How could we make it quicker and easier for third-party agents to sell our products? For leading ACT developer Geocon, so much rides on being able to answer – and deliver on – this question.    

With all Geocon’s sales taking place via third-party agents, activating this channel to its full potential was a must. Furthermore, since sales agents also sell stock for other developers, Geocon wanted to make it easier for sales agents to prefer selling Geocon over the competition.      

Having an effective agents’ portal would be a win-win for Geocon and their sales agents. But the portal they had was not optimal. Salespeople need to move quickly, and the portal was clunky. Technically it worked; but it was convoluted and hard to use. Geocon’s network of agents was growing, but it was a manual, time-consuming process to onboard them.

The Brief

Geocon wanted to replace their existing agents’ portal with a new one that would be clean, simple, secure and intuitive. Since Carnac Group specialises in delivering Salesforce solutions for property businesses, Geocon came to us to see how we could help.  

Geocon wanted to enable third party sales agents to sell more stock through the creation of a new, intuitive agents’ portal:

Key Requirements

Improve user experience and increase sales effectiveness with Geocon’s third party sales agents through the creation of a secure, dedicated and user-friendly agents’ portal. The portal would give agents the ability to:

  • Filter available lots based on allocation and user-defined criteria (price, number of bedrooms, bathrooms, cars, etc.)
  • Create leads and convert them through the sales cycle
  • Streamlined, automated sales processes, including approvals
  • Take payments from customers (eg. initial deposit, outstanding balances)
  • Work on-the-go. 

In a snapshot:

Implementation of Salesforce Experience Cloud as a property agents’ portal for improved third party sales effectiveness. 

Salesforce Products 

  • Experience Cloud 

ISVs

  • FatZebra as the transactional platform 

  • Chargent as the payment gateway 

Timeframe

  • 5 Months

Our Approach 

Since Geocon already had an agents’ portal, anything less than success with its replacement was not an option! A technically sound solution would not be enough. It needed to make a difference to their agents.   

A tight team comprising Geocon and Carnac Group was assembled. First, they analysed how their sales agents work to make a sale, including what the agents would need from Geocon’s portal and when. They also reviewed the existing portal and identified where it was falling short of expectations.  

Having mapped out their list of requirements, they set to work with creating the portal using Salesforce Experience Cloud. This included an integration with ISVs FatZebra (transactional platform) and Chargent (payment gateway) to secure customer deposits and instalments via credit card, bank transfer or payment requests.

The Results

Geocon’s agents’ portal is now widely used by third-party sales agents across their network. Having easy access to the projects they have been allocated to sell (including information, documents and picture galleries), helps them understand what they are selling, faster. It also helps them communicate with confidence with their own buyers.   

Since rolling out the new portal, Geocon has reported a massive increase in the number of daily visitors, while logins have increased from double-digits into the thousands every month. They have also experienced increased engagement with their sales agents who are displaying more commitment than ever.

Importantly, feedback from the portal’s users is positive. Sales agents rate the new portal as a vast improvement on its predecessor. They feel much more empowered to be successful sales agents.

Geocon’s third-party agents especially value having: 

  • Instant access to exclusive projects  
  • An intuitive property search feature, filtering by criteria, location and availability
  • An ability to create, track and convert leads directly in the portal
  • Automations and step-by-step guidance built to streamline the sales process
  • A payment gateway to secure customer commitment by accepting deposit and balance payments.  

“Sales is at the heart for every developer so this project is critical to our business. This was absolutely the right course of action for us.” 

– Andy Magee, Director of IT, Geocon

Geocon is Canberra’s largest integrated construction, development and hotel management company. Geocon builds vibrant town centres and develop new standards of contemporary living by delivering world-class, architect-designed, affordable high-rise apartments and mixed-use precincts.