Bellator Real Estate & Development in Alabama recently partnered with Delta Media Group® to adopt an all-in-one solution that enables them to do what they do better and provide a better work-life balance for their agents.

What happens when a real estate developer bands together with the region's top brokerage leaders and the most reliable technology partner in the game? They form a real estate powerhouse.

In 2008, the formation of Bellator Real Estate began after Nathan Cox left the Marine Corps and had the opportunity to start his own construction company. The business started small, with a single office along the Eastern Shore in Spanish Fort, Alabama.

Wanting to focus solely on development and construction instead of sales, Nathan recruited Troy Wilson and Geoff Stacy from ERA Platinum Properties to come and join him as President and Executive Vice President - COO of the brokerage. Bringing 25 agents with them, the companies merged in 2011.

"We had been in real estate for probably five years together before that," recalls Geoff. He [Nathan] came to us and said, 'Hey, I need somebody to help me grow this company. I want to go do a lot of development. I want to build houses, but I don't want to try to sell real estate. So we got together and formed that company."

That merger was undoubtedly a catalyst for growth at Bellator Real Estate & Development. It opened the door for a couple of other brokerages in the area, including Coldwell Banker United and Ono Island Realty, to come and join as well. 

"They came to us and we came to them, and we got together and said, 'Look, let us handle this for you. Go out, sell real estate, bring your team over, roll into the Bellator brand, and let us do the tough stuff for you,'" says Geoff. "And that's how we started, and it was probably the quickest way to grow for us as opposed to growing organically, rolling those two companies in. Both companies had about 25 agents, so that added 50 agents into the mix."

Over the next several years, the firm's expansion continued with the acquisition of Coastal Real Estate & Development Gulf Shores and Fairhope Realty Group. In 2017, Bellator Real Estate was invited to join Luxury Real Estate Companies of the World®, Luxury Portfolio®, and Military on the Move®. By 2021, they surpassed 200 agents. 

Still directed under the company's original leadership, their team is now spread out across the region among seven different office branches. Understanding how much work is required for their agents to do their best job each day, Bellator Real Estate recently began working with Delta Media Group to provide them with modern, automated tools that make their lives easier.

A Standard of Values

Combining talent from different backgrounds with many years of experience, it's evident that the leaders at Bellator Real Estate & Development are the foundation of the company and what ultimately makes it unique from other brokerages in the area. 

"I would say the number one thing that separates us right now just talking about our brokerage, it's our broker mix," says Geoff. "It's the broker leaders that we've got that are in the branches that are working with the agents. You combine that experience, it's 216 years of combined real estate experience. I mean, they just know the business. They know the area."

Not only do their brokers know the area and how to navigate the real estate market, but they are also there to support their agents 24/7. This attribute is something you won't find at most other brokerages.

"They're well respected and they are available to their agents at all times," says Geoff. "For most brokerages in our area, you can't get your broker on the telephone. They might not return that phone call. Nights and weekends, good luck. So they're available, and I think that is the most important thing. They are caring brokers who care about the success of their agents and that fuels an attitude and a culture in those offices that is unmatched in our marketplace."

While the leadership at Bellator Real Estate is unmatched, the brokerage wouldn't be nearly as successful without its dedicated agents. Something that all of the agents at Bellator Real Estate & Development have in common is that they embody an equivalent set of core values in their life and work. These core values, which include faith, effort, gratitude, commitment, honor, and courage, are what their company culture is based on and therefore, the leadership team looks for these values in the agents they seek to hire. If an agent doesn't possess a comparable set of core values, then it won't be a match.

"We don't hire just anybody," explains Geoff. "You've got to be a culture fit. If they're backstabbing or if they're primadonnas or if they put themselves in front of other things than their clients, then they're just not going to be invited to be a part of what we have here. It's too important to us. So we are very selective in who we reach out to and invite to come over to this company."

Geoff identifies the importance of hiring to these values. He acknowledges that the company could be much larger if they hired just any agent that walked through the door, but that is not how they want to run their business.

"Hiring to culture and hiring to values is the most important thing we do," he states. "We probably could have grown a lot faster to a higher agent count if we would've sacrificed that, but it's not something we're willing to do. The people that are here are people that we care about, that we want to see succeed, and we want to help them create better lives for themselves, and that's the culture. 

A Pillar of Their Community

Given that gratitude is one of their core values, every single person at Bellator Real Estate & Development strives to give back to their community. "Honestly, we've got 200 agents, we've got 200 of the biggest hearts you can imagine in the market," says Geoff.

One of the key ways they do this is by taking on a new initiative each year. This year, they are choosing to support the Alabama Coastal Foundation, a charity that provides education programs centered around the preservation of the Alabama coasts, through a campaign they call Preserving Alabama Coasts. During this year-long campaign, agents will be contributing portions of their commission to the foundation, along with participating in several of their programs. 

When speaking about the campaign, Meredith Hill, a Marketing Specialist at Bellator Real Estate & Development, says, "They do all kinds of different programs, education, they can get into the classroom with the kids. We do coastal cleanups, work programs, share the beach projects, and all kinds of great things. We're committed to raising $25,000 this year for that goal."

Last year they chose to work with the South Baldwin Literacy Council, an organization that supports the community by providing free tutoring for children, English as a second language, and career development assistance for adults that are new to the community.

"We raised over $23,000 for this South Baldwin Literacy Council," declares Meredith. "And that was in a short amount of time. It wasn't a full year that our agents gave back to that program, and some of them went and tutored with the kids also in addition, just on their own time."

The agents at Bellator Real Estate & Development have contributed to countless community-based charities over the years and are always seeking out new organizations.

"Our agents are so involved, they probably have done well over 70 different charities, things like Operation Reconnect for military families, Toys for Tots, Privacy Pantry, Backpacks for Kids, Coats for Kids, all kinds of great, great things," says Meredith. "And they're always looking for things. So it's really neat to see, and it really does go back to our core values."

Along with supporting local charities, Bellator Real Estate & Development works with local businesses through their partnership with LoLo, Locals Helping Locals. Through this partnership, agents select gifts from participating businesses to give to their clients each month. In 2022, they had over 30 participating vendors.

Agent Marketing Director Anna Pippen says, "We love LoLo. It is a local gift-of-the-month program to support client gifts for our agents. But the best part about it is that our agents are able to support local businesses. They are local businesses themselves along the Gulf Coast, but we get to pair up with other local businesses and provide wonderful resources, and client gifts, but it's enabling those agents to put business back into those local businesses. So it's a fantastic partnership. It also helps build up their database, and build up their sphere of influence."

Saving Time and Money With Delta Media Group

Even with their extremely passionate, capable team, Bellator Real Estate noticed how difficult it was to keep up with the seemingly endless demand of working in real estate. They recognized that there was no way for an agent to do all of the tasks involved themselves and still have a work-life balance. So they turned to technology.

"What we needed was a way to help our agents with all the things that they have to do," says Geoff. "From getting their license to maintaining their license, continuing education, working with clients, going on listings appointments, showing appointments, writing contracts, and negotiating, it's 261 plus jobs that an agent has to do to stay successful. There's no way any human being can do all of that and still be able to take care of their family and have a life outside real estate."

To make life easier for their agents, Bellator Real Estate began investing in various automation tools from different providers. With these tools, they could stay in touch with customers, make marketing materials for new listings, and so much more. 

"We started investing in building a toolset that automated as many things for our agents as possible, that helped automate their campaigns to their sphere, made communicating with their past clients a little bit more automated so that when they need to pick up a phone and talk to a client, they can do that," says Geoff. "There are so many other things that you can automate from the time you get a listing and enter it into the MLS, and we were just thinking, the only way that an agent's going to ever get their life back is if they can automate these things so that when they enter in that listing, it creates their marketing materials for them."

After spending several years piecing together tools from different providers to try and create the perfect solution, they found that Delta Media Group would offer them all of these tools in one single platform. They found that partnering with Delta Media would make things simpler and more cost-effective.

"These tools that we were buying outside from separate vendors trying to cobble together and tie together, Delta had a solution for every single one of those things." Geoff notes, "For me, I mean, I'm the operations guy, it was one of the cost savings. I mean huge cost savings and being able to take tools that we were buying from other vendors and be able to get rid of them and use the tools that were already in the Delta platform."

Since partnering with Delta Media Group, Geoff has witnessed how having all the tools they need to do their jobs in one place has made a positive impact on their agents, just as they intended.

"I can say that being able to get all of that into one place and one platform for the agents, so they only have to go one place, is a game changer, and to be able to automate some of those things that they're having to do on their own is giving them their lives back," he says.

At Bellator Real Estate they are even seeing agents who were previously hesitant about adopting technology get on board and start using the tools in DeltaNET®. One of the tools they see being used most often is Social Connector, a tool that automatically posts new updates and listings to an agent's social media channels directly through the platform. 

"We've had agents who have been reluctant to adopt technology in the past that are now beginning to see this start to make sense," says Geoff. "The social media connector is a huge thing for agents. They can take the stuff that they're already doing and put that on their social platforms. It's the little things that they don't think to do or they don't have time to do that we can set and forget. It is a huge, huge advantage for our agents."

Joseph Vogtner, another Marketing Specialist at Bellator Real Estate, has additionally seen the value in the tools that Delta Media Group provides for agents, including how much it saves them time, especially when it comes to marketing.

"It's really just anything that the agents can turn on and they don't have to manage, which gives them their time back and their personal lives back," explains Joseph. "So My Customer for Life articles, the email and the social version of those, and then the drip campaigns that they can set up, all the preloaded campaigns that Delta provides for them, they don't even have to think or create a campaign. They can just attach their customers to it and start it and watch it go."

Aside from the benefits of saving costs and giving their agents their lives back, Bellator Real Estate views their partnership with Delta Media Group as an outstanding tool for both recruiting and retaining talent. 

"We would not have gone down this path if I didn't think it would help us go out and recruit new agents," says Geoff. "I mean, that's the lifeblood of the company. Continuing to grow the company is what we want to do and retain those agents. I mean, once those agents get on your technologies and they're using them every day and they're starting to see how it truly is beginning to create a business that they would not have gotten otherwise, that's a retention tool that you can't put a value on."

A Website That Generates Traffic

Bellator Real Estate was also interested in partnering with Delta Media Group for our patent-pending Search Engine Optimization (SEO). This is something they did not get from their previous website provider. They now have a Delta Media Group brokerage website with SEO strategy overseen by our expert team of digital marketers. In a profession where expanding your reach is essential for success, they recognize the necessity of having a website with strong SEO for business growth. 

"You have to have a website, but if nobody can find it, it doesn't matter," remarks Geoff. "So having an SEO strategy behind it is vital. We're not a big lead company. We don't try to generate lots of leads. We're more of a sphere-based company; we are trying to market to the people that already know us and trust us, but at the end of the day, you have to meet new people. So being able to have traffic coming into that website is hugely important to us."

Geoff mentions that SEO is something that they prefer to outsource rather than handle in-house, as extensive education and knowledge are needed to do it right.

"Having a partner that brings that knowledge to the table and understands it is absolutely something we were looking for from the get-go because we did not have that with our previous vendor at all," he says. "It was totally on us to try to figure it out, and it was not a very comfortable situation to be in. I would much rather pay an expert through Delta to do that kind of stuff as opposed to trying to go out and find staff that knows how to do it and then retain them."

The agents at Bellator Real Estate love their personal websites powered by Delta Media Group as well. According to Joseph, the thing they like most is how seamlessly they connect to DeltaNET.

"I think the main thing that they really like about it is everything involved with their agent website is connected to their CRM," says Jeff. "When a customer is on their website clicking on properties, saving properties, that information is automatically put into their CRM. They get notified on their mobile app that they use, and they can do everything right there and know that it's connected."

Anna says that one of their agents' favorite website features is the INRIX drive time search, a feature that allows visitors to search for how far of a drive any given location is from a property.

"The map feature, being able to have the INRIX drive time is significant," remarks Anna. "If you are commuting across our bay, we have two counties that we cover and so being able to navigate, say 'I want a 30-minute commute to work' on our website is significant, and having agents be able to offer that value to their clients is significant."

A Mobile App Integrated With Their Other Technology

Along with launching new sites for their brokerage and their agents, Bellator Real Estate launched a mobile app through Delta Media Group that their customers can use, enabling them to search for homes and communicate with their agents on the go. 

"People, they're not sitting in front of their computers looking at real estate anymore," explains Geoff. "They're driving around, they want to respond and communicate with an app and not necessarily your desktop technology anymore. People are on the go. So having that mobile app is absolutely imperative. It's probably one of the most sought-after tools that agents are looking for."

They felt that although any agent can get a generic board-provided app, having what they have now from Delta that is both personalized to their branding and integrated with their other technology is much more beneficial to them.

"I know there are a lot of other mobile apps that agents can choose from, but the board offers one for free to the agents," says Geoff. "It sounds great, but it doesn't integrate with all of their technology. Being able to tie all that in together so that things that are happening on the app are translated into the CRM so that you can see what people are doing and all of that is co-branded is huge for us because if an agent's using the board-provided tool, it's just a generic app that does not really look like it's that agent's personalized app."

Using Technology Requires Support

Bellator Real Estate knows that if you want to succeed in real estate, you must get on board with technology.

"If they don't get on board with it, they're not going to be in business for very long," states Geoff. "Technology is absolutely the only way that people can succeed in providing the level of service that we've got to provide in this day and age. People are used to having things immediately when they want it, they want it on demand at all times. And if you can't provide that, they're going to find somebody else to do business with."

Over the years, they have found that although agents understand the necessity of it, technology adoption is still something they fear. But they knew that finding the right provider could make it easier.

"I think they understand that they've got to have it, but it's a necessary evil for a lot of them," says Geoff. "We're trying to get to that point where it is not something that you have to fear, it's very accessible, it's learnable, it's usable, and it's the only way you're going to survive in the future."

They also understand that having a team of support staff who dedicates their time to assisting them with using their CRM and other technology is an effective way to get more agents to adopt new tools.

"This is a very intimidating industry and agents need to be concentrating on what they need to do to take care of negotiating for their clients, working with their clients, and providing the best level of service they can get," explains Geoff. "They don't need to be worried about what technology they need to be using or what their CRM does or doesn't. That's what our staff's here for. We are going to help set them up on these tools and let them focus on taking care of their clients."

Anna explains that they offer one-on-support which enables them to meet each individual agent exactly where they are at, rather than bombarding them with too much information at once.

"Our culture, we're relational. We're not transactional," she says. "So we know our agents on a first-name basis. We try our best to sit down with them one-on-one, hear their pain points, hear where they're at with technology and try to match their training to match what they need. Not necessarily to give them so much information that they're overwhelmed, but to try to find what matters to them right then and there."

Focusing Their Attention on Tech Adoption

Since agents at Bellator Real Estate have only had access to DeltaNET for a few months now, their current focus as a brokerage is on tech adoption. 

"The Delta platform is a new technology for them," says Geoff. "So gaining better engagement with the tools and adoption of the tools is really the most important thing for us right now, what we're tracking. We decided a while back that sometimes you can do a million things okay, but it's better to do one or two things really well. And that's what we're trying to focus on."

They aren't looking to add any more technology to the mix or implement any new strategies, they simply want to get their agents to utilize these tools that they are confident will work.

"I don't want any new initiatives," remarks Geoff. "I don't want any new technologies. I don't want any more new ideas. I want to take what we've got that we know works, and let's get really laser-focused on being the best at that as we can. And a lot of that is one-on-one. Getting with those agents and saying, "Okay, here's the toolset." Like Anna said, 'Where are you having trouble? What is in our tool stack that is a solution for you?' And don't worry about the rest."

This idea of focusing on getting better at what they do rather than trying anything new is representative of the culture at Bellator Real Estate. They believe in always looking for ways to do what they do better, and that includes leveraging technology to do the tasks they are already great at more efficiently. 

"I don't want to do anything new," declares Geoff. "I want to do what we're doing better. It probably is the biggest cultural point of Bellator, and we're the only people in this market that's doing it, we're constantly looking for ways to get better every day to help the agents get better every day and leverage our technology to help them do that."

The leaders at Bellator Real Estate comprehend that technology adoption is not just a leap into modernity, but rather a strategic move that empowers agents to regain control over their lives and amplify their talents. By integrating innovative tools for property research, customer relationship management, digital marketing, and so much more, agents can unlock newfound opportunities to connect with clients, close deals, and strike a harmonious balance between their work and personal lives. By choosing to partner with a provider who offers them all the tools they need and the support to back them up, convincing their agents to adopt technology has never been so simple.

To learn more about Bellator Real Estate & Development, visit their website at gobellator.com.