Meet the RE Founder: Stefan Peterson from Zavvie

In our newest real estate tech entrepreneur interview, we are speaking with Stefan Peterson, founder of Zavvie.

Without further ado…

What do you do?

Over the past 5 years, we’ve developed an online hyperlocal marketing solution focused on generating listings in specific neighborhoods. This grew out of 8z Real Estate, a tech-forward Colorado independent brokerage. 8z agents were getting great results with this program, so we created a separate company to offer the same service to agents everywhere.

Zavvie clients hire us to grow their business in the neighborhood where they specialize. Zavvie provides them an exclusive web presence consisting of a neighborhood themed website and a neighborhood Facebook page (which is in addition to other Facebook pages the agent may have). Then, Monday through Friday, we post local real estate content to the agent’s website and Facebook. This gives the agent instant credibility as a local expert who is active in the marketplace.

Just as importantly, our proprietary mobile and desktop apps make it ridiculously easy for clients to share their professional insights through short posts such as listing reviews and market updates. These include templated forms so agents can quickly update their web presence in the flow of their regular job, for example while touring houses – they don’t need to block their calendar to write a blog article.

Over time, our clients build their web audience and their market share in their exclusive territories, becoming recognized as the local go-to pro.

What problem does your product/service solve?

For agents who seeking to build a listing business in a specific neighborhood, zavvie offers a proven, cost effective, turnkey solution.

What are you most excited about right now?

The internet, particularly Facebook, has evolved to the point that online hyperlocal marketing presents a golden opportunity. Traditional “farm marketing” has always been effective, but the challenge has been that door knocking and direct mail take a long time (5-10 years) and a big investment (easily over $1K per month). In contrast, we have found that online hyperlocal marketing produces superior results much more quickly (1-2 years) and at a far lower cost.

At the same time, consumers are increasingly choosing agents who are true local experts – agents who not only know the inventory inside and out, but also the nuances of the neighborhood (not city or zip code) where they specialize. As a result, there is a movement underway for top agents to use the internet, especially Facebook and other social media, to share their expertise and grow their businesses in on their own neighborhoods. Being aligned with that movement is what zavvie is most excited about!

What’s next for you?

We are about to launch our Instagram integration and more streamlined video posting. Also, we continue to increasingly localize the automatic daily real estate content we post to our clients’ websites and Facebook. We know our model gets results, so we are focused and working hard to make it more and more effective.

What’s a cause you’re passionate about and why?

zavvie is proud to support Greenhouse Scholars, an education non-profit that provides comprehensive personal and financial support to high-performing, under-resourced college students. Through this approach, Greenhouse Scholars is catalyzing change in low-income neighborhoods by cultivating leaders and role models from those neighborhoods. Their vision is to create a community of recipient scholars who become the next generation of leaders and change agents, and together change the trajectory of their families, their communities, and broader global communities.

That’s certainly a worthy cause, but more importantly Greenhouse Scholars gets spectacular results. Nationwide only 11% of low income college students graduate within 6 years, while for Greenhouse Scholars that figure is 90%. And, the scholars give back, with each scholar directly impacting 60+ low income students each year. It’s an amazing, beautiful program that continues to grow.

Thanks to Stefan for sharing his story. If you’d like to connect, find him on LinkedIn here.

We’re constantly looking for great real estate tech entrepreneurs to feature. If that’s you, please read this post — then drop me a line (drew @ geekestatelabs dot com).

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