Rob: Well, let’s get started in case people out there don’t know your background. Can you give us a quick spiel about who you are, what you do, and what sort of size Turner is as an agency? 

Emma: Sure, Rob. I’m the chief executive of Turner Real Estate. We’re a very large rent roll here in South Australia, managing about 4,000 properties. And we’ve also got a sales team of 20. So we’ve got about 75 staff all up. I’m also involved in the Real Estate Institute as a board director. 

Technology Adoption in Real Estate 

Rob: You personally and tech, are you an early adopter? Are you someone who likes to jump in and try things out? Or do you let everyone else get all the bugs out of the way and then you give it a crack? 

Emma: I probably like to know what’s going on, chat to lots of people across the country and find out what’s working and then really map it against what we do in our workflows and our client service journey as well to see whether it’s a good fit. And if we think that’s a match, yeah, we’re happy to take it on and give it a try. 

Customer Journey and Technology Integration 

Rob: So your customer journey, who designed that? I mean, surely this is something that continually evolves, but are you in charge of that mapping out what piece goes where from a tech perspective in that workflow? 

Emma: Yeah, absolutely. I suppose myself in property management, but Locky Turner heading up that sales is actively involved in that sales journey as well, but for us, it’s about the team as well and seeing what works for them. Being able to access data, access what we need on the road, being able to offer the clients more and actually seeing a real measurable result are really important with any tech that we implement now. 

Evolution of Real Estate Technology 

Rob: So if you were to rate your tech stack out of 10 now compared to five years ago, how would it stack up? 

Emma: Rating it out of 10 is really tricky, Rob. I guess we’re always adapting and looking at what’s changing in the market and I would definitely say our tech stack is very different. One thing that I’m really mindful of is too much. Suddenly you can turn around and have eight different products all with different subscriptions, all doing different things and all creating different data, which is not only a costly exercise, but sometimes confusing. So we try and come back to the fundamentals of what drives the business and what works sort of day to day. 

Implementing Technology in Real Estate Teams 

Rob: How do you get your team to use them the best? I was once told that it doesn’t matter what tools you have. It’s about execution. So how do you make sure that your team executes on the tools that you give them? 

Emma: Being a larger agency we have the ability and I suppose also the resources to segment different parts of the process for both sales and property management. So whilst, for instance, in property management, you have that same property manager on the whole journey, they’ll have people come in and support them. So when the property is vacant, we’ve got a team that execute all the advertising, make sure the marketing looks professional. So you’re getting the most views from day one on the website. 

We put people in charge of those different processes. So they come in and out at different places and certain members of the team are really, really good at some products and not so much others. But as long as that’s around their role, they’re playing their role and using it effectively. 

Key Real Estate Software and Systems 

Rob: So you’d probably have most of your PMs and associated teams connecting to that and work out. Would that be a central hub? 

Emma: Probably how we bind everything together is through the use of a project management system. So from basically when a property comes into our management through to when it’s going through lease renewal time, when it’s on the internet for advertising, it’s all tracked through that external system. So that bolts everything together. It gives us the inspection runs for the weekend to make sure that bonds are paid before cases are released. 

All those sort of small things that add up to being a smooth service is how we tie it all together. So property may, of course, is integral for day to day management trust system, bond lodgment, payment of rent, and of course, disbursement for owners. But there’s lots of other parts that come into the journey as well. 

Digital Marketing and Lead Generation 

Rob: And I was on your website because I do a lot of snooping on people’s website. And I’m going to be honest, the Turner’s one, it’s brilliant. It’s got so much information for buyers and potential landlords. And one thing I noticed was one of your lead magnets, I assume, is the ability to get an instant appraisal, digital appraisal through Domain Insights. Is that a good generator for you of new leads, or is that just a service you like to provide to get people into your ecosystem? 

Emma: Yeah, a bit of both. We’re often surprised that current clients use it. I think that probably they’re at a certain point. They might be considering whether they retain an investment property, buy a new one, that type of thing. And likewise, we also get incoming inquiries for a new business with that as well. So it’s definitely something that people are very aware of. I mean, you think 20 years ago, there were very few people that really knew the value of their property, where it’s a really common barbecue conversation now. 

Data-Driven Real Estate Practices 

Rob: So if there’s any piece of software or platform that you’ve implemented in the last five years, that’s been a game changer or something that’s leveled you up more than others, would there be one that you could mention? 

Emma: Well, it’s probably not a property tool and that’s the project management system in Airtable, just that we can build it to do whatever we need to. So anything from reporting statistics through to gathering information from new sales listings, from new property listings about everything we need to know to help the client get a seamless journey. 

We tried to think about everything that makes a smooth property transaction and collect that information and bring it together in one place. And it’s also got the ability to push out between different departments and different intersections as well. So you’re not having to replicate information. 

AI and Automation in Real Estate 

Rob: And so you mentioned AI just now, and that’s one thing that we’re discussing quite a bit on this podcast is the use of the current use of AI. But where do you think it’s going to go? So you use AI at the moment within your tech stack? 

Emma: Uh, I think there is a lot of tasks that we do repetitively. So if there is the ability to replicate some of those things I think you’ve got to have the data right, and you’ve got to have the AI machines trained to learn your system. So, we have deployed PROPIC on our website to assist people 24/7 with common queries around our rentals and sales. 

I think there’s a lot of application where it works really well because people will ring all the time when it’s the next open and we’re giving the same answer. Please register and the second that we set a time we’ll be able to let you know and allow you to register for that open and we give that repetitively. So for 99 percent of those inquiries we’re giving them an answer immediately 3am in the morning or 7pm at night and I think that’s a real win for the consumer but it’s not going to answer everything. 

The Future of AI in Real Estate 

Rob: I know locally I get the emails from different real estate agents, but they tend to be fairly generic. An EDM is a one to many, but AI has this potential. And this is what I’m really excited about in marketing is that ability for AI to turn that one to many email into a one to one email, drawing on the CRM data, the property data, the customer’s history with you to really drill down into the needs of that specific customer. Do you see that being something that’s going to jump in fairly soon in real estate because you guys must be sending out so many comms. 

Emma: Yeah, I do. And I think also time has marched on a little bit in that you don’t really care how the real estate agency works out what you want, Rob, but you don’t want to see all their listings. You only want to see listings in three different suburbs. Now, whether I do that as a human or my friend Claire does that, who’s our AI assistant, I don’t think matters. And I think there’s probably a piece in that is making it really clear when you are using AI. 

I think that’s where the line really needs to be drawn, is what do I expect from a human? And what do I expect from AI? And how do they meld together? Or where do they intersect? Or where do they cut off? Sort of any of those three could be different depending on what process you’re involved in.