Michael Beckerman helps businesses build credibility with content

How did you first get involved in real estate public relations?

I always loved news. I always loved reading. Some of my favorite memories from childhood were talking with my dad about what he’d read in the newspaper. In my early 20s I decided to start a public-relations firm, without really knowing anything about PR. I remember getting a book at the library about press releases, and thought, hey, I could do that. I set up this business and started to network. My first client was a real estate homebuilder. This was in the late ’80s, when the market was really bad. I realized that in bad times, companies needed more PR, and I also realized there wasn’t really anyone who specialized in the real estate industry. From my reading, I knew that there were advantages in business to having a niche. I decided then to specialize in real estate. It wasn’t long before I got my first commercial client. For 25 years I built up my agency: Beckerman Public Relations. We were in New Jersey, New York, D.C. and San Francisco. We had clients across the country. I grew the firm to about 60 people. Then in 2008–2009 I decided to go in a different direction. 

Why did you decide to launch The News Funnel?

As a PR professional, I had seen that print was starting to go away. In the late 2000s, individuals and corporations were beginning to understand that they could create their own content and their own media by writing blogs, by creating their own white papers and by hosting their own webinars and podcasts. When I started The News Funnel in 2011, my goal was to encourage as many people and companies as I could to create their own content, which I would then distribute to the industry. I wanted to help real estate professionals limit the distance between their message and their market.

How does The News Funnel aggregating system work? 

We upload more than 5,000 sources of content daily, including blogs, press releases and articles. We scrape that content daily to determine what it’s about, then categorize it. When one of our users tells us that they are interested in a topic — say, retail in Cleveland — we pass along the content that relates to that subject. Our focus is really on accuracy and relevance. We put a lot of time into our software to make sure you are not getting a crime story that would be totally irrelevant to a business person.

Why do you think some of the leaders in commercial real estate have historically been slow to adapt to new technology and social-media platforms?

The resistance really has had to do with apathy. The industry is working extremely well. Buildings are going up just fine. People are leasing space just fine. People are selling properties just fine. So there’s been no mandate, no sort of drive to embrace technology. There hasn’t been any reason to rock the boat. It’s the opposite on the residential side, by the way. There, customers have started demanding the industry be online. Clients want all the residential data to be on Facebook and Instagram. They are going on the Internet looking for information before they make their decisions. That’s the same reason our industry is going to have to step up our online footprint and embrace technology. 

Have you seen a changing attitude at all in recent years?

Yes, as Millennials rise up in the ranks, they are pushing us baby boomers forward. They are so much more comfortable with technology than my generation is. Our end users are also starting to demand that we be on these sites. Big developers and private equity firms and tenants want to work on these platforms. This is going to force commercial real estate providers to change our attitudes.

Part of your business model at The News Funnel involves producing content for commercial real estate companies and individuals. Can you provide some tips on what makes for good material?

First off, you need to know who your target audience is. Your content is ineffective if you don’t have a customer in mind. Once you know who that customer is, think about what social platforms they are on, and where they are getting their news, so you can make sure you are there too. Then ask yourself: What topics are they most interested in reading about? Say, for instance, you are a leasing professional who is trying to reach tenants, and your niche is high-end fashion. On your blog you are going to want to be writing about fashion trends, you are going to want to do surveys and do Q&As with high-profile designers. You want to establish yourself as an expert in the industry. You also want to stay away from self-promotion — if you start blogging and talking about your wins and your successes, that’s not giving them anything they want to consume. The other thing is to just be really consistent. Set up a calendar for all your ideas. Decide if you’re going to write once or twice a week, then commit to it. When I go to a website and see they are just blogging sporadically, it’s a waste of time. You are not going to be able to build a following if you’re not consistent.

What’s next for The News Funnel?

Platforms that connect people are really the most important ecosystems we have today. One of the gaps our industry is facing is that we are really not connected to what’s going on in the technology industry. I’ve started to see that part of The News Funnel’s mission should be to bring the two together. In January we bought a content-and-connectivity platform called CRE Tech Intersect. We want CRE Tech to be a site where people can come to discover all the wonderful apps, virtual-reality devices, customer-relationship solutions and data sites that are out there and really help curate all this technology for the industry. It’s sort of the outgrowth of everything we’ve been doing previously. The News Funnel does not create news, nor are we a tech source, but what we do — and will continue doing in the future — is connect people and organizations.