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Jenn Van Burkleo serves as the Senior Director for Events & Social Media at eXp Realty. After a large group of their agents attended Inman Connect New York, we spoke with Burkleo to learn more about why the event was important, how their group came together, and the overall impact of the experience.
Why is attending Inman events a priority for you and for your company?
Having a presence at Inman events is an important opportunity for eXp Realty. Leadership, staff and agents get a chance to collaborate, network and connect with other top producers, leaders and executives in the real estate industry.
As my second Inman event, this was a valuable opportunity for me to see our company leaders build relationships and have strategic conversations that could help shape our company decisions. Watching this collaboration come to life was truly an exciting opportunity and helped inform me in my role as Senior Director for Events & Social Media.
Glenn Sanford, founder of eXp Realty
Why do you think it’s valuable to attend Inman events as a group?
When we started planning for ICNY 2022, only two staff members and two executives planned to attend. However, just days leading up to the event, 26 executives and staff members joined, along with eight eXp agents who secured speaking spots. It is valuable to attend as a group because our presence was widely noticed, our energy was contagious and we also had a ton of fun.
What kind of feedback did you get from members of your group?
The feedback we received from our agents and staff was extremely positive. The CEO of eXp Realty, Jason Gesing, is already planning for next year because of the tremendous success this event brought us. We were able to connect in person with local NYC agents and those who traveled in and by the end of the conference, we attracted a handful of agents to join eXp Realty.
How does attending as a group impact the networking aspect of the event?
Attending as a group allowed us to capitalize on branching out throughout the event, having a presence in multiple sessions at one time. One person could watch our agent-led Learning Labs while another met with prospects in our hospitality suite.
The first highlight of attending as a group was watching our founder, Glenn Sanford, have a robust discussion with Brad Inman about technology and the future of real estate on the main stage. And the second was seeing one of our top-producing agents, Veronica Figueroa, participate in a panel with some of the industry’s most distinguished women in leadership.