In the digital era, the increasing aspirations of buyers and the expanding world have created a great scope for marketers. Every brand for its customer/consumer base wants to create lasting and unique customer experiences which are now completely absorbed in a world of rich digital experiences. Nowadays, digital medium is emerging as the key marketing medium while traditional offline channels are still struggling to keep pace. Digital medium is raising high for building, retaining & growing customers and increasing topline growth.
More avenues for brands have been created by digital in order to engage meaningfully with their consumer. Digital is the best and more ROI centric medium for all sectors, brands and categories. Real Estate is no exception as it is fuelled by the increase of internet penetration and portable devices into the Indian heartland. Digital strategy includes a lot of techniques such as Content Automation, Campaign Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, E-mail and SMS Marketing, Search Engine Marketing, E-commerce Marketing, Content Marketing, Influencer Marketing, etc.
By 2020, the Indian real estate sector is expected to touch US$ 180 billion. Country’s 5-6% of GDP is alone contributed by the housing sector alone. Recently, many initiatives have been taken by the government that raised hopes for the buyers and developers and has also started translating into improved sentiment, sales as well as growth. In India, real estate companies are trying to incline towards a digital led marketing strategy. These strategies are designed around online generation of leads, experiences, and bookings. Across the top 50 urban hubs, India consists of approx. 250 million online users, and this makes India’s real estate marketplace more with potential buyers of home.
Indian real estate firms are spending around Rs. 2,500 crore per annum on promotional activities and campaigns, out of which over 30% is being spent in digital alone. And in the next few years, industries are estimating this to increase by 50%.
As per trends, online search provides ease of analyzing through various options within a few clicks, so primarily 90% of the property searches are done online. On the basis of comparison, growth is observed because it helps in decision making process of the potential customer more aided and easier. Messaging and communication which is being tailored to the behavior of online buyer ensures more clicks as well as better conversions. The key to success of any Real estate marketing campaign is the authentic and quality content in the digital medium. As it makes them in taking actions for registering interest and creates interest in the mind of the potential customer.
High quality content contains information that is contributing towards effective discovery of quality content. For example, more pertinent search result is anticipated by the use of specific keywords. Also, a lot of features that are based on real experiences add great values to the search results of the potential clients. A 360 degree on-line tour of a property is probably going to get rid of any initial misgivings that the client may need regarding the project while giving him a quick product experience.
With Facebook tools like canvas ads, 3D videos etc., it’s clear that these social networking sites can be an equally effective tool for real estate marketing. And it has been observed that over 90% of the leading brands of real estate are using social media sites for lead generation, promotion, marketing activity and consumer engagement. Lead generation platforms and campaigns, lead management, Online Reputation Management (ORM) and mobile responsive sites play a major role in driving marketing activities.
For targeting customers, real estate developers are using digital marketing as a very significant technique. Usage of digital marketing is directly proportional to the needs of the developer. For instance, for a project costing between 30-40 lakhs, a small developer spends very less on digital marketing. They target their customers via SMS and database marketing. However, for a big developer the case is different. As their majority of the customers come from the digital savvy class, so they target them via digital medium. As this medium is more effective for them so depending on their target, they post their ads on most visited sites. And this whole process of approach to the customers via digital marketing has become very dynamic these days.
Moreover, the new and upcoming buzz in real estate world is Geo-targeting. Real estate companies are trying to target some specific areas for promoting their business in the form of Hyper-local marketing as it is a kind of a micro-market sport and helps them in building local brand recognition and focus on smaller number of prospects as well. Also, in the near future, it will facilitate them to measure their success results and understand the market easily. And they will continue to focus on their strategy, more the confined area is; more easily one can target the strong prospects within that region!
The Real Estate Market Gears Up to Leverage the Digital World
