Many estate agencies have started to embrace the potential of SMS for having more engaging customer interactions – but few have realised just how many ways it can help. So what are the different applications? Well before we answer that question, let’s ask a very important question.
Why does SMS work so well in the real estate sector?![]()
SMS enjoys an open rate of 95 percent, meaning that the chances of prompting an action to take place (like booking a house viewing) are much higher than if you were to solely rely on an over-used channel like email.
There are also significant cost savings that estate agencies will make by using SMS over more traditional channels like agents making manual calls to notify potential buyers about new properties. For example, if an estate agent has a new property to inform their prospective customers about, the cost to send a personalised text to an audience of 100 would be around £3.80, and would take about five minutes. Compare this to making individual calls to 100 customers which would be at least a day’s work, and is more intrusive.
The conversion rate for SMS is much better too! If you measure conversion as someone taking the desired action (i.e. booking a viewing, updating their information, providing feedback), email comes in at 3.26% (source) and SMS at up to 32% (source).
What are the applications of SMS in the Real Estate sector?
New/updated property alerts
Prospective buyers are willing to take extra steps to stay ahead of the competition in a competitive buyers’ market. As such, it’s now commonplace for them to register their details with estate agencies in the hope of being alerted to properties before they reach the open market on online platforms like Rightmove and Zoopla.
With SMS customers can be kept in the loop about new listings, and any other information they’d like to know about, keeping them well informed and ahead of the competition. The message can even include a link to a web location containing more details on the property, or a phone number which, when selected will initiate a call with an estate agent.
On demand property information
Have you ever walked past a house that’s for sale on a great street and thought “I wonder how much that place costs OR is that a 3 or 4 bedroom house?”. SMS can help with that.
Real Estate agencies can put a keyword and a phone number on the front of their signs placed in front of the house, and then any interested parties can simply text that keyword to the number provided and receive information with links and integrate phone numbers.
Lead Generation
Using SMS is a great way to drum up interest in property. Real estate agencies can include keywords in advertisements, which when messaged will trigger a set of questions relating to the requirements of the potential buyer/tenant (e.g. number of bedrooms required, preferred area etc).
Once this data has been received and analysed by the estate agent, recommendations can be sent, with a view to making a viewing appointment.
Data Cleansing
It’s often a time consuming and resource heavy process for real estate agencies to keep their potential customer databases up to date. SMS makes it easy to send your audience a set of questions – find out if they’re still looking for a property, and what the specifics of that property might be.
Virtual business cards
It’s often a pain for prospective customers to carry around a host of business cards that they’ve received from various estate agents. They get lost easily and are expensive for estate agencies to print.
Agents can now easily send their prospective customers an SMS with all of the details, and links they’ll need to send an email, make a call, or be added to notification lists.
What are the next steps?
Esendex work with a wide variety of estate agencies to provide more engaging SMS customer communications. To find out more, get in contact today 0345 356 5758 or email us at [email protected].
