Kim Prior While in some ways 2021 feels like the longest year ever, in others, it’s moving lightening-fast. As we’re blazing through the last few calendar months in preparation for the New Year, I had to stop and acknowledge some of what we’ve accomplished at FBS so far. Results like this are celebration worthy but that’s not the sole intent of this post. I’d also like to highlight these from a business perspective. They are a powerful, unbiased testament to the value of the work we’re doing. Beneath the ever-changing surface, beyond the daily noise that can easily distract, at FBS, we’re laser-focused. We’re consistently learning, innovating, growing and delivering tremendous software and service value to our MLS customers and software subscribers. These are results that shine brightly and speak loudly. Take a look.
Confidence to Renew Again and Again
This year, 100% of our MLS customers eligible to renew their Flexmls agreements, renewed. Being trusted and relied upon by 155+ MLSs (representing more than 300,000 Flexmls subscribers), some that have been clients for 3+ decades, is awesome and absolutely what fuels us. This isn’t a rare occurrence, either. I’d be hard pressed to find a timeframe where we didn’t renew 100% of eligible contracts and when I find those rare non-renewals, they’re always unique circumstances. How do we achieve this, year after year?
Recently, Arizona Regional MLS (ARMLS) once again, renewed their contract with us. When I asked CEO, Matthew Consalvo about some of the drivers behind their continued trust in us, he had this to say: “As an organization, ARMLS strives to find ways to continually elevate the capability and value of services provided to our subscribers. One of the primary areas of focus for ARMLS is providing the tools our subscribers need to exceed their client’s expectations. FBS continues to be an active, responsive, and advanced partner in this shared goal. We value tremendously the relationship and partnership we feel with the FBS Team, and look forward to a shared commitment of creative collaboration in the many years that come”. Three main contributors, echoed in Matt’s feedback:
1- Partnership and Collaboration. We build and nurture long-term partnerships underpinned by open communication and trust from consistently delivering on promises. With FBS, our customers gain a team of laser-focused employee-owners as collaborators who listen, engage and respond with action. When we make mistakes (which we do), we own and fix them – quickly. We also have a lot (a lot) of fun together; collaboration takes many shapes!
2- Innovative, constantly-improving technology that’s laser focused on helping MLSs make the market work. Enabling geographic growth and choice through standards-built, API-powered, locally-customizable software, Flexmls with Spark API technology empowers subscribers to do their jobs and serve their clients as the local experts quickly, easily and effectively; accessing the richest, most accurate and comprehensive property data and ancillary software they love on any device. Driven home by Mike Smith, the CEO of Alaska MLS, another long-term customer who recently renewed their contract: “Alaska MLS is proud to again renew our relationship with FBS and continue to provide our members with an outstanding MLS platform. The team at FBS have been so easy to work with and are constantly innovating, ensuring our Brokers and Agents have a premium platform to support them”.
3- Unparalleled focus on our Customer’s Success: Seriously, those aren’t just fluffy adjectives. FBS service is notoriously personal and super responsive. Because we’re 100% employee owned, we are empowered to focus on that one outcome: customer success. To that end….
Keeping Customers Happy
This Year we’ve achieved incredible customer satisfaction. And again, this isn’t new. As wild as it may sound, these kind of customer satisfaction results are the norm for us. Our support team alone averages an NPS of 92 and answers 94% of incoming calls in less than a minute. Add to that a Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) score averaging 4.8 (out of 5). Those are powerful numbers. Translation? Problems SOLVED and subscribers back to focusing on their clients. When you couple that with purpose-built, rock-solid-reliable technology, awesome training and unmatched, professionally produced, multi-media marketing resources, our customers have the full spectrum of customer success resources at their (and their member’s) fingertips.
Growing (While Keeping Customers Happy)
This year we’ve already grown subscribers more than 10%. It’s a notable accomplishment to maintain existing clients (and keep a few hundred thousand software subscribers satisfied) year after year (for decades) as technology demands scale and evolve rapidly. It’s entirely another level to grow by double digits year after year for more than a decade in parallel to that incredible retention. Yes, we’ve done that too. In 2021, year to date, we’ve grown the number of subscribers on the Flexmls Platform more than 10%, to more than 300,000. Ask any MLS who has converted to Flexmls and they will attest: we work closely with their teams to navigate and deliver comprehensive system training and conversion support. Through the pandemic, more so, ensuring the utmost standards of sensitivity and care. I won’t be modest here, our conversion team is masterful, I’d bet to say the best in the business. While converting MLS Systems is challenging and there’s no way to completely eliminate that, our conversion and customer success teams are truly awesome, laser focused on ensuring the smoothest transition possible with processes, clear timelines and great communication.
Innovating New Products that Build MLS Value Proposition (While Growing and Keeping Customers Happy)
This year we’ve launched and scaled a new product. Yikes – this blog is getting longer than I expected (sorry)! I’ll dive in more another day. We launched The FlōPlan System in late 2020 and today, it’s available to more than 250,000 of our Flexmls subscribers. Floor plans that improve the listing for less than $25 each, created with just a cell phone in less than 10 minutes. This product consistently earns a customer satisfaction rating of 99% and the accuracy ratings +95%. Unmatched.
Inviting YOU to Grow With Us
At FBS, we have something totally unique that’s grown annually… for more than 40 years. As a 100% employee owned company we have freedom unlike any other MLS technology provider. We have the financial and operational freedom to wholly focus on and invest in our work. Undistracted. That freedom breeds certainty and confidence in our work. We know we’ll be around for the longterm so we build relationships and MLS software products for the long term.
We’d love to catch up with MLS Leaders this week at the NAR Conference and Expo to discuss how FBS can support the current and future success of your MLS!