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Buyer's Guide: High Tech Presentations
Being able to deliver an effective sales presentation is crucial in real estate. Let technology help you create professional, personalized presentations that are sure to impress.
One component to generating new business is being able to dazzle prospects with sales presentations that offer a compelling case for your market knowledge and services, and ultimately, motivate prospects to become your client.
But many practitioners are discovering that, in staying competitive, presentations must be much more than just talking the talk. Software, on- or offline, can help you create quality content and graphics that make your presentations more professional, personalized, and organized in an easy-to-understand, eye-catching format.
Personalized Presenting
At a typical listing appointment, Yvette Valdes, e-Pro, sales associate with Lexi Realty, Homestead, Fla., talks through eight to 10 slides created in Microsoft’s PowerPoint software, as she advises sellers how area development has impacted the real estate market since the purchase of their house. Valdes assesses her audience’s tech comfort zone before determining the most effective way to present information. For example, tech-savvy home owners view those slides on her Sony VAIO laptop; less tech-savvy customers see the same graphics printed on paper.
“Meeting face to face so people can hear things directly from you is the best presentation you can make,” she says. “Having something visual helps remind me to cover everything and gives them information in a way that’s easy to understand. I always leave a printed copy for them to refer to and remember me by.”
Brenda O’Brien, e-Pro, Long Realty, Tucson, Ariz., also makes a point to tailor the content of her presentation to whatever she learns about the prospects, their motivation and their goals during her initial contact by phone or e-mail.
O’Brien then builds a personalized presentation using the Web-based solution ToolKitCMA from Realty Tools. “I can pull in data from the MLS, and easily add community information or something about me and my experience,” she says. “It’s always geared to whoever I will be talking to.”
Mix and Match Tools
Flexibility is fundamental to effective presentations, says Robert Farnsworth, CRS, associate broker with RE/MAX Associates in Salt Lake City. “You’ve got to know your audience and what’s important to them,” he says. ”People are different and so is every presentation I make.”
He relies on whatever helps him make his point: PowerPoint slides, reports created in the presentation software Howard and Friends’ CMA Plus, evenGoogle Earth to zoom in on property and highlight the surrounding area. In the office, clients view the visuals on a 42-inch plasma TV; offsite, they might look at his laptop or a printout.
Farnsworth has made so many presentations during his 24-year career that he has a library of slides that he can return to again and again for topics like relocating, investing, exchanges, and testimonials.
The emphasis is always on using graphics and picture to convey the message with minimal text. “As they say, ‘one picture is worth a thousand words,’” he says. “I believe in giving people something clean, simple to read, and easy to understand.”
He especially likes how CMA Plus makes it easy to look more professional in the printed reports he leaves with clients.
“A lot of agents don’t work on their presentation because they think it’s busy work and don’t see the rewards,” he says. “But you’ve got to take the time, or pay someone to do it for you. That presentation is your best opportunity to show people your unique selling proposition, and it’s what separates you from everyone else selling real estate in your area.”
Choosing the Right Presentation Tools
A number of affordable solutions — all under $300 — aim to help real estate professionals create the visual aids that make a presentations more effective. These tools are only as good as the use you’ll make of them, however, so keep the following points in mind when evaluating your options.
- Content: For multimedia audio and video, the latest versions of applications like Microsoft PowerPoint and Apple’s Keynote may give you the most creative options. Such off-the-shelf solutions can’t integrate easily with your MLS to pull in property information, a convenience you may want.
- Ease of use: All software or Web-based services require a learning curve. Presentation templates eliminate some of that; the creative work is already done. Real estate software takes it a step further, giving you more control over the look, feel, and content of your presentations.
- Distribution and display: Expect that you’ll eventually want all the options, such as displaying your presentation on a TV or computer monitor, posting it to your Web site, sending it as a PDF e-mail attachment, sharing it on CD, or handing out printed copies.
- Repurposing: You’ll want to rework slides or video clips from time to time to personalize the content for your audience. Solutions that let you create your own templates, easily revise content or design themes, and brand the show with company logo, colors, and contact information give you the flexibility you need.
- Appeal: The bottom line is the graphics and content have to look good to help make your point and sell your services. Let the samples every supplier offers guide you to the presentations solution that projects the clarity and professional image you want representing you.
Prices are the vendors’ suggested retail prices and are subject to change. This list isn’t comprehensive; NAR doesn’t evaluate or endorse these products and isn’t responsible for changes in product info.
Michael Antoniak is a journalist and technology expert with a focus on real estate applications. Antoniak also writes about real estate technology at his blog, RealTechTools. He can be contacted at antoniak@dtccom.net.