Tips & Tales💡 The ONE Thing TECH Can't Replace

Welcome to another episode of Golden Nuggets Tips & Tales powered by Property Finder. The leading property platform and number one property app in the region driving more leads and transactions than any other platform. This is where SuperAgents and smart home seekers meet even smarter tech because behind every great listing and every hot lead is technology that works harder so you don't have to. I'm back with Jack Simpson, sales director at Edwards and Towers, 96 % of his agents are

property finder super agents. Round of applause for that achievement. Yeah, well done team. It's them, not me. Now let's talk about technology and AI because it's a hot topic right now. There's been a few claims that AI is coming to replace real estate agents. What's your thoughts on that? AI ever replace the real estate agent? um Look, let's be honest, an off-plan agent is pretty much a financial planner. There isn't much real estate

about that. that's been my job over the last few years. um A real estate agent where you go and show homes to people and we discussed emotion and... the why people are looking at properties and, you know, having that emotional attachment to that client, it will always be there. However, I am a huge fan of AI. I don't think the machines are coming to take over just yet. They might take over uh off plan sales.

Yeah. I think with more and more transparency in the market and as it matures, which Property Finder's done extremely well is to provide tools, not only to agents for them to inform their clients to make better decisions, but when that then rolls out to clients, you can see transactions on the listings now of what was previously uh sold or rented for, which is fantastic. Just provides more visibility for clients. And as that... evolution occurs where data points that were only

for professionals become public. I think the client will be able to get right the way down the funnel, the sales funnel themselves without employing an individual or a professional, right up to the point where they're making a decision. And that point they need to obviously interact with potentially a human. Well, it could be a human on behalf of the developer directly rather than having an agent. So yeah. you know, who knows what the future holds.

I think the efficiencies or the systems within a business, that's going to be the, the, the real, uh, the real impact for AI. What's going to, what's going to happen there. So what's in, what's in your toolkit? I mean, look, we've, we've, I've explored everything, right? Um, so I've explored the, the AI agent to call out. which sounds like me, which is crazy. it sounds like a robot. No, it sounds like Jack, but it's the language model that's not quite there yet and the

latency. So the language model you would effectively tell it a script. So if somebody says this, then you take the direction of this. And, but if someone, if the AI agent calls up and says, Hello, this is Jack. How are doing today? And the person goes, I'm terrible. I've, you know, I've just lost my cat or whatever it obscure thing is that somebody says a human would be able to respond to that. But the AI agent will just say, that's great.

I'm sorry to hear that. eh And have you, you know, have you looked up the tree or whatever the, you know, it finds out through the internet, but there's also a delay on that, which is awkward. Yeah, it is. And people will pick that up and say, this is AI. And I think the government here in Dubai in particular will um have the ability to limit AI being able to reach people because it's leaving people exposed. And you don't want to be misled thinking you're speaking to Jack

when actually you're speaking to Jack's AI representative. you hear all these horrendous stories of grandmothers in the UK that are being targeted from, all over the world, whether you know, their bank accounts are ultimately empty because somebody's acting as Amazon or, know, their internet provider or gas services, whatever. if people start then using AI to do, to do harm to people, there's gonna, there's gonna be

some, um, restrictions and Dubai will be the first to do that. And I think, and I think it's really important that they get that right because otherwise You know AI agents regardless of industry will be calling people all day every day every hour of the day It's unlimited. So you dabbled in that and decided to wait. Yeah. And I looked at it a lot and I also looked at kind of sales automations and funnels and where we can employ AI and where

it's going to save time. But fundamentally when we do transition and it's going to happen, we can't fight it. It will happen. When we do transition, into that world, it's going to be really special that somebody is actually dealing with an actual human being and somebody that they can trust. So, I mean, you're probably seeing it now on social media, some of the videos, it's really

difficult to differentiate AI and a normal human. one piece of advice that I would probably give, and that's what I'm personally doing is, making sure that I'm focusing a lot more time and attention to my own personal brand of me online and me giving real life case studies of maybe some of the clients that I'm working with and some of the properties that I've helped them source and purchase and also have some testimonials on there so that when this change or this shift does

happen, people can look and go, you know what? That's a human and they've done the job and they... can advise me correctly and I'm comfortable in dealing with them because all I want to do is just try and find a human. Yeah. You're building your personal brand. Trying to.

Trying to. It's hard work, but yeah, when you start in real estate, it's something that people advise you to do. And then when you look back and you haven't done it, you kick yourself because as we know the most experienced and Uh, most successful agents now are the ones that are self-sufficient on referral basis and lead generation coming through their own trusted personal branded

pages. Um, but I'm trying and it just, it was just one of those where throughout my real estate career, was either helping clients, helping colleagues, managing people, building systems, hiring people, you know, that it just, it runs away from your time. Not dancing on Tik TOK. Not yet. Actually, I was approached yesterday in a very unique way that I actually responded to for the first time. And I'll give this as as a golden nugget to everyone

listening. get hundreds of messages on LinkedIn every week. Yeah. And, um, even to the point where it's, you know, I don't respond, apologies. and then they keep following up and then they typically end it with, did I say something wrong? And that really gets on my nerves. when they say, I say, cause then they're trying to take it like emotional. Yeah, but that's an automated software system. Is it? Yeah. I feel misled. Okay. All right.

Well, it's annoying. I don't respond even to, I say something You have plugins on LinkedIn and LinkedIn hasn't, hasn't been able to stop it yet. Okay. I don't feel so bad for ghosting them now. that was, was an automated process and that's AI kind of. But it's annoying. So, it's, it will get no business out of me. Yeah. But. someone did send me a voice note on LinkedIn yesterday. And of course I get voice notes all day long on WhatsApp and I'm

used to that. But because it was out of character for the LinkedIn platform, I was like, well, I'm going to press play. And I played it and it was a very lovely message, very professional. And he was reassuring me that I'm sending you a voice note so that you know I'm not AI. And I really appreciated that. And guess what I did back? Sent him a voice note. So it's kind of like, I, what was he selling?

He was actually selling. He hasn't responded yet, but he was like, if you something to do with podcasting SEO, um, yeah,

something like that. And I get tons of those in a day. Like optimize your YouTube channel. It's like my YouTube channel is just doing fine. I like you real people. like you real humans. Like engage, do what you want, but. It's not, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to hack the system. Whoever's watching enjoys it and whoever likes it shares it. Um, but yeah, I just thought again, it's, it's dealing with people, different behaviors on different platforms.

I wasn't expecting a voice note on LinkedIn. It was refreshing and it was refreshing and I listened to it. So that's a little golden nugget tip for you all. Voice notes LinkedIn. Do a quick voice, but then also it's got to feel authentic. So that's the thing. Like people are trying to focus more on being sounding authentic rather than automated or scripted or, yeah. So had he said, hi Silvia I'd like to tell you about our pro, no, was just such a casual voice note.

And I was like, you seem pretty cool. Reply. And I replied, I don't, well, he's not the same business. Everyone on LinkedIn is just selling, selling, selling, right? It's just like, Well, it's no different to real estate industry. You feel like you're constantly being sold to. Constantly. So come at your clients, come at your leads with a slightly more refreshing approach. Yeah. And that is the human element of why.

And AI won't ever have that, I don't think. m Which is why it's, you know, really important now more than ever is to cement your personal brand online. Yes, the systems that the business will probably roll out, which we're looking at seriously. I mean, even like the listing module that we use, um the text that we can just plug in chat, GPT, and it's giving you a listing for two bed and the address or whatever, and it's there. It's probably better than... uh better in terms of grammar than

what I could ever write. And I'm a native English speaker, terrible English at school, the way. But yeah, so it's exciting. when you look at the fundamentals of a real estate business, there's photo, video, editing. We have a library of stock images anyway, which you can then rotate. can then, uh it's email campaigns, all the creative, WhatsApp campaigns to some degree with chat bots built in. You've then got the call systems. It's like, oh my God, this is

amazing. Right the way through as well to kind of like finance and payroll, HR, all of that can be streamlined now. And it's great, but it's also leaving people a little bit worried, which I understand. I mean, if you're a taxi driver in the US, I'd be very worried. Yeah, be worried, Tesla's going to turn on the self-driving next year. And if you're a taxi driver over there, that's the first major industry drivers that's going to be kind of, Oh my God, what do I do?

I've driven all my life. And it's not just like taxis, it's chauffeurs, it's logistics companies, big trucks driving over the U S it's all going to be self-driving. It's going to put a lot of people out of work. So be prepared for it, but adapt to it. Don't be scared. And build your personal brand. Build your personal brand. What tech can't you live without? But technology for me, I

absolutely love it. think the systems that we've put in place as a business now, predominantly for visibility on the business metrics on success of individuals inside the company and their activity metrics for us as a leadership team is super, super important. And, you know, we've got several systems that we're very proud of that not many other businesses have. And that was something that at Edwards and Towers, we were taking a really old brand and bringing it into today's modern age.

And, um, and it's worked really well. Um, but tech systems for me personally, I mean, the one thing that a new agent has to have, and that's because they're building their own network is just a simple broadcast list on WhatsApp, especially if they're a community specialist. And I say this all the time to new agents is just have your own

little list of people that you can. market to have saved your number and can see how busy you are and what you're doing and how you're adding value and sending information because I've still got broadcast lists now that I ping out a few messages to and always something comes back and even if it's just, Jack, nice to hear from you, you know, it's those relationships and you can nurture those relationships and still provide value to people down the line for many years to come from just

being on top of that contact list. great. All right. Well, thank you very much for that. Hope you enjoyed that episode. And no, we don't think AI is going to replace real estate agents, but get working on your personal brands and get ready for the changes. Hope you enjoyed that. Catch Jack's other episodes and while you're at it, binge the whole season.