Integration RULES!

Any successful technology has always had to come to the point of bowing to integration with other technologies in order to stay competitive.  There are examples everywhere.

Take the Internet for example.  The first time I was told that it took time to change where a domain name points, I was dumbstruck.  Internet servers all over the world had to be informed.  And, as soon as one got the message, it passed it on to the next, and so on.

Something as simple as plugging in a coffee maker is another example.  Somebody set a standard for how electricity would be passed to the appliance, and everyone else followed it.

Even Apple finally got the idea that the business community was not going to make a mass migration to Apple computers, and that they needed to be able to play in the PC world.  And, whether you believe that’s a good thing or not (I know some people who wish the PC would just silently disappear), that integration has kept Apple more competitive than it would have been otherwise.

So, if everyone else can do it, what’s it going to take for the real estate technologies to get on board?

What We’ve Got

Most of the agents I work with have more than one system that generates and tracks contact information, which can include some number of the following:

• A real estate website.  Contact forms on the website typically generate an entry in the site’s contact database.
• An IDX MLS search with registration capabilities.
• A contact database/client relationship manager.  Systems like Top Producer or Agent Office typically have client relationship management capabilities that go beyond what is available on a real estate website.
• A system that makes it easy to create and email online newsletters.
• Lead capture on a single property site.

And, these are just some of the things I could think of quickly – I’m sure you can think of others.

What We Need

What we need is a way to integrate the contact information for all the lead sources into one database.

What we need is an industry standard for, at a minimum, storing and porting contact information.  I don’t think it would be reasonable to expect that the listings a site visitor saw on an IDX search could be transferred into a separate contact manager.  But, what about the contact information itself?

This is not rocket science.  How many pieces of contact information are there before you start getting into application-specific data?  Even if we could get common elements like Name, Address, Telephone, Email Address and Source into one database, the benefits in terms of time saved and more effective marketing would be tremendous.

I’m just not sure who should be taking the lead in terms of setting standards.  Anyone have any ideas?