All Forum Posts by: Martin CS

Thanks guys. I ended up creating an Excel sheet with the help of my VA and is not too bad.

OK so I currently use use Investorpro as my CRM and website host. Everyone else talks about the other two but this one I rarely here mentioned. It doesn't offer as much as the other two but it is also cheaper and some things are better than the other more expensive two.

Let me start with Investorpro and say I been with them for over a year. It is a a CRM and you get two websites for the gold package ($60) plus start up fee somewhere around $200-$300. I like that both their database and websites are not hard to learn and they actually do most of the work for you. The two are well integrated with email, auto responders, some SEO , etc. I like their database much better than the other two because it is easy to use and allows to get collect the right info. One big plus about Investorpro is their customer service as you always speak to the same guy by phone or email about issues and I never had a problem there. The other two, not sure if they even have a phone # posted anywhere.

The biggest difference between Investorpro and the other two, is that the other two have a lot more features specially when it comes to marketing. Investorpro doesn't offer you leads, direct mail, and many other bell whistles the others have.

So I tried Realeflow about 2 weeks ago after hearing Than Merril pitch it (fan of his company). I was excited because it promised a lot of automation with leads and direct mail marketing. It costs $200 to join and I think $97 / month. After joining , I was quickly disappointed. The dashboard or interface not as nice as I expected and worst then Investorpro. What quickly turned me off is that the seller lead page was very clunky and not easy to gather information from the seller here. This did it for me as I primarily want a CRM first and a marketing software second. I contacted support about a few issues and they were late getting back to me. I canceled and got my money back.

I will keep my review for FreedomSoft short as this is getting long. Basically it had some of the same problems of Realeflow. What good is all theses bells and whistles if the database sucks. This is the most important piece of any CRM and they both get it wrong, Investorpro not so much. I want the marketing in a CRM but I can always market using other web services at cheaper rates. It is also very slow and I just didn't have the patience. FreedomSoft was the most expensive of the three so I just canceled a few moments ago.

I didn't write this for extensive reviews on all three software but more of a disappointment of not being able to find something close to perfect(if there's such a thing) for real estate investing , specially wholesaling. I will keep Investorpro but wish it could do more. The other two have so much hype but don't deliver specially on the basic stuff. I know there's other CRMs not specifically for real estate such as Salesforce but not sure at this point.

In conclusion wanted to express my experience iand frustration in looking for the better CRM. Hopefully this helps someone who hasn't tried any of these.

Good stuff guys! I'll look into Ring central.

Thanks for your input Justin. Where do you get your vanity # from and is it an 800#? I would prefer a local vanity # but those are probably harder to find.

Hi Guys,

I realized that I done a horrible job at tracking my ROI, mainly because of lack of time and maybe ignorance as well. I did a lot of research online and here to find the best method to track your ROI or some kind of template or software. I didn't have much luck.

What do you guys use to track your marketing dollars and lead response? IE your ROI. I created an Excel spreadsheet before but didn't stick to it probably because it was flawed. I got to thinking if there's a software that helps with this. My current CRM does not offer this option or is very limited.

So please help me and let me know you track all this? Thanks in advance.

Martin

Hi All,

I am in the process of shopping around for a good easy number to remember eg: 333-3333 , I think these are easier to find than vanity #s (800-sell-now). I picked this up while listening to a webinar on basically calling someone who owns a really easy phone # and pay them a few hundred bucks to buy that phone #.

I currently use google voice but I can't find a simple phone # with my area code. I researched all the internet phone providers (ringcentral,grasshoper) but it looks like they are all very limited in these types of phone #s.

My plan is to hopefully be able to buy one of those #s from someone using this for a landline and use in all my marketing.. I am currently in the process of having my virtual assistant handle all my calls. Are all landline #s able to be routed to a call center? I know this probably depends on the provider and my best bet might be a VOIP service.

My other dilemma I have is whether I should also use this # on my bandit signs. I use a lot of signs for my marketing and been using Google voice to stay low. But I hate having so many phone #s out there and I really want to establish credibility with my company even if it means using the same phone # on all my marketing materials. Not sure about this though.

I would like to hear from the pros how you branded your phone # or perhaps you don't think is all that important. Please share your thoughts.

Thanks!

bump...

wow maybe everyone is busy chasing deals but I expected a little more feedback..Everyone talks VAs these days but people don't want to share their success or lack there of ..I'll figure it out

I put down $10 and flipped wholesale the contract /property for $30,000 ..of course does rarely come around but when they do is special

So for someone who has been wholesaling for 3 years, I am surprised I have not hired one but frankly I am tired of doing it all myself specially basic tasks.

I been looking into hiring a VA for over a week. I have plan and what kinds of work I want to delegate.
Here is a sample:
• Data Entry
o Enter business cards into system
o Organize Excel Spreadsheets/ docs
o Answer phone calls from leads and enter information in database (Strong communication skills a must)
• Research
o Prospecting online
o Comps (sold properties)
o Property records
o Important articles
o Personal stuff to buy
o Create a speech
o Skip trace
• Marketing
o Use the social media to drive traffic to your buyers list "squeeze pages"
o Marketing from Click2Mail direct mail
o Craigslist and other sites ad postings

As you can see the list is long (hey I can dream , right lol).The chance of finding someone that could do all that is probably not great but where I am most concerned is getting help with data entry (taking calls, excel etc). The other part that's very important to me is help with online marketing and increasing traffic to my website. I am not good with this at all and I want to grow this big time.

So far it looks like you can hire a VA from anywhere from paying $2 to $50 / hour. Obviously there's probably a big difference in skills between the two. I was thinking I would be comfortable somewhere around the middle like maybe $20 IF this VA is very good at online marketing. Then I think to myself that someone with that skill set might be closer to that $50 range. Of course I thought maybe I would hire a VA dirt cheap for data entry and hire a more expensive one for the more technical part. But then I would have to train 2 people and keep track of both.

I been looking on Elance and even ran an ad that netted me about 10 proposals. The cost ranged similar to what I mentioned before. I have not gone any further than that because I want to get this done right . I also know there's other online services to hire a VA , some on the cheap side and than really expensive perhaps suited for executives.

I would like to hear from investors that are already using a VA please. How did you find them and share some tips on the hiring process? What are you paying and what is that expense getting you? Are the results worth it? Do you use someone local to supplement what they can't do live?

I would really appreciate some feedback here and I'm sure other fellow investors would too. Thanks!

Thank you guys for painting a clearer picture. As far as the LLC goes, that all sounds nice but they take around 30 days to form ( I think) and I don't want to lose the deal. I guess my buyer would be ok with that but then again why not just have my buyer pay me outside closing. Yes I know that's not really legal but I know it happens all the time and I really need some money to feed my family.

One thing I don't understand is that my agent told the receiver about me and the receiver was OK with me making a profit. I don't think he can do that or am I missing something here?