Rebranding And Scaling A Property Management Business Without Losing Service

We talk through what happens when a property management business outgrows its original plan, and why changing your point of difference is not a betrayal of your earlier marketing. Sophie shares how she rebranded, restructured, and built systems that protect service standards while still making room for growth. 

• why a business name change lands easier than you think 
• the emotional weight of partnership changes versus brand changes 
• scaling from a small portfolio mindset to 250 managements 
• staffing levels in a high-compliance market and what “overstaffed” can miss 
• building specialist services for insurance, VCAT, escalations and renovations 
• protecting property manager retention with better support roles 
• why human connection still wins even with better tech 
• lead generation through content, relationships and positioning rather than Google ads 
• onboarding that reduces friction now and educates clients later 
• using workflows, templates, VAs and AI to keep quality consistent as you scale 
• the shift from solo operator to true business owner leadership 

This podcast is kindly sponsored by Longreach

This podcast is sponsored by PropertyMe.

Australia's #1 Property Management Software. www.propertyme.com.au

Transcript

Welcome And Why Change Matters

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome to another episode of Oppeam Collective, The Art of Property Management. And today we are joined with my friend Sophie. Sophie, welcome.

SPEAKER_02 0:11

Hovy to be here.

SPEAKER_01 0:13

I I had to quickly do a little Google a minute ago because I couldn't remember where you were from. And I know as Elements Night, we always just go, Sophie from Elements, but can you just give us a little bit of I know that's been a recent change. Well, it's probably not so recent now, is it?

SPEAKER_02 0:28

No, it's been a couple of years now, but it feels like I know. It's sixth year in business now, but it just feels like everything's I don't know. I think things just just it's like that slow and quick thing. Like you just don't realize how yeah, just six years feel like a flown blah, flown by, honestly. And so has it been two years since your name change? It's been so we started the change at the end of 2023. So sort of like almost three years working under one business, and then the change slowly happened, but we didn't officially launch it until I think August 2024. So it's almost coming up two years now. Wow, that has flown by. I know. And everyone still knows me as Sophie from Geelong. So it doesn't really matter what name I'm under.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

No, it doesn't. It'll always be so from Geelong.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

And I and I think this is this is where we want to sort of guide the conversation today because I think that people get quite scared of changing or doing something different, you know, in their business, you know, every four years or every five years. And I was actually in an office yesterday and we're talking about software. And I was doing a um soft demo for them for Property Me. And the business owner said to me, Oh, we've we've changed our software so many times. And I was like, Oh, but what have you changed and how have you done it? And it ended up being sort of like, I mean, pretty, it wasn't actually a lot because it was actually over the whole lifespan of the business. And I mean, don't quote me because I can't remember how many years, but it was something like a change every five years in software. And I was like, that's actually okay to have a change for with things like software business names, targets. And I think people sometimes fall into the trap of thinking that when you start, that that is the way you've got to be for the next 10 or 20 years. And so I guess what we'd want to do today is have a little bit of a conversation around those changes and how we need to have changes in our business to continue to grow. One of the webinars I also did yesterday was on dual roles that people hold and the and how people that are business owners from the start, where they're solo business owners, they have an intention of just wanting to do 50 properties or a hundred. And when they start their business, and maybe this was similar to you, I know it's similar for me. We started off and like, yep, we just want to have a hundred properties and we want to stay small. And that's how you sell yourself and your whole business, you know, ego is around that selling feature and that point of difference. And then what happens is you then go, you know what, I do want to bring someone on. I do want to grow. And then you then fall into that a little bit of a guilt trap because you're like, oh, like, how do I let my clients go? Because I've just sold them this dream that I only wanted a hundred properties and they're going to deal directly with me. And my comment to that is your point of difference is allowed to change and your marketing strategy is allowed to change. And just because that was the way it was at the start doesn't mean that you can't have a new point of difference or a new strategy. So I think all of that is where really where we'll take the conversation because there's a lot of people that fall in this space. So let's

Rebrand Without Losing Trust

SPEAKER_01 3:56

go through. I want to sort of go through not necessarily the reasons why you changed your name, but I want to go through how you felt doing that and if it was a bit of a struggle, you know, and and was it were you nervous about it? Were you worried people wouldn't know who you were? Like what sort of was the emotion around actually physically changing a name, or did you find it quite easy?

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Name change itself wasn't so much the it was it didn't come as a concern to me at all. I think so. Because the actual business itself wasn't changing, it was just changing entities because it was an end of a partnership. And so from that point of view, because we had the sales side and the rental side, but I owned the rental side, but it was under a company structure, which we won't go in today. We might, I don't know. We'll see where we go with that. But it had to change for me to focus on my next 20 to 30 years. So the actual name change wasn't the hardest part. It was the end of partnership because I actually loved my business partner and I still do. And so that was probably the emotional side of having a relationship. And even though the relationship is still there, it was still like it's how you started the business. It's how, you know, you've you've grown together, you've supported each other. And logically, nothing of that changes, but the split makes it feel that way. So I did go through a bit of like the emotional side of that. And that was probably the hardest part of it. But the actual change of the name, it was just, hey clients, nothing changes, new name, this is where it's at. And they're like, cool. So there was no, like, that was it. And and this is and this is what I say to people that it's like people don't really care as much as what you think they do from an outsider looking in. Like, I think I think we put more weight on what our brand looks like or what this looks like. And as I said at the start, it doesn't matter if I'm I'm like the old brand, new brand, anything like that. I'm still so from Geelong. They do not care. Like a lot of people don't even know what my brand name is when they first call me. They're just like, hey, you're so from Geelong. We've been told to come and speak to you. So yeah, it didn't really change. What I did find though is that the brand itself, because I was doing more marketing and things like that with the brand, we got a lot of good feedback that the brand itself actually emulated what they thought it should. So, like they like the brand looked really polished and it actually looks like how we think it should. So I know that for some people that really elevated the brand in ways that I was not thinking at all. I was just like, here's a random color, I like that. Like there was not really much thought into it, but it incidentally ended up being a really good brand change as well.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Yeah, amazing. How where are you sitting at the moment with business in terms of team and number of properties under management?

Scaling From 80 To 250

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 7:09

So when I first started the business, as you said before, it's like, oh, I'll get to 100 and you know, what that. When I started the business, I went, let's get to 80 and see what happens. We're now at 250. Okay. So it's changed a lot. My mindset has changed a lot. And six years goes by very, very quickly, but man, you you you you learn as you grow and priorities change as you grow. So we've got myself, two property managers, and two VAs. We are going through, so the last 18 months, especially, while I was going through the change of partnership and all that, that is a bit of work that needs to happen. And I also went through that phase of focusing on growth and then focusing on streamlining because we were at that next level of growth. So I wasn't focusing as much on new business during that time. We still grew, but it wasn't to the same level as what I'd been, what had happened the year before. And now this year we're back in that sort of growth phase. So I'm at that, you know, do we hire a next person? How do we structure it? What do we need to get it to 300, to then 400, to then 500? And I've never been in this position before. So, and I know you have Ash, you've gone through all the agents.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

For those listening, I do have permission from SOAF to maybe even use the opportunity of this recording to be a little bit of a session where we do actually, dare I say, like a little bit of a consulting session where we go, okay, well, you know, what what is your next step? And, you know, where do I think as someone outside of your business can look in and sort of see maybe where there's opportunity or maybe areas that you haven't thought of, even maybe areas where you have got a little bit of a mind block as well, because that sometimes happens with business owners. So so I'll actually just go in with some questions and hopefully I'm sure they're all okay. But the first thing I just want to ask you is that what is your opinion around your headcount? Because I've just counted, we've got five people in the property management department and you've got 250 properties. How do you feel that sits? Do you feel you're overstaffed? Do you feel you're you've got the right numbers? What's what's your opinion around that setup?

SPEAKER_02 9:27

I have had to compartmentalize that because when I look at the industry average, we are overstaffed. When I look at how much change has happened in Victoria and how much our workload has increased since 2021, I think we're almost on par. However, the revenue hasn't kept up because we're in a competitive market. So it is a, and again, because this is the first time that I'm going through this, you know, you speak to the accountant and they say, oh, maybe get to 300 before you hire someone else. But then I look at my ethos around service levels, and then I think I think I need to continue to invest in the resources to be able to keep up with the demand of the constant change that's happening in Victoria at the moment. If this was 10 years ago, I'd be able to do 250 with myself and one other person. But the landscape has changed so much in Victoria with all the legislation changes. It's massive. Yeah. Yeah. And we also have a lot of seasoned property managers who left the industry. So there's also a training, we're going through retraining and there is a skills shortage. So even though I've got a great team, there's still levels of training in some areas and aspects of property management that does create efficiency things until they're completely up to scratch as well. So I think it would be if it was myself and someone who had been in the industry for 20 years, it might be a different story. But Victoria is actually not in that. I think a lot of Australia is not in that scenario anymore either.

SPEAKER_01 11:04

Yeah. And I absolutely fully respect that each state and location is definitely going to have their own pain points. Where I sort of try to come in is looking at what we believe the future holds. And I guess everyone is going to have their own opinion on the future of property management. But I think that the changes and the decisions we make now should be reflective of where we see that being.

Staffing Ratios And Capacity Planning

SPEAKER_01 13:29

I think bringing that head count down to four in that department would be reasonable. The next thing that I would say, and I don't know if you've calculated this, sounds like you might have already, but is for people to understand what capacity that they've got in the business with existing labor. So would you maybe if you mentioned extra 50 properties or to 300, do you think that that would be a reasonable capacity to say, I, you know, I think we can get to 300 using the existing headcount?

SPEAKER_02 13:57

I think we can while we continue to refine our automations and really utilize the resources better. So we do have, we utilize Property Me. We've started introducing Tarpe as well. So we were like, while we're going through this phase of really utilizing the resources that we have, it was, it was, it was actually funny. I'm going to be pretty open here. When I first started the business, I had the mindset that I never wanted a property manager to manage more than 100 properties ever. And then it was actually my team that said we can do more and we want to earn more as well. Because if you're capping the portfolios, are you also capping the opportunity? And that for me was a massive mindset shift for myself to go, I need to listen to the team more to actually understand what they think their capacity is and then work out how does the business service ethos align with that growth of the business. So now it was okay, maybe we still work to a workload of 100, which is why we brought in VAs and resources and things like that. Because I do truly, I truly believe that when you start to do end-to-end, when you get over to that 120 to 150, something gets compromised. And I don't like to compromise when it comes to service. So it was okay, if the portfolio numbers increase, we need to make sure that we've got the resources and the things in place to make sure that we're still working to that workload of 100 to one property manager.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Yeah. Do is there talk in Victoria about the change of the change of staffing? So in Perth at the moment, there's a few of us where we're not replacing property managers with property managers, we're replacing property managers. Uh like for example, I had a property manager leave, I put a absorbed the portfolio into the other PMs and then hired someone who was able to take over insurance claims, court attendance, and all of that, and have trying to bring in that, you know, that we talk about the advisory role, but no one actually has actually structured it properly. So that would that sort of like was a step that we took because I believe the future is going to need, you know, that support. And I think that the property manager role with automation is going to actually reduce, hopefully, you know, or bring back to basics what they need to do. Is there talk about that with you guys, InVic?

Building Specialist Roles Beyond PM

SPEAKER_02 16:34

I don't know about InVic, but our business has been built on being a specialist service. So the advisory, and I think that we're very aligned with how you've positioned yourself in Perth to how we've done it in Geelong, is that a lot of people come to us because of the specialist service that we have in property management. And the advisory stuff, we know that we do a lot more than what standard property manager or what the perception of a property manager does. So one of my property managers is stepping into a gradual team leader role. And as part of that team leader role, that's actually taking on the coordination of insurance claims, the escalated matters, the things that we call it the sticky shit. Sorry if I've Yeah, that's exactly what it is. But we call it the sticky shit. So, and that that is a specialist service within itself. And in our authorities, we actually have it separated to say, this is what's included in property management, this is leasing, this is advertising, and these are our specialist services and in coordination of insurance and coordination of renovations, you know, and then even like ad hoc, like there's so much outside of scope property management stuff that investors want a property manager to do these days, which do does take a lot of time. So we've actually we're going through that process of separating it to say this is an advisory, this is a specialist service, and this needs to be factored in accordingly. And I did that for the transitional change of my PM going into that team leader role because it's it like, yeah, it it needs to be factored in.

SPEAKER_01 18:13

Yeah, absolutely. So then, and then what it means is that we're not constantly piling on new stuff to our property management team and be focused on property management. Exactly, exactly. And so then, okay, so that's great that you've you've started bringing that in because I think like I do you do you agree that there would be then an increased capacity with the property managers? Or like how do you see that looking or do you not see the lap property in your business? You do you see that property manager role still saying the same? Like, but this would be because I how do I word it? The because for the way that I see it is that I believe that my team would be able to continue to manage more properties with the support in-house support of someone who does their claims and court attendance. I also believe from a an emotional point of view, just knowing they've got that support to be able to handball it over and not have to go to court, I think is good. So there's an element of retention for my team. Is your the benefit of having that sort of similar? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 19:21

Yeah, yeah. So it's to what I've noticed is that so property managers are not trained to be in court, they're not trained to know how to renovate a property, they're not trained to know how to fight an insurer to get an extra $15,000 to $20,000 out of a claim. Like that is an experienced specialist service and it should be treated as such. So like it's I know that a lot of agencies say that they do it, but then when it gets too hard, it then falls into the I actually don't have time for this, so I'm gonna set it aside, and then that's when we get reactive, and that's when the expectations haven't been managed from the client. But from the beginning, if we say, look, the property manager is there to make sure that your rent is collected, your routine inspections done on time, you do the, you know, that will all be done. However, this is also the extra layer that we can do, and this is what it looks like. If that's set up from the beginning, then it's setting up the property managers to also not feel that pressure. Yeah. And that's been the conversation that we've had, and especially as younger property managers come in. Even when I first started, you get thrown in, you're at VCAT every week, you're at all that. From that experience, we now rarely go to VCAT unless it's a really like you have to go. I think I've been six times in the last five and a half years. So it very rarely happens in our business now. But it's because we've started putting those like boundaries and parameters in place. But with a new property manager coming in and they're green, and that will always be our industry to some shape or form. It'll always be entry level coming in and then learning from the get-go. If they just come in and they're dealing with insurance claims and all the other chaos that can come with property when it's not going to plan, it's it's setting up the property managers to fail. They need they need to have a stepping stone.

SPEAKER_01 21:21

And and and the stepping stone for people to like have the specialists and have somewhere else to go, not just a BDM role or a department as well. The and I think holistically, what you're going to find is that you're going to then have a long-term team. And we all know that when you've got a long-term team, they know their clients better, they will stay longer, but they'll also be able to increase their capacity as time goes on because they'll know that their clients so well that arranging maintenance is easy, you know?

SPEAKER_02 21:50

And one thing I we did a survey recently to our clients to ask them about a particular product, like a particular software. That we introduced, and what came back is that they're still craving the human connection. So they're like, we don't care about the tech, we just want the human connection. And taking from that, we do have the tech that will give us the ability to automate more so then we can get on the phones more. So I do see property management turning into having that team approach where a lot of the automation is being done in the background with VAs outsourcing, all that sort of thing. But the property managers being there as that traditional relationship manager that's being there for the owners. I am hearing some talk of people wanting to remove, like not have the property manager manage the owners and the tenants and just focusing on the owners, which will then lead them to being able to scale and have a larger portfolio. You can change my mindset on that. I'm not quite there yet because I truly believe that the tenant is as important as the owner. And I feel like the relationship should be with the property manager for both of those. But I do believe that a lot of the admin that happens in the background is taking up a lot of time to actually build those relationships.

SPEAKER_01 23:06

Yeah, I I like the relationship triangle, to be honest, and one person handling that with owner, tenant, and property. There was, I can't remember her name, but it was when I was at a coffee convo's in in Melbourne at one of Travis's Travis's that um Travis Wheelan, and there was a lady and she said to me she property manager, and she she was saying how she goes, property managers are just a shit filter. Like we receive the shit, we filter it in our head, and then we spit it out the other end in a more appropriate way. And I was like, I love that. That's exactly what we do. So I feel like that that with that in mind, that it sort of like makes sense that one person holds on to that role so they can filter it correctly because you are filtering it in a way that you know that it's going to, you know, you're gonna be able to get more money.

SPEAKER_00 23:53

Correct. It's gonna land better. Correct. I'll be more productive.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

100%. So you know that. I think that um it's really interesting positions, isn't it? And like, you know, I guess you know there'll be some officers out there that would be like, oh, I have my senior property manager, they look after my owners, the junior person can look after the tenants. And and you're absolutely right. Like, why do we, you know, put a somewhat someone somewhat inexperience with a uh a tenant? I don't know if that would be the best option. I think that that should also be a senior role. But it also comes down to recently we've been talking about the leasing role and how people naturally always put the junior in the leasing role when I actually think that that's probably the most important position because you get that right. You actually might have the smoothest tenancy you've ever had and made that property manager's job the easiest. Like in a in a way, it's sort of, I would dare to say, imagine trialing this just for fun, putting a senior as the leasing consultant and a junior as the property manager to see how that dynamic works.

SPEAKER_02 24:58

I don't know if you recall, but our first podcast that we did almost three years ago was talking about the importance of the leasing process. Oh, was it? Oh, there you go. So, and like and I I've done some reels online getting captured saying that like there is an art to leasing. Like leasing is fundamentally the most important part of property management, and it gets thrown, as you said, to the juniors. They don't know what questions to ask, they don't know what things to look out for. Like that comes with time. It comes with time, it comes with experience. Doing routine inspections as well comes with time and experience, massive time and experience.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Yeah, we keep on throwing that to a junior old.

SPEAKER_02 25:43

Yeah, yeah. And I do think after, and again, I've been talking to a lot of I call us old bag PMs that are, you know, trying to figure out the new way of property management and with all the changes that have been happening and how fast the expectations are changing as well. And one property management owner said to me, and she scaled from zero to 750 in about the same time that I've been open. Like she's a beast, she's amazing. And she said that every one of her property managers that are now in her business started as reception. And I never, because I never had a traditional reception type business, I never actually wanted an office ever. I don't like the nine to five construct ever. Like I just I'm not a fan of it. I do have an office now because I live in the middle of nowhere, so it became a necessity, unfortunately. But I was like, you're right. It's you know, having having that time and space and the the reduction of pressure to be able to get to know the owners, the tenants, the the way, you know, the things that they ask for, getting to know the systems without having that pressure of being in the day-to-day. I think that we've that tradition might be more important than what we or than what I've given it.

SPEAKER_01 27:05

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I so we've gone through sort of what the next step would look like with the number of managements and and how you're doing your team, which I think is great. I mean, the main thing is that you've you've got some sort of plan and idea, which is the first thing to have. The second thing will come down to the point of difference. If that's changed, how has new growth changed for you? And does your strategy have to change? And and all of that

Marketing That Beats Google Searches

SPEAKER_01 27:37

jazz. So talk me through how, like I know because you are very similar to me over here, but the equivalent in Geelong, we've obviously had uh been very blessed with good contacts and and good business coming through quite easily. Has is that continuing for you? Have that has that slowed down because it's dried up for us in WA a little bit. Yeah, and maybe answer that one first.

SPEAKER_02 28:00

All right. Has business dried up?

SPEAKER_01 28:03

Well, not dried up, but you don't mean a thing reduct, you know what I mean, but a reduction from the phone like calling 70 times a day.

unknown 28:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:10

No, it it did when the announcements came up about the changes with CGT and and negative gearing. There was a little bit of a lull. And then in the last two weeks, so again, that that released about a month ago. Last two weeks, there's been a bit of sentiment to come back in. I think people got through the initial shock, restructured, replanned, and then they kept going. In the last week, and this is to do with the way that both you and I have positioned ourselves online. We do a lot of podcasting, you know, stories, reels, all that sort of thing. Because I've spent the last five years working on that, my lead base and conversations are a bit more consistent than if I was focusing on traditional, you know, Google AdWords or something like that. I haven't really gone into Google. We don't really come up on Google.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

I actually am not a fan of Google. Yeah, I've never done it. Do you know why? Because I feel like if someone has to Google a property manager in Geelong or a property manager in South Perth, then you haven't created any loyalty or relationship with anyone, and you're going to be fee-driven. So I actually don't really rate it.

SPEAKER_02 29:17

Yeah, yeah. And I get really shocked and surprised when someone says they found me on Google. Yeah. I'm like, oh, okay. Like I came up. You must have really searched hard. Correct. I was probably on page four somewhere. I don't know.

unknown 29:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:34

But like, okay, so I had in the last couple of weeks, I did two presentations. One was an investor evening, a podcast went live with a buyers agent. And just from those couple of things, this week alone, I've had about 20 new conversations come through. So it's good. Yeah, so it's it's it's constant, it's good. I think what has changed in that time, because again, this isn't like I opened up yesterday and here we are. This has been six years, and I'm sure that over 20 years that you've been running the business, you've seen highs and lows and and as things change. But the thing that I'm starting to get into now is because I'm spending more time with the team, making sure that we've got the service and the quality control. Because at like when I first started the business, I had the intention of starting the business to make sure that we can deliver on our promises. So uh working in the industry for the 10 years that I did before starting the business, there was always a disconnect for me between the wow experience that owners first got when they first started, and then the mediocre subpar experience that they got after they were with, after the property was leased and then went to management. And my promise to the clients has always been that your experience will continue to be what you expected in day 100 compared, you know, not just day one. So that is the that is the the promise that I wanted to continue to keep to the clients. Now, between one and 80, that's super simple, right? You're one person, you control everything. As you're starting to grow, it's like, all right, what do I need to put in place to make sure that we can still deliver on that promise? And I certainly haven't got it right every single time because as you grow, new things come up, you scale, you might not have the right system in place to be able to keep that expectation as pressures start to increase, as you're focusing on the team and their development, you're like, oh wow, the thing that would usually I'd remember to do, I didn't remember because I was doing 50 things at one time. And, you know, so I've gone through a lot of that and I've been very humbled with how much I needed to change to be able to keep that promise to my clients. So when it first started, it was all me. And then as I started to build the team, I had to focus on the values that the that the team had, is that we wanted to be able to feel pride in the service that we're providing. Because our clients, I feel like I built a business based off a higher level of service expectation. And that can be a lot of pressure on a property manager. And I'm very, very well aware of that. It took me a while to figure it out, but I did have to go, okay, well, if I want my service delivery standard to be maintained, I can't expect that every single person is going to come in with the same level of experience and skill set that I might have or that the next person might have. So let's build the system to make sure that we can make it bulletproof. Now, when it comes to the new business side of it, because we'd focused on the day-to-day and streamlining that, my I recognized that my new business was still very manual.

Streamlining New Client Onboarding

SPEAKER_02 32:57

It was still the same way that I was doing it before on the phone, send an email. And now with people wanting. So, like for example, I had a phone call yesterday, and then I was like, Yep, great, I'll send you an email with some information. I haven't done that yet. I've already had a phone call saying, hey, can I please have like, where is that? It hasn't even been 24 hours. And I'm like, okay, so and and this is where now I'm starting to learn about how I need to streamline that process. So then it's not heavily reliant on me as a human and I can use the systems around me. So that's sort of where I'm focusing on now is using the digital products that we have to create a great onboarding experience because I've been more focused on the let's give them a lifetime grade experience, not necessarily just at the beginning.

SPEAKER_01 33:43

Yeah. The do you not have like preset signatures in place so that you can just put the email and pull down a signature that's got all the the information?

SPEAKER_02 33:54

I've got a CRM.

SPEAKER_01 33:56

Because it's just when you said that, just you know, that you haven't sent it. And if it was something generic, like it but there's people out there that don't have CRMs. Actually, a lot of people don't have CRMs. And like when so I've got like email signature, uh which is maybe designed for new management. So it's it's pre-set, like I've written out like so. When you write the email, just write out the save that email as a signature. So next time somebody asks you to, you literally just have to put their email address in and then pull down, you know, new management signature, for example. And it's like all the information is there and you just press send. So do you do that through through a CRM or do you still run that through your Outlook? I just well, I just have my presets through Outlook. But then so, and I find that easy, but it's also good for like like if there is any type of email that you're doing on a regular basis, like I would just do it, that's how I do it. But we we were with IRE BDM, we got rid of it, and now we're on the property me grow, and that now has the workflow. So the team would actually do that where you put in an email and it sends out the the email straight away and then the sequence of emails because when we changed our CRM, it was actually really hard to find one where there was the workflow attached, and that was really important because that's what I relied on with IRE BDM. And so prop the property me grow one does have that feature, and so that's how you would do it now. But yeah, no, the it the set email signatures has also been a game changer, to be honest.

SPEAKER_02 35:32

Yeah, and I use a CRM at the moment, and I will be leaving them soon, so I'm not gonna say any more. So it is because like I've been so used to now being able to automate a lot of my emails through Property Me that I'm like, surely there's a way to be able to do this for the new business. And I almost went, you know what? Maybe I don't even need a CRM. Maybe I'll just automate my new business email sequence through PropertyMe, not even grow. Like I don't even need grow. I can just build a prospecting task and email through through there. But then there's prompts and automations, like there's a lot more like of the new client experience that would benefit from having a CRM, such as like EDMs and all that sort of thing. But what I'm saying is I've never focused on that. No, I've always been on the day-to-day of property management, making sure that that's all good. I have been heavily reliant on myself as a standalone human to do all the new business stuff. So I'm now going through that process of, you know, what does the new customer experience look like if they put an inquiry through the website? Yeah. Do we put a video there? Do we, you know, just that's sort of the phase where I'm at now. But because I'm in between waiting for my current CRM contract to end, I'm still at a bit of a standstill with manually doing a lot of that at the moment. But like, yeah, but like it sounds like you've just gone through like a transitional thing as well, where you ended one, started another one, and then you had to sort of make do in between. And I don't, I don't think that ever changes.

SPEAKER_01 37:09

No, it's constant. And and this is a thing that one thing I would I and I don't know if you feel this, but just like when you're talking, I also just feel like like you do put a lot of energy and effort into setting, you know, all of this up, which is which is so good because so many people don't. But I'm part of me is also like, you know, so if it's gonna be forever changing, like don't don't be too much of a perfectionist with it. Just be the email. Just that's that's right. Because because do you know why? Like I did a round table with um Macquarie and Property Me the other day. The changes that are happening to the Property Me platform probably by the end of this year, are next level. And it's gonna change the game all over again. So rather than getting to like 100% perfect, and then not saying you are, but I know people in the industry that like spend so much time getting 100%. You know what? I I say you aim for 70, 80. That is good enough because by the time you get to 100%, it's changed again. And I just don't think we should like we need to pay attention to it, but we can also go down a huge rabbit hole trying to be a perfectionist. Absolutely. Fortunately, I'm not a perfectionist, so I'm really happy with 70% is like a 10 out of 10 for me. Like if I get 70% efficiency, I'm like, you know, kicking goals. But that's just because I'm not that perfectionist. Um, you just need a pass, right? 100%. I'm pretty sure they were my words when I was my real estate certificate. That's right. Because do you know why? You aren't your owners aren't gonna say, did you get a you know, a C or an A? Are they? You passed. Yeah. What does it really matter? Like it's your own pressure that you put on yourself, Laura. I just don't, I don't get it. But the the yeah, I just think there's some incredible changes. And I think that, yeah, for me, a CRM that does have that workflow is really important. But a couple of other things from an onboarding point of view, you may or may not be doing it, um, but we've been tweaking it as we go along. Is we've got the when a client first says, yep, happy to go ahead, or it's it's weaved into our emails, there's a link, a nice form that they complete with all the information that we need. And, you know, that sometimes, you know, we might have had an issue with you know initial cleans and properties. So then we went in and we added that in. So people are aware that initial cleans are expensive and this is what the expectation is. So weaved all those expectations into that. We then had a more of an onboarding touch as well. And with that, we had incorporated into one form and then it became very long. And we were like, oh, I think people are going to get a little bit tired and hesitant to do a really long form. So then we separated it. And what I what I see, and hopefully this is helpful for some people, is yes, the onboarding is it is important, but also remember that the clients, whether it's a tenant or an owner, doing a bit of an onboarding, reading the lease, signing the lease, they just want to get through that first stage. They just want to get the paperwork signed so they can tick that off their list. They just want to get the lease signed so they can take it off the list. You can sit there and talk to them for an hour on all this other stuff that might go on during the tenancy or during the management. But to be honest, they're not in the headspace to remember it. So, what I would probably prefer is keeping it somewhat basic, the onboarding, both for tenants and owners with just the paperwork and the initial, because you know, they're they're moving house. I mean, both both owners and tests, they're moving house, they're they're doing renovations, they've got too much going on. They're new going on about stuff that's not relevant to them right now. And then what I would say is that an onboarding onboarding form or another type of uh nurturing form, maybe like for a tenant, it might look like 14 days after they've moved in, or maybe for a new client, it is the week before the key handover, or whatever that looks like. Then you touch base with them again. And there's great products like oh type or like on type form, you can do it.

Automation With Workflows And Templates

SPEAKER_01 41:14

There's one called Storytime. I think it's a program called Story Time, which is actually pretty cool. And you can embed videos in there and and really create that really good user experience. And it then you can start going into things like from a tenant point of view, it would be like, I hope you've you know you had a smooth move into your property, just to remind you that route inspections they get done at this time. If you have any maintenance, don't forget this is the QR code to use if it's an emergency and then give them all that information like two weeks in. And then for a landlord, that might be something like, hey, you know, your tenant moved in a few weeks ago. Now it's just a quick reminder to double check that you've changed your insurance over to investor, that you've done this, you've done that. Even though you might have told them or had that, you know, at the start, it's going to be heard differently a couple of weeks into it. That would be my tip too.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Yeah, absolutely. It's just like being able to separate the chunk of the onboarding because there is so much to retain and remember. And people only take in 5% of the information that you give them. And that's where I personally think that people get stuck on like what is the fee? Because that's all that they need to focus on right there and then because they're planning out their finances, they're planning out what their accountants told them. So it's like, that's all I need to know. Whatever happens later, later. So when we're sending the authority, I actually don't even have an onboarding form yet. I actually use the there's a setting within Inspection Express which gives owners the ability to be able to make changes, like adding their um addresses and stuff like that. And we found that that has been a low resistance way to be able to get the information, but then we verify it with the ID checks and stuff on the owner instructions. So that, and then, but then when the disclosures and all the Victorian compliance came in, that became really, really long for onboarding. So now we're like, okay, do we send the disclosure first so then it doesn't stop the leasing process and then send the onboarding? Like the, you know, there's so many different ways to be able to work it to make sure that the owners aren't feeling that, like, oh, now I've got another form to fill out, or now I need to do this and now I need to do that. But we do have our automation task set up in Property Me that the first email that they get actually says, this is what from now until your property is leased, this is what it all looks like. These are the things that we're doing, these are the things that we need from you, these are the emails that you're gonna receive. Here is the log into the portal. Here's the, you know, this this is how it's all gonna look. Make sure like these are the things that we might find if locks aren't working, if gardening and cleaning needs to be done, if minimum standards needs to be done, like just to give them the heads up, but they're not necessarily going to take it all in, and that's when they've got it back to to reflect on.

SPEAKER_01 44:15

So yeah, no, absolutely. So, okay, so in summary, you've got a bit of a clear idea of where the team is and where where they need to be. You've got you've already planted the seeds with regards to new management. So that sounds like it's quite a natural process. And and then you've got the second part of your role, which is making sure those efficiencies continue during the tenancy and that helps support the property management team, which is great. What do you have? If there's anything that you can share, do you have anything on a to-do list that you're like, I really want to get to that, or something that you've been sitting on that you're like, that really needs to be my next priority? Is there anything that you've got?

SPEAKER_02 44:59

I'd need to look at my to-do list.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

Is it long or short?

SPEAKER_02 45:03

It is what's what's on this week? Every time something and actually hold on, and where where do you keep your to-do list? I keep my to-do list on my Google notes in my in my in my Google. I I I would love to be able to keep it within the Property Me task workflow. Yeah, that would be the ideal. We're not using the workflows and the dashboard as well as what we could. So we're going through that learning and training phase at the moment. We've actually brought in an external consultant, Julie, Julie Collins, to help with actually teaching how to best utilize Property Me, which has been really, really good. But I'm still in the habit of Google. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:47

Yeah. I keep my to-do list on my and and I've tried lots of different ways, but for me, my best place is under my reminders on my Apple phone. And I just add everything there. And then as I do it, I tick it off. Like this weekend, I've got a bit of a free weekend. So I'm just going to work through and see if there's anything on my on that to-do list that I could maybe action. So, but yeah, that's so squish today. So anything on that, Lip?

SPEAKER_02 46:11

Uh, biggest thing is the refining the email automation, like the email message templates within a property meeting.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

Yeah, okay. Yeah. As in you've got them, but you're just going to tweak them so they're in your brand voice and yeah.

unknown 46:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:30

And because we're going through that phase at the moment of really testing how much the VAs can do to be able to take the um pressure off the property managers, that is a huge fundamental step for them to be able to just go through the checklist, do what they need to do so that it's consistent across the board. Um, and the inefficiencies that we find through that, it holds the process up. So I know that um we've been going through sort of like task list by task list, and it's going through the stages of the process. So, first we actually focused on the new tenancy process to go, what does that look like? What are the steps? You know, what can the VA do versus what the PM needs to do, you know, to make sure that that's a great experience and it also makes sense sequence by sequence of what needs to happen. So then the checklists actually get done as well and ready to go. The emails go out to the owners and renters and all that. Then we focused on the vacate process and then we looked at whether we needed a different checklist of when the property goes for lease as well. So, like we're really just going through to the whole like this is what it needs to look like and on the customer experience. How do we match the automation experience for the VAs to continue in the background? So yeah.

Training AI For Brand Voice

SPEAKER_01 47:50

Will you use chat or Claude to help with the brand voice, or do you physically do it? I mean, I know you you will also still physically do it, but you do use that for a bit of support.

SPEAKER_02 47:59

I do, yeah. So I I've spent the last 18 months teaching Sintra my whole life, the business, the operations, the brand voice, and all that. And Sintra is pretty much the same as any other ones. It's just 12 little chatbots that do. Do you like Sintra? I've I've got mixed feedback. It's if I was starting from now, I wouldn't use it. But if like Sintra was sort of like the first thing, it was like lifetime, you know, 200 bucks. It was like they just started out. So I thought that I'd give it a go. But now because it's got everything in there, it's got my operations, it's got my like, you know, agreements, it knows like anytime I say, hey, should I do this? They're like, does this fall in line with your growth goal? Like it knows everything about the business now. So I'd find I find it really helpful for that reason. But is it the most comprehensive AR tool out there? No, definitely not. But because it knows my language, my brand, I actually tested it out one time and it started talking back because we're going through the pre-purchase customer experience because I was trying to really refine that. And then it started talking back to me as if it was me. And that freaked me out. I was like, oh wow. And then I was like, wow, like that's crazy that it's just, it's actually picked up everything, my language, my the way that I say hey instead of hi. Cause I'm always like talk to you clients like they're your friends, like, you know, it just, it was just nuts how much you can learn. So yeah, I do use Centra a lot when I'm like, hey, this is what the current template looks like. I want it to look more like this. And then it like, you know, puts it all together.

SPEAKER_01 49:41

I think there's a there's a few lessons in that. I think the first lesson I would take away is that when you do put in the effort and you know, you will you will reap the rewards later on down the track. Because I think the people that I know that have tried it maybe have only done sort of three months and then gone, you know what, not for me.

SPEAKER_02 50:00

I AI is just like training a team member. Yeah. Does it it it's the the what you put in is what you're gonna get, what it's what you're gonna get in return. Yeah.

Stepping Into The Owner Role

SPEAKER_01 50:11

The and and and thank you for your time today. I really appreciate you're you're a great person with great ideas. And I think that this is also a very good reminder for people that are listening who are a business owner and who are potentially right in the operational duties of managing a small portfolio, managing managing portfolios. I want to use Sophia as an example of someone who actually really does embrace and take seriously a business ownership role. And the attention and the work that everyone has just heard you working on as a business owner is exactly where you should be as a business owner. But no, not many people are stepping into that role. But I'm so glad that they got to hear you today talk about what you are actually doing, which is supporting the team and it's a different role. And so many people are not doing that. But you can you can see that the gaps if you're if you're stuck in and managing a big portfolio or getting really put into those weeds, who in your office will be doing these things? And I think that that's what I want people to take away. Who is doing them? If who's doing these Sophie jobs, we'll call them, if if you're not doing them, because yeah, there's you you they're gonna have to work out a way to to step out of that and put even if they just put time aside and treat it as a very serious role that that you put you know a lot of value on. So that's that's what I want people to take away from today.

SPEAKER_02 51:51

And wanna like I'm if it's okay to sort of add to that. I think a lot of it came down to like why did the business start in the first place. And I think when I when I started the business, just like you, it was I will get to 80 or we'll get to 100 and and that's fine. And then things change. And as you said at the beginning, it's okay for things to change, it's okay for all that. But going back to the roots of why you started it in the first place can always be there, regardless whether you're at 100 or whether you're at a thousand. But it's learning to be vulnerable in those times when you don't know. And I've been vulnerable a lot in like, you know, have doing that transition from being a property manager because I was a solo property manager running a business. I was effectively self-employed, running as a property manager, and then I had to transition into business owner to continue that growth. So it's really that that decision between do I want to keep it as be solo or do I want to get out of a or do I want to grow into a leader? And that was a hard transition. You're definitely out of your comfort zone. And it doesn't matter. Like one thing that I will say is I probably would have known I got thrown into the deep and because I didn't actually learn a lot of the operational aspects of running a property management business before I jumped into it. So when it actually came up, a lot of it was reactive because I didn't know. I was like, I've always been in PM. I did a little bit of team leader, but it was more in the BDM, like just teaching a property manager how to take over a portfolio once it got to that 800 and then, you know, sort of keep growing. But I've never been in like a senior property management position. I do think that people that are coming in with operational experience or team management experience would fly through something like this. But also if you haven't been there and you're scared to take that leap into that next stage of leadership, you get through it because you learn real quick as well.

SPEAKER_01 53:53

So just I don't know if there's many people that were have been on an operational level that have gone into business ownership. I feel like there's it's there's more property managers that just step in. Maybe because the operational managers know better. They're like, fuck that, I'm not doing that anymore. They've seen the darker side, they know.

SPEAKER_00 54:14

Absolutely. Property managers are like, yeah, they've got a complete different set of glasses on, uh, and they're a bit more ballsy. So again, very different. It means a very good bliss.

SPEAKER_01 54:25

Absolutely, absolutely. But yeah, but it isn't it funny. But now in reverse, now I've had the business. Now I'm like, gosh, it'd be easy just to go be an operational manager somewhere. You know what I mean? Like, and not have the business. Whatever position you're in, there's always the pain points. Doesn't matter whether you're property manager, team leader, business owner, it's different problems, but the same level, if that makes sense, like same intensity, I feel. Yeah. Always lovely chatting. I appreciate your time. It's lovely to connect again. And and I will um hopefully see you soon anyway when I'm back over in Melbourne. And but yeah, keep doing good stuff and being a beautiful positive influence on our industry. Thank you. I'll talk to you soon.