| Profile: |
Mike Ruth |
| Home: |
Cary, North Carolina |
| Profession: |
Principal, Homescape Building Company and York Simpson Underwood Neighborhood Marketing |
| Favorite Quote: |
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work."
— Thomas Edison |
His view on buyer expectations
"Wake County, NC, is one of the ten fastest growing counties in America. MSNBC placed Raleigh number one in Best Places To Live. Forbes recently named us the top best place for business and careers. That has brought us very sophisticated home buyers who arrive with high expectations. And since we’re in the heart of the Research Triangle, our buyers also use high technology every day.
"In our model home sales center, BrightDoor handles interactive buyer registration on laptop as well as interactive sales presentations. These buyers love that. To them, an interactive touchscreen presentation is like starting a friendly conversation. And our database captures all their data as well as the exact presentation they saw that day. It’s the same database that keeps our maps and inventory up to the minute. The capabilities of the system are amazing."
On increasing lead conversions
"The intelligence BrightDoor delivers through their CRM has given us quite an edge. Here’s just one example, an out-of-town buyer who stopped by Village Square at Amberly, whose sales and marketing is by York Simpson Underwood Neighborhood Marketing. She viewed a touchscreen presentation and shared her wants and needs. The BrightDoor CRM, called BrightBase, recorded what she saw, everything she and the sales agent touched on. She was happy to hear that everything they’d talked about would be visible online at our private web portal, including photos and floor plans.
"She returned home and made daily trips to our web portal, spending a significant amount of time researching our homes. Our ability to see her time commitment on the portal gave us good reasons for follow-up emails and phone calls."
"We had subsequent on-site meetings, but we were able to keep her interest through content updates to the portal. The extra personal touch led to a great sale."
On differentiating from the competition
"BrightDoor projects the kind of upscale, knowledgeable, customer-oriented image that is vital for marketing homes in the $350K to $1.5 million range.
"The BrightDoor competitive edge is its ability to change the buyer’s overall experience. It’s polished. It’s high tech. There’s an impressive drama and emotion about it.
"As the customer leaves the sale center, he or she receives a password to log into the portal over the internet. So our followup is basically instant, and our message has lots of continuity—all this at the customer’s convenience. It also enhances the buyer’s sense of control of the sales process. And the portal provides our sales agents with actionable intelligence about exactly what interests this particular buyer. It’s gold."
On ROI
"BrightDoor’s innovations have increased our productivity and our conversion rate significantly. The proof is in our sales force’s use of and praise for BrightDoor to:
- Tell the neighborhood story
- Display inventory in a dynamic, up-to-date manner
- Open up productive lines of communication with the buyer
- Customize sales presentations to suit their own personal styles and the buyer’s particular situation
- Speed up the buying decision, thanks to the quality and amount of information we provide to them
On BrightDoor
"They are invested in introducing us to new technologies and in sharing best practices. They are extremely responsive, professional, and creative. Our relationship is a true collaboration, dedicated to pushing the envelope in how to best meet or better our goals."
For more, please visit www.homescapeonline.com
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