The Feature Request Mindset
"...we want more information. As the support team, it’s our job to give the product team enough information to make decisions around building a new feature.
It’s kinda like being a detective. We go out and investigate the situation a customer is when they email us their feature request. We talk with people involved, detail the facts, and then bring all of this back to the product team. Once they know the facts, the product team can start thinking through our options."
Common Requests and How to Respond to Them:
- Open house data
- Add IDX to a Facebook business page
- Any feature that would keep the clients from having to call their leads
- Bulk Texting
- I want to remove the search from the blog page
- Polygon Search for Market Reports
- Edit Property Update emails
- Adding the status field
- Can we update when the property update email goes out
- “Why don’t you integrate with “this” platform?”
- I want to add information to the sign-up form.
- I want all the fields from our MLS board to be included in my Advanced Search
- “Your websites are missing basic features”
- "I want half-baths"
Open house data
Real Geeks websites are specifically designed for lead generation. By enabling open houses on the Real Geeks sites, agents would be allowing other agents to access their leads by sending them to a variety of open houses where the site owner may not be present. This gives other agents the opportunity to connect with the lead which is not good for the site owner on the buying or selling side.
Alternative: The agent could create a Coming Soon page and send it to their leads. The content section of this page could include details about the specific open houses that the agent/Site Owner will personally be at. This type of page is also a landing page so another way to use it to capture leads is by posting this link on Facebook and writing the Open House dates in the text section of the ad.
Add IDX to a Facebook business page
Something that is being asked more and more is the ability to put our Real Geeks IDX feed on a Facebook business page. Our agreement with the MLS board for the IDX is only for our Real Geeks websites. Not to mention, if the client had an IDX feed on their business page, they are teaching their clients to use their FB business page as their main real estate resource and not their Real Geeks website. Then the data of what properties and searches the leads are looking at don’t get ported over into the CRM and thus the client will have less insightful conversations with the lead.
Any feature that would keep the clients from having to call their leads
This is a tricky one because our clients will convince themselves that they need this “one thing” in order for their business to thrive. Most likely they watched some video or talked to some other service where they said “The conversion just skyrocketed!” when in fact it’s something flashy to distract the client from doing their job. Which comes down to them making phone calls, forming a relationship with the client and making the transaction.
Always respect the client’s wishes to add these features but remind them that, while adding feature “X” would be nice, our platform is designed for the client to make phone calls and communicate with their leads. Ultimately, the client should be using emails and text messages to get the conversation started but the relationship is made through the phone.
Bulk Texting
NO!
Texting is something that is much more regulated than email. Cell providers are quick to mark a cell phone number as spam if they see that too many of their carriers getting the same text message. Once that number is marked for spam, there is nothing that can be done.
Why can't I choose a default for the "Sort By" field (Why is it set to highest?)
Whenever someone on your website does a search, we default the listings that show up as the highest price because people love looking at fancy homes. This is a case that we want our websites to put the best foot forward in regards to the homes we are displaying because this will entice someone to click on those homes and sign up. It’s all for the lead generating.
I want to remove the search from the blog page (or really any page for that matter)
Our websites are designed to be searched and to look at properties. Our clients should be encouraging their leads to search because the more properties they look at, means the more information they collect on the backend. That information can then be used to have better and more constructive conversations with their leads about their real estate needs.
Map Search Polygon for Market Reports
Typically with the polygon, it’s used for very detailed locations in regards to the area. This isn’t a good idea for Marketing Reports because if a client has a polygon that is really detailed, then most likely there will not be updates from the MLS for the Market Report. Which means, that client will never get emails in regards to those updates.
If the client is insistent on this, you can have them create a Sold Search and whatever they save for the polygon, our system will also create a Market Report for that client.
Edit the content of the Property Update Emails
Consistency is key. If the lead gets one email from you for a while but then that email changes, they may think that something has changed and will stop going to your website.
Adding the Status Field
Our websites are designed to showcase active listings. What’s currently on the market has the most appeal in regards to attracting people to sign up. We want that to be at the forefront. The biggest complaint most users have with Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com is users are looking at properties that are actually under contract without realizing it. We hide pending properties on the website to prevent this from occurring. We can always make site-wide adjustments using the search status mapping but in the interest of lead generation, we want to keep that element from being used on the client-facing side.
Can we update when the property update email goes out?
Consistency is key with this one as well and we want to make sure that these emails reach the lead's inbox in the morning. It’s a tendency of people to view their emails when they first wake up, this leads to more engagement with the emails.
Why don’t you integrate with “this” platform?
Integrations are a two-way street. Real Geeks cannot freely integrate with whomever. Our developers will need to work with their developers to get this accomplished. A lot of times, we’ll want to integrate with someone but they don’t want to integrate with us back and vice versa. That mainly has to due to the fact that we're competitors. But, if the client has someone over from that software company that wants to integrate with us, have them reach out. We’ll be more than happy to see what we can accomplish.
I want to add information to the sign-up form
The reason why we don’t do this is that we are a lead generation platform. The more information that you add to the sign-up form the more intimidating it looks to a potential client and the less likely they are to sign-up. However, whatever information you are looking for from the client, a quick phone call will be the best way to get that information.
I want all the fields from our MLS board to be included in my Advanced Search
From a technical standpoint, adding a bunch of fields is a bad idea because the more data we have to pull from the MLS, the slower your search will perform. Search speed is super important.
From a best practices standpoint, more search option isn’t a good thing for your clients. Fewer options make things easier for clients to search and find a home. Not saying you cannot add fields, but adding fields for field's sake, won’t lead to good user experience. Fewer details can also lead to a more productive phone call with the clients because it will give you something you can talk about.
“Your websites are missing basic features”
I know this is a more generic question but ultimately, our websites are designed the way they are for a reason. We want the ease of use in regards to people being able to search freely for their dream home. Our websites will also have the call to action be that search box and anything that takes away or draws function from that search box, it will hurt not only lead generation but make things harder for the client to use the website as a resource.
“I want Half-Baths”
We are unable to add 1.5, 2.5, etc as options. This is because it will get confusing if a house has more than one half bath. For example, if a listing were to have 2 half baths, it would be equal to 1 bath (0.5 + 0.5), which isn't accurate. So if a listing had 2 full baths and 2 half baths, it will be displayed as 4 baths in total instead of 3 baths.
Some MLS boards do provide a half-bath search field option that can be added in though.