automation software you may need as part of your marketing efforts.
• Advertising – Break your budget down by channel for advertising activities. This includes commercial real estate listing sites, Google PPC advertising, social media advertising and offline and print advertising.
• Contractors – If you need content written or collateral designed and don’t have the staff internally to handle the job, you may need a contractor – budget accordingly for location, skill level, and project type.
• Staff Hours – Be sure to include hours spent by yourself and your staff as this will directly factor into your return on investment.

Building an Effective Budget for Your Real Estate Marketing Efforts

A good budget is designed to provide a roadmap for your marketing efforts over a period of time. It will account for both direct spend and total investment (both monetary and time), into generating traffic and new prospects. This helps you to measure ROI from these efforts, but also to improve efforts over time. If ROI is high for one tactic but not another, you can adjust your budget accordingly and drive better results with the same spend.

Commercial real estate trade associations are a great way for CRE professionals to meet and learn from industry peers, build valuable relationships, and continue their professional education to help advance their career.

We’ve round up some of the most widely-respected and popular commercial real estate organizations that are consistently providing value to the commercial industry and facilitating important professional connections.

Below is a list of top 21 Real Estate Trade Associations you may want to consider to join in 2019.

1. International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)

ICSC serves the global retail real estate industry and they provide their 70,000+ member network in over 100 countries with invaluable resources, connections and industry insights and actively work together to shape public policy.

Visit ICSC website

2. Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) International

BOMA International is a primary source of information on office building development, leasing, building operating costs, sustainability, local and national building codes, legislation, occupancy statistics and technological developments.

BOMA International’s members are building owners, managers, developers, leasing professionals, medical office building managers, corporate facility managers, asset managers and the providers of the products and services needed to operate commercial properties.

Visit Boma website

3. CCIM Institute (CCIM)

CCIM Institute is a commercial real estate professional organization providing opportunities through its education program, led by established practitioners. CCIM Institute members are eligible to earn the CCIM designation, the industry’s most prestigious certification.

Visit CCIM website

4. National Association of Relators, Commercial (NAR)

The National Association of Realtors is America’s largest trade association, representing 1.2 million members, including NAR’s institutes, societies, and councils, involved in all aspects of the residential and commercial real estate industries. It provides a facility for professional development, research, and exchange of information among its members and to the public and government for the purpose of preserving the free enterprise system and the right to own real property.

Visit NAR website

5. NAIOP, the Commercial Real Estate Development Association

NAIOP, the Commercial Real Estate Development Association, is an organization for developers, owners and related professionals in office, industrial and mixed-use real estate. NAIOP provides industry networking and education, and advocates for effective legislation on behalf of their members.

Visit NAIOP website

6. Society of Industrial and Office Realtors (SIOR)

The Society of Industrial and Office Realtors is a professional commercial and industrial real estate association.

SIOR members are eligible to earn the SIOR designation, the industry’s professional symbol of the highest level of knowledge, production, and ethics in the real estate industry.

Visit SIOR website

7. National Multi Housing Council (NMHC)

The National Multifamily Housing Council is the leadership of the trillion-dollar apartment industry. They bring together the prominent owners, managers and developers who help create thriving communities by providing apartment homes for 35 million Americans. NMHC provides a forum for insight, advocacy and action that enables both members and the communities they help build to thrive.

Visit NMHC website

8. US Green Building Council (USGBC)

USGBC works with government, member businesses and allied organizations to support policies and programs that advance greener buildings and communities.

They use direct advocacy, strategic partnerships, campaigns and engagement to drive development of standards, programs and regulations that enable a greener, more resilient and prosperous future.

Visit USGBC website

9. Urban Land Institute (ULI)

The mission of the Urban Land Institute is to provide leadership in the responsible use of land and in creating and sustaining thriving communities worldwide. Its members represent the entire spectrum of land use and real estate development disciplines, working in private enterprise and public service. ULI members are the people that plan, develop and redevelop neighborhoods, business districts and communities across the U.S. and around the world.

Visit ULI website

10. CREW Network (Commercial Real Estate Women)

CREW Network is the industry’s premier business networking organization dedicated to advancing the achievements of women in commercial real estate. CREW Network members comprise more than 10,000 professionals globally and represent nearly all disciplines of commercial real estate – every type of expert required to “do the deal.”

Visit CREW Network website

11. National Association of Real Estate Investment Managers (NAREIM)

The National Association of Real Estate Investment Managers (NAREIM) is a national professional association for entities engaged in the provision of real estate investment services. NAREIM’s member organizations represent both domestic and foreign capital, and include real estate advisors, financial institutions, REITs, opportunity funds and private investors.

Visit NAREIM website

12. CoreNet Global

CoreNet Global is a non-profit association representing almost 10,000 corporate real estate (CRE) and workplace professionals, service providers and economic developers with strategic responsibility for the real estate assets of large corporations. The organization’s mission is to advance the practice of corporate real estate through professional development opportunities, publications, research, conferences, designations and networking.

Visit CORENET Global website

13. American Seniors Housing Association

ASHA represents the interests of more than 500 companies involved in the finance, development and operation of the full spectrum of housing and services for seniors – including independent living, assisted living, memory care, and continuing care (or life plan) communities. ASHA primarily focuses on legislative and regulatory advocacy, research, and educational opportunities and networking for senior living executives.

Visit American Seniors Housing Association website

14. AFIRE Association for International Real Estate Investors

AFIRE is an essential forum for real estate investment thought leadership – AFIRE members gather throughout the year to help each other become Better Investors, Better Leaders, and Better Global Citizens through conversations, research, and analysis of real estate capital markets, cross-border issues, policy, economics, technology, and management. Representing the “who’s who” in the global real estate investment industry, AFIRE membership is exclusive to principals and senior executives.

Visit AFIRE website

15. Appraisal Institute

The Appraisal Institute is a global professional association of real estate appraisers, with nearly 18,000 professionals in almost 50 countries throughout the world. Its mission is to advance professionalism and ethics, global standards, methodologies, and practices through the professional development of property economics worldwide. Organized in 1932, the Appraisal Institute advocates equal opportunity and nondiscrimination in the appraisal profession and conducts its activities in accordance with applicable federal, state and local laws. Individuals of the Appraisal Institute benefit from an array of professional education and advocacy programs, and may hold the prestigious MAI, SRPA, SRA, AI-GRS and AI-RRS designations.

Visit Appraisal Institute website

16. CRE Finance Council (CREFC)

The CRE Finance Council is a trade association for the commercial real estate finance industry. Member firms include balance sheet and securitized lenders, loan and bond investors, private equity firms, servicers and rating agencies, among others. Their industry plays a critical role in the financing of office buildings, industrial and warehouse properties, multifamily housing, retail facilities, hotels, and other types of commercial real estate.

Visit CREFC website

17. Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM)

The Institute of Real Estate Management is an international community of real estate managers dedicated to ethical business practices, maximizing the value of investment real estate, and promoting superior management through education and information sharing.

Visit IREM website

18. National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts (NAREIT)

NAREIT, the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, is the worldwide representative voice for REITs and publicly traded real estate companies with an interest in U.S. real estate and capital markets. NAREIT’s members are REITs and other businesses throughout the world that own, operate, and finance income-producing real estate, as well as those firms and individuals who advise, study, and service those businesses.

Visit REIT website

19. National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries (NCREIF)

NCREIF is a provider of investment performance indices and transparent data for US commercial properties and a non-partisan collector, validator, aggregator, converter and disseminator of commercial real estate performance and benchmarking information.

Visit NCREIF website

20. Pension Real Estate Association (PREA)

The Pension Real Estate Association is a non-profit trade association for the global institutional real estate investment industry. Their members include public and corporate pension funds, endowments, foundations, Taft-Hartley funds, insurance companies, investment advisory firms, REITs, developers, real estate operating companies and industry service providers.

Visit PREA website

21. Real Estate Roundtable

The Real Estate Roundtable brings together leaders of the nation’s top publicly-held and privately-owned real estate ownership, development, lending and management firms with the leaders of major national real estate trade associations to jointly address key national policy issues relating to real estate and the overall economy.

By identifying, analyzing and coordinating policy positions, The Roundtable’s business and trade association leaders seek to ensure a cohesive industry voice is heard by government officials and the public about real estate and its important role in the global economy.

Visit Real Estate Roundtable website

If you want to launch a successful marketing campaign for your property, there is one thing you need to know:

An effective commercial real estate website is the cornerstone of successful commercial real estate marketing foundation and, without one, you stand to miss out on the 80% or more of tenants and investors who start their searches online.

And it’s not enough to just have a website anymore. It needs to meet certain standards if you want to stay competitive.

From accessibility on different types of devices to visibility in the world’s largest search engines, you need a website that successfully represents your property wherever your prospects might search for it.

Does yours hit the bar, or are you behind the digital curve?

Let’s take a closer look at some of the signs that your website may be overdue for an upgrade.

1. Your property presentation is a PDF

If your property presentation currently consists of only PDF documents with important property information, you need to get it optimized for the modern internet user.

While a PDF is a great way to provide that information in easy-to-share and print format, it doesn’t work nearly as well online. Limitations of certain devices, load times, and the lack of indexable content for search engines mean a poor user experience, and content that is overly hard to find.

2. Your property website isn’t presentable

You spend a lot of time making sure your properties are as visually appealing as they are functionally sufficient.

The same should be done for your property website, and if you currently feel embarrassed to share your website with prospects, and haven’t bothered to put the URL on your business cards or brochures, it is well past time to make an upgrade.

There are several changes you may need to make sure to ensure your site is ready to share with the world, including:

• A shareable URL – If you are using a third-party service to host your website and your URL isn’t share-friendly, it’s time for an upgrade. Buying a domain name that matches your property is a must and will make it easier to showcase on social media and in your collateral material.
• Modern design – An unattractive website with an outdated design, low quality images, and minimal or poorly written copy can be more of a detriment than a tool and should be updated as soon as possible. Opt for something modern and clean that showcases the most important visual elements of your property while supporting access on all device types.
• Provide useful information – Detailed property descriptions, ample photography, and contact details are a must to ensure anyone who visits your website gets all of the information they need to make an informed decision.

3. Your property website is in Flash

Fifteen years ago, Flash was all the rage. It was a slick, new, and looked pretty cool (when done properly).

Today, it is considered a non-starter in web design because it isn’t supported on mobile devices, slows down load times and limited to certain browsers. Static images and well-crafted headlines should be used instead.

4. Your property listing pages are not responsive

A responsive property website is one that adjusts to the size of the screen on which the site is being viewed. It will look as sharp and feel as accessible on a 4” phone screen as on a 28” desktop monitor. With 20-30% of all web traffic being by mobile device, this is more important than ever.

A truly responsive website is compatible not just with mobile devices, but with a range of possible resolutions, from tablets to older phones to chromebooks with 10” screens. The goal is to provide an optimal user experience regardless of medium.

If your site doesn’t currently do this, it’s time for an upgrade.

5. Your property website isn’t indexed in Google

A website is only as good as the traffic and visits that it can bring for you. If your property website currently isn’t listed in Google search results, then the odds of generating the high quality, free organic traffic that is so important to the growth of your business is low.

To start capturing quality traffic you need a comprehensive SEO campaign that leverages a well-built site with an active link building campaign.

While there are dozens of SEO ranking factors that can impact where you appear in these searches, the first step is a full optimization of your website, addressing issues such as:

• Keyword distribution in your content
• Content quality and volume addressing important topics
• Photo quality and tagging to describe images
• META tags and title descriptions for every page of your site
• Links to relevant internal and external pages
• Fast loading, mobile-friendly design

6. You don’t have control of making edits

What do you do if you need to make a quick change to your site?

Do you have to contact your design agency, submit a formal request, wait a few days for someone to be available to make that change, and then pay for whatever hours it took to process?

For many commercial real estate companies that rely on third party agencies, this is the reality, and it can be frustrating.

Especially with frequently updated information or an active property that is being heavily promoted, these kinds of design bottlenecks can be frustrating – slowing down your marketing efforts substantially.

Having full control of your website’s design and layout within a structure that is accessible for you and your team is a must.

7. You have no insights on leads generation

If your website is also responsible for lead generation, how do you make sure you know who is visiting it and who is a qualified sales lead?

While the primary goal is to drive leads through your sales funnel, you also want to know as much as you can about these new leads. On what page did they originate? How many pages on your site did they view before converting? What was the total conversion cost of that lead if you are running ads?

The answers to these questions can help you streamline future marketing efforts, reduce cost per conversion, and generate higher quality leads over time. Some of the key changes that will provide this data include:

• Ensuring proper installation of analytics software that tracks lead source and goal conversion.
• Use of tracking tools that provide data on pages viewed, actions taken, and exit points.
• Marketing software that provides insights on specific landing page conversion points, as well as overall ROI from specific channels.
• Install forms that capture key pieces of data you need to know about your prospects. By adding a web form to your website, you can decrease the number of phone calls or emails you receive that lack this data.

Conclusion

A good website that is mobile-responsive, visually appealing to your prospective tenants and investors, accessible in Google search, and easy to update and keep this way makes all the difference for a commercial real estate marketing campaign.

If yours has any of the above warning signs, it may be time to consider an upgrade.

Learn more how a commercial real estate marketing software like SharpLaunch can help.

A good commercial property management system goes above and beyond work orders and basic communications. It is the backbone of your business. The heart of operational efficiency in your organization.

The best property management systems will match the specific needs of your company. It is a data machine that streamlines operations in the form of inspections, work orders and maintenance. It mitigates risk. It improves tenant satisfaction. It helps you make smarter decisions based on data and analytics.

It’s a measurement tool – but also a resource to make future decisions and grow your business.

So, choosing the right one is a process you should invest careful time and consideration into.

To that end, this guide will discuss some of the most common and popular solutions and help you determine if they are the right fit for your needs.

What Makes a Good Property Management System?

Before we dive into the features of the top property management systems, let’s first look at what makes a good one.

A good system is designed to be as flexible as your business, to scale as you grow, and to be easy to pick up and use. That means:

• Intuitive Use – You have a diverse team that will need to plug in and be able to use this software immediately. Hard to use software can be devastating not only to efficiency but employee morale.
• Mobile Access – How often are you at your desktop with a keyboard? Most of us work a good part of the day on a tablet or mobile phone while on the go. Your software should be flexible enough to support mobile interaction.
• Offline Access – If you’re in the basement of a building checking a system or meeting with the maintenance crew, you need access to the data in your system. Online only access can make that difficult.
• Insights to Improve – The goal of good property management software is to get better. To improve speed and quality of service, manage costs, improve tenant satisfaction, and ensure quality and safety in equipment and the property itself. The software should provide the tools and insights needed to do just this.

What to Consider When Choosing a Property Management System?

While the core responsibilities of good property management software are mostly operational, the most robust tools can go well above and beyond as needed. So, it’s important to evaluate which factors are most important for your business. Some things include:

• Preventive maintenance
• Tenant satisfaction evaluation
• Incident tracking
• Emergency planning
• Self-service tenant resources
• COI management
• Automation to reduce manual data entry
• Dashboards and reporting for easy analysis

While many of these will be appealing to most commercial real estate companies, not all are strictly necessary, so be sure to take time and evaluate which make the most sense for your business.

Choosing the Right Commercial Property Management System for Your Business

With all of this in mind, it’s time to review the options for your commercial property management. But not all options are created equal. Let’s evaluate each and what they offer:

Appfolio

Appfolio offers an all-in-one software tool for multifamily, single-family, student housing, condo, and commercial property management. It is strictly cloud-based and designed to support ownership, maintenance, support, and marketing tasks, as well as tenant and building management, and accounting.

Key Features

• Owner Management – An online portal provides access to owner and vendor eChecks, owner contributions, and communication with owners.
• Maintenance – Online maintenance requests, a contact center, work orders and mobile inspections are all supported.
• Support – The support modules offer training and support contacts, a team section, and data migration.
• Marketing – There is a marketing resource available that includes rent comparison, website development, vacancy management, and lead generation.
• Residents and Leasing – Here, there are several features including an online renter portal, online lease management, task management, texting and email, and mobile app.
• Accounting – Appfolio supports online payments, reporting, debt collection, bulk charges, holding deposits, late fees and security support.

Building Engines

Building Engines offers a suite of available tools and modules to match your specific property management needs. The software is cloud and mobile based, allowing for easy access and management on the go.

 Key Features

• Tenant Service – Online tools for tenant access where they can submit requests, access their paperwork, and communicate with both maintenance and ownership.
• Maintenance – Automation and reporting on maintenance tasks for your portfolio, supported with both web and mobile access.
• Risk Management – Tools to reduce exposure to risk, maintain safety in the building and reduce overall expenses for insurance and liability protection.
• Reporting – Real time reporting for operations, trend reports over time and annual summaries for your entire portfolio or on an occupant or building basis.

Yardi

Yardi offers several software and service solutions for property management and marketing. Their commercial suite and property management software work with their Voyager platform, designed specifically for larger firms and investors, supporting commercial property and financial management for a range of needs.

Key Features

• LeasingPad – A mobile supported solution for lease management, combined with prospect and contact management.
• Business Intelligence and Reporting – Detailed analysis and dashboards for operational and financial data.
• Budgeting and Forecasting – Planning tools for evaluating expenses and accounting all in one place.
• Paperless Procurement – A centralized procurement tool allows paperless execution of online catalogs, workflows, invoice processing and more.
• Maintenance Support – Manage maintenance with preventive, routine, and emergency service on both desktop and mobile. Options are available for inspection management, fixed assets, and inventory control.

Realpage

RealPage was founded in 1998 and is in Richardson Texas, with 11,000 clients around the world. They offer a range of products in property management, sales and marketing, and general support for commercial and non-commercial property managers. RealPage property management is designed to provide support across a range of different areas.

Key Features

• Accounting and Budgeting – Support for simplifying financial processes and creating and managing budgets in one place to save time.
• Facilities Management – Maintenance service requests, work order management, and resource orders.
• Document Management – A single central location to storage electronic records for tenant, vendor, and maintenance interactions.
• Spend Management – High level spend management resources for overseeing expenses on a per unit basis, including purchasing and vendor services.

AwareManager

AwareManager is a full-scale facilities management tool used in some of the country’s most iconic properties. As such, they offer one of the more comprehensive suite of tools for commercial real estate and corporate facilities, depending on your specific needs.

Key Features

• Work and Project Management – Keep track of work status, projects, and planned maintenance.
• Scheduling – Staff, resource, and room reservation as well as related activities and planning.
• Maintenance – Maintenance scheduling, planned work on assets, equipment upgrades, and inspections.
• Contract Management – Input and manage contracts and any information related to governance of contracts.
• Stakeholders – Tracks all requests and responses for stakeholders, including staff, tenants, workers, vendors, owners, and contractors.
• Risk Management – Establish and manage risk ledgers, insurance certificates, incidence reporting, and RAG analysis.

MRI Commercial Management System

Based in Cleveland, MRI Software has been producing applications and solutions for real estate companies for nearly 50 years, today offering a suite of property management systems for commercial, multi-family, corporate, and investment purposes. Their Commercial Management System offers property management, building and tenant operations management, financial reporting, several API features.

Key Features

• Automation and Workflow Capabilities – Automation in MRI is designed to reduce manual input and streamline recurring activities.
• Configurable Reporting – Reporting modules are available for output on several key data points.
• Configurable Dashboards – Dashboards allow quick visualization of real time data for commercial real estate companies.
• Accounting Engine – The accounting tools in MRI offer accounts payable, general ledger and reporting modules.

Electronic Tenant Solutions

Electronic Tenant Solutions offers operations, communications, risk management, reservations, leasing, marketing and energy management features for your property portfolio in a single interface. These applications can be packaged to match your specific needs.

Key Features

• Custom Application Packages – Choose packages to match your property type including leased properties, sustainable properties, prepared properties and SOP/Employee portals.
• Risk Management – Risk profiling that helps to lower liability exposure, reducing excess administrative work, and improve property preparedness.
• Operations Systems – A suite of operations tools for vendors, staff, and engineers, including automated workflows for maintenance, service requests and staff management.
• Energy Management – Analysis and management tools to reduce energy consumption and costs and support Energy Star reporting.
• Leasing and Marketing – Resources for property presentations, availability tracking, and activity.

Angus Systems

Angus Systems has been helping commercial buildings and CRE businesses manage operations for decades, with software development dating back to the 1980’s. Today, their Angus AnyWhere commercial property management solution is a cloud based solution with a suite of tools available for everything you do in your business each day.

Key Features

• Communication Systems – Notify and response systems, property website development support, tenant handbooks, and surveys all run through the backend.
• Operations and Maintenance – Automation and streamlining of everyday operations include service requests, preventive maintenance scheduling, mobility platform, reservations for building resources and inspections.
• Risk Management – Manage your certificate of insurance, visitor security management, and emergency preparation plans.
• Billing and Reporting – Service schedules and billing rules can be set in the backend, along with several billing integrations, estimates, and a comprehensive reporting module for analytics.
• Green Performance – Measure green building performance with Energy and Environmentally Conscious Operations in the backend (EECO).

Conclusion

There are quite a few options when selecting a commercial property management system for your business. As you can see, each of them offers something unique in a slightly different package.

There is no right answer as to which is best. What matters most is that you evaluate the specific needs of your organization, and which system best meets those needs on a recurring basis.

Whether you need something basic and entry level for a single small property or you need a more robust system for a larger portfolio of commercial properties and existing tenants, take some time to evaluate which will make the most sense for your business.

Marketing mistakes in commercial real estate can cost you leads and lost revenue opportunities.

While there is no surefire way to succeed in commercial real estate marketing, there are plenty of mistakes you can avoid to improve your chance of selling or leasing properties.

To help avoid costly fallout, we’ve gathered 11 of the mistakes you absolutely must avoid at all costs as a commercial real estate company.

Mistake #1: You’re Following the Herd

One of the biggest mistakes you can make is to just “do what everyone else is doing”. It’s tempting, of course.

Simply posting your listing on LoopNet and sending a few generic emails won’t get you very far.

Not every audience is created equal, nor should every marketing strategy be the same. By following the herd and promoting your business in the same channels and with the same approach, you’re wasting potentially useful energies on outlets that don’t represent where your prospects spend their time.

What is relevant for commercial real estate?

• The types of properties you promote
• The potential audience you hope to engage
• The geographic location of your properties
• The need represented by your available space

Simply sending a one-size-fits-all email won’t help you better engage your audience and it will waste a whole lot of your time.

Spend time evaluating where you should invest time and energy, what types of content and marketing collateral are needed to reach your ideal audience, and you’ll have a stronger strategy.

Mistake #2: You Use Too Many Tools

It’s very common to get swept up by the multitude of marketing tools and CRE technology that exist and combine them into a “Frankensystem”. Besides complicating your life and consuming a lot of time, this also creates multiple disconnected data silos.

The solution: invest in an all-in-one commercial real estate marketing software.

One of the big benefits of a full-feature marketing platform is that it offers a suite of tools under one umbrella to make things easier and much more efficient.

Mistake #3: You Have a Weak Promotional Strategy

You might have listed your property on some commercial real estate listing sites and invested in eye-catching presentation materials but if you don’t have an effective promotional strategy in place, you will not achieve great results.

To create visibility and qualified leads for your property listing, then you need to roll up your sleeves and put in the work. That means continuous, multi-channel promotion.

Let’s break this down:

1. Continuous: Simple one-time campaigns do not work as well as campaigns with relentless, ongoing promotion. Keep frequency of promotional activities high during your marketing phase. Properties that keep showing up are the ones prospects will remember and have better chance of converting into leads.

2. Multi-channel: Effective campaigns make use of multiple distribution channels. This includes CRE listing sites, email, social media, SEO, paid campaigns and personal outreach. Spread the net wide to capture the attention of as many prospects as you can.

Mistake #4: You Have Weak Content

Good photography is a start, but close behind it is the quality of your content and composing a compelling property description. Weak content that does a poor job of describing the property and its amenities can kill interest quickly.

Written content has a profound impact on conversion rates for several reasons. Just think about how much even a short blurb describing your property conveys:

• Location and proximity to nearby attractions
• Accurate description of space and availability
• Benefits of certain amenities in the context of the property
• An accurate understanding of the cost and value of a space or property

Good copy on your landing pages and property descriptions is vital to capturing and keeping attention, while communicating the benefits they stand to gain from choosing this property. Low quality copy can at the least fail to do this, and at the worst push people away due to an unclear message.

Mistake #5: You Don’t Share Efforts With Your Team

When it comes to marketing a property listing, it’s a team effort.

Companies that place the burden of marketing on one person never achieve as much success as teams that are all actively promoting the listing together.

The key is to make sure your marketing and sales (brokers) are aligned and processes are in place to make it easy for team members to participate.

There are many marketing activities that require no investment (posts on social media, sending emails, outreach, etc.) and are simply a question of your time and effort.

Mistake #6: You Lack Objectives

You need a plan – one that accurately represents your organizational goals, exactly what you plan on doing, why you plan on doing it, and the metrics you will track throughout your campaigns.

Marketing without objectives is akin to investing capital in a casino. Sure, you might hit it big every now and then, but the odds are you’ll come out in the red.

Your plan should include several important elements:

• A clear understanding of your target audience
• A list of specific strategic goals you plan on engaging
• The reasons and expected return on investment for your strategy
• The specific numbers you will measure as metrics for success

If you are missing even one of these, your marketing efforts might be dead on arrival. The worst part? You won’t realize it until you’ve invested heavily in trying to make them work.

Mistake #7: You Have No Process in Place

Once you know what you want to accomplish, you need to answer the next big question: how?

How will you successfully build and execute a marketing plan? What resources do you need in place to do it? What tactics will you pursue to drive success in your selected metrics?

This is the game plan – the blueprint for your potential success – and far too many CRE professionals start spending time and money without it in place.

Some of the specific things that need to be included are:

• Tactical action plan for what you will do to achieve the objectives you’ve laid out
• Specific tools you will use to build your marketing campaigns
• Technologies that need to be integrated for your website, content distribution and marketing follow-up efforts
• Vendors you need to engage to complete key elements of your plan
• Total budget and timeline for each of the above components so you know how much you’ll spend and how long will it take to accomplish?

A good plan is a fundamental cornerstone to your success in any kind of marketing. Go in without it and you’re flying blind.

Mistake #8: You Have Low Quality Photos

This applies to just about any type of business – visual aesthetics are incredibly important. But, for commercial real estate companies, photography is one of the single most important aspects of your marketing.

A high-quality photo does a lot of things. It engages your audience, showcases the property, captures attention at various distribution points, and conveys the story of the property through a visual medium.

Without good photos, not only could your prospects get a bad impression of the property, they may not see it at all – whether on a local listing directory or your own website, low quality photography can make people skim right past your most important properties.

Mistake #9: You Don’t Include Calls-to-Action

Imagine you launch a new marketing campaign and it’s a huge success at first glance. Hundreds of page views from a diverse range of traffic sources. Tons of clicks and time spent on site. Good quality traffic coming in to your website quickly.

And yet…no forms or calls.

Without strong, well-placed, and timely calls-to-action on your website, you might as well be erecting billboards in the desert.

People need to know exactly what to do next – how to act to get what you are offering. This means two things:

• Include relevant contact information in an easy to find location on every page of your site. It should include multiple contact methods – not everyone likes picking up the phone.
• Include targeted links and buttons for relevant conversions above and below the fold on every page. At any point on any page of your website, a visitor should be able to see a button that offers them an option to talk to someone in your office, download a document or otherwise engage.

If you don’t do these things, expect to receive half or a third as many possible prospects from the same amount of traffic. It’s that important.

Mistake #10: You Don’t Send Targeted Communications

How many pieces of marketing collateral do you get in your inbox every day? Dozens? Hundreds?

The average person sees an average of 200-300 marketing communications a day, half of which come via email. That’s a lot of potential junk mail – and if the messaging isn’t clear, you’re wasting an awful lot of effort and even doing more harm than good.

A broad, untargeted blast email to 1,000 people on your list may drive a bit of engagement, but you can exponentially increase the response rate by segmenting your audience and only sending relevant email communications to relevant people.

New property? Send to engaged prospects without deals attached. Company news? Send to frequent contacts, not recently converted prospects who don’t know your company well. Segment and generate better results from every email you send.

Mistake #11: You’re Not Measuring Success

In step one, I warned against the lack of a clear objective and metrics for success.

But setting those metrics is very different from measuring and reporting them to ensure things are working the way you want them to.

Having basic KPIs in place to try and understand the ROI of your marketing efforts is a must. It helps you to measure success and failure, and ultimately improve your efforts in future campaigns.

Some key metrics to keep an eye on include:

• Total visits
• Total leads
• Lead conversion rate
• Total sales
• Sales conversion rate
• Total marketing costs
• Cost per lead
• Marketing ROI

Your actual KPIs may vary depending on what you hope to get out of your marketing efforts, but if you’re not watching and adjusting based on at least some of these eight KPIs, you’re less likely to be successful.

Making Smart Marketing Decisions to Prepare for Success

Who doesn’t want to succeed in their marketing efforts?

It’s not for lack of desire or ambition, but often planning and over extension that CRE marketing plans fall flat and fail to generate results.

That’s why it is so important to invest carefully, both in terms of time and budget, to build an executable plan based on the specific people you are targeting.

Avoid the 10 mistakes covered here and you’ll be in a good place to drive positive ROI in your future campaigns.

If you’ve already started to plan a photography commission for a commercial real estate project you’d want to know how much it would costs and how quickly you can get the photos of your property. We already covered the top tips for planning to shoot your property provided by the leading commercial real estate photographers.

The goal in an architectural shoot is to enhance and present the property in its best light and in a way that the viewer will want to be there.

It requires precision, patience, attention to detail and planning around many pre-existing conditions that have a difficulty to be manipulated like the weather, sun position, human activity or existing lighting conditions.

© Tony Roslund Photography

If you’re hiring a professional photographer, have in mind you are paying for their expertise, time and necessary equipment that will add value to your property marketing and crucial assets to feature on your commercial real estate website design.

Photography Prices

© Andrew Buchanan Photography

As with properties, photography prices vary. Different price range depends on the type of shoot, location, complexity, ease of access to the spaces, the amount of prep work involved, if 3D tour or aerial photography is required, photo quality, number of shots and usage license.

There are usually two types of pricing; per photo and per day.

Photographers might quote anything between $150-$350 for daytime photographs and between $750-$850 for a dusk/twilight photograph.

The rates calculated per day include the required editing and post-production based on the final number of photos. The range for a professional photography shoot can be between $1500 and $15,000 depending on all above mentioned variables.

Here are a few example estimates per different project type:

Mid-rise office building

• Photographer’s Fee: $1250 (includes pre-planning, scouting, one full day of photography including either early morning / dusk exteriors as appropriate, and standard Marketing Use package)
• Digital Production Charges: $550 (includes digital capture, RAW file processing, preview galleries, final high-rez file prep and delivery of up to 10 final high-rez, finished TIFF files; delivery also includes image library of every image photographed (after edit) as un-retouched, screen-resolution jpegs suitable for most on-screen uses)
• Other Production Charges: $325 (includes assistant’s charges, expendables, mileage, etc.)
• TOTAL estimate: $2125, including standard Marketing Usage package

Small retail property

A small retail property might not need interior shots at all if the point is to highlight the property’s location and context in the neighbourhood, amenities like parking and landscaping, general level of perceived value, etc.

• Photographer’s Fee: $975 (includes pre-planning, scouting, one partial day of exteriors-only photography, and standard Marketing Use package)
• Digital Production Charges: $375 (includes final high-rez file prep and delivery of up to 5 final high-rez, finished TIFF files; plus an image library of every image photographed (after edit) as un-retouched, screen-resolution jpegs suitable for most on-screen uses)
• Other Production Charges: $35 (includes expendables charge, mileage, etc.)
• TOTAL estimate: $1385, including standard Marketing Usage package

Large 3-building mixed-use development

Given the larger size and the different number and quality of spaces, a photographer might suggest shooting it over the course of two or more days if the budget allows.

• Photographer’s Fee: $2400 (includes pre-planning, scouting, two full day of interior & exterior photography including early morning and dusk exteriors, and standard Marketing Use package)
• Digital Production Charges: $800 (includes final high-rez file prep and delivery of up to 15 final high-rez, finished TIFF files; plus an image library of every image photographed (after edit) as un-retouched, screen-resolution jpegs suitable for most on-screen uses)
• Other Production Charges: $350 (includes assistant’s charges, expendables, mileage, etc.)
• TOTAL estimate: $3550, including standard Marketing Usage package

Delivery time

The delivery time depends on the complexity and the number of photos captured. Turnaround time can vary depending on the amount of post-processing.

An architectural job would require 1-2 weeks of delivery time and real estate projects can be turned around in 1-3 business days for the first web gallery selection and then 2-3 more days for final delivery.

Usage license

The license is an agreement between the client and the photographer for the usage rights that have been granted for a given project similar to license as a lease and the usage rights as the terms of that lease.

Photography is a creative business and professional photographers are paid based on their skills to create impressive and eye-grabbing imagery for clients to market their properties. This means that photography commissions are considered intellectual property of the photographer.

So, the final photographs are not actual owned by the client, but rather licensed depending on the usage.

© Ed Wolkis Photography

For commercial real estate photography the usage is generally property marketing on the CIMLS, property websites, collateral materials, and other similar resources.

If the building is shot for architects/designers, the usage could be for competition, portfolio, and RFP responses and any use outside of those scopes requires additional licensing.

Most photographer’s fees will include a standard marketing usage agreement that includes most of the common marketing uses for images, but any additional usage not included will be charged extra, so you need to make sure everything is agreed and signed in writing to avoid any uncertainties and conflicts.

What does the photography process look like?

We asked a few select photographers to describe how they approach the job and what the client should expect from the photography project.

Honestly…expensive and beautiful. If you hire someone who is passionate and knows what they are doing and who delivers reliable and inspiring imagery they will be expensive and you will get beautiful results. You as a client will only need to listen to your hired professional and do what they ask.

Trent Bell Photography

When I get an assignment, I will ask the client for information regarding the type of property, the purpose of the photos, how many photos are expected, how much propping and styling will be required, will there be people in the photos, the location, and the timeframe. It is great if the client can supply some general photos to give me an idea of what the property looks like, or sometimes I will scout the location beforehand. When I am doing the photography, I will bring a laptop with me, so that the client and I can look at the images and make adjustments before doing the finals.

Ed Wolkis Photography

Typically, a client reaches out with a broad sense of what they are looking for in terms of photography. I then help the client flush out a shot list and come up with an approximate number of finish photos they’d be looking for. I’m often working with brokers and marketing teams to achieve a cost/benefit balance. The quote is then sent for approval. I use TAVE for accounting; this allows the client to book and sign the contract online simplifying process greatly. Once the job is booked, I’m often in contact with the building manager to schedule the shoot. Here in Chicago, we often have to wait a couple days for the weather to cooperate. Once the shoot takes place, I typically turn around watermarked proofs in 48 hours. Decisive clients might respond with their selections in a single business day, while other clients might take a week or even longer. Once the client makes their selections, I will do the full post-processing on the images – again typically turning over the images in 1-2 business days.

Josh Pabst Photo

Generally we start with a scout of the property, to know what we’re up against. This helps identify any challenges that may be present during the actual photo shoot and help us move more efficiently. We typically allow for up to an hour per image to include time for composition, staging, and lighting. Staging doesn’t have to involve adding furniture or other items, but moving existing furniture around, levelling blinds, turning on/off lights, etc can all take time. Finally we need to light the scene, we want to draw attention to the details of the space by highlighting certain areas. We want to keep the viewer’s eye moving through the photo by creating a flow of highlight/shadow areas of the scene.

Tony Roslund Photography

Once I’ve been contacted and hired by a client, I need some guidance regarding the goal / intent of the photos, how and where they’ll be used, and any specific shots they’re hoping to come away with. Next, I need help contacting and coordinating with building management, either a property manager or a tenant / occupancy coordinator, in order to gain access and permissions, reserve common areas, coordinate with tenants as necessary, and schedule the shoot day(s). Finally, once the photography’s done I’ll take a few days to edit down what’s usually hundreds of images into a more manageable number, process and retouch them, and then post them in a web gallery for client review. At that point, my client needs to make some choices based on their needs, and then I can deliver final images within another few days, or sooner depending on urgency.

Subtle Light Photo

My clients enjoy an extremely simple process. They contact me with a “shoot”, we agree to a date and time. If there is something unique about the property we discuss or they send me a “shoot list” otherwise I text them when I arrive at the property and again when I leave the property. They get finished photos shortly after that with an invoice.

James Meyer Photo

Resources to find a commercial real estate photographer

The best way to find a professional commercial real estate photographer is through word of mouth and referrals.

However you can also search for architectural photographers on search engines and on specialized photography resources such as:

• AIAP – The Association of Independent Architectural Photographers whose mission is to promote the professional success of established independent architectural photographers.
• APA National – American Photographic Artists, a non-profit trade organization that provides business tools and creative inspiration which help photographic artists of all levels run a smarter, more creative, and profitable business.
• Found Artists – An online directory for photographers, illustrators and production artists.
• Production Paradise – An internationally acknowledged go-to source for photographers, production companies and advertising creatives
• Wonderful Machine – A production company with a network of over 700 photographers and videographers worldwide.

Further reading:

• How to Build a Commercial Real Estate Website
• How to Build a Commercial Real Estate Marketing Strategy
• 7 Elements of Modern CRE Websites

Digital marketing is increasingly becoming one of the key drivers of success for any commercial real estate sales or lease up effort.

Whether you’re a building owner or a CRE broker, keeping track of your marketing activities is crucial and will help you determine where to allocate your marketing budget and what isn’t working so it can be improved.

Once you launch your listing or commercial real estate website, then tracking results is easy and the math is straightforward:

More visits = more leads

More leads = more sales

More sales = more commissions.

So how do you start to create a marketing report?

With the abundance of existing information about marketing metrics we’ve narrowed it down to the 8 real estate marketing metrics that are most relevant to your real estate funnel and to the end result: closed transactions.

We’ve also included a marketing report sample spreadsheet you can use for your own property marketing. Simply download and swap your data to instantly generate results and graphs.

8 Key Real Estate Marketing Metrics

Measure these 8 metrics to track the success of your real marketing performance and help build a marketing report.

1. Total Visits

Visitors to your site is the most direct way to measure interest and whether you are generating enough visibility. This is an important number to measure that has direct impact on the rest of the funnel.

Look at total visitors (volume) for a given time period and month-over-month trend (growth).

Dig in further and look at this data by marketing channel. For example, how much of your volume and growth is attributed to Google? Loopnet? Email blasts? Social media?

2. Total Leads

Leads are any prospects that contact you via your website. This could be by clicking an email link, filling a contact form, or picking up the phone to call you (more difficult to measure).

Similar to visitors, your real estate lead reporting should measure total number of leads and month-over-month trend. Ideally, you should also break this down by marketing channel to understand where you should be spending more of your efforts for greatest impact.

If your website is not producing leads, then it’s not having much direct impact.

3. Total Sales

Sales is the end game. It’s not only the result of attracting visitors and generating leads, but also your ability to close the deal.

The key to understanding the impact of your real estate marketing efforts is your ability to measure what sales were achieved from leads generated by your online activity.

Why?

Because this will give you a holistic view of your entire marketing and sales efforts. It bridges the gap of online efforts with offline deals. Look at total deals closed (volume) and revenue generated (deal value).

 4. Lead Conversion Rate

Once you have visitors and leads, then you can calculate your lead conversion rate. The formula is simple:

Leads / Visitors = Lead conversion rate

For example, if you had 2 leads and 100 visitors for a given month. Then you would have a 2% conversion rate.

This is an important metric because it gives the relative impact of your results which can be obscured if you only look at absolute numbers. Moreover, it becomes very useful when comparing month-over-month trends to give an accurate picture of progress.

5. Sales Conversion Rate

Besides total volume, it’s also important to measure your sales conversion rate. This will help you answer a very critical question:

How many leads do I need to generate 1 sale?

The calculations is as follows:

Total Sales / Total Leads = Sales Conversion Rate

This is very challenging because the sales cycles in real estate are long and it requires extremely detailed tracking. Fortunately, there are number of tools and CRM systems that can help you with that.

6. Total Marketing Costs

Look at all of your costs for marketing spend and break it down for a given period of time. This can include costs related to advertising, PR, email marketing, website updates, consultants, agency fees and anything else related to your marketing efforts.

If you have a dedicated marketing team, then headcount costs should also be included.

Measuring overall marketing spend gives you the ability to track the relative efficiency and impact of your marketing as it relates to cost per lead and overall return on investment.

7. Cost Per Lead

Now you can get an idea of what is your cost per lead (CPL), or how much money do you need to spend to acquire 1 lead?

For any given period of time, the calculation is:

Marketing Costs / Total leads = Cost per lead (CPL)

With this metric, you will get a sense of the overall math for your real estate marketing activity. It should help you understand “If I spend ___ on marketing then I should expect ___ in leads” and how viable it is to scale your efforts.

If you’re marketing investment is not translating into leads, then you need to know assess if there are other marketing activities that could be more effective.

8. Marketing ROI

If you’re tracking your marketing expenditure and the closed deals from your online activity you can easily determine the quantitative impact and overall real estate marketing ROI for your entire marketing/sales funnel.

Total Sales Value / Marketing Costs = ROI

Once you have this framework in place, you can drill down deeper to look at channel performance and specific marketing activities to help you answer the following question:

What gives me the best real estate marketing ROI?

If you can’t answer this question, then it will be difficult for you to understand the basic unit economics needed to grow and scale your business.

Marketing Report Template (Excel)

To help you put these KPIs into action, we’ve created a sample real estate marketing report that encompasses all the key metrics outlined above in a comprehensive Excel file you can download. Simply open the template file, include your own data in the spreadsheet and then refresh to automatically visualize everything in pivot graphs.

Further reading:

• How to Build a Commercial Real Estate Marketing Strategy
• How to Create a Real Estate Funnel
• How to choose a Commercial Real Estate Marketing Software

Imagine if you could make one simple improvement to your marketing and sales process, and see an instant boost in the number of closed deals.

That’s how a funnel can help you.

If you’re serious about marketing your properties, improving lead generation or closing more deals, then keep reading…

What is a real estate sales funnel?

A marketing or sales funnel is an effective way for you to break down the entire sales journey of closing a client into specific, measurable stages. This can be applied to almost any commercial real estate process, both for leasing or sales.

Why do I need a funnel?

Funnels are important because they help you understand what part of your marketing and sales operations are working effectively. More importantly, it also helps identify problem areas that need improvement (leaks or clogs).

It shows all the stages needed to close a deal and can help bridge the gap to better align your marketing and sales processes towards a common objective to help your company grow.

How do I create a sales funnel?

Creating a real estate funnel is simple:

Step #1 – Stages
Break down your client’s journey into key stages of your marketing and sales activity

Step #2 – KPIs
Set relevant KPIs (key performance indicators) to measure activity of each stage

Step #3 – Track and report
Track performance of each stage to understand where you need to improve

For most commercial real estate companies, whether for investment sales or for a lease-up effort, your marketing and sales funnel stages can consist of the following:

• Awareness (reach)
• Interest (visits)
• Conversion (leads)
• Qualification (opportunities)
• Closing (closed deals)

1. Awareness

The top of any funnel is completely focused on attracting potential clients.

How well do your commercial real estate marketing strategies create awareness for your property?

The ability to create awareness can come in many different forms, both online and offline, and there are plenty of creative property marketing tactics to consider. In general, you want to try to measure the extent of your exposure and reach generated through different marketing channels.

Prospects in this stage are not yet ready to engage so this is a good opportunity demonstrate the value proposition of your property and pique their interest to move them into the next state.

Some metrics you may want to consider:

• Email opens
• Ad impressions
• Social media views
• News clippings

2. Interest

In the interest phase, a prospect has now become more engaged with your property and is willing to consider a potential deal.

This is where the quality and depth of your listing content is very important and has an immediate impact on demand generation to move them into the next stage.

You should be thinking:

What can I do to engage prospects as soon as they land on my property listing?

Take time to create a listing presentation that demands attention and generates an immediate “wow” factor to capture interest.

Some metrics you may want to consider:

• Visits to website
• Time spent on site
• Bounce rate
• Specific actions (downloads, newsletter sign ups, etc.)

3. Conversion

What is the lifeblood of any real estate marketing or sales process?

One simple word: leads.

The effectiveness of your marketing comes down to how well you can convert visitors from the previous stage (consideration) into warm leads that have shown interest in your property and inquire for more information.

This where a good CRE marketing team can rely shine and help their brokers.

Marketing is not always about creating shiny collateral, it’s about putting into place repeatable processes that move people through the funnel and effectively convert them into a potential prospect for a broker.

The ability to convert leads is based on two things:
1. Effectiveness of your property listing to drive action
2. Volume of people in previous stages

Some metrics you may want to consider:

• Total leads (inquiries)
• Lead conversion rate % (total leads / total visits)

4. Qualification

Not all leads are created equal.

Although the total volume of leads is important, the quality of your leads is even more critical.

What you don’t want is a real estate funnel that is producing the wrong kind of leads (buyers, investors or tenants that are not a good fit for you). This can be a huge loss of your time and effort.

This is why lead qualification is an important stage of any funnel, and where you can separate potential opportunities (qualified leads) that can convert into deals from the tire kickers that are wasting your time.

Property tours are a relevant opportunity to gauge the level of interest and may be another middle of the funnel metric to consider as part of the qualification step.

Remember: success in closing any real estate transaction depends on this step.

Some metrics you may want to consider:

• Total opportunities
• Opportunity conversion rate % (total opportunities / total leads)

5. Closing

The final step of any real estate sales funnel is the end game: closing deals.

Whether it’s a property that is sold or space that is leased, the ultimate measure of success for any funnel can be reduced to the deals you win.

However, to have a more comprehensive view of executed deals, you can also break down the “closing” stage into more granular steps such as:
– Proposals sent
– LOIs sent
– Offers submitted
– etc.

This will allow you to further track and improve performance at each stage and better gauge your sales forecasting.

You may also considering tracking two additional dimensions (Deal Size and Total SF ) to give you more meaningful information about the total opportunity at the bottom of the funnel.

Some metrics you may want to consider:

• Total closed deals
• Closing conversion rate % (total closed deals / total opportunities)
• Conversion rate % of additional stages (LOIs, proposals, offers, etc.)

Conclusion

Once you have identified and organized your real estate marketing and sales process into a funnel, it’s important to measure and optimize each stage of the funnel on a continuous basis.

The benefit of creating a real estate funnel is that you’ll have a visual representation that allows you to quickly assess whether you are slipping in any area. This gives your marketing and brokerage teams the ability to align and fix “leaks” or “clogs” to help drive growth of your company sales in a very systematic way.