3 Reasons Tenant Rep Brokers Should Embrace New Technologies

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3 Reasons Tenant Rep Brokers Should Embrace New Technologies

In recent years, hundreds of millions of dollars have flowed into new CRE technologies, yet few have addressed the specific needs of the tenant rep broker. This is particularly surprising given the impact that technology has already had onlandlord reps and owners.

We believe that technology, when purpose-built, could have a similar impact on the thousands on tenant rep brokers in the United States. To make these features a reality, Hightower has developed Tenant Advisor, the first platform designed specifically to support commercial tenant rep brokers. We’ve partnered with leading tenant rep brokers to make a platform that meets the needs of the community. Here are three ways we can see technology immediately empowering today’s tenant rep broker:

1. Improve prospecting

Prospecting is one of the most important parts of a tenant rep’s job — and it is just as important to the rookie as it is to the veteran. There are a myriad of best practices for securing new clients — like building a relevant prospect list, formulating a good pitch, specializing, making a great first call — and the right technology can help supercharge those strategies.

Although making face-to-face connections will always be necessary for building a book of business, purpose-built technology enables brokers to store all of their information in one place and always make the right pitch at the right time.

Rod Santomassimo, founder of the Massimo Group, wrote for CCIM: “You can have the best list in the market, but if you cannot clearly articulate the purpose of your call and the value to your audience, your great list is worthless. Alternately, you can have a silver tongue and deliver consistently, but if your calling list is outdated and not validated, you are not any better off than the broker in the first situation.” Without technology, this alignment of pitch and time takes work and a bit ofluck.

With new tools — like leasing management platforms — brokers can store all client information in one place, schedule reminders, and easily generate reports, allowing them to focus on strategic execution.

2. Track deals and communicate with clients

After winning a client, the challenge shifts to keeping them appropriately informed and happy with how the deal is progressing. As Ryan Miller, a First Vice President with CBRE explained, “We often struggled giving our clients the right level of visibility into the deal process. It is very hard conveying a sense of progress when you are confined to calls every few weeks that show only static snapshots of your activity.” Ryan continued, “Clients want real-time visibility into the process. But, there was no good way to do that. Even if we were progressing the deal very quickly, you always felt behind the eight ball.”

Much of this limitation is because tenant rep brokers are limited by how they can share and store their information. There is only so much communication that can occur through weekly meetings and static Excel sheets. By storing information in one place, accessible by all stakeholders, and updated in real-time, tenant rep brokers “have the ability to capture all necessary information in one place and give 24/7 visibility to clients,” said Miller. “The information will always be at their fingertips, which will help them see the deal progress.”

3. Unprecedented productivity

A natural result of a leasing management platform for tenant rep brokers would be improved productivity. “The entire client/brokerage team could access pertinent information and make informed decisions without having to wait for the next scheduled call or meeting,” said Ryan Miller.

Because today’s technologies are designed to be mobile and cloud-based, this information is accessible from anywhere at anytime. This allows brokerage teams to be effective from wherever they are, and spend less time on administrative minutia. The result is that tenant rep brokers are able to focus on prospecting and winning more business — directly translating to more clients and faster deals.

Billy Fink
Billy Fink
Billy Fink is a former member of the VTS team.

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