Sherry FitzGerald is Ireland’s leading network of estate agents, with over 100 branches nationwide. Before they started using DataWarehouse, they were relying on static, point-in-time reports, which were time-consuming to produce and would very quickly be out-of-date by the time they reached their intended audience.
To help solve this challenge, Sherry FitzGerald asked us if there was a way they could extract their data from the Reapit platform and import it into Power BI for a faster and more accurate display of information. We had something for that.
The challenge
“I'm not sure we actually picked DataWarehouse, it was a necessity from our side... the biggest challenge we had was real-time visibility of data, trends and their consumption in a meaningful format, along with the ability to generate insights in a short period of time.” - Brian Dooley, Technology Director
Before using DataWarehouse, Sherry FitzGerald were relying on static, point-in-time reports through Reapit’s custom and Power Reporting options, though giving valuable insights to achieve the level of detail they wanted, those reports were combined with data from other sources and were manually manipulated to get meaningful results before they could then be circulated to senior members of the business for their consumption.
This was a long process that from start to finish would typically take a week to complete, which meant that the information was often out of date by the time it reached its audience, and that audience often didn’t always have the expertise to query or filter those excel reports to get the insights they needed. Given that this process had to be repeated regularly, it became very time-consuming, inefficient and cumbersome.
The requirements
Sherry FitzGerald understood that they could become even more competitive in each of their market verticals and were looking for better ways to extract and interpret the data.
They had already been using Microsoft Power BI in other areas of their business and understood that utilising real-time data across their entire business would provide them with the opportunity to proactively react and make strategic changes.
The team at Sherry FitzGerald questioned whether they could use their Reapit data in the same way, and was that possible without the need for a developer or someone with extensive knowledge of the Reapit platform.
The solution
Sherry FitzGerald asked Reapit if there was any way they could extract data from AgencyCloud and import that data into Power BI to generate reports using near-real-time data for a faster and more accurate display of information.
DataWarehouse offered the ability to import their data via a readable analytics schema that allowed them to organise their data and combine it with other data sources that could be easily plugged into the reports and dashboards built in Microsoft’s Power BI.
This was previously a long process that from start to finish would typically take a week to complete, which meant that the information was often out of date by the time it reached its audience, and that audience often didn’t always have the expertise to query or filter those Excel reports to get the insights they needed. Given that this process had to be repeated regularly, it became very time-consuming, inefficient and cumbersome.
"We plugged into DataWarehouse and it's given us a whole new world of possibilities, it’s a total game changer.” - Brian Dooley, Technology Director
DataWarehouse’s most immediate benefit for Sherry FitzGerald was that the data is refreshed constantly throughout the day, so now their reports are almost real-time. DataWarehouse enabled Sherry FitzGerald to feed the latest data directly into their pre-built reports and dashboards in Power BI. They now have all the data they need at the click of a button, enabling them to create a much more holistic and up-to-date view of their business performance.
Whereas previously Sherry FitzGerald had to manually filter and manipulate data in Excel, DataWarehouse enables them to plug all the relevant fields into Power BI dashboards, with greater flexibility to filter as needed.
"In terms of what we can produce and show the business, it’s now simple for anyone who has Power BI to see real-time reports at the drop of a hat and apply filters as well, which is a game changer for us.”- Brian Dooley, Technology Director
The result
“We really have our finger on the pulse to immediately determine trends and impacts on our business. It's a constantly evolving landscape so to be able to have that information at your fingertips is fantastic.”- Brian Dooley, Technology Director
DataWarehouse offered numerous advantages in terms of business reporting for Sherry FitzGerald, empowering senior managers, and the C-Suite to take a high-level overview on recent activity and its impact on KPIs such as market appraisals, new instructions, and number of enquiries coming in.
One of the many benefits that Sherry FitzGerald derived from using DataWarehouse was the ability to produce one holistic view of all businesses that is always up to date for the C-Suite to view, previously this would have been 15 separate reports. Another report that has been generated since they integrated with DataWarehouse highlights the instruction price versus the price achieved.
This data is easily viewed via the Reapit dashboard that calculates the differential between the asking price and selling price, giving Sherry Fitzgerald a very quick steer in terms of where they are under-pitching the sales price during their market appraisals, which they have said has had a huge impact on whether they win listings.
Having near-real-time visibility of data means that Sherry FitzGerald can see the immediate impact of macroeconomic influences on business trends, enabling them to react quickly before business may be affected; no more waiting around for data that’s already obsolete by the time it hits the desk.
There’s really no limit to the number of reports that Sherry FitzGerald can now create. Now the business has seen the power of the reporting functionality available with DataWarehouse, they’re asking for more, with a report on trends on instructions recently completed and a monthly KPI tracker in the pipeline.
One of the best parts is that reports only need to be built once, and they automatically refresh with the latest data and allow the team at Sherry FitzGerald to bring in their own data, on budgets, targets, and everything in between, and to run reports that show performance in real terms, with the enhanced ability to make insight-driven decisions on the fly.
“There is such a plethora of dashboards available now, there’s literally nothing we aren’t measuring.” - Lyndsay Cremin, IT Project Lead
What do you value most about DataWarehouse?
“I think it's great because we don't have to pull all these different reports. You can connect into numerous tables and then immediately consolidate all the information with all the manipulations done in Power BI with everything at the click of a button. As we refresh the reports several times a day we get near real-time information and live business trends from across the whole company.” - Lyndsay Cremin, IT Project Lead
“The most useful report we've created for our C-Suite gives us an overview of the three businesses, New Homes, Residential and Countrywide and at a glance we can see the KPI's for each of those three businesses in real time, in one single view so we can get a very quick understanding of exactly what's happening across all three businesses in the space of 20 seconds, which is fantastic. Historically we'd have to run about 15 different reports to produce that information, that's a game changer for our guys. And of course, the ancillary benefit of all that is, that is a far less time is required to manipulate all this information and create those reports. They came from the accounts team predominantly, so they find themselves with multiple extra hours on their hands every week so they can start channelling their efforts into more productive work as well." - Brian Dooley, Technology Director
About
Sherry FitzGerald
Established: 1982. Dublin, Ireland.
Sherry FitzGerald is Ireland’s largest, fully diversified property advisory firm servicing the residential and commercial property market. The firm was founded in 1982 when two companies – FitzGerald & Partners (founded 1972) and Sherry & Sons (founded in 1949) joined forces. They started out with one residential office on Merrion Row in Dublin 2 with a second office in Terenure opening in 1989.
They now have over 100 offices and operate 4 business units: Residential, New Homes, Financial Services and Countrywide.
DataWarehouse
Our DataWarehouse solution gives estate agents easy access to their Reapit data. It is specifically designed to hook up to multiple mainstream business intelligence tools like Power BI, Tableau and Metabase, significantly reducing the time and effort it takes to create, update and analyse as many reports as you need to understand your business. It makes your data a powerful tool in your business operations.
