The COVID-19 pandemic has greatly impacted the way businesses are performing globally, with the harshest impact being felt due to restrictions and inhibitions on face-to-face communication. The real estate sector had been facing a major crisis, with a sharp decline in the number of buyers-as many people are not keen on investing in properties at this stage. Also, with travel restrictions and social distancing in place, property visits have drastically reduced, which has also impacted the sales. Realtors are now looking at online marketing to approach potential prospects and also to market their existing listings. We present a few proven ways in which you can increase your client base and also improve your conversions by simple real estate online marketing strategies.
In the present restrictions due to COVID-19, buyers are looking towards online property searches and checking our property specifications across the internet. In such a scenario, it would be apt for a real estate website to focus more on giving buyers the information they require, with elaborate property images, specifications, and videos helping to get the interest of prospective buyers. Having elaborate property images in your real estate website increases the chances of buyers getting to know more about the property and this could initially be a substitute for actual location visit. As a means of lead generation for your real estate website, you can invest in revamping your existing website to focus more on image galleries, or can also ask your sellers to provide a video of their property, so that you can showcase it to leads as a virtual tour.
Video Mails for effective Real Estate Digital Marketing
One major feature that you can implement in your real estate marketing plan is to have the facility of sending video mail. Unlike traditional emails, video mails are recorded videos that are custom made to communicate effectively. This facility allows you to record a custom video-that could either be a sales pitch, an introduction to a new property listing, or just a way of staying in touch with your regular leads. You can easily integrate the facility in your real estate software or can use a third-party tool to record and send video mails. You also have an option to upload the video in a video sharing portal such as YouTube, and can share the link with your leads.
One of the most widely used video mailing platforms is BombBomb®, which integrates with your existing email application and helps you easily records and mail videos. You can use this feature when you would want to record a personalized message to your leads, instead of having a plain text email do the talking. BombBomb® allows you to easily record and share your video just with a click of a button, and a video mail helps you get that “personal touch” in your communication with a lead. Thousands of realtors are using this technology to communicate with their clients, and you can also explore its advantages by subscribing to their service or have your software consultant integrate the feature in your existing website. You can also choose a real estate marketing CRM that offers this functionality.
Virtual Property Tours for clients
For those of you who are planning to include recorded videos in your listings to give leads a virtual tour of the property, here are a few tips that can help you better create such videos. You can also share the tips with your clients and help them create better property videos.
Essentials of a Virtual Tour Video
A virtual tour video should offer a prospective client a complete view of the entire property, similar to the way it would be looked at in a face-to-face meeting. To create an engaging virtual tour, do include the below aspects in your video. Do keep in mind that a virtual tour video is a substitute for an actual property view, so ensure that you do not miss any essential property elements that you would want your buyers to know or something that would add value to your property.
- Start with a brief introduction of the property– giving an insight into the highlights of that listing.
- You can follow with more detailed description of the specific property features, and can also use text to highlight individual elements.
- The most essential part of the video would be a walkthrough of the property, where you would need to go through the entire property space so that clients viewing it can get to understand your property better.
- You should also include floor plans, essential documents, photographs and also information about the neighborhood-such as nearby schools, public utilities, and transport facilities.
E-Closing: Finishing the sale process online
The final step of a real estate sales pipeline is when the buyer and seller, along with the related parties come to a sales agreement that is implemented to close the sale. Over the past years, this process has been slowly moving to a paperless and electronic platform, and with the COVID-19 pandemic, it is steadily gaining importance as it attempts to reduce the physical interaction and extensive paper documentation. Though the process cannot completely replace a physical interaction, it’s worth exploring as an option to your customers during this time. Parties can look at soft-copies of the necessary documents and can electronically sign them.
One of the features of Electronic Closing is Remote Online Notarization (RON), which allows notaries to attest a document with a virtual conference with the signers. RON is slowly gaining prominence and has come into effect in 24 states of United States by the end of April. This is expected to majorly help the real estate sector in the sales process, as both parties would not need to physically be present while notarizing an agreement. As a part of your real estate marketing efforts, you can research on these aspects as per your state laws, and can develop a strategy that would help your leads easily close the deal by using electronic closing options.
The current times have been challenging to the real estate sector, and it’s of utmost importance to all realtors to move towards a digital marketing platform for their real estate lead generation, and also use modern technology to bridge the gaps that have been recently created with COVID-19. IDXMatrix wishes our readers all the best in their online real estate endeavors.