Company: ReachWerks
Website: www.reachwerks.com
Founder: Kevin Tisdel
Headquarters: Seattle
Investors: Bootstrapped
Twitter: @reachwerks
Facebook: www.facebook.com/reachwerks
Brief Company Description: Reachwerks is a web-based suite of tools that helps the rental and real estate industries market their properties more efficiently.
By Kevin Tisdel, founder
Product Overview
The Reachwerks platform simplifies and streamlines everything people need to more efficiently market their rentals, real estate, vacation homes and event spaces by utilizing the place they spend the most time in their day: their email inbox.
Simplified Advertising
With Reachwerks’ advertising tools, clients schedule how often and when they want to post vacancy ads on Craigslist in advance, and can also easily distribute to other national classifieds websites (like Zillow, Trulia, Vast, Oodle and others) in just a few clicks. For people who advertise often, this saves a ton of time and headaches.
Users set up ads using a simple form just once. Reachwerks then distributes the ad to classifieds sites and automatically creates cleanly-designed, Craigslist-friendly templates for each one. When it’s time to post an ad to Craigslist, Reachwerks sends a reminder to their email account with the HTML code and details ready to be pasted into Craigslist. Reachwerks also makes sure every ad abides by Craigslist’s terms of use and has set up rules to prevent over posting or ‘spamming’ Craigslist.
Simplified To Do List
Reachwerks has shifted ‘to dos’ from a pile of sticky notes on your desk to your email inbox—where you actually notice them and prioritize them. Users simply add a task to the Reachwerks Calendar and set a time/date to be reminded of it. They then receive an email about the task when it’s due. This allows people to focus on a ‘to do’ when it needs tackling, instead of taking on the easy tasks first or getting overwhelmed from a long list.
Simplified Marketing Documents
Reachwerks lets clients store their important documents on a secured server, so they can access files quickly whenever they want, from wherever they are in the world. With the Reachwerks system, photos, flyers, templates and all other marketing docs are organized and at a user’s fingertips.
The Reachwerks system is currently in use for property management companies, apartment communities, real estate brokers, vacation homeowners and event spaces, but the company plans on expanding its offerings to a broader variety of businesses soon—anyone who needs to advertise or market something can benefit from Reachwerks’ GTD (Get Things Done) tools.
Founder’s Story
In 2002, I launched SeattleRentals.com as a marketing solution for local landlords and property managers. As the owner of a handful of small apartment buildings and vacation rentals throughout the Northwest, I set out to develop a ‘hub’ for renters and landlords to find each other. In addition it would make it easier for me to advertise my vacancies and fill my rental units, and provide an alternative to expensive newspaper ads. As Craigslist and other Internet Listing Sites grew in popularity, the SeattleRentals.com team noticed that advertising a vacancy was becoming increasingly difficult and time consuming due to dozens of advertising websites to monitor and keep updated. So the company evolved in 2012 from a typical ‘classifieds’ model of advertising to an all-encompassing marketing platform that helps a wider demographic of users effectively manage their marketing. With its broad marketing reach (and ability to work well for anyone across the world who advertises something—not just rentals), the name Reachwerks encompasses the company’s new vision.
Marketing/Promotion Strategy
Reachwerks already has a strong foothold in the rental industry due to relationships created over the past ten years with SeattleRentals.com. The team is currently beginning to permeate the apartment and property management market through direct sales to its existing client base and a network of industry association relationships. As this continues to grow, the Reachwerks team will begin broadening its client base and coverage area while by offering free ‘Taste of Reachwerks’ accounts that allow users to sample the differing tools.
How Reachwerks Differentiates Itself from the Competition
Reachwerks has combined the best features from a variety of products and tools into one place: to-do list management, calendar reminders, advertising distribution, and ad scheduling. It enables users to login once and manage every marketing task throughout their day from one spot, instead of having to juggle multiple products and website logins.
Business Model
Users pay a monthly fee to access Reachwerks’ tools based on their volume of ads and storage space. A free option (‘A Taste of Reachwerks’) allows users to sample the different tools before buying.
Current Needs
Reachwerks has an awesome, close-knit company culture and a strong team of young, entrepreneurial-minded individuals. The group is currently looking to hire sales reps to help broaden the brand into other industries and locations.
Reachwerks – www.reachwerks.com
