Tony Smaniotto

People Power... Nobody doubts that strong personal relationships drive successful investment sales brokers. That's why golf, sporting events, and client entertainment are important. So what's the proper role of e-marketing in real estate sales? For insight into this question, I spoke last week with Tony Smaniatto, a 17-year veteran with the Investment Properties group at CB Richard Ellis in Chicago. Smaniotto specializes in the sale of CBD office buildings in Chicago and other midwestern cities. (You'll see sales up to $200 million on his resume posted at CB Richard Ellis.)

Smaniotto describes his primary interest as people (naturally!), and he concentrates on business development and the sales process. But technology plays a big role in the success of his four-person team, which includes his partner Mike Vesper. His team centralizes all client contacts, appointments, and meetings using REA (Real Estate Assistant). Smaniotto also plays an active role in CB Richard Ellis' Investment Properties group, which coordinates the activities of 300 professionals nationwide, including a subset that focuses on higher equity transactions, typically $20 million and above. CBRE aggregates their collective market intelligence digitally. Hence the expression, "Automate to Dominate."

Once a property is listed, Smaniotto's team outsources to RealCapitalMarkets (RCM) the preparation and distribution of marketing information. RCM initially sends a CBRE-branded e-teaser to between 50 and 800 prospective buyers. Interested parties then return a non-disclosure form to Smaniotto for a password to unlock the complete package. Smaniatto selects the original contact list using his team's database, CBRE's Investment Properties' database, and RCM's proprietary database of buyers nationwide. According to Smaniotto, "We tell clients that combining these three databases adds value to our marketing efforts by ensuring that we surface all prospective buyers, including private capital buyers that might otherwise be under the radar." He's wired.

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--Peter Pike