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. Our goal is to provide our clients and colleagues with useful information, so if you have any feedback and/or suggestions please let us know.
In this edition, The Current focuses on the value of Corporate Intranets. Our Client story, "No Room for Yesterday's Technology," spotlights Zephyr Real Estate and the affect their Intranet has on agent productivity, as well as the bottom line.
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Zephyr Real Estate
http://www.zephyrsf.com
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Real Estate
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Develop and implement a new Intranet system to support more than 200 employees, as well as a new Internet web site for the public.
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Successfully developed, designed and implemented the Intranet and Internet within budget.
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Project Management
Development
Design
Content Development
Maintenance
Founded in 1978, Zephyr Real Estate has become the largest independent real estate firm focusing exclusively on San Francisco -- with 4 offices, 150-plus agents, and nearly one billion dollars in gross annual sales.
Zephyr Real Estate has over 150 agents plus administrative staff in each of their offices -- all of whom need to access and share information with each other and their clients around the clock. At Zephyr, transactions happen swiftly and are heavily "paper" driven. Agents must be able to get their hands on information and the proper forms quickly.
"Several years back our management team recognized the need to arm our agents with best-of-breed tools that would enable them to compete effectively, explained Ilse Cordoni, Sales Manager at Zephyr. "We envisioned implementing an Intranet that would be easy-to-use and allow our agents and staff to communicate and disseminate information from any remote area. Unfortunately, our intent was accurate, but the Intranet did not work, let alone accomplish our objectives," continued Cordoni.
In 2003, Zephyr decided to replace the current Intranet with a new solution that would streamline communication processes and meet the current and future needs of the agents and staff. Zephyr wanted an Intranet that was simple, yet rich in information -- one the agents would view as a valuable, important resource to both their daily interactions and real estate careers.
Zephyr put together an evaluation team to spearhead the search for a development firm that could meet their Intranet requirements. Based on recommendations and a thorough evaluation, Zephyr chose Marker Seven to develop and design their new Intranet, and new public web site as well. "Marker Seven's extreme professionalism, coupled with their experience and demonstrated success, made us confident they could meet our needs," explained Cordoni.
Zephyr had many sophisticated requirements for the new Intranet. The Intranet needed to support hundreds of independent contractors (agents), from anywhere they chose to work, who use it for countless activities and purposes. Some of these requirements include: posting Zephyr real estate listings (new, current, sold) with a direct and automatic synchronization to Zephyr's Internet site; interactive floor schedule; categorized and pre-populated transaction forms in HTML and PDFs; agent and staff management/directory; employee training; events calendars; mail system; and administrative forms.
In addition, the system automatically updates the listings from the MLS daily and makes them available to both Zephyr agents through the Intranet and the public on the Internet site. "When we decided to implement a new Intranet, it meant more than just upgrading the old one. Most of the previous Intranet didn't even work so Marker Seven had to essentially rebuild it to provide full functionality and would greatly benefit our agents," explained Cordoni.
Marker Seven deployed a team that provided Zephyr with project management, Intranet and Internet development and design (including content), training, testing and on-going support. Working according to Zephyr's requirements and functionality specifications, Marker Seven developed an Intranet and Internet that is tightly integrated, easy to navigate, and laden in functionality.
"Since we were embarking on a complete overhaul of the Intranet, we decided to upgrade and refresh our Internet site as well," explained Cordoni. "Marker Seven worked diligently to get both the new Intranet and Internet sites developed and implemented in a relatively condensed timeframe. Support has been terrific and our questions are always answered," continued Cordoni.
After recently completing a thorough beta test, Zephyr went live with the new Internet in November and the new Intranet in early December. Zephyr plans to roll-out the new Intranet and train their agents and staff at the start of the New Year.
"With the Intranet, we will see a great improvement in productivity and agent satisfaction," explained Cordoni. "The Intranet is an essential tool to help attract and sustain quality agents. Marker Seven helped us realize our vision and we look forward to working with them to support and maintain the sites," concluded Cordoni.
Companies are inundated with information. Everywhere employees turn there are forms, policies, sales forecasts, financial reports, databases, proposals, client references, documentation, job listings, employee handbooks, and on and on. To be competitive, employees must be able to access and share this vital company information in a timely and cost-effective manner.
Traditionally, corporate communication has either been paper-based and delivered to employees via the post office or the information has been locked away in departmental databases. This is not only inefficient and unproductive, but also very expensive.
Corporate Intranets provide the best solution for significantly improving productivity within an organization. An Intranet is a secure, private web-based environment that allows employees to streamline communication and gain wider access to information from a searchable, central location.
Intranet applications can vary widely -- from information publishing, email, document management and databases to corporate bulletin boards for topics such as job listings, forms, and company news. Training is becoming a widely used and very effective application for Intranets as well.
Though once considered a necessity only for large corporations, Intranets provide many benefits and significant return of investment for small to medium-sized businesses as well. Intranets can be inexpensive, easy to implement and seldom require major redesign. Because intranets are built with standard components, many companies already have the necessary hardware and software.
Some Intranet benefits include:
- Maximum employee productivity by extending the reach to bring them information across all kinds of databases and geographic boundaries.
- Costs reduction by publishing and distributing information electronically, eliminating paper, postal and overnight delivery services.
- Employee empowerment by improving the information flow - they get the job done faster and are able to make better decisions.
- Improved communication and collaboration by enabling cross-functional departments to share electronically and teams to work more effectively.
- Increased revenues by making customer and vendor information more readily available and accessible.
As with all projects, it is important to define the goals (ie. what the Intranet will accomplish and how the employees will use it). When the goals are developed, a strategic plan should follow. The plan must include the appropriate resources necessary to design, develop, implement and support the Intranet -- either by contracting with a web development firm or using in-house staff. Intranets that are properly implemented, continually updated and adequately maintained will provide a competitive advantage and a significant return on investment.
by Felice McDonnell, Marketing Writer, Marker Seven
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