It's easy to get overwhelmed with your real estate CRM. And, it’s very easy to end up with hundreds of Tags with duplicates, typos and no clue what you meant to use them for when you added some of them in the first place. When you have a team, it can get worse. A lot worse.
Tags are known by many other names such as Categories, Contact Types, Classifications, Groups, or Buckets. It is a field that identifies what that person’s relationship is with you, such as Buyer, Seller, Gold Partner, Title Rep, Mortgage Processor, etc.
For you to truly interact with your client relationship database in an expedient, accurate, and profitable manner, being able to categorize your contacts is at the core of what you are trying to accomplish.
If you haven’t used Tags before or are just beginning to, this may sound like the rantings of an overly analytical person with too much time on their hands. That said, if you are now in a position where your Tags are a mess or getting there, you know what I’m talking about. It can get nasty.
Fortunately there are a few things you can do to avoid a very time consuming reorganization of your contacts a few years down the road.
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Tip 1: Use one word tags when practical and then search for them as combined groups of Tags.
You can have a multiple word Tag such as “Buyer Prospect - Residential”. Then you would need another Tag that was “Buyer Prospect - Commercial”. Right? And then “Buyer Prospect - Land”. Sound good? No, not really. You’ll end up with dozens of Tags right off the bat for only the most basic organization of your contacts.
One primary goal is to limit the number of Tags whenever possible. When you have a very large list to go through just to assign the proper Tags to a new contact, it can get tedious and people tend to resist doing it and being accurate. There are many more variations on these and we haven’t even started on ancillary services like title company, mortgage company, etc. Then you have hobbies, sports teams, and on and on.
This is an example of multi-word Tags. They can be used as seen below , but that means having 30 just for a start!
| Buyer Prospect Residential Buyer Active Residential Buyer Pending Residential Buyer Past Residential Seller Prospect Residential Seller Active Residential Seller Pending Residential Seller Past Residential Buyer Prospect Land Buyer Active Land Buyer Pending Land Buyer Past Land Seller Prospect Land Seller Active Land Seller Pending Land |
Seller Past Land Buyer Prospect Commercial Buyer Active Commercial Buyer Pending Commercial Buyer Past Commercial Seller Prospect Commercial Seller Active Commercial Seller Pending Commercial Seller Past Commercial Buyer Settled 20XX Seller Settled 20XX Buyer Commercial Settled 20XX Seller Commercial Settled 20XX Buyer Land Settled 20XX Buyer Land Settled 20XX |
Instead consider the following list. This contains all of the same information as in the list above.
BuyerSeller
Residential
Commercial
Land
Prospect
Active
Pending
Past
Closed 20XX
We just reduced the list of Tags from 30 to 10 !!!
Now when you want to find someone, you just search for the Tags “Buyer” “Prospect” “Residential” and you stipulate that the results must have ALL three of those Tags.
Tip 2: Decide to capitalize or not capitalize the first letter
Granted it’s a trivial thing but make the decision and stick with it or you'll have duplicates.
Tip 3: Assign one person as the Tag Tender
You can create and maintain them as a group if you are a team, but one person should be in charge of adding and deleting them. This helps insure that you are all on the same page and at least one person knows what has been added and why.
Tip 4: Use Workflows to change Tags
Be aware that remembering to change Tags consistently throughout the listing and 
closing process can be challenging. The best way to stay on top of them is to use your Workflows to change the Tag of the contact, as they progress from status to status. For example, when a house closes, you remove them from “Pending” and add them to “Past”. In Realvolve you can do that automatically in Workflows!
So that’s how you start off on the right foot with Tags!
The bottom line is that if you just put a little thought to it up front, make a plan and then stick to it, you’ll be able to find everyone you want quickly and easily and your staff will understand how to use Tags the way you intended.
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