THE REAL ESTATE DISH: 15 MINUTES WITH YORK BAUR, CEO OF MOXIWORKS
CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE Join QuantumDigital’s EVP and CMO Eric Cosway as he gets the latest dish on real estate technology with York Baur, CEO of MoxiWorks—a comprehensive, open-platform system for both real estate agents and brokerages. As CEO, York leads the MoxiWorks team that serves over 110,000 real estate agents and 60 brokerages nationwide.
MoxiWorks Adds Exclusive Email Marketing System, HomeActions, to Moxi Cloud Open Platform
SEATTLE, July 12, 2018 – MoxiWorks, a fast-growing real estate tech company, has recently added HomeActions to their comprehensive open platform network known as the Moxi Cloud. HomeActions joins over 40 best-in-class partners that plug into the cloud.
HomeActions is an e-Relationship platform. It’s a complete email marketing system with an e-newsletter and lead-generation system all in one, focusing on predictive metrics that turn engagement into Conversation Starters. HomeActions builds a database for the agent from their sources such as Facebook, LinkedIn, the MLS, and all email systems. Once enrolled, contacts become exclusive to the enrolling agent.
“What we like most about HomeActions is that they help agents get their marketing database set-up and then focuses the email communications on that specific and unique segment of their sphere. HomeActions delivers in-demand content and widgets that portray the agent as an advocate. This is a great match for our Moxi Engage sphere-centric philosophy,” said Kylah Searing, Director of Moxi Cloud Partnerships and Integrations.
HomeActions is integrated into the Moxi Cloud and Moxi Engage CRM. Agents can upload their custom-made database into their Moxi Engage account for streamlined marketing efforts. Albert Clark, HomeActions President and Co-Founder, sees the combined efforts helping the agents focus on the right segment of their sphere. “We all know real estate is a numbers game and the more we can get agents (through MoxiWorks and HomeActions) in front of their growing sphere, the more deals will come about.”
HomeActions newest feature, Neighborhood 360, allows consumers to get an “Inside Scoop” on any neighborhood they wish. Home value estimates, cost of living data, demographics, lifestyle data, school info, nearby sold properties, and more with the click of a button. It now covers 150 million street addresses and neighborhoods.
Mike McHenry, VP of Moxi Cloud Partnerships and Integrations said, “HomeActions provides an awesome marketing solution with readymade content for agents who need to stay in-flow with their sphere of influence. Fully integrated into the Moxi Cloud, we share several mutual clients with them and enjoy a great relationship with Albert and his team.”
About HomeActions
HomeActions LLC is a digital marketing and lead-generation solution with engaging content and interactive widgets delivered on behalf of real estate agents. The HomeActions platform provides automated prospecting and marketing delivered biweekly via email to a professional’s sphere of influence. With instant lead access, and robust predictive metrics, the system has the capability to generate real-time leads and top-of-mind awareness while nurturing relationships that lead to the agent’s long-term success. More information at HomeActions.net.
Case Study: tinyurl.com/yat4cgue
About MoxiWorks
MoxiWorks is a comprehensive open platform system for large residential real estate brokerages that serves over 110,000 agents and 60 brokerages nationwide. MoxiWorks’ integrated tools are centered on sphere methodology that drastically increases agents’ repeat and referral business by 40%, while lowering overall technology, training, and support costs for the brokerage. Named one of the 10 Best Cloud Solution Providers of 2018 by Industry Era, the open platform known as the Moxi Cloud has tools from more than 40 partners that plug and play to create unique brokerage solutions. MoxiWorks also powers the LeadingRE Cloud. More information at moxiworks.com.
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For more information on this topic and other press inquiries at MoxiWorks, please contact Tiana Baur at tiana@moxiworks.com. For more info on HomeActions, please contact Albert Clark at aclark@homeactions.net or 570-510-3507.
A Moxian Life: A Tale of Adversity and the Will to Succeed
By Mavis Chi, Staff Accountant
I was an intern at MoxiWorks 10 months ago and recently became a full-time employee. I landed an internship here through a presentation that York Baur, the CEO, gave at my finance class at University of Washington Bothell. At the beginning of his presentation, I wasn’t interested in the real estate industry and hardly remember what was on the PowerPoint. My primary focus was York’s personality as a CEO; he was funny, friendly, and approachable. I thought it would be fun to work for a company that provides a relaxing and flexible environment, yet always encouraging its employees to take a step further.
So, I approached York at the end of his presentation and earned an internship with Moxi. Also, who doesn’t want to work for a company that has a motto “Get shit done,” right? But this isn’t one of the stories where I tell you how awesome it is to work at Moxi even though it is pretty awesome. This is my story of how I was a non-English speaking immigrant who became a first-generation college graduate and landed an entry level position as a Staff Accountant.
Do you remember the last time you achieved a long-term goal? Do you remember that incredible force that over-pumped your endorphins that made you jump up and down and shout out, “I did it?” Well, you may only see that reaction in a 21-year-old or younger, but you get my point. I had a similar feeling a month ago at my first college graduation. For some people, a bachelor’s degree may not be a phenomenal achievement but rather a necessity, an expectation because everything is planned for. For others, like me, achieving a bachelor’s degree is almost as hard as finding a needle in a haystack. It’s not because of the lack of intelligence but the lack of encouragement.
I was raised in a traditional Vietnamese culture, where boys are more valuable than girls. My mother was forced to quit school when she was 13 years old to get into the workforce – yes, child labor was not regulated in Vietnam – to help finance for my uncles/her brothers’ tuitions. All my older female’s cousins quit school after high school because they didn’t think they could make it through college. When I first came to the United States seven years ago, my primary drive was to get a college degree. A close relative told me that, “You hardly speak any English, it will be a waste of time and money trying to catch up with other people your age. I think you’d be better off marrying someone here, so you are taken care of.” As wrong as it sounded, he was right about my English ability. I pushed my goal aside and focused on improving my English. During that period, my “English instructors” were the customers that came into my cousin’s nail salon, movies with subtitles, newspapers; I even sacrificed my chances to make friends who are from my country so that I could practice English with the native speakers.
Six months later, I moved to Kentucky to stay with my brother hoping that he could help me get into a local community college. I was staying with my sister-in-law and her family at that time, they didn’t like the idea of me going to college because they wanted me to work for them in return for my free stay, and I couldn’t afford the tuition on my own. My brother doesn’t have a say in his immediate family, so I had to hold off my college again. After a few months of working 10 hours a day scrubbing people’s feet and other chores at my sister-in-law’s nails salon, I discovered the tuition reimbursement program at UPS from a regular customer at the salon. I applied and was hired as a warehouse loader working from 10pm to 3am (Mon – Fri) – it was the only shift that qualifies for tuition reimbursement program. With the benefits that I received from UPS, I finally applied to a few English as a Second Language (ESL) classes at a local community college.
Growing up in a city (Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam) makes it difficult for me to adapt to the country living, so I moved to Seattle once I completed my ESL classes. Seattle opened a new path for my education journey. I discovered a local college (Bellevue College) where it accepted my high school transcript from Vietnam and converted the classes into usable college credits. With the result from the assessment test, I only needed two more English classes to start taking courses for an Associate degree in Business Administration. Pell grant Financial Aids and scholarship helped me get through the AA’s program, but the living standard in Seattle prolonged the process. With the high cost of living, I couldn’t be a full-time student and worker, so I had to take one or two classes at a time in the first two years of college. After four years of on and off with courses, I finally finished my AA with a 3.79 GPA and applied to a business school at UW Bothell and got accepted. One and a half years later, I become the first generation in my family to graduate from college.
The feeling of an accomplishment that I described at the beginning isn’t just over-pumped endorphins. It is my pride for overcoming the discouragement and standing up for what I believe in. My story is only one of many stories where people encounter difficult obstacles that prevent them from achieving their dream, yet they conquer their hardships and punch the impossible in the face. One of my classmates that graduated with me was a lady who is 60+ years old, her story is that she had to push her education aside for her husband and children. Whenever in doubt, always remember: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt.
You are probably thinking why is this relevant to the blog? And why is this girl talking about herself? Because I’m a Moxian and we have a saying that goes, “What got you here won’t get you there.” At Moxi, everyone is always evolving and pushing themselves to go above and beyond to create better products to benefit our customers. This is who we are! We “get shit done!”
Interested in a career at Moxi? We’re hiring.
Artificial What? 4 Tips for Appealing to the Traditional Consumer
By Jessie Trapp, Marketing Coordinator
Let’s face it- the process of buying a home can be one giant migraine waiting to happen. From finding the right agent to closing the deal, the stressful decisions having to be made by buyers can often times overshadow the generally exciting event that it should be in one’s life. Although the notoriously tech-savvy millennials may appreciate your incorporation of technology, for the more traditional consumer who is not up to speed with the latest tech advances, facing them can be an experience that adds even more stress to this already exhausting process.
In order to help you, the agent, navigate the divide in capabilities and preferences, we are sharing a few tips that will likely make the process with the traditional consumer a more enjoyable and stress-free one from start to finish for both you, and your client.
Get back to the basics. The golden rule here – don’t assume that your clients can figure out how to use a program or website. To avoid anyone becoming overwhelmed, it would likely be worth your time to carefully walk more traditional clients through each program they will be using step-by-step. Don’t be afraid to ask them if they are familiar with certain systems at the beginning stage of your relationship, as clarifying this right from the start can help provide a smoother experience overall.
Put it all in one place. Remember, less is more. Instead of leaving it up to the client to navigate the web in search of information such as listings and drive time calculations, beat them to it and use a program like Moxi Present to create a one-stop shop for all the answers they are likely looking for.
Go the extra mile. Adding personalized elements to their buying experience will likely go far and make your clients all the more confident that you genuinely care about them finding the right home. Although listings often contain detailed information regarding the surrounding location, consider taking the time to set up dinners for clients near their top prospective homes to help them get more acquainted with the neighborhoods firsthand.
Visit the post office. Chances are, if you’re teaching a client how to google something they probably aren’t checking their email often enough for your marketing efforts to have a significant impact. Only 26% of real estate agents claim to use postal mail as a form of communication with clients, so what better way to set yourself apart then to get out your old stack of postcards? Send them notes while you’re working with them, as well as after you’ve closed a deal to celebrate events such as birthdays and house-iversaries. Have a blog? Send them paper copies of your posts every so often to keep them in the loop.
If you think about it, working with clients who aren’t familiar with technology can be a refreshing breath of fresh air. Technology allows us to operate on autopilot so much of the time, it’s likely healthy for all of us to have an opportunity to make things personal, show off our creative side, and take a little trip back to 1989.
MoxiWorks releases automated recruitment tool, Moxi Talent
CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE MoxiWorks CEO York Baur says the data-driven tool helps brokerages remain competitive amidst disruption.
MoxiWorks, a Seattle-based real estate technology startup owned by Windermere, Long & Foster and Howard Hanna, has announced the launch of Moxi Talent, an automated and multiple listing service data-driven agent recruitment platform for brokerage managers.
Moxi Talent is the seventh addition to the startup’s suite of products, which includes Moxi Engage, Moxi Present, Moxi Marketing, Moxi Websites, Moxi Hub, and Moxi Cloud.
Recruiting Trauma: Ghosting at Work
By Ringo Nishioka, VP of Human Resources & Operations
You met a great agent you would like to recruit or a potential home seller that you really like. For both of you, business and personal values align. You have a few great phone calls and face-to-face meetings. Suddenly, your colleague disappears and falls off the map. They don’t return your calls and may even miss a scheduled meeting with no heads up. Silence. Just a big echo chamber which leaves you wondering what you did wrong. We have all been there.
What happened? You were ghosted.
It’s happening in dating relationships, companies looking to hire new employees, and yes, in real estate, with both potential recruits and potential home sellers. Unanswered texts and phone calls that are not returned. It hurts. You have invested time, money and emotional energy into the relationship only to find it come to a very hard and dead end.
What is ghosting?
Ghosting refers to when someone in a relationship disappears without any warning sign. The term is a common one in our online world with the advent of dating apps, but we are hearing about it more and more in the professional world as well. We understand it might happen in potentially shorter term personal relationships, but in long term professional relationships?
“Dude, that candidate ghosted you? I can’t believe that. I thought for sure she would accept your offer.”
What are the signs you might be ghosted?
This isn’t our first rodeo here at MoxiWorks. We still get ghosted by candidates we are looking to recruit, but we know some of the signs to look out for. We are not surprised we are dropped like a hot potato when:
- There is a lack of engagement between MoxiWorks (the hiring company) and the candidate.
- When emails exchanges contain slow responses. When we email, we look for timely responses and hope to see a response by the end of the day.
- We look for courteous follow ups and thank you. If we took the time to interview someone or show them around our office, we take a follow up thank you as a sign our candidate is engaged.
Why does it happen?
We have a number of theories, but these are just theories and ours alone.
Bad Communication/Unreal Expectations
We believe that ghosting happens when the communication and expectations between two parties doesn’t match up. Most of us would take the time and effort to talk these differences through, but in an age of immediate gratification, for some it is easier to just walk away.
Your Compass is our Amazon.
We are competing for tech talent in a town where there is a shortage of talent. Every brokerage out there is living in fear of Compass. They have deep pockets, endless perks, and are the shiny object right now in the real estate industry. What’s our version? Amazon. We know what it’s like competing against a giant with endless amounts of cash. When candidates feel like they have opportunity, they can act very differently. There are more tech jobs than tech candidates in Seattle. Consequently, the candidate doesn’t feel the urgency to respond as quickly or respond at all.
How to avoid being ghosted:
- We explain what our interview process will look like in the very first interaction with a potential candidate. We explain how many interviews there might be, who the candidate will meet with and why we take it so seriously. I literally say the following: “Our process may be a little longer than others, but we want to learn what we can about you as the candidate and we want you the candidate to learn as much as you can about MoxiWorks. Ultimately, we are looking for a great fit for both parties because we want you to be as happy as we are with you.”
- Keep the dialogue moving. Nothing creates engagement better than engagement. If your candidate or potential seller has to wait days for a response, they will assume you are not interested in them.
- End your emails with a proposal to continue the dialogue. Give your seller something to respond to.
- “I’d like to meet next week and talk about talk about X. Coffee is on me.”
We mentioned that ghosting happens more in economies where the candidates feel they have choices. The way to overcome this is to make the candidate feel like YOUR SERVICE IS A UNICORN. There may be a lot of agents in town, but YOUR BROKERAGE AND SERVICE IS DIFFERENT. THERE IS ONLY ONE OF YOU IN THIS TOWN!
Benefits of being ghosted:
Believe it or not, there are benefits of being ghosted. You know the candidate’s true colors earlier vs. later and you didn’t find this out after investing in them for six months of training or showing half a dozen homes. Time is money, and they just saved you a lot of it.
3 Steps to Change Your Focus from Software to Success
By Jessie Trapp, Marketing Coordinator
In the world of real estate, we all hear the seemingly constant buzz about the ever-evolving technology that is shaking up our industry. The traditional ways in which real estate has been conducted are slipping away, and brokerages and agents alike are being left scrambling to define what they do, and exactly how they ought to do it. The movement to incorporate technology into real estate practices is tempting and, in many aspects, necessary to keep up and maintain a competitive edge. The pressure to stay current with the movement can be daunting, in fact, 48% of all real estate firms consider keeping up with the tech advancements to be one of the most significant challenges they are facing today. The question that arises here is: what technology does one actually need in order to achieve success?
When searching for new software for your brokerage, make sure you’re confident when it comes to exactly what benefits you are hoping to gain from bringing it on board. Further, that you’re aware of the tools you will need in order to fully utilize it. The process of acquiring new software can be costly and have the potential to put a major strain on the financial health of your brokerage if done incorrectly. Simply handing your agents a fancy new program and leaving it at that won’t anyone any good, and definitely won’t rock your agent’s socks off. In order to see the jaw-dropping ROI you are looking to get out of your software, it will require you to invest the time and money into the implementation process so that your agents are continuously being trained on how to use it and actively receiving value from it.
In light of this, avoid the common mistake of buying technology solely for the sake of buying technology. Instead, raise your bar high and purchase software that you deem absolutely essential in order for you to achieve success, and then gear your efforts toward making sure that you are getting everything you possibly can out of it. After all, what’s the point of having flashy technology if you don’t get value from it? No point. The answer is that there’s absolutely no point to that at all.
Here are a few steps we suggest you consider taking before sealing the deal to maximize your success:
Step One: Clearly define your goals.
Look beyond the buzz and clearly define what you are hoping to achieve by incorporating new software into your business. After you decide on a goal, articulate what metrics you will use to gauge when you’ve successfully reached it. Clearly you want your goals to be centered around the main interests of your company. Here are a few that we here at MoxiWorks like to focus on:
- Improving the quality of your marketing efforts
- Increasing lead generation
- Strengthening CRM
- Increasing agent productivity
- Retaining current agents
- Recruiting rockstar new agents
The main takeaway here is clarity. Be able to state what your goal is, and how you will measure its success.
Step two: Look for the missing parts.
Once you define your goals and establish your metrics, it’s then time to create a game plan for how you will go about achieving them. This requires first conducting extensive research within your brokerage to ensure that you are utilizing the skills you already have, making worthy investments in the technology, and avoiding the expensive mistake of double-dipping in resources. Start asking questions to get a clear insight into what you already have covered, and what you will need to look externally to find.
- What types of resources do you already have within your brokerage that can help you reach your goals?
- What steps can’t you complete without the implementation of new technology?
- What does your timeline for onboarding new technology need to look like?
- Will you need your technology partner to supply onboarding assistance and continuous training, or do you have tech savvy agents that can support others in the process?
Asking questions like these will assist you in finding the missing pieces within your own team, and help you pinpoint exactly what you will need to get out of your technology partnership.
Step three: Treat yourself to a technology shopping trip.
After you discover what kind of technology you need, it’s time to begin the hunt for the right company to partner with. Taking the time to complete the previous steps beforehand will make this process much more straight forward. Make sure to compare different options and take on a “What can you do for me?” approach. Brush up on the major players for that kind of software in order to be perceived as educated and become more likely to get a better price.
At MoxiWorks, we know that you have a unique set of goals and needs. This is why we created the MoxiCloud, an open platform of tools that are designed to help you reach your goals within a variety of different segments of your business. We even have a team of amazing Account Managers available to help your onboarding run as smoothly as possible and ensure that your agents have the tools they need to achieve incredible levels of success with our platform. Our clients are happy with our plug-and-play style, and we want you to be too. Take a look at what they have to say.
Why You Should Always Be Recruiting Your Existing Agents
By Tiana Baur, Content Marketing Manager
Recruit, recruit, recruit. Getting new agents through the door is the number one thing on every brokerage owner and manager’s mind, but does it deserve that top spot?
While it’s a major pillar of every brokerage’s survival plan, we argue there’s another aspect of recruiting that deserves the number one slot and that’s existing agents.
An agent only spends four years at a brokerage on average. How many of your agents are coming up on that four-year mark?
When agents threaten to leave, only then do people’s ears perk up and start to put emphasis on retention efforts. For some agents, it might be too little too late. If they’ve been largely ignored or feel like they’re under-valued at your brokerage for the past four years, it’s easy to see why the grass would look greener to them.
Don’t play into the four-year statistic. Start recruiting your existing agents before they threaten to leave.
Here’s how:
Implement an open-door policy.
When your agents feel comfortable coming to you for anything and everything (like when Compass calls them up) it allows for an open dialogue and a foundation built on trust to exist.
Less is not more.
Don’t be afraid to talk about what’s going on out there. Talking about Compass should be as easy as asking someone to pass the salt – not like walking on eggshells. Bring the hard topics up.
Losing your existing agents only puts more pressure on the efforts to recruit new agents and shocker – it puts pressure on the brokerage wallet as well. Our CEO, York Baur, did a presentation at LeadingRE a couple years ago, sharing local data and insights about the cost of recruiting. The cost per recruit based off data that year in the Pacific Northwest was $20,000 dollars. After the presentation, other industry leaders commented that it was “more like $40,000.” Another way to slice it is by salary (or in this case, commission). According to Forbes, the loss of an employee costs 33% of their salary. Whether it’s 20k, 40k, or somewhere in the middle, that is a LOT of money.
Losing a top producer to let’s say Compass, might not hurt your market share or revenue much, but it will hurt your sales volume numbers. Be better than the other managers out there. Pay attention to your existing agents that are priceless to your business. Think about your agents walking into your office and saying, “I’m leaving and going to Compass.” Which ones would make your heart start pounding?