Is a Real Estate Chatbot Worth Your Attention?

Real estate giants usually spend tons of money and resources on bringing high quality leads to the relevant properties on their website. Sending cold SMS, running Facebook ad campaigns, using site banners, advertising on Google, etc. are some of the common but expensive ways to get more leads.

And even after spending thousands on advertising, the website footfall rarely sees a sustainable jump. And an increase in website footfall almost never converts into leads. Why? Because once the user lands on the website, there is no way for them to engage with someone, get their queries answered immediately. The website visitors tend to look around and leave, thereby not generating any real ROI for the realtor.

Enter real estate chatbot.

With chatbots in real estate, realtors can automate FAQs and instantly respond to queries, thereby increasing engagement and quality leads. Many realtors are implementing real estate chatbots to reap its benefits like saving time, money, and providing quality customer service.

Here’s how a chatbot can assist you in nurturing your potential lead from lukewarm to hot –

Say a buyer on your website is on the lookout for a new place to move into or the seller is looking to sell his/her home. In both cases, the buyer or the seller need immediate answers. However, for a real estate agent that is juggling new and old property listings, evaluating products, chasing their own sales and marketing goals, and managing past clients — it is quite difficult for them to take time out and assess the requirements of an online lead.

Taking time out to ascertain the overall seriousness of the lead from scratch is pretty time-consuming. But, it is a no-brainer that if you wish to be successful when it comes to real estate, you need to capture as many leads as possible to make sure that you have a specific number of clients on a monthly basis.

Given that majority of buyers and sellers are starting their journeys online, it is prudent for real estate agents to deploy custom chatbots that assist them in building their sales funnel.

The bot will handle conversations with clients that are at the top of the funnel — generally people you don’t know and who might be unsure of actually buying/selling the property. The bot can be programmed on tasks like collecting basic information in the form of asking relevant questions and generating relevant answers resulting in an e-mail capture. Additionally, the chatbot can even transfer the conversation to a human agent, if need be.

To get started, one needs to figure out what medium makes the most sense for their business — Facebook, WhatsApp, Web Chat, automated email or SMS bots.

If you happen to have a robust Facebook presence with a good following and engagement, it makes sense to deploy a Facebook bot.

If you generate a good amount of traffic on your website, then a chatbot that pops up and assists your visitors in their journey is your best bet.

Either way, once you have decided on the medium, listing out the set of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) that can be easily automated and handled by the chatbot should be the next step. Questions may be –

• How much is my property worth?

• What will be the down payment on an apartment on Miller Street?

• What is the cost of moving to this city?

• How close is the nearest hospital to this house?

There’s more to a chatbot than just replying to FAQ’s and reducing your workload. Elucidated below are 4 more things an intelligent real estate chatbot can do for your business –

Qualify Buyer and Seller Needs

Using natural language generation, your custom chatbot determines the prospect’s exact needs and relays the required information without you having to step in, or without your customers having to download an additional app.

Search MLS Listings

The bot can assess a prospect’s search requirements, scan the MLS for relevant and matching properties and then display listings that are active within the chat interface itself.

Schedule property viewings

Once the prospect is moved further down the sales funnel, the bot can schedule a home tour and in a way, facilitate the introduction of the client and the real estate agent.

A 360-degree virtual tours

Are prospects too busy or too eager to see the property in person? The real estate chatbot has your back. Your prospects can take a quick virtual tour through the bot itself without them wasting time waiting to get an inside look.

The widespread adoption and advent of bots over the last two years along with the participation of media giants such as Facebook are major indications that conversational AI is here to stay.

It is high time you consider bot-o-mating your real estate sales and customer service process.

Try WotNot for FREE on your website and take a look at how it can assist you in sorting and assessing your leads while constantly providing a seamless customer experience.