Chris and Leigh Russell started Plum Tree Realty from scratch about seven-and-a-half years ago. After taking took some time to define what “being the best” meant for their firm and researching the many lead generation programs out there, they chose a platform they felt was "the best technology available." Now, from lead generation to recruiting, Russell has built his brokerage around the value proposition of getting leads to his agents.

The winning combination of technology plus culture sets Russell Real Estate Services apart. "The trust cultivated in our organization has led to a reciprocal tech relationship: Our agents have embraced our approach to consolidated technology, which has led to widespread adoption, and, consequently, unprecedented success." - Jeff Russell, Broker/Owner of Russell Real Estate Services

Find out how this brokerage struck gold with a well-thought-out tech strategy, a near flawless platform rollout and record numbers of agent adoption.

It’s common for brokerages to focus more on lead generation programs, CRM software, and sophisticated websites as their revenue driving solutions. There is no question powerful solutions like kvCORE are built to drive revenue. But if brokers ignore the backend, that’s a missed opportunity to carve out additional profitability and claim a competitive advantage with a modern back office.

It’s only been in the last few years that virtual brokerages have popped up, and they’re a hot topic within the industry. Without a physical location, virtual brokerages have significantly lower overhead costs and can scale their business with relative ease–two big reasons why they’re growing in popularity.

Today it seems as though there is a tech tool or solution for every stage of the real estate transaction, from marketing and advertising to listing and closing. Sometimes it can feel like we are kids in a candy store, overwhelmed by so many choices that promise they will miraculously improve our business. But is there such a thing as too much tech for real estate? And what is the perfect balance of tech tools that produce the highest agent adoption and profitability for the brokerage?

What tech really matters to agents, and what doesn’t? Invest wisely.

There seems to be an unspoken agreement that the single most important piece of technology a real estate professional can have is their website. Looking further into this belief many think that the website alone will produce an infinite amount of leads and business as long as it is a unique, one-of-a-kind custom site that has video and parallax elements throughout. So if a single tech asset, namely your website, is not your best tech asset, what is?

The real estate profession is unique when it comes to joining a new brokerage or firm. Unlike with traditional job onboarding, there is a combination of requirements to be successful as an agent. New agents need a thorough and effective onboarding process. Many new real estate agents drop out of the industry simply because they didn’t receive proper training when they started out. Here are a few tips for how to improve the onboarding process for new agents.

Want to maximize your presence on social media as a brokerage or individual agent? A Facebook Business Page is a great starting point— so long as you’re venturing past the default settings. Whether you recently set up shop or your business has lived on Facebook for a while, fine-tuning your page with the following tools is a must. Here's how to customize your layout, communicate with customers, compete for business, and analyze trends.

Technology solutions offered at a brokerage level to agents are intended to make agents more productive and their life easier at the same time. So why is there often so much hesitation and resistance to embrace these solutions that have nothing but good intentions towards the agent and their business? Here are 3 reasons agents use or don’t use technology.