Webinar Recap: Strategies to Transform Your CRM Into a Goldmine

CRMs, or Customer Relationship Management systems, are great organizational tools, but they are often underutilized. The endless opportunities for CRM-based business building were discussed during RISMedia's recent webinar: "Double Down: How to Double Your Business, Profit and Free Time."

The webinar, sponsored by IXACT Contact and moderated by Verl Workman of Workman Success Systems, offered listeners actionable strategies they could implement to not only double their productivity, but also their profitability, using CRMs.

Workman provided the following tips for turning a CRM into a goldmine using the 3-2-2-1 system:

1. Call three past clients
2. Prospect until you get two new leads
3. Learn one new thing
4. Give one outbound referral

Panelist Nelson Goulart, broker of record for Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate Signature Service, emphasized that agents are "only as good as their database."

"If you don't have one, and you're not organized, you're searching for that bright, shiny thing every month," he said.

Goulart suggested the following in terms of a CRM strategy:

1. Select a good CRM that meets your needs and proficiency.
2. Organize your database into one location and segment contacts based on motivation.
3. Select 35-40 touches and create an action plan with hard dates and a budget.
4. Automate everything that can be automated: newsletters, e-campaigns, etc.
5. Create a Facebook business page and invite everyone in your database.
6. Create a website within 30 days of joining a brokerage.
7. Create a plan to have 70 percent of business done by July 1, vacation in August and July, and complete the remaining 30 percent of business between September and December.

All of this, said Goulart, isn't challenging, but it does require commitment.

"This business is easy but it's hard," said Goulart. "The things you have to do are easy. The hard part is you doing it consistently."

Jay Quigley, the second panelist and broker associate of Florida Executive Realty, stated the most important thing to do is fill out the CRM with contacts before jumping on any marketing plans.

"Adding people to your CRM is key," said Quigley. "Having multiple ways of staying in touch with your clients, and your top 50, is a great strategy."

In order to do so, Quigley relies on a lot of automated marketing: a monthly e-newsletter, a monthly market update letter via snail mail, and consistent touches on birthdays, wedding anniversaries, home-buying anniversaries, etc.

"Spend time and listen to what your clients have to say," said Quigley. "The CRM really helps me stay organized. To think of it as a telephone book is tremendously short-sighted."

For more tips on how to effectively implement marketing strategies revolving around your CRM, watch the full webinar below:

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