Purpose of the application
MarketSpace is a RE tool for sharing the listings & availabilities with potential clients as well as organizing easier communication with leads.
Application UI
The content on the page consists of the left sidebar, the navigation bar, and the main content area.
Left sidebar
The left sidebar contains the logo and the menu with the following tabs: Dashboards, Contacts, Listings, Collaboration rooms, Deal rooms, Documents, Marketing Lists, Email campaigns, Static Lists, Images, and Color Themes. The Admin user can see also Internal Users, Guests, Admin Dashboard, Config Templates, Mapping, and Picklist Values.
The logo is not clickable and is a part of the applied Color theme.
By clicking on the burger menu icon, the menu can be collapsed and unrolled back.
Navigation bar
In the navigation bar, there are the following icons available:
Notifications
In the notification center, any notifications about events, reminders, and system activities are stored. [more detailed info is here]
Chat messages
In chat messages, there are Deal rooms and Collaboration rooms listed with the last updates in them. They can be entered as well via this icon.
Org Settings
There are 2 tabs in Org Settings: Email Setup and SEO.
In the Email setup tab, the SMTP settings can be adjusted. By default, the user can use Acendix’s SMTP server credentials. However, it may trigger the emails to end up in Spam, which is risky and unstable. The opposite is using its own SMTP server’s credentials that must be validated and saved to proceed.
In the SEO tab, the user can adjust the visibility of the listing in the portal for the Google search engine.
Help Center
Via this icon, the Help center on the Ascencix website can be opened.
Profile
In the Profile tab, the following settings are based:
user profile;
contact info;
services (integrations);
licenses;
notifications management;
Open in Guest view
The user can see the view the same as the Guest user would see this portal.
User Roles in the application
There are 2 options to use the Marketspace listing portal: as a registered or a non-registered user.
Non-registered users are called Anonymous. They can use only limited functionality of the product in Guest view without the ability to store data and settings between sessions. Anonymous users have access to Anonymous Listing Portal and can filter listings, review them, and save them to Favorites.
Registered users include 2 sub-roles.
After registration users automatically receive Guest user security role. Guests - external users (for ex., Investors, Investor brokers, attorneys, etc.) who have access to the app in Guest view mode only. They require just a registered guest license, which will be free for this user (either free at all or paid by the Organization), yet the guest user must accept the license agreement, which will be a trigger for the creation of a License record. Guest users can be transferred to the Internal by providing an Internal user license and assigning Broker security role.
Admin users can turn Guest user into Internal User - full-fledged user with the fullest set of opportunities on the portal.
MarketSpace working principles
MarketSpace can be used via 2 options:
as an add-on to SalesForce by using its database;
as a standalone application with its own database.
Synchronization with xRE
In this option, MarketSpace takes the data from SalesForce and processes it. To create a listing, property or availability in MarketSpace, the user must create them on the SalesForce side and sync data between SalesForce and MarketSpace. There are 2 options how to do it:
forced sync;
auto sync.
The “forced sync“ can be done from the Property and Contact tabs in SalesForce.
Properties pull the related listings & availabilities to MarketSpace as a part of a sync. Only data related to the Property or Contact from where synchronization was initiated will be imported 
“Auto sync“ is an automatically processed synchronization that is done every 24 hrs. During this process, all the modified data will be synchronized. The process does not require the broker’s attention but is done once per day.
Images cannot be synced and should be added manually.
Listing portal
In MarketSpace, there are 3 entities that can be edited:
listings (the major);
availabilities;
contacts;
Properties do not exist as a separate entity and are synced (for xRE version) or can be created (for a standalone version) as a part of a listing.
Actions for listings for xRE-synchronized version
review in MarketSpace or Open in SF: the user can review the information taken from xRE in MarketSpace, and open the record in xRE. After selecting this option, the user will be redirected to the corresponding record in SF in the separate tab;
add images, documents, and video tour URL: the added materials will not be synchronized with xRE;
create collaboration and deal rooms;
generate a report: the same functionality as xRE has when the user selects a template and records and gets a generated report that will be automatically downloaded once will be ready;
send the listing via email: the user initiates the opening of the email client on the PC and the link to the selected listing(-s) will be auto-substituted there.
add a listing to Static list: it helps to fix particular listings in a specific list that will be saved with such content even if the number or the content of the listings will be changed in the future. In other words, it helps to save listings in their view at this particular moment;
Publish/Unpublish to the listing portal: the broker operates on the portal and can open access to the listings or close it. If the portal is not opened to search engines, people cannot find it but can review listings that were published (if they were shared). If a listing was not published, no one except the broker can see its content.
initiate email campaign: to attract more leads, the broker can create and send advertising email campaigns. The selected listings will be automatically substituted into the campaign as a point of offering.
Actions for listings for a standalone version
In addition to what was mentioned about the xRE-related version (except, the “Open in SF” option), the user can do the following:
Edit;
Copy;
Add Availability;
Deactivate.
Filters
Attention! By default, only active records are displayed in the search result. To see the inactive records, this parameter should be selected in the “Record status“ filter.
Saved searches: the user can make searches and save these filters for the future. In this tab, the own and shared filters are stored;
Listings: the main listings' parameters are listed in this tab and can be set to filter the relevant listings;
Availabilities: the main availabilities' parameters are listed in this tab and can be set to filter the relevant availabilities;
Properties: the main properties' parameters are listed in this tab and can be set to filter the relevant properties;
Location: the additional tab with properties' characteristics.
Filters can be applied via the button Apply:
and reset via these buttons (the difference is in the area of reset (local and for all parameters):
Other functionality of the listing portal
In the listing portal, the user can:
expand and collapse the availabilities within the listings:
search for listings;
sorting records;
change the view (map or table);
share search;
export listings and availabilities;
The selected listings are displayed in the bar above all records, and this selection keeps saved even if the user goes to another page with listings (but not to another tab).
In the Map view, the broker can use a map to search for listings via location. There are 3 shape options are available: circle, rectangle, and manual. The user can draw them on the map, and the search result will contain only options within the selected area.
Collaboration & Deal rooms
Collaboration room
Purpose
A collaboration room is a special space where the broker and the client of the deal can discuss cooperation nuances. It was created with the following goals:
simplify communication between the broker and potential client(-s);
store everything related to the potential deal in one place (all messages, documents, preferences, selections, etc.)
simplify the process of offering and discussing the listings & availabilities;
How to create a Collaboration room
To create the Collaboration room, the broker can follow one of the ways:
Open Salesforce and click “Open” room in the corresponding Deal (if any). It works for Tenant and Buyer representations.
Open the Collaboration room tab and create it from scratch;
Select the required listings and create a room with them;
In the opened popup, the user can select the participant for this room:
After clicking on the Quick Create New Contact, the popup for a new contact is opened and the user can create a contact without the need to do it in xRE and then sync, or in another tab (for the standalone version).
For xRE-related cases, this contact will be automatically synced with the CRM system.
The link to the room can be copied and shared manually, or sent via email. the participants are selected among the existing contacts.
Actions available in a Collaboration room
In a Collaboration room, the broker can do the following:
Select and edit selected Preferences (inside MarketSpace, it will not be synced to xRE);
Search for listings and sort them;
Add and remove listings from the room;
Review listings and their availabilities;
Add comments to listings, make them primary & disqualify them, and rate them;
Change view;
Invite and remove participants and make them co-owners of the room (the primary participant cannot be removed from the room, but this status can be reassigned to another participant).
Share documents;
Give access to the room to anonymous users and make it private back;
Close room;
Chat with participants;
In case, Anonymous access was granted, the broker can share the link to this room with non-registered users as well. To do it, the user should go to the Non-Registered Participants tab, open the action menu and Copy Public Link.
In the opened popup, there are 2 options for how to share the link:
Deal room
Purpose
The deal room is a logical continuation of the Collaboration room when the object of selling is 100% determined and the broker and the client discuss the precise nuances for the cooperation and agreement. This room has the following goals:
finalize discussing the deal;
make a decision whether the deal is closed as won or lost.
Collaboration and Deal room do not have any connection and should be created independently. There is no duty to create both rooms - if the broker wants, they can discuss everything within only 1 type of room, however, some limitations of these rooms can occur.
How to create a Deal room
Open the Deal room tab and create it from scratch;
Select the required listings and create a room with them;
Open Salesforce and click “Open” room in the corresponding Deal (if any). It works for Landlord and Seller representations.
The principles of creating the deal room are similar to the collaboration room, however, deal rooms are more secure and the broker can add an NDA to it, so every new participant will need to sign it before joining.
Actions available in a Collaboration room
In a Collaboration room, the broker can do the following:
Review selected listings and availabilities of it;
Invite participants;
Add NDA (if it was not added);
Add document;
Add availability (within the selected listing);
Close room;
Chat;
Share documents;
For Deal rooms, there is no option to allow Anonymous access.
Inquiries
This tab is visible in a standalone version of MarketSpace. It collects all requests that were sent by the listing portal’s visitors.
After clicking on this button in the opened listing, the visitor (who is not a part of the organization) will see the form:
After filling it:
for xRE-related version: the request will be saved in the Inquiries tab in xRE. In this case, Inquiries are not displayed in MarketSpace, and only after convertation, the corresponding entities will be synced in MarketSpace;
for standalone version: the request will be saved in the Inquiries tab in MarketSpace.
To convert an inquiry into another kind of entities in MarketSpace, the user should open action menu, select Edit, and change the status to Open. Then the Convert button will be available.
The inquiry can be converted into:
Contact;
Preference;
Collaboration Room.
Documents
In MarketSpace, the broker can upload and save files by using it as storage. If uploaded once, the files can be reused multiple times. Bulk uploading is available: up to 100 files at a time, up to 50 MB for a file.
Images
The images are stored separately from other documents. If uploaded once, the images can be reused multiple times. Bulk uploading is available: up to 100 files at a time, up to 50 MB for a file.
Static Lists
Static Lists are the fixed-in-time files that save the data about listings in that moment of time and will not be updated if the listing will be updated. There are 2 options to create such a list:
open the Static List tab and click “+“;
select the required listings and add them to the list.
Color Themes
Color Themes are the custom themes that can identify the listing portal with the client’s brand.
The information about this functionality is available via the link.
Dashboards
In this tab, the user can see the overview of the most important metrics:
the number of Inquiries, Collaboration rooms, Deal rooms, and Invitees within a particular period;
diagrams of new inquiries, Top Listings by Number of Inquiries, New Collaboration Rooms, New Deal Rooms, New Participants in Collaboration Rooms, New Participants in Deal Rooms, Top 7 Listings by Collaboration Rooms, Top 7 Listings by Deal Rooms.
The period can be selected among the options:
this week;
this month;
this year.
Admin Dashboards
Admin Dashboards are available for Admin users only (are not visible in the menu for usual users) and show the statistics of all the users in the organization.
The following metrics are available:
the number of Listings, Availabilities, Inquiries, Contacts, Collboration Rooms, Deal Rooms, Guests and Internal users;
diagrams of new inquiries, Top Listings by Number of Inquiries, New Listings, New Guests, New Collaboration Rooms, New Deal Rooms, New Participants in Collaboration Rooms, New Participants in Deal Rooms, Top 7 Listings by Collaboration Rooms, Top 7 Listings by Deal Rooms, Users Activity, Top 7 Guests by Activity, Top 7 Collaboration Rooms by Guests Attention.
The period can be selected among the options:
this week;
this month;
this year.
Contacts
For the xRE-related version, contacts & preferences are synced from there and all the actions (like editing, deleting, etc.) should be applied to them in xRE to be displayed in MarketSpace; for a standalone version, contacts & preferences can be created, and modified in MarketSpace.
Contacts can be organized into Marketing Lists.
Marketing Lists
A Marketing list is an organized group of contacts who were gathered by criteria.
The main purpose of Marketing lists is to create email campaigns. Mailchimp API is used to arrange email campaigns, so the logic of composing campaigns is replicated in MarketSpace - the campaign can be sent to groups of people, not to particular people directly.
Email campaigns
Email campaigns mean arranging a series of marketing efforts that are sent via email to multiple people at once to advertise their services, and cover the broker’s need to sell and lease properties online in an active way. The current listing portal allows us to place the information and be waiting for clients who can find this or that listing via Google search, but this is too dependent on the occasion.
How to start an email campaign
The 1st step is connecting a Mailchimp account. Currently, only this service is available in MarketSpace, so connecting a Mailchimp account is a must to initiate the campaign.
After clicking on the button “Mailchimp“, the user should log in to the Mailchimp account in the opened popup and confirm the allowance of access to the account by MarketSpace.
The 2nd step is organizing contacts into Marketing Lists.
Entry points to start the email campaign
There are 3 options to initiate the email campaign.
via Email campaign tab: in this case, the campaign will be initiated from scratch, without any pre-filled entities.
via Listings tab: in this case, the selected listings will be auto-substituted to the campaign.
via Marketing Lists: in this case, the selected marketing lists will be auto-substituted to the campaign.
Email campaign wizard
Email campaign wizard is a flow organized into 5 steps that allow creating and launching an email campaign. It has a step counter that allows moving between steps easier and identifies whether the step is passed (with green checkmarks).
Step 1. Setup
In this step, the user can fill the main information about the campaign like its name, subject, preview text, and the name and email of the sender.
From name and From email are auto-substituted from the connected Mailchimp account. All verified domains are also available. The local part of the email is customized, so the user can send the campaign on behalf of their colleague, etc.
The step is not required to move forward, so this data can be filled in later.
Step 2. Template
In this step, the user can select the template from Composer Online. Only Email templates built on Listing and Availability collections are displayed. Only 1 template can be used per campaign. This step is required, so the future steps keep locked until the user selects the template.
The user can click on Manage in Composer Online, and the main page of Composer Online will be opened in the new tab. By clicking on Manage in Composer Online in front of a particular template will open this particular template in Composer Online. In case, the user has a role Editor, they will see “View in Composer Online“ option, and the template will be opened but cannot be modified (since this template was published for the organization but the Editor does not have rights to edit it.
Since the template built on the Listing collection was selected, the 3rd step name was updated to “Listings“. For the case with Availability collection, it would have the “Availabilities“ name.
Step 3. Collection
This step looks like the Listings tab in MarketSpace. Here the user should select the listings to use in an email campaign. The number of availabilities cannot be adjusted. If the selected template contains the fields bounded to Availabilities, the data about all availabilities within the selected listings will be grabbed by the report. If the selected template does not contain anything related to the collection “Availability“, their number does not matter.
If the template type is “Availability“ (it was built on such a collection), the number of availabilities can be adjusted and only selected availabilities will be used in the report.
For the case when the Availability-type template is selected and no listings with availabilities are selected, the user can see the notification about it which means that no report cannot be generated (no points to generate it). In this case, the step is not recognized as “passed“ despite the fact the item(-s) is selected.
If the user changes the type of the template when at least 1 item on the Collection step is selected, the corresponding notification will be displayed:
It indicates that the change in the type may influence the resulting report.
For Listing → Availability change it does not make much sense since the Listing-type template grabs all the related availabilities anyway, and now this number can be adjusted.
For Availability → Listing change is important since the custom selection of availabilities will be “reset“ and all the related availabilities can be grabbed to the report (if the fields of Availability collection were used for the template).
If the user has a selection of items (listings or availabilities) and changes the type of the template, but then changes their mind and returns to the previous type of the template, the selection will be saved.
Trigger the report generation
Once the user selects a template and items in the collection (listings or availabilities) and moves to the next step, the report generation is triggered. During this process, the user cannot make any edits related to templates and listings/availabilities as well as save a campaign.
Every new report (triggered by changing either template or collection items) replaces the previous one in the email campaign wizard, but all of them are stored in Composer Online. There is no option to call the previously generated report if a new one was generated after - only generate the required report by reproducing the same conditions (template + listings or availabilities). Once the user saved the campaign as a draft or sends it, the lastly generated report is assigned to the current campaign, and all other reports that were generated within it are removed from Composer Online.
Step 4. Recipients
In this step, the future recipients can be selected. This page imitates the Marketing Lists tab with the list of available MLs.
By default, the user can see the notification to ensure that the number of contacts in the selected Marketing Lists fits the available recipients in the user’s Mailchimp pricing plan. Mailchimp API does not share this information with our API, and we cannot display it in the email campaign wizard.
The total number of recipients is displayed above the list of them.
Step 5. Summary
In the 5th step, the user can ensure that the selected data for the campaign is valid. On the left sidebar, there is the info collected from the 1st-4th steps, and in the Preview area, the generated report is displayed. By clicking on the “edit“ icons, the user will be redirected to the corresponding step.
Until all the required fields are fields, the campaign cannot be sent. Once all 4 steps are passed, the user is able to send the campaign as a usual campaign or as a testing campaign. The testing campaign can be sent only before the campaign is launched.
After clicking on the Send Test button, the popup is displayed:
The user can add any email to the list of recipients: personal, corporate, colleague’s emails, etc. If the contact with such an email exists, the application will suggest selecting this contact; if not - the email will be added to the list without the name determination.
The limit of available recipients for the testing campaign is calculated based on the Mailchimp logic.
The generated report can be edited. The user can click on the “edit“ button and the report will be opened in Composer Online in a separate tab. Once the edits are done and saved, the user can click on the “update” button, so the changes can be grabbed to the email campaign wizard.
Save as draft
The campaign is not automatically saved in MarketSpace, and the user can do it manually by clicking on the Save as Draft button. After this, the campaign will be closed and opened again from the step where this button was pressed. Saving as draft triggers removes the previously generated reports within a campaign and saves the last one. Such a campaign has a status “Draft“. The drafts are saved on the MarketSpace side and are not shared with Mailchimp (cannot be found in the Mailchimp account outside MarketSpace).
Send the campaign
Once the user presses Send, the campaign is sent to Mailchimp and gains the status “Sent“. It can be found in the Mailchimp account now:
In MarketSpace, the campaign looks the same as the 5th step, but no step counter and control buttons are available:
The user can open the Statistics of the campaign by clicking on the action menu → Open Statistics. They will be redirected to Mailchimp:
Error handling in the email campaign wizard
Removed artifact
If the generated artifact was removed in the background (by the user or the Admin who has rights for this), it is not a big issue since it can be regenerated.
For drafts: after opening the draft, the user will see the notification:
If the user selects “Regenerate now“, the report’s generation starts immediately. If the user presses “Regenerate later“, they can review the campaign and regenerate the report later by clicking on the button on the 5th step, or by selecting new conditions for the report (template and/or listings/availabilities).
For usual flow: the same flow but the lack of the report will be recognized once the user presses Send.
Removed template
This case does not block sending of the campaign since the report was already generated and can be used. The 2nd step keeps marked as “passed“, however, the notification about the template deletion is displayed there:
If the user selects a new template, it will trigger new report generation without the opportunity to return to the previous one in the email campaign wizard.
Deactivated listings/availabilities or marketing lists
If the user removes the listing/availability in SalesForce or deactivates the Marketing list in MarketSpace and sends the campaign, the popup will be displayed:
The user has 3 options:
- cancel sending and manually handle the issue;
- send the campaign without inactive items. In this case, the campaign will be sent but all inactive items will bi filtered;
- send anyway. In this case, the campaign will be sent with inactive items too.Updating of the campaign by Admin (or another user with the relevant right)
If any user who has access to the owner’s campaign, edits it, and the owner of the campaign opens this campaign, they will see the notification about some edits made:
Campaign deletion
Drafts. Since drafts are saved on MarketSpace’s side, they can be easily deleted by the user with the relevant rights and no 3rd party applications are involved.
Sent campaigns.
- if the user, who deleted the campaign, was logged in to the Mailchimp account from where this campaign was sent, the campaign will be deleted in both Mailchimp and MarketSpace;
- if the user, who deleted the campaign, was not logged in to the Mailchimp account from there this campaign was sent, the campaign will be deleted in MarketSpace only, and will keep available in Mailchimp. It can be removed only from Mailchimp’s side now;
- if the user manually removed the campaign from Mailchimp, it will keep available in MarketSpace (no backward compatibility is set between the applications). It can be removed from MarketSpace’s side manually.
Configuration Tool
Overview
Users with the role “Config Editor" can have access to the customization of some templates. These templates are different and configurable for both (MarketSpace and MSGuest) configs:
Listing details screen
Availability details screen
Contact details screen
Please refer to “Config Templates” in the left menu (R7) or the "Gear” icon in the header (R7.1)
Filters
You can use filters in the filter panel to shorter the list of available templates for the organization
You can filter by configuration, entity, and template type.
How to use the configuration tool
copy an existing template by clicking on the "Copy” button in the action menu
Change the default name in the “Name" textbox to be able to find your new template and click save
Find your template in the search results and click on the “Open configuration tool" in the action menu
Now you can add, remove or change existing fields
Mapping tool
Users with the role “Config Editor" and organizations with SalesForce can have access to the mappings customization. You will be able to change default field mapping or add a new field for data sync from SalesForce to MarketSpace.
Please refer to “Mappings” in the left menu (R7) or the "Gear” icon in the header (R7.1)
To change any mapping please click the “Edit" button in the action menu. If you made any changes and you want to reset to default state - click “Reset to default" button.
On the edit mapping screen, you can see CRM fields on the left and MarketSpace fields on the right
After you made any changes click the “Save” button
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