A worrying wake-up call for Estate Agents…

Covid, rising fuel costs, and scary advancements in artificial intelligence, the 2020s will change the world forever!How will Estate Agency be affected? Who will win, and who will lose?

A worrying wake-up call for Estate Agents…
Written by Mark Burgess, CEO of Iceberg Digital and best-selling author of business books around marketing, data, and the future.
 
I read an article in EAT the other day from the leading man at Connells, who is stepping down. He said that other than technology making it easier to list property, the skills are the same as 50 years ago when he started.
 
It is possibly already too late if you don't think that is a worrying wake-up call for your industry.
 
For the rest of the world, 2023 will be one of the most technologically advancing years in recent history. A.I. will start to be able to do things that you thought only 'humans' could do. Hold conversations, draw art, drive cars, and write meaningful content. The levels of this are already insane, and in 2023 they will go to a whole new level. 
 
People will switch from running a google search to asking the computer by voice to find them a service and schedule an appointment for either Tuesday at 2:00 or Thursday at 4:00, and then let them know when it's been done.
 
Driverless taxis have already quietly made their way into real life and have been running in San Francisco for a while now and are about to start spreading.
 
Most of you will have seen the art A.I. can draw for you. That is about to replace artists and videographers with people saying I would like a video of a woman in a red dress walking down the street. Then I want to see her stop and notice a man in a suit - and the computer will create the whole thing.
 
If you thought it was already hard to tell if you were talking to a man or a woman online, how about face-swapping technology to mask a user's face with a realistic, digitally generated one? Yep, it is all coming.
 
I posted a video recently in our Lifesycle group showing how we can use A.I. to write detailed blogs on why it is better to sell before you look to buy and any other topics you might like.
 
I also showed how it could write a great property description from just a few bullet points.
 
This wave will sweep across the world in 2023 like a Tsunami. Estate Agency is traditionally eight years behind the rest of the world (they are only talking about being media companies, which was a thing in 2012! Now all businesses know they are data companies, and 99% of Estate Agents don't even have software for that, even though it has been a thing for 3-4 years), but in recent years that lag has shortened to about 5 or 6 years behind the rest of the world.
 
Let's be honest, some Estate Agents still get away with using software that won't even run on a MacBook or one that somebody can fully use if you are on a desktop or laptop, and that is not enough to make them think "we are falling behind and we NEED to change this NOW."
 
Unexpectedly, 2020/21 made life easy for agents. Still, if you are not using software that gives you the edge over the competition, you are falling behind and FAST. Agents are using software that shows them who to call from their vast database to get their next sales or lettings listings by cross-referencing every person in your database, combining that with their recent activity on your website, blog, social media, emails or proposals etc. and presenting you with the best listing opportunities before your competitors (P.S. this is happening now not in the future!), software that will contact and qualify all of your tenant and buyer enquiries, fully qualify them and organise them for your team to speak to more efficiently, then allow your buyers and tenants to keep your database up to date automatically for you themselves. Property Alerts is an automated process carried out by the software that does not involve the staff but instead just continually puts the best new viewing opportunities in front of them for them to contact. 
 
If you are thinking, 'Nah, computers can't do that', reread this article from the beginning…they are doing far more complicated things than that.
 
But this is not a human-less future or one to fear if you can embed these technologies into your business now and ride forward with the wave. 
 
It is critical for you to get your company's head out of the sand ASAP.
 
Suppose you agree that Estate Agency is essentially the same as it was 50 years ago, and you are not breaking your neck to change that in your business; in the next few years, your business will be wiped out in what seemed like an overnight moment. Although it wasn't an overnight moment as I wrote my first book about this called 'Where did my industry go?' for Estate Agents in 2017, followed up by the more recent 'Estate Agency Revolution' in 2019/20. You are even reading this blog now, so if you are one of those companies using software built 15 years ago and not doing anything about it other than moving to another software that does the same thing as the one you currently have, you can't say we didn't warn you.
 
If you are breaking your neck to try and solve it now, you have a good chance of being able to ride this wave to an incredible opportunity. The likes of which you will have never seen before, as this hits Estate Agency. What does breaking your neck to solve it look like?
 
  1. Going through the pain of getting your company moved over to Lifesycle. The main pain points are:
  2.  
  3. Having to move properties over manually - ugh! A week of pain.
  4. Having to find a different software solution for the property management department - ugh! Not two systems (like you don't already have 200 systems for marketing, sales, lettings, bits and bobs etc.).
  5. Having to put up with moaning staff about the aggravation of learning a new system. (Weirdly new staff that never used the old system will think it is incredible and that the old system is a joke)
  6. Having to invest time with one of our coaches to embrace new ways of working to take full advantage of how your future business will operate – ugh! Self-development!
  7. Having the balls to do it NOW and realise that none of these obstacles or any others you might mention is that bad, hundreds of other companies have already done it. Indeed, none are as bad as the consequences of continuing to use your' convenient' software-built 15+ years ago.
 
Lifesycle is the ONLY lifeboat built for a future like this; if you don't see the enormous shadow of a problem that this will start to solve for you looming, that is your choice. 
 
You don't have to choose it. 
It is totally up to you.

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