Phil Harris from Harris Real Estate joins the pod. We discuss the evolving role of technology in the real estate industry, focusing on the integration of CRMs, AI, and other tech tools to improve efficiency.
Phil shares insights on the challenges and opportunities of tech adoption, especially for smaller offices, and the importance of scalable solutions for effective implementation. They also touch on the future potential of AI and the wish for a central dashboard to streamline agents’ workflows.
Learn more about Property Edge and join our mailing list at www.propertyedge.app
The Property Edge Podcast is brought to you by Land Services SA and our never ceasing quest for a deeper understanding of the property industry.
Time Stamps:
00:00 Introduction to the Property Edge Podcast
01:19 Guest Introduction: Phil Harris from Harris Real Estate
01:27 Phil Harris's Journey in Real Estate
02:31 Industry Trends and Consolidation
05:02 Technology and Innovation in Real Estate
08:06 The Role of AI in Real Estate
10:26 Challenges and Opportunities in Real Estate Tech
14:46 Conclusion and Key Takeaways
15:12 Closing Remarks and Subscription Information
Visit www.propertyedge.app/the-property-edge-podcast to see other episodes, see episode summaries and read transcripts.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Rob Turnbull (00:00):
sonic logo
Rob (00:04):
On today's episode or the property edge podcast.
Phil Harris (00:06):
we're starting to see a much larger gap between
what some of the largercompanies can provide as opposed
to somebody in that smalleroffice environment.
I think that innovative agenciesare now just agencies that have
the ability to actually take atech stack and integrate it and
get more vertical penetrationthrough the organization So I
(00:27):
think AI is going to be a greatassistance tool for maybe
segregating a better data set atthe end of the day though, it's
a human to human businessthat'll get you a better short
list of contacts, but the humanrelationship is not going to be
replaced.
Rob Turnbull (00:44):
sonic logo Hello and welcome to the Property Edge
podcast where we delve into thetools, data, technology and AI
that are powering today'sproperty industry leaders.
My name's Rob Turnbull.
I'm the marketing manager hereat Land Services SA and I hope
(01:04):
through these conversations todraw out some really interesting
insights and perspectives thatyou can use and take back to
your own business and that wemight use to add Technologies,
features and capabilities to ourproperty edge property research
platform.
today.
I am delighted to be joined byPhil Harris from Harris Real
Estate.
Welcome Phil.
Phil Harris (01:25):
Thank you.
Thanks for having me Rob.
Rob Turnbull (01:26):
Do appreciate coming on today.
Now, for the listeners outthere, could you just give a
quick overview of firstly, yourpersonal story and then the
story of your real estateagency?
Phil Harris (01:36):
Yeah, no worries.
So, my personal story, keep itvery brief.
I started real estate at 20years of age.
so I, you know, I've been goingout for just over 20 years.
I spent the first five years ofmy career working, at Ray White
inside a franchise.
I did that for about five years.
that was in the kind of innersouthern suburbs of Adelaide.
Uh, from there I moved over toToop and Toop Real Estate, which
(01:58):
is, an independent agency, uh,eastern suburbs of Adelaide.
So I did just under five yearsat Toop and Toop as well, and
we've now had Harris Real Estatefor, just shy of 13 years, I
think.
So, uh, it's been a pretty hardand fast journey.
Rob Turnbull (02:11):
Yeah, I can see that.
And I remember when Harris firststarted, I just kept on seeing
these, these pink signboards popup everywhere.
And it was a real change for theindustry.
I think Woods Cannon did thatfor you guys.
Is that right?
Phil Harris (02:22):
Yeah.
Oh, there you go.
Yeah.
You know, uh, Woods Cannon,yeah.
So I went through school withAaron Woods.
So they were a great supporting,they still work with us today.
So they've been on the wholejourney, which has been great.
Rob Turnbull (02:31):
You've had lots of mergers of the last 12, 18
months.
If one thing I've noticed, Ikeep on having to update the CRM
because you, you've gotdifferent agencies coming under
the Harris banner.
Do you see this consolidationthat's happening, not just with
your business, but across theindustry as something that's
going to be ongoing or is itgoing to get to a stage where
there's not much left or, or youjust get big enough?
(02:51):
How do you reckon that works?
Phil Harris (02:52):
There's definitely a larger gap that is occurring
now.
Uh, particularly here to talkabout technology today and
there's definitely some realblockers to technology
succeeding, uh, in real estate.
But it seems as though we arestarting to see the emergence
that we haven't really seen inthe past.
We are starting to see some alot more larger independent
agencies.
So there is this consolidation.
(03:13):
I've got some kind of theoriesbehind that, which is, I saw
some data recently saying thatthe,, there's 10, 000 real
estate agencies acrossAustralia, and 80 percent of
those agencies all have lessthan 10 employees.
You know, so the average realestate office is very, very
small.
And so technology is going alongat a rapid rate of knots like
that in terms of the prop techthat's being spent.
(03:35):
But the actual consumer, thataverage office, 80 percent of
those 10, 000 offices, theydon't really have the expertise
or the resource to actually rollout tech, you know?
So I feel like we're starting tosee a much more of an emergence
of, I would say more corporatestyle run organizations now.
Larger, they have to be largerto have the revenue base to be
(03:56):
able to have that middle levelof management to roll out tech,
to have people responsible fordata, people responsible for
innovation, proposals, all ofthose sort of things.
I think that's the way theindustry is shaping up, uh,
larger, higher resourcedorganizations versus maybe that
traditional corner storeorganisation.
(04:17):
Not to say that's going todisappear, but we're starting to
see a much larger gap betweenwhat some of the larger
companies can provide as opposedto somebody in that smaller
office environment.
That's what we're starting tosee.
Rob Turnbull (04:28):
And one of the reasons I brought up
consolidation is I figured thatyou probably have put a lot of
overtime hours and paid or techteams a bucket load for all the
different people you bring on.
There must be a lot of work toget their, their integration of
their systems into the Harrismothership.
Would that be right?
Phil Harris (04:43):
Yeah, massively.
So we have, yeah, fullintegration team for that.
I think we've done about fouracquisitions this year.
And, yeah, we definitely everytime we do one, we get a little
bit better and we work out, youknow, we, we, we improve, you
know, we outsource certainthings now to data experts and
we've been able to kind ofrefine that process to, uh, to
bring it all together.
Rob Turnbull (05:02):
So, from a tech stack perspective, yours would
have changed quite significantlysince you started Harris 13 odd
years ago.
what's been the biggest gamechanger for you in your, in your
mind?
Has it been one system itself ora philosophy that you went
through?
Phil Harris (05:15):
If you think about kind of the two core pieces of
tech that sit inside a realestate business, you've got your
CRM for sales and theneffectively your CRM for
property management.
So they're still like the coreof your business.
Probably the biggest change intech that we've seen is that
Those platforms, they've all,you know, we're on different
platforms, obviously, to what westarted at going back 13, 14
(05:37):
years ago, but probably thebiggest integration we've now
seen is that those techplatforms have become cloud
based and they've now got big,um, open API, open APIs on both
of those platforms now to beable to integrate with the rest
of the tech stack.
Whereas previously, so I thinkkind of the, you know, for me,
when I look at, you know, whatmakes a great innovative real
(05:57):
estate agency.
it's definitely not aboutdeveloping or innovating tech.
I think that innovative agenciesare now just agencies that have
the ability to actually take atech stack and integrate it and
get more vertical penetrationthrough the organization as
opposed to being half good atall of these different kind of
tech stacks that you've got.
(06:18):
The innovation piece now isone's ability to select the
right tech and be able tointegrate it across all of the
other tech pieces, across thegroup.
So I think that's more the skillset that sits inside tech.
So I'd say the biggest changeI've now seen is, is the ability
to integrate across, that techstack as opposed to everything
being in isolation previously.
Rob Turnbull (06:39):
Cain Cooke made that interesting point when we
chatted to him recently.
You know, he's seeing things andhe just loved us to plug that
thing in.
And then, you know, if somethingbetter comes along, then you can
unplug the first one and plugthe next one in just as long as
it's pluggable.
Jumping into your agent's hat,because I believe you're still
on the tools, right?
What are the top pieces of realestate software that you
couldn't live without?
Phil Harris (06:59):
Uh, well, I think the major things from a sales
person's perspective at the endof the day, You know, uh, the
core functionality of a realestate agent is to be able to
secure business.
You know, I've been doing it for23 years now.
So, you know, at the end of theday, people who maybe don't
understand the real estateindustry, the whole industry is
based around getting listings.
So if you can't, if you getlistings, you've got a career.
If you can't get listings, youdon't have a career.
(07:21):
I don't care how good you are atselling houses.
If you can't get stock, you'llnever do well at real estate.
So I think you gotta, you know,start at the start.
The starting point obviouslystarts with the CRM.
So let's assume you've got agood CRM in place, but after
that, you're gonna need to go,whatever software is based
around lead generation and leadconversion, they're the two kind
of, that's the, the softwarestack that you need to get in
(07:42):
place.
So I would say, you know,products around.
Uh, like lead generation aroundRita and AI around generating
actual, you know, call lists andSMS lists and actually working
with data.
But then after that, then you'vegot to look into that lead
conversion platform for pre listkits, selling proposals and a
digital workflow that kind ofcomes after that.
Rob Turnbull (08:05):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so you mentioned AI justnow, and that's one thing that
we're discussing quite a bit onthis podcast is the use of the
current use of AI.
But where do you think it'sgoing to go?
So you use AI at the momentwithin your tech stack?
Phil Harris (08:18):
Yeah, we do.
Yeah.
Well, in the form of Rita asthat.
Yeah.
Rob Turnbull (08:22):
there's the dystopian future of some people
are saying that will be realestate.
ai's calling up customers tryingto get trying to get business in
the future.
And then there's the morerealistic view that it's going
to sit somewhere in your techstack.
Is that an area you're pushingyour tech guys to really focus
on to try and give your yourteam more ability out in the
field?
Because we're seeing AI as areal ability to lift the output,
(08:44):
the volume of an agent.
Yep.
Is that something you askingthem to do?
Phil Harris (08:49):
Uh, not really, not at the moment.
I don't think that's somethingthat, as an agency that you need
to be first to market with, Ithink that the AI, uh, you know,
the AI play, there's a lot ofnoise in that market about,
Automatic calls, automatic SMSs,and like, this is what I'm about
(09:09):
to say.
This is fact.
This is not an opinion.
Like, if you interviewed rightnow, the top 10 real estate
agents in the country inAustralia.
So if you said Matt Steinway,Alexander Phillips, Will
Phillips, Tom Hector, ArabellaHooper, whoever it might be.
They're number one lead sourceright now, they've got a high
quality CRM, they've got highquality relationships and they
all make 20, 30 telephone callsevery single day to real people.
(09:31):
Right?
So I am, yeah, I'm happy to behumbled, but put the person
online, he says, Oh yeah, I'vejust got this great piece of AI
and it spits me out 10 listingsper month.
Like it's, it's not there yet.
So I think AI is going to be agreat assistance tool for maybe
segregating a better data set atthe end of the day though, it's
(09:52):
a, it's a human to humanbusiness that'll get you a
better short list of contacts,but the human relationship is
not going to be replaced.
But if somebody wants to jumponline and tell me I've got it
wrong and you're listing to arobot is producing you 10
listings per month will show me,but I just haven't seen it yet.
Not, not across those greatagents anyway.
Rob Turnbull (10:13):
No, you're right.
It was Emma from Turner's sayingthat they use a chat bot to
answer really simple, repetitivecalls so that just doesn't waste
teammates time.
But when it comes to anythingelse, they're still person to
person.
It's very human side ofbusiness.
If you could design one piece oftech that you haven't got now,
something that you reckon wouldbe a game changer for agents, or
(10:33):
a piece of data that you couldget a feed of, whether it be at
the prospecting's time or theconversion time, or at the
analysis of your sales process,or even just, building
relationships with existingcustomers and making them a bit
more solid.
Is there any area there youthink there's a weakness in the
market at the moment?
Phil Harris (10:50):
Uh, I'm not necessarily convinced it would
be new technology.
I think where there's a greatopportunity is to bring in a,
uh, a middleware product thatkind of sits between all this
tech that's out there and yourCRM.
And if an agent could have onone dashboard, that's my, so
it's actually bringing all of itto one place to go, that's who I
(11:15):
need to call today.
That's who's getting SMS today.
The AIs told me that that's alikely list who I could focus on
today.
That's where my KPIs are up totoday.
So I think there's anopportunity where, uh, and
probably where I think thetechies don't really understand
the industry is that, you'reasking the average salesperson
(11:35):
to turn up into a real estateoffice and like work with like
15 different pieces of tech andlike make those calls, receive
this, reply.
Somehow it needs to come to aformat where I've got my one
screen and I can just, inworkflow, it's all there on
like, I guess it would, mydescription would be the
ultimate ad agent dashboard ofnot new tech, but bringing all
(11:58):
of those things to one centralhub.
Kind of like what, um, uh, Ro,I've got an IT guy sitting here.
What's the product, Ro, uh,Hamish and Andy are pushing with
their, um, uh, it's like aFoxtel box onto it.
What's it called?
Uh, hubble.
Rob Turnbull (12:13):
Hubble.
Yes.
Phil Harris (12:14):
Yeah.
So I get that.
That takes your Foxtelsubscription, your Stan
subscription, your Netflixsubscription, your Apple.
And like it puts it all on one.
I think that's where real estateis going to have to get to that
because everybody's going tokeep innovating, bringing out a
new app for that and new productfor that and new tech for that.
We need a hubble for a realestate agent.
It goes, that's your screen.
(12:35):
Just focus on those six likemodules.
Makes sense.
Rob Turnbull (12:38):
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
Is there, is there a state thatstands out or particular company
that stands out that you go,geez, these guys are doing it
good?
Phil Harris (12:46):
No, I think, all of us are fumbling around trying to
figure out how to bring it alltogether.
Like it, it's, uh, it's hard,it's hard work, you know?
Yeah.
As I said, tech's going likethat.
Ability to implement is goinglike that across the industry.
So you gotta, if you want thatto work, you gotta figure out
this, you know, that, that's,uh, like, it's very, very hard
(13:08):
to absorb all of this tech.
Which, by the way, the techieshave got, like, I did a session
a while ago with a competitor.
I won't mention their name.
I said, we've got all thesegreat products.
It's like, yeah, but like,they're great products, but they
can't be rolled out.
You know
Rob Turnbull (13:21):
Yeah.
Well, let me, that's one thingis, is, is very good to have
brilliant products, but ifpeople aren't using them
properly, there's no point, youknow,
Phil Harris (13:27):
great products, it's the engagement.
Rob Turnbull (13:28):
So how, how do you, do you have anything like a
monthly meeting or some way ofupskilling your teams in the
tech side of things, as opposedto the sale side of things?
Cause they're different skillsaltogether.
Phil Harris (13:39):
Well, I think that's what's different about us
is we have the scale.
So we have, you know, we havetwo full time people in IT at
Harris who are constantlyassessing tech, what's on the,
what's on the list toinvestigate further, what's on
the scrap pile.
We don't want to know about it.
And what's on the radar formaybe two or three years time
(13:59):
that we should be keeping an eyeon, you know?
So first and foremost, we'vekind of got any, I guess, an
innovation team who areconstantly looking, right?
But then we've got a sizableenough management team where we
can have, we've got a captain,that person, they are solely
responsible for CRM.
That person is solelyresponsible for, uh, proposal
and pitching software.
(14:20):
That person is solelyresponsible for workflow tech.
So we've got area experts andtheir job is to manage that
portfolio, train people, coachpeople, create online courses on
how to engage, and actuallyrolling those products out,
among the team.
So, uh, If you haven't gotscale, I don't know how you do
(14:40):
that inside of seven manorganization.
I don't.
Rob Turnbull (14:43):
And that's what it comes down to, right?
Scale and using that know how.
So if we might end it there,listen, the things that I've
taken away from that isdefinitely is connectability.
This needs to be able to plug inthis need to make it usable and,
and valued to your team and alsofor it to be relevant, right?
Otherwise they're not going touse it.
So thank you so much for joiningme today.
Really appreciate your time,Phil.
Phil Harris (15:04):
Pleasure, Rob.
Have a good one.
Thank you.
Rob Turnbull (15:06):
You too.
Take care of yourself.
Bye bye.
Phil Harris (15:08):
Cheers.
Bye.
Music
Rob Turnbull (15:12):
Thanks again to Phil Harris for putting up with
our tech issues at the beginningof this episode.
And if you enjoyed it, please dohit the subscribe button.
And if you want any moreinformation about the podcast,
about Property Edge, theresearch platform, or even
signing up to our monthly emailnewsletter, you can do so at
www.
propertyedge.
app.
(15:32):
Thanks and see you in the nextepisode.
sonic logo
sonic logo
Rob (00:04):
On today's episode or the property edge podcast.
Phil Harris (00:06):
we're starting to see a much larger gap between
what some of the largercompanies can provide as opposed
to somebody in that smalleroffice environment.
I think that innovative agenciesare now just agencies that have
the ability to actually take atech stack and integrate it and
get more vertical penetrationthrough the organization So I
(00:27):
think AI is going to be a greatassistance tool for maybe
segregating a better data set atthe end of the day though, it's
a human to human businessthat'll get you a better short
list of contacts, but the humanrelationship is not going to be
replaced.
Rob Turnbull (00:44):
sonic logo Hello and welcome to the Property Edge
podcast where we delve into thetools, data, technology and AI
that are powering today'sproperty industry leaders.
My name's Rob Turnbull.
I'm the marketing manager hereat Land Services SA and I hope
(01:04):
through these conversations todraw out some really interesting
insights and perspectives thatyou can use and take back to
your own business and that wemight use to add Technologies,
features and capabilities to ourproperty edge property research
platform.
today.
I am delighted to be joined byPhil Harris from Harris Real
Estate.
Welcome Phil.
Phil Harris (01:25):
Thank you.
Thanks for having me Rob.
Rob Turnbull (01:26):
Do appreciate coming on today.
Now, for the listeners outthere, could you just give a
quick overview of firstly, yourpersonal story and then the
story of your real estateagency?
Phil Harris (01:36):
Yeah, no worries.
So, my personal story, keep itvery brief.
I started real estate at 20years of age.
so I, you know, I've been goingout for just over 20 years.
I spent the first five years ofmy career working, at Ray White
inside a franchise.
I did that for about five years.
that was in the kind of innersouthern suburbs of Adelaide.
Uh, from there I moved over toToop and Toop Real Estate, which
(01:58):
is, an independent agency, uh,eastern suburbs of Adelaide.
So I did just under five yearsat Toop and Toop as well, and
we've now had Harris Real Estatefor, just shy of 13 years, I
think.
So, uh, it's been a pretty hardand fast journey.
Rob Turnbull (02:11):
Yeah, I can see that.
And I remember when Harris firststarted, I just kept on seeing
these, these pink signboards popup everywhere.
And it was a real change for theindustry.
I think Woods Cannon did thatfor you guys.
Is that right?
Phil Harris (02:22):
Yeah.
Oh, there you go.
Yeah.
You know, uh, Woods Cannon,yeah.
So I went through school withAaron Woods.
So they were a great supporting,they still work with us today.
So they've been on the wholejourney, which has been great.
Rob Turnbull (02:31):
You've had lots of mergers of the last 12, 18
months.
If one thing I've noticed, Ikeep on having to update the CRM
because you, you've gotdifferent agencies coming under
the Harris banner.
Do you see this consolidationthat's happening, not just with
your business, but across theindustry as something that's
going to be ongoing or is itgoing to get to a stage where
there's not much left or, or youjust get big enough?
(02:51):
How do you reckon that works?
Phil Harris (02:52):
There's definitely a larger gap that is occurring
now.
Uh, particularly here to talkabout technology today and
there's definitely some realblockers to technology
succeeding, uh, in real estate.
But it seems as though we arestarting to see the emergence
that we haven't really seen inthe past.
We are starting to see some alot more larger independent
agencies.
So there is this consolidation.
(03:13):
I've got some kind of theoriesbehind that, which is, I saw
some data recently saying thatthe,, there's 10, 000 real
estate agencies acrossAustralia, and 80 percent of
those agencies all have lessthan 10 employees.
You know, so the average realestate office is very, very
small.
And so technology is going alongat a rapid rate of knots like
that in terms of the prop techthat's being spent.
(03:35):
But the actual consumer, thataverage office, 80 percent of
those 10, 000 offices, theydon't really have the expertise
or the resource to actually rollout tech, you know?
So I feel like we're starting tosee a much more of an emergence
of, I would say more corporatestyle run organizations now.
Larger, they have to be largerto have the revenue base to be
(03:56):
able to have that middle levelof management to roll out tech,
to have people responsible fordata, people responsible for
innovation, proposals, all ofthose sort of things.
I think that's the way theindustry is shaping up, uh,
larger, higher resourcedorganizations versus maybe that
traditional corner storeorganisation.
(04:17):
Not to say that's going todisappear, but we're starting to
see a much larger gap betweenwhat some of the larger
companies can provide as opposedto somebody in that smaller
office environment.
That's what we're starting tosee.
Rob Turnbull (04:28):
And one of the reasons I brought up
consolidation is I figured thatyou probably have put a lot of
overtime hours and paid or techteams a bucket load for all the
different people you bring on.
There must be a lot of work toget their, their integration of
their systems into the Harrismothership.
Would that be right?
Phil Harris (04:43):
Yeah, massively.
So we have, yeah, fullintegration team for that.
I think we've done about fouracquisitions this year.
And, yeah, we definitely everytime we do one, we get a little
bit better and we work out, youknow, we, we, we improve, you
know, we outsource certainthings now to data experts and
we've been able to kind ofrefine that process to, uh, to
bring it all together.
Rob Turnbull (05:02):
So, from a tech stack perspective, yours would
have changed quite significantlysince you started Harris 13 odd
years ago.
what's been the biggest gamechanger for you in your, in your
mind?
Has it been one system itself ora philosophy that you went
through?
Phil Harris (05:15):
If you think about kind of the two core pieces of
tech that sit inside a realestate business, you've got your
CRM for sales and theneffectively your CRM for
property management.
So they're still like the coreof your business.
Probably the biggest change intech that we've seen is that
Those platforms, they've all,you know, we're on different
platforms, obviously, to what westarted at going back 13, 14
(05:37):
years ago, but probably thebiggest integration we've now
seen is that those techplatforms have become cloud
based and they've now got big,um, open API, open APIs on both
of those platforms now to beable to integrate with the rest
of the tech stack.
Whereas previously, so I thinkkind of the, you know, for me,
when I look at, you know, whatmakes a great innovative real
(05:57):
estate agency.
it's definitely not aboutdeveloping or innovating tech.
I think that innovative agenciesare now just agencies that have
the ability to actually take atech stack and integrate it and
get more vertical penetrationthrough the organization as
opposed to being half good atall of these different kind of
tech stacks that you've got.
(06:18):
The innovation piece now isone's ability to select the
right tech and be able tointegrate it across all of the
other tech pieces, across thegroup.
So I think that's more the skillset that sits inside tech.
So I'd say the biggest changeI've now seen is, is the ability
to integrate across, that techstack as opposed to everything
being in isolation previously.
Rob Turnbull (06:39):
Cain Cooke made that interesting point when we
chatted to him recently.
You know, he's seeing things andhe just loved us to plug that
thing in.
And then, you know, if somethingbetter comes along, then you can
unplug the first one and plugthe next one in just as long as
it's pluggable.
Jumping into your agent's hat,because I believe you're still
on the tools, right?
What are the top pieces of realestate software that you
couldn't live without?
Phil Harris (06:59):
Uh, well, I think the major things from a sales
person's perspective at the endof the day, You know, uh, the
core functionality of a realestate agent is to be able to
secure business.
You know, I've been doing it for23 years now.
So, you know, at the end of theday, people who maybe don't
understand the real estateindustry, the whole industry is
based around getting listings.
So if you can't, if you getlistings, you've got a career.
If you can't get listings, youdon't have a career.
(07:21):
I don't care how good you are atselling houses.
If you can't get stock, you'llnever do well at real estate.
So I think you gotta, you know,start at the start.
The starting point obviouslystarts with the CRM.
So let's assume you've got agood CRM in place, but after
that, you're gonna need to go,whatever software is based
around lead generation and leadconversion, they're the two kind
of, that's the, the softwarestack that you need to get in
(07:42):
place.
So I would say, you know,products around.
Uh, like lead generation aroundRita and AI around generating
actual, you know, call lists andSMS lists and actually working
with data.
But then after that, then you'vegot to look into that lead
conversion platform for pre listkits, selling proposals and a
digital workflow that kind ofcomes after that.
Rob Turnbull (08:05):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so you mentioned AI justnow, and that's one thing that
we're discussing quite a bit onthis podcast is the use of the
current use of AI.
But where do you think it'sgoing to go?
So you use AI at the momentwithin your tech stack?
Phil Harris (08:18):
Yeah, we do.
Yeah.
Well, in the form of Rita asthat.
Yeah.
Rob Turnbull (08:22):
there's the dystopian future of some people
are saying that will be realestate.
ai's calling up customers tryingto get trying to get business in
the future.
And then there's the morerealistic view that it's going
to sit somewhere in your techstack.
Is that an area you're pushingyour tech guys to really focus
on to try and give your yourteam more ability out in the
field?
Because we're seeing AI as areal ability to lift the output,
(08:44):
the volume of an agent.
Yep.
Is that something you askingthem to do?
Phil Harris (08:49):
Uh, not really, not at the moment.
I don't think that's somethingthat, as an agency that you need
to be first to market with, Ithink that the AI, uh, you know,
the AI play, there's a lot ofnoise in that market about,
Automatic calls, automatic SMSs,and like, this is what I'm about
(09:09):
to say.
This is fact.
This is not an opinion.
Like, if you interviewed rightnow, the top 10 real estate
agents in the country inAustralia.
So if you said Matt Steinway,Alexander Phillips, Will
Phillips, Tom Hector, ArabellaHooper, whoever it might be.
They're number one lead sourceright now, they've got a high
quality CRM, they've got highquality relationships and they
all make 20, 30 telephone callsevery single day to real people.
(09:31):
Right?
So I am, yeah, I'm happy to behumbled, but put the person
online, he says, Oh yeah, I'vejust got this great piece of AI
and it spits me out 10 listingsper month.
Like it's, it's not there yet.
So I think AI is going to be agreat assistance tool for maybe
segregating a better data set atthe end of the day though, it's
(09:52):
a, it's a human to humanbusiness that'll get you a
better short list of contacts,but the human relationship is
not going to be replaced.
But if somebody wants to jumponline and tell me I've got it
wrong and you're listing to arobot is producing you 10
listings per month will show me,but I just haven't seen it yet.
Not, not across those greatagents anyway.
Rob Turnbull (10:13):
No, you're right.
It was Emma from Turner's sayingthat they use a chat bot to
answer really simple, repetitivecalls so that just doesn't waste
teammates time.
But when it comes to anythingelse, they're still person to
person.
It's very human side ofbusiness.
If you could design one piece oftech that you haven't got now,
something that you reckon wouldbe a game changer for agents, or
(10:33):
a piece of data that you couldget a feed of, whether it be at
the prospecting's time or theconversion time, or at the
analysis of your sales process,or even just, building
relationships with existingcustomers and making them a bit
more solid.
Is there any area there youthink there's a weakness in the
market at the moment?
Phil Harris (10:50):
Uh, I'm not necessarily convinced it would
be new technology.
I think where there's a greatopportunity is to bring in a,
uh, a middleware product thatkind of sits between all this
tech that's out there and yourCRM.
And if an agent could have onone dashboard, that's my, so
it's actually bringing all of itto one place to go, that's who I
(11:15):
need to call today.
That's who's getting SMS today.
The AIs told me that that's alikely list who I could focus on
today.
That's where my KPIs are up totoday.
So I think there's anopportunity where, uh, and
probably where I think thetechies don't really understand
the industry is that, you'reasking the average salesperson
(11:35):
to turn up into a real estateoffice and like work with like
15 different pieces of tech andlike make those calls, receive
this, reply.
Somehow it needs to come to aformat where I've got my one
screen and I can just, inworkflow, it's all there on
like, I guess it would, mydescription would be the
ultimate ad agent dashboard ofnot new tech, but bringing all
(11:58):
of those things to one centralhub.
Kind of like what, um, uh, Ro,I've got an IT guy sitting here.
What's the product, Ro, uh,Hamish and Andy are pushing with
their, um, uh, it's like aFoxtel box onto it.
What's it called?
Uh, hubble.
Rob Turnbull (12:13):
Hubble.
Yes.
Phil Harris (12:14):
Yeah.
So I get that.
That takes your Foxtelsubscription, your Stan
subscription, your Netflixsubscription, your Apple.
And like it puts it all on one.
I think that's where real estateis going to have to get to that
because everybody's going tokeep innovating, bringing out a
new app for that and new productfor that and new tech for that.
We need a hubble for a realestate agent.
It goes, that's your screen.
(12:35):
Just focus on those six likemodules.
Makes sense.
Rob Turnbull (12:38):
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
Is there, is there a state thatstands out or particular company
that stands out that you go,geez, these guys are doing it
good?
Phil Harris (12:46):
No, I think, all of us are fumbling around trying to
figure out how to bring it alltogether.
Like it, it's, uh, it's hard,it's hard work, you know?
Yeah.
As I said, tech's going likethat.
Ability to implement is goinglike that across the industry.
So you gotta, if you want thatto work, you gotta figure out
this, you know, that, that's,uh, like, it's very, very hard
(13:08):
to absorb all of this tech.
Which, by the way, the techieshave got, like, I did a session
a while ago with a competitor.
I won't mention their name.
I said, we've got all thesegreat products.
It's like, yeah, but like,they're great products, but they
can't be rolled out.
You know
Rob Turnbull (13:21):
Yeah.
Well, let me, that's one thingis, is, is very good to have
brilliant products, but ifpeople aren't using them
properly, there's no point, youknow,
Phil Harris (13:27):
great products, it's the engagement.
Rob Turnbull (13:28):
So how, how do you, do you have anything like a
monthly meeting or some way ofupskilling your teams in the
tech side of things, as opposedto the sale side of things?
Cause they're different skillsaltogether.
Phil Harris (13:39):
Well, I think that's what's different about us
is we have the scale.
So we have, you know, we havetwo full time people in IT at
Harris who are constantlyassessing tech, what's on the,
what's on the list toinvestigate further, what's on
the scrap pile.
We don't want to know about it.
And what's on the radar formaybe two or three years time
(13:59):
that we should be keeping an eyeon, you know?
So first and foremost, we'vekind of got any, I guess, an
innovation team who areconstantly looking, right?
But then we've got a sizableenough management team where we
can have, we've got a captain,that person, they are solely
responsible for CRM.
That person is solelyresponsible for, uh, proposal
and pitching software.
(14:20):
That person is solelyresponsible for workflow tech.
So we've got area experts andtheir job is to manage that
portfolio, train people, coachpeople, create online courses on
how to engage, and actuallyrolling those products out,
among the team.
So, uh, If you haven't gotscale, I don't know how you do
(14:40):
that inside of seven manorganization.
I don't.
Rob Turnbull (14:43):
And that's what it comes down to, right?
Scale and using that know how.
So if we might end it there,listen, the things that I've
taken away from that isdefinitely is connectability.
This needs to be able to plug inthis need to make it usable and,
and valued to your team and alsofor it to be relevant, right?
Otherwise they're not going touse it.
So thank you so much for joiningme today.
Really appreciate your time,Phil.
Phil Harris (15:04):
Pleasure, Rob.
Have a good one.
Thank you.
Rob Turnbull (15:06):
You too.
Take care of yourself.
Bye bye.
Phil Harris (15:08):
Cheers.
Bye.
Music
Rob Turnbull (15:12):
Thanks again to Phil Harris for putting up with
our tech issues at the beginningof this episode.
And if you enjoyed it, please dohit the subscribe button.
And if you want any moreinformation about the podcast,
about Property Edge, theresearch platform, or even
signing up to our monthly emailnewsletter, you can do so at
www.
propertyedge.
app.
(15:32):
Thanks and see you in the nextepisode.
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