[T]echnology: What I Told the Guy Who Runs AI for the Biggest MLS in the Country
[E]ducation: 707 Views on Zillow. 3,200 in Her Facebook Group.
[C]oaching: The Best Ad I've Seen in a While
[H]ow To: Create A Coloring Book
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[T]echnology: What I Told the Guy Who Runs AI for the Biggest MLS in the Country
I recently sat down with Rajeev Sajja on his Real Estate AI Flash podcast. If that name sounds familiar, it should. Rajeev is the first Chief AI Officer at Bright MLS, the largest MLS in the country with over 100,000 subscribers. When the person figuring out AI for 100,000 agents asks how your brokerage runs, you say yes.
The episode is called "How AI Is Reinventing the Modern Brokerage," and we spent 37 minutes on what AI actually looks like inside a brokerage that uses it every day. Not theory. Not predictions. The stuff running right now. 🏃➡️🏃➡️
The core of it: less software, not more. Most brokerages respond to AI by buying another tool. Another login, another subscription, another icon your agents never click. We went the other way and built ToryOS, one place where our agents get their tools, their training, their answers, and their numbers. The goal was never more technology. It was less friction.
We also got into what agents are doing with it day to day. Pulling MLS data apart for real market insights. Finding farming areas actually worth the postage. Market research that used to eat a weekend. Marketing that drafts itself while you review it. And where this is all headed... browser agents, CRMs that work for you instead of the other way around, and the AI assistant every agent will have whether they know it yet or not.
Rajeev asks good questions. This one made me think more than most. 🤔
Video above, or take the audio with you in the car: Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
[E]ducation: 707 Views on Zillow. 3,200 in Her Facebook Group.
Liane Jamason, a broker-owner down in St. Petersburg, ran an experiment on her own listing, and Inman covered it this week. Same house, two platforms. Zillow: 707 views in three days. Her local Facebook group: 3,200 people reached in three hours. The house went pending in three days at full asking price. 💸
Here's the part that matters. That reach didn't come from an ad budget. It came from a group she spent years building... 44,000 locals talking about road closures, restaurant openings, and what's actually happening in their market. Her brokerage sponsors it, disclosed and out in the open, and only her agents can post listings. Everyone else reads, comments, and argues.
Notice what the group is not. It's not a listing dump. 💩 The listings are the exception, not the feed. The rest is value... local news, market education, the stuff people actually joined for. Value first. Listings second. That order is the whole strategy.
And she lets people push back in the comments. Skeptics feed the algorithm, and visible disagreement is what makes the rest of it believable. A page where every comment is "Beautiful home!" convinces nobody.
There's a bonus most agents miss. A group like that is free market research. You hear what buyers are worried about weeks before it shows up in the data.
Zillow sells you access to an audience. She built her own. And when she sits at a listing appointment, that reach is something the agent across town literally cannot offer.
You don't need 44,000 members. You need your neighborhood. 🏘 Start the group for your farm area, or become the most useful person in the one that already exists. Be the first to post the road closure. The listing reach comes as a byproduct.
[C]oaching: The Best Ad I've Seen in a While
I was at the HousingWire AI Summit to speak, and sitting on every seat in the room was an envelope. Big blue letters: "ENCLOSED: 20 BILLION DOLLARS (or more)."
A room full of people who came to hear about AI, and every single one of them opened that envelope first.
Inside was a real 50 billion dollar bill. An authentic Zimbabwean banknote from their hyperinflation crisis, paper-clipped to a booklet that reads "Compete like you have a billion-dollar budget." It's from a software company called Systato. The bill is real. It's also worth nothing, which is the whole point they're making about budgets and systems.
Here's why I'm showing you this. That note made it home and has been sitting on my desk since. I've handed it to three people. Now I'm writing about it in a newsletter. Their cost? A few bucks a piece.
It reminded me of a book I read years ago called Marketing Outrageously by Jon Spoelstra. He ran the New Jersey Nets back when they were the worst team in basketball and still had to sell tickets. One of the things they did was give away jockstraps. Not just to be funny. Because he knew fans would be talking about it at the water cooler the next morning. The goal was never the jockstrap. The goal was the water cooler.
A word of caution before you get inspired. Do not hand out jockstraps with your headshot on them at your next open house. What an NBA team could get away with in the 90s will get you a call from the board. ❌ Find your own version.
Now look at your marketing. The just-listed postcard. The market update nobody asked for. All of it clean, professional, and in the trash before the mail is even sorted.
What would a past client actually keep on their desk? What would make a seller hand something to their neighbor? That's the bar. It doesn't take a billion-dollar budget.
Boring is the only thing you can't afford.
[H]ow To: Create A Coloring Book
The Chris List shared a very cute idea this week that I think could be a great opportunity for agents. Megan Sullivan, a Greenwich real estate agent, created a custom coloring book featuring local landmarks, games, and neighborhood trivia. She distributed the books through community businesses and events to stay top of mind and the strategy generated buyer and seller leads. Even better, the local businesses featured in the book started sharing it on their own social media📱, creating an organic ripple effect and giving Megan even more exposure in her community.
As an office, we've already created REMAX coloring books for agents to use, especially during those long closings when kids need something to keep them entertained. But what if we took that idea one step further? Instead of just creating a generic coloring book, we could create one that showcases our local communities, favorite businesses, iconic landmarks, community events, parks, restaurants, and other places that make our area special. ✨ It becomes more than a giveaway, it becomes a way to build relationships with local businesses, support our communities, and keep our name in front of potential clients.
So, how do you create your own? It's actually pretty easy. Start with a photo of a local landmark, business, or other iconic place. Upload it to ChatGPT and simply say: "Create a coloring book page based on this image." Boom, one page for your coloring book. Do that for 10–15 local places, add a cover and a few fun activities or trivia questions, and you've got a unique piece of marketing that people may actually want to take home, and local businesses may want to share. Sometimes the best marketing ideas aren't about being everywhere online. They're about creating something useful, fun, and local enough that people want to pass it along.
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