Brokers: Total Transparency of Agent Performance and Activity is Here

Market Leader made significant additions to its market-leading brokerage CRM system last month, including an innovative lead management dashboard that gives brokers and office managers visibility into agent performance, activity and lead follow-up.

Lead management services have been around in some format for years, of course, but Market Leader is the first to provide comprehensive tools specifically targeting the broker, office manager and team leader.  Agents historically (and still today) are inconsistent, at best, with responding to online leads (and are usually worse at follow-up).

With Market Leader's Office Pro package and new lead management dashboards, leading brokers can increase ROI and profitability of their marketing investments, plus increase the success and retention of their best agents.

Market Leader is responding to two trends we see emerging that are changing the landscape of lead management for brokers. The first one is confounding. Agents want syndication and online advertising, but only respond to about one in four leads. When they do, it is normally a "one and done" call or email.

The second trend is the need for brokerages to increase their visibility, management and ROI of leads – online and offline.

Market Leader is now delivering a comprehensive Office Professional solution that includes not just the new dashboard, but CRM, Lead Management, and Lead Funnel management.

WAV Group sees three key takeaways:

• Office Reporting helps brokers better understand leads overall and leads by lead source. This is a fundamental requirement to managing your online lead strategy. WAV Group emphasizes that brokers use these reports to publish the facts about online lead generation. If sites are not delivering any leads to agents, show agents the results, then turn off the data feed. Don't waste your listing asset on partners who do not perform. Syndication to 200+ websites is an online marketing mistake.
• Agent Lead Responsiveness helps managers understand which agents do not care about online leads. It helps the office manager open a discussion with the agent to determine a strategy for lead placement. Either the agent needs to commit to following up with the leads with broker support and coaching, or the leads should go to another agent or a relocation desk. Don't waste them! The lack of responsiveness by an agent will tarnish the brokerage reputation with the consumer. It's disgusting to think that a consumer would reach out to a broker on a home purchase and be ignored. Brands cannot handle this type of erosion in consumer confidence.
• Agent Performance is another measure on the dashboard. Not all agents are alike. If some agents are converting more online leads, the manager can celebrate that success with the agent and find out what they are doing to have such positive results. In this case, the agent will train the manager on best practices so that the manager can train poor performing agents. Moreover, the manager has visibility into the agent's sales pipeline. Knowing how many consumers an agent has in various stages of the sales funnel will help the manager manage the agent more effectively.

It is clear that brokers must supply CRM and drip marketing to agents if they ever want to convert an online lead. It's about time that more brokers take customer service seriously and respond to consumers who are inquiring about their listings. These solutions will help.