The $50 Real Estate Tool Every Agent Should Use in 2025

Michelle Kesil (01:31)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Investor Fuel podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil. Today I’m joined by someone I’ve been looking forward to chatting with, Eric, who’s been making serious moves in the real estate space, particularly creating a new service for real estate agents. So Eric, we’re really glad to have you here. I think our listeners are really going to

Take something away from how you’re approaching this new technology that you’ve created that can really help real estate agents across the globe. So let’s dive in

for anyone who may not be familiar with you and your business, would love to hear the short version of your business and your focus.

Eric (02:20)
Sure. So the company is called Lookbook Link. And what we do is we help agents express a book of information with a single link. Something they can set up themselves. It only costs $50 a year. That’s less than $5 a month. And it expresses all kinds of things to a potential client and lead, as well as collects lead information, swaps information like a digital business card, and things like that. So it’s a neat way for realtors.

to reach out to leads and prospects. It’s called Lookbook Link.

Michelle Kesil (02:54)
Yeah, that’s awesome. And can you share a little bit more about how real estate agents can utilize this to maximize their growth?

Eric (03:05)
Sure, well the first problem that we solve for real estate agents is a thing I call content creep.

where all the time now real estate agents have a new document that they need to share with a client, with the NAR settlement. Now there’s disclosures and things like this. There’s educational tools that plus they have listings, listing flyers. It’s not anymore, a link tree is no longer good enough. That’s a nice list of links. But a realtor needs a whole set of content. So we have a link list that’s surrounded by a photo tab, a document tab, and a video tab.

tab. And that’s why we call it a look book that is turned into a link that the agent can sell. So we solve that content creep problem by tying up all the content in a single link that you can text. Do you mind if I go one further? I know I’m going a little bit long.

Michelle Kesil (03:59)
Please,

no, continue.

Eric (03:59)
But yeah,

then we take it to the broker level. Now, this is really cool, agents. Listen to this so you tell your broker for me, you promise? OK. The broker can sign up for no money and set up a template of content, a library, if you will, that automatically shows up on all the agents’ lookbook links.

Things like the next quarter’s interest rate projections or, ⁓ gosh, a buyer guide or something like that that’s branded for the brokerage. They can add this content to the team by just simply adding it to the team controller. And instead of sending the new quarterly interest rate report to all the…

agents and telling them to post them, they just show up automatically on their lookbook links. So a live feed of broker provided content keeps your lookbook link fresh. And of course you can add your own content like a video walkthrough of a listing you have or a brochure that’s unique to you. But having that brokerage provided content is a real ⁓ bonus for a busy agent. I hope that makes sense.

Michelle Kesil (06:02)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I really caught my attention how you guys are just creating this innovative way to make things simplified for people. I think that’s really valuable.

Eric (06:15)
Right, and think about it from the agents, the person they’re reaching out to. Right, I might not be with my significant other right now, but I want to use you as a realtor. I got a referral to you. Can you send me your stuff? And then the agent will send the lookbook link. And I don’t have time to look through all of this right now. I’m not even standing with my significant other that I’d be buying the home with. ⁓

So I need to save this. Like this is great. She just sent me all her stuff, but I don’t have time for this. You can bookmark it like a website or save it as an app icon to your phone and just look through it at your leisure. So for the agent to be able to send a book of information that doesn’t drown the receiver, but they can look through as much or as little as they want. And then later when they get home and they show their wife or husband, ⁓ they can look through it together and everything’s there, again, in a single link.

Michelle Kesil (07:12)
Yeah, that’s awesome. What do you feel has been the key to keeping this new idea and this business running smoothly?

Eric (07:24)
Well, ⁓ gosh, running smoothly. I would just say constant feedback from realtors. And we do business with other companies, all types of companies, anybody that has a sales team.

But realtors are a large ⁓ portion of ⁓ who has become early adopters of this technology because of, again, the content greet problem. There’s a ton of content. We need to express it. But we need to keep the team consistent. just focusing on the simplicity of that is our daily challenge. We want to express a lot of information, but we don’t want your viewer to be confused or turn away.

Michelle Kesil (08:08)
Yeah, that’s super important.

Eric (08:10)
So user, I would say user experience, just a relentless focus on user experience. We want the person that receives this from you to be real happy and trade information with you and start learning about you.

Michelle Kesil (08:25)
Yeah.

Eric (08:25)
And

you can put your lookbook link on social media. Social media is a great place to meet. There’s all kinds of people there. But once people know about you and want to have a real professional conversation, get them off social media and onto your lookbook link where there’s no ads, no tracking. It’s all about you. It’s just you and your contact information.

Michelle Kesil (08:50)
Yeah, that’s super valuable. ⁓

Eric (08:53)
I think so.

So it’s a compliment to social media, but Lookbook Link is not social media. It is your portfolio turned into a link.

Michelle Kesil (09:02)
Right? And what do you feel like sparked this ideation for you?

Eric (09:08)
Thanks for asking that question. I used to be a professional photographer, I still am, but ⁓ now the CEO of Lookbook Links is kind of keeping me busy. ⁓ back in those days, we used to carry a leather portfolio around, you know, and show people. you know, with this content creep problem, it went when I evolved into being a web designer, you know, I was constantly…

you know, Eric, we need to add this content, this content, this content, but we don’t really have money to pay you, so we’re just gonna leave things not updated, was the old answer. But now I’ve given people a tool that they don’t need to contact a web designer to update content. And so that was the genesis of it. It was like the idea of expressing a portfolio like a photographer, but not requiring the person that owns it to know a web designer or their friend’s son who knows

knows

technology. This is all browse and attach kind of stuff. If you can set up a social profile, you can set up a lookbook link just as easily.

Michelle Kesil (10:48)
Now, every operator or person in business also has a moment where things got real, maybe something went sideways or you needed to pivot fast. Could you share a moment like that for you?

Eric (11:04)
where I had to pivot fast. I would…

I would probably say, ⁓ gosh, let’s see here, would just say, you know.

We’ve done many pivots. haven’t done a massive pivot, we absolutely, like initially, Lookbook Link was just something to express the Realtor information or the salesperson’s information. But we immediately got feedback of like, that’s great that I’m broadcasting who I am, but I need their contact info so I can put them into our CRM. And so we had to pivot and say, okay, now we have to figure out tips and tricks to encourage the viewer to send their information.

back and to export that from Lookbook link into the agency RM. So we do all that now but we didn’t do any of that initially. was that I would say specifically from Realtor feedback that asked us to pivot there.

Michelle Kesil (12:03)
Yeah, that’s super valuable and a good place to learn from and see what people need.

Eric (12:08)
Right, that’s why we also have ⁓ free customer support. We consider great support part of sales because if we really take care of all of our members, give them a hug, set them up, don’t charge them extra for the help.

They’ll refer us down the line. So I always tell my support people, you’re doing sales when you do support. And we also, during these support calls, learn the things that the new environment requires. And ask any realtor, the environment is changing all the time. And so for us to have that open line of communication with our…

agents and other salespeople that use us. It’s just so critical and it’s a big part of what we do is, you know, just develop a conversation. Even though it’s just, look, it’s a little $50 piece of software that presents who you are, you’d be surprised about the conversations that we have with people. I mean, it’s a lot of fun.

Michelle Kesil (13:04)
Yeah.

What are some of those conversations? Is there one that stands out to you?

Eric (13:11)
Oh gosh, well, you know, let’s see here. We had a big…

real estate brokerage, Atlanta Communities Real Estate Brokerage ⁓ join us. And they have 2,000 agents. through conversations with them, we developed a way so that they could give us a spreadsheet name, property search page. ⁓

you know, all the other DEETs on every agent plus their headshot on a spreadsheet. And now we can programmatically create 2,000 profiles for a company. They don’t have to have each agent sign up. You know, so that was, ⁓ that came from a referral from one of our other companies referred us to the Atlanta communities. And then in the first conversation, we kind of got.

scared, but it was that open, ⁓ you know, idea scoping that brought us a new feature.

Michelle Kesil (14:16)
Yeah, awesome. So let me ask you this. What are you most focused on solving or scaling next?

Eric (14:28)
Simplicity. I would say that’s the hard, it sounds silly, but so many successful software companies suffer from scope creep, meaning they increase their scope all the time to show more value.

And ironically, my goal is to keep Lookbook Link inexpensive and easy to use.

And that’s why, you know, these, again, the discovery conversations with our clients, when they wanted to export the leads they’re collecting into CRMs or ⁓ constant contact, bulky mail systems, things like that, ⁓ you know, these are great features, but how can we do it in a…

just super efficient, elegant way to where the agent doesn’t feel like she has to go through a Salesforce training class or equivalent. So that is probably harder than building things, is deciding what not to build. And of what you build, how can you make it as simple as possible? That’s our goal every day.

Michelle Kesil (16:23)
Yeah, that’s a great goal, especially when there’s so much out there for people, people really like are trying to simplify our lives. Because now with technology, there’s just so much.

Eric (16:35)
Right. Well, I’ll give you an

example. Have you ever heard of a company called Wix, the website builder company? Okay. So I built a Wix when they first came out and super easy. But if you go to Wix today and I’m not criticizing her Wix, they’re a great company, make a ton of money, but they’re kind of like WordPress. Now there’s all these plugins and there’s just a lot to do and a lot to do wrong. And so you almost needs a Wix expert to help you with Wix now. And the, that’s what we want.

Michelle Kesil (16:39)
Yeah, I have.

Eric (17:05)
avoid. We want you or anybody that sells any product to be able to reach out to their leads in a professional way. And remember Facebook tried to solve this problem by giving you a Facebook page and you can do that but reaching out with a Facebook page to a professional lead to me seems a little cheesy and also what else is on Facebook ads tracking your competition. So we wanted to create something that was separate from social media that didn’t have all that social media.

downside but was just as easy to set up as a Facebook page or whatever.

Michelle Kesil (17:41)
Yeah, that’s super important and very unique.

Eric (17:46)
well, thanks. I know I’m doing all the talking here.

What other questions can I answer for you?

Michelle Kesil (17:51)
Yeah, I mean, a lot of the listeners here are maybe early, like in their real estate investing journey or looking to level up. And they could benefit from hearing this when it really comes to building relationships and growing your network. What do you feel? Yeah.

Eric (18:14)
Establishing credibility, let me interrupt you

right there, for the newer agents. You want to express to your lead or prospect that you are more than somebody that opens doors. You want to express that you are a professional and that you can guide them through the many, many steps that justify your commission. ⁓

You can’t just say, hey, I’m a realtor. Here’s my property search page. You have to really establish yourself better. using your own research, sometimes using ChatGPT to help get you started, but you could, I have a realtor that put together 10 great dog-friendly parks in Atlanta as a PDF document. He puts that on.

He shares that document all over dog groups and stuff like that in social media. And they come there because they want the list of dog parks. And then they see all this really credible information about how he’s a realtor. And they like him because he’s a dog lover. And they’re right there on all of his stuff. So I would say establishing yourself with great content that shows that people can trust you

to walk you through all the steps.

Michelle Kesil (19:40)
Yeah, absolutely, that’s really important. Relationships are everything in this space and yeah, that network is so crucial.

Eric (19:49)
Right, and the first thing is, in realty, it’s a, they say belly to belly business, it’s a personal business, right? So you’re first, but then when they get home to their husband who might not be so excited about using you as a realtor,

The wife who does want to use you as a realtor, and I’m just making up a scenario here, she needs to be able to say, this is why I want to use Tina. Look at all this stuff she does for us. And my gosh, look at all these how-to guides that I can download. And we haven’t even signed her up yet. look, mean, this is like, she’s got a lot of resources here, Jack. I think we should use her. And that gives the person that you met that day.

the resources to prove you’re the right one.

Michelle Kesil (20:37)
Yeah, that’s really valuable.

Eric (20:39)
That’s

the key. Whether you use Lookbook Link or not, ⁓ as a new agent, you need to be able to show a lot more than just your name and number and property search page.

Michelle Kesil (20:51)
Absolutely. All right, before we officially wrap up, if someone wants to reach out to you, connect with you, learn more about your business and look book, where can people find you and reach out?

Eric (21:07)
Okay, so it’s a look, L-O-O-K, book, B-O-O-K, link, L-I-N-K, lookbooklink.com, that’s our website. There’s lots of examples on there. You can contact us, see our blog and all that kind of stuff. So ⁓ we’re also on all the socials, at lookbooklink. So if you’d like to follow us there, that’d be great.

Michelle Kesil (21:31)
Well, listen, I appreciate your time, your story and your perspective. We really value the people in this space that are doing innovative new things. So thank you for being here. ⁓

Eric (21:46)
Yeah, Michelle, you’re amazing. And I appreciate the invitation to be on your wonderful platform. And hello to all of your listeners. And thank you for listening.

Michelle Kesil (21:57)
Awesome. And for those of you tuning in, if you got value from this, make sure you’re subscribed to the show. We have more conversations coming with operators just like Eric out here building real businesses. And we’ll see you all in the next episode.