Since 1983, NAI Koella RM Moore has been East Tennessee's largest commercial real estate firm, pairing deep local expertise with global reach. Like much of the industry, though, its brokers and marketing team operated in silos, with no shared source of truth and a lot of time lost to back-and-forth. Discover how Buildout gave NAI Koella RM Moore one centralized platform, cut listing production from hours to about one, and let a single marketing professional support a team of 20 brokers.
It's not just about getting deals done, it's actually giving us time to go generate more deals.
"Before having a shared platform like Buildout, departments were very siloed," explains Chad Elmore, Director of Marketing at NAI Koella RM Moore.
With no central place for property assets, the teams were constantly second-guessing which version of a file was current. "Probably the most glaring challenge that we faced before having a system like Buildout would really be version control," Chad says. "Whether that be images, is this image the highest resolution? Is this the image that we're going to use? Is this the right aerial?"
Marketing materials had the same problem. "Is this the latest brochure? Is this the latest offering memorandum? Is this the latest package?" Chad says. "Going back and forth on a daily basis can really be a waste of time without a centralized source of truth like Buildout."
For Justin Sterling, Senior Retail Advisor, the cost showed up in hours. Producing a single listing across Photoshop, Illustrator, and PowerPoint was slow. "It would take somewhere between 3 to 4 hours if I was going to do a listing in the past," he says.
Buildout brought NAI Koella RM Moore's property data, photos, marketing packages, and listings into one centralized platform that brokers and marketing work from together.
That matters for a lean team. "Currently, I'm a marketing team of one, and I'm assisting around 20 brokers and also a fairly large property management staff," Chad says. "We spend a lot of time chasing people down or trying to find what we need, but having that single source of truth is a game changer for us."
Justin sees the same effect from the brokerage side. "Having one centralized system has allowed us to improve that marketing-to-broker ratio in a way that empowers the brokerage and the marketing team to get more done," he says. "So, this is about operational efficiency and speed to market."
Because both teams work in the same place, updates happen in real time. "When I'm in there, making a change to a document, they can see that change," Chad explains. "We're not sending each other, you know, document after document or change log after change log or suggestion after suggestion. We can both sit down and collaboratively work on the same thing."
Listings that once took three to four hours now take about one. "And now my time investment to get that listing, my work done, about an hour," Justin says.
He puts that time straight back into the business. "We like to say that time kills deals and so does friction. So, through Buildout, we're able to eliminate that friction, invest that time into more high-value tasks, like meeting potential clients, working on getting deals closed," he says. "And so, it's not just about getting deals done, but it's actually giving us time to go generate more deals."
The bigger shift is in how the two teams work together. "Buildout has really improved the relationship and interplay between marketing and brokers," Chad says. Justin agrees: "The benefit of marketing and brokers working in sync is that it removes the gray area, and it allows us to be partners in the process together, rather than just order taking and being transactional."
His advice to other firms is direct: "Having a silo is not good. Removing it through Buildout is essential."
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