Lead Intake Automation for a Boutique Real Estate Brokerage

The Client

Robert is the managing broker at Bluestone Realty Group, a boutique residential real estate brokerage serving Hudson Valley, New York. Bluestone had a growing online presence and was generating leads from its website, open houses, Google Forms, and Real Geeks IDX property searches. But as lead volume increased, the team struggled to keep intake, routing, follow-up, and reporting organized.

The Problem

Bluestone was using several tools that worked individually but did not work together cleanly. The team used Real Geeks for property search and buyer lead capture, Google Forms for open house sign-ins and seller intake, Gmail for notifications, Google Sheets for manual tracking, and a CRM for agent follow-up.

This created several recurring issues:

• Leads entered through different forms and systems with no unified view
• Duplicate contacts created across platforms
• Agents received incomplete or inconsistent lead information
• Open house leads were not always followed up with quickly
• Seller leads were not routed differently from buyer leads
• No clear dashboard showing lead source, response time, or conversion status
• Robert had limited visibility into which marketing channels were producing serious opportunities

The Solution

A lead intake automation system was designed using Make as the central automation layer. The goal was to connect Bluestone's existing tools without forcing the team to switch platforms. Instead of replacing Real Geeks, Google Forms, Gmail, and Sheets, a workflow was created that allowed those tools to share information in a structured way.

The system collected new leads from Real Geeks and Google Forms, cleaned and standardized the data, checked for duplicates, categorized the lead, routed it to the right agent, triggered immediate follow-up, and logged the activity for reporting.

The Workflow

• A lead submits an inquiry through Real Geeks, an open house Google Form, or a seller intake form
• Make captures the lead data and standardizes the fields
• The workflow checks whether the contact already exists
• If new, a CRM record is created; if existing, the record is updated with the new activity
• The lead is categorized as buyer, seller, investor, open house visitor, or general inquiry
• Make routes the lead based on source, location, property type, and urgency
• The assigned agent receives a Gmail notification and internal alert with a lead summary
• The lead receives an immediate personalized response
• A follow-up task is created for the agent
• The lead source, assigned agent, response status, and next step are logged in a reporting dashboard

Example Lead Flow

A buyer visited the Bluestone website through a Google Ads campaign and viewed several homes in the Hudson Valley through Real Geeks. The buyer submitted a showing request for a farmhouse outside Kingston. Make captured the lead, identified the inquiry as a high-intent buyer request, checked whether the contact already existed, and created a CRM record. The system then summarized the lead for the agent — including property interest, price range, source, and a recommended next step — and the lead received an immediate acknowledgment while the agent received a detailed brief before reaching out.

Tools and Systems

• Real Geeks IDX website and lead capture
• Google Forms for open houses and seller intake
• Make for automation and routing logic
• Google Sheets for lightweight reporting
• Gmail for notifications and follow-up
• Google Calendar for consultation scheduling
• CRM updates and task creation
• AI-assisted lead summaries and categorization

Outcome

The new workflow gave Robert and his team a cleaner, faster, and more consistent lead intake process. Leads from Real Geeks, Google Forms, and open houses were no longer scattered across disconnected tools. Each lead was captured, categorized, routed, and logged automatically. Agents received better context before reaching out, and Robert gained visibility into where leads were coming from, how quickly agents were responding, and which sources were producing the strongest opportunities.

Key Value

This project showed how a real estate brokerage can improve lead conversion without replacing its existing software. By using Make as the automation layer, Bluestone connected its intake forms, IDX website, CRM, email, calendar, and reporting workflows into a more reliable operating system for lead management.