As an agent, you know firsthand the grind of vetting new leads, keeping them interested and juggling endless tasks to seal the deal. It’s not easy to juggle all of these things on your own. In fact, if you’ve got multiple deals on your plate or run a larger agency, it may be impossible to do all of these things by hand. This is where real estate marketing automation comes in.
Beyond saving you hours of manual labor, automation can help you keep up with the big dogs—and avoid leaving thousands of dollars on the table.
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What is real estate marketing automation?
Real estate marketing automation is the use of software and tools to automate repetitive tasks to support your overall marketing strategies. These tasks may include things like updating your property listing, scheduling tours, creating email campaigns, managing your social media activity and more.
Why real estate marketing automation matters
With real estate marketing automation, agents can work smarter, not harder, and achieve better results in less time. There are various benefits to look forward to, but here are the top ones to keep in mind.
Work more efficiently and productively
Marketing automation has proven to be an essential tool for businesses aiming to improve efficiency and productivity across teams. More than 90% of workers recently surveyed by Salesforce said automation solutions increased their productivity, and nearly 90% also said they trusted automation solutions to get more done without errors and help them make decisions faster.
We see similar trends in the real estate world. Marketing automation tools enable you to work and manage your leads more efficiently and improve client interactions with automated follow-ups and personalized communications. In turn, this gives you more time to dedicate to high-value activities, such as nurturing client relationships and strategizing for business growth.
Get your sales team battle-ready
Real estate marketing automation aims to optimize sales team performance to ultimately convert more leads into clients. In fact, real estate agents using marketing automation in iHomefinder Max close two more deals per year on average compared to agents who aren’t using it.
The secret: the best real estate automation platforms equip agents with automated, data-driven insights and communication strategies tailored to leads' interests and behaviors.
By leveraging these insights, agents can make more informed decisions about which leads to prioritize and how to tailor their outreach efforts for maximum impact. This not only improves the efficiency of the sales process but also enhances the overall client experience, leading to higher conversion rates and greater client satisfaction.
Open up more business opportunities
By automating follow-up and lead nurturing, you can make sure that no potential opportunity slips through the cracks. You can send automated texts and emails that recommend listings and market data based on a person’s past property searches. These campaigns serve to educate your entire database about the market. Additionally, by maintaining consistent communication with past clients, you can increase the likelihood of them coming back to you or referring you to a friend.
8 ideas for real estate marketing automation
Here are some common applications of marketing automation that may come in handy as you or your agents aim to work faster, engage clients and grow your business.
01. Automate your email communications
Set up drip email campaigns to nurture leads over time, delivering relevant content such as property listings, market updates and home buying tips. Reach out to leads early and often without expending your own energy typing up emails. These emails may include:
Educational newsletters
Local market reports
Neighborhood spotlights
Property recommendations
Requests for more information
Event marketing emails (like open house invitations and follow-ups)
Seller onboarding
Buyer onboarding
Referral and review requests
Special offers
02. Schedule social media posts
Use automation tools to schedule posts across multiple social media platforms; some tools will include ready-to-use post templates and lead capture capabilities (e.g., if someone messages you about a property, you could send them an automated thank you note and link them to a form). Keep up a consistent online presence while freeing up your time to interact with high-priority leads.
03. Sync lead information
Integrate marketing automation with your CRM to automatically update lead information, track client interactions and segment your audience for targeted campaigns. This ensures that whether a lead discovers you via social media, an ad, email, search engines or other platform—their information is properly captured.
As you continue engaging with leads, you can retain a unified view of their activity. If, for instance, their status changes from “interested” to “under contract” at any point, you can rest assured that your CRM, email campaigns and other connected tools are all updated.
04. Score and segment your leads
Implement automated lead scoring to prioritize follow-ups with high-potential clients, making sure your efforts are focused on the most promising opportunities. Simplify and enrich your conversations with all of your other leads as well—you can route leads to the right agent, or automate personalized messages based on their behavior and preferences.
For example, you could set up your follow-up sequences so that first-time homebuyers receive information on the home-buying process and financial advice, while seasoned buyers are sent more detailed property reports and investment opportunities. You may also find yourself having to check in with first-time buyers more frequently than experienced ones in order to ease their anxiety. All of this can be managed by your automation tool.
05. Syndicate your multi-channel property listings
Automatically post property listings to multiple online platforms (like Zillow, Realtor.com and Trulia) without having to manually input your listing information on each site. The same tools can help you update all platforms at once whenever a listing is modified.
Moreover, this type of syndication can help you comply with MLS rules and regulations. Automatically update statuses, remove expired listings and adjust details according to the latest MLS data, reducing the risk of fines or penalties for non-compliance.
06. Send property or appointment alerts
Set up automated alerts to notify leads when new properties matching their criteria are listed, keeping them engaged and informed. Similarly, notify clients when there’s a price reduction, status update or other change to a listing.
If clients are ready to view a property, send them automated text or email reminders for upcoming showings and open houses. If a client needs to reschedule, automation can make it easy by offering available times and dates. The system can instantly update the calendar and notify all parties of the new appointment details.
07. Automate back-office tasks
Automate routine administrative tasks such as appointment scheduling, document sharing and internal reminders to streamline workflows and improve efficiency.
Not to mention, automation can be useful for tracking your performance across multiple marketing channels or customer segments. Instead of manually crunching numbers, you can consolidate and analyze your data in one place. Easily track the success of your email campaigns, social media activity, real estate website and overall sales activity.
08. Collect feedback from your customers
Use automated surveys to gather feedback from clients after transactions, going direct to the source for ideas on how to improve your services and customer satisfaction. You can send personalized feedback forms, e.g., send different questions to buyers versus sellers that you work with so you get relevant feedback, or send feedback requests on your client’s platform-of-choice (be it email, text message or a mobile app).
In the event that you receive negative feedback, automation can trigger an alert to you or your team, allowing for immediate follow-up so you have a better chance at salvaging the client relationship.
Tips for implementing real estate marketing automation
While it can come in many shapes and forms, automation is undeniably useful for every real estate operation. However, to successfully implement marketing automation, you’ll want to consider the following tips.
Narrow down your specific needs
Identify the specific areas of your business that can benefit from automation. Whether you’re focused on lead generation, client communication, data analysis or another type of marketing, pinpointing your needs will help you choose the right tools to invest in.
Integrate your automation platform with your existing systems
Check that your chosen automation tools integrate smoothly with your current CRM, website and other marketing platforms.
For example, the marketing automation in iHomefinder Max can be integrated with the property search features of your website. Your leads’ search activity can, in turn, be used to personalize any automated text and emails with relevant listings and market activity reports.
This lead activity can also inform lead ratings in your CRM, helping you to understand which leads are most active and likely to convert into clients. Note: iHomefinder integrates with Wix, so if you're creating a website for your real estate business on Wix, you can enrich your site with iHomefinder’s property search experience and features.
Don’t forget about compliance, optimization and personalization
For every automated process, heed the following best practices:
Comply: Ensure that your automation practices comply with relevant regulations such as GDPR and CAN-SPAM.
Optimize: Regularly review and optimize your automation workflows to improve performance.
Personalize: Leverage data to personalize your communication and deliver a tailored experience to each client.
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