The real estate businesses have shown a rapid growth since the beginning of the 2021. The real estate businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE are quickly implementing digital strategies to compete in the market. The year 2021 and 2022 are important for real estate businesses, the market is rapidly growing since the 2020 and now the Dubai Expo 2020 is also boosting up the real estate industry. Businesses in the real estate sectors have quickly realized that they will have to emphasize on digital mediums in order to be able to establish a good brand identity. For real estate it is not only establishing the brand identity, in fact the real estate websites are generating online leads worth millions upon millions each month. Actually in Dubai and in fact all across the UAE everyone is connected to the internet, everyone have access to the computers and almost 99% of the population owns mobile phones. Which makes digital marketing even more important and crucial. People tend to look up online before most of their purchase decisions, as it is easier and convenient.
When it comes to online, the website is the most important part of the digital marketing. In fact a business website is the foundation of entire digital marketing strategy. For real estate businesses the website can generate a huge chunk of total leads for the business. The studies have shown that a human brain takes almost 50 millisecond to build an impression of a brand in subconscious mind by only looking at the web design of the website. That brand image, impression or perception keeps on amplifying as the user dive deeper into the website and go through the available content. So the real estate business websites are not only a tool to attract traffic from the targeted audience, but the websiteis a great source of acquiring low cost high quality leads. That is why we are writing this blog to let our audience and realtors understand how they can boost their online leads by only implementing the best practices of the real estate business website in 2021 and 2022.
Add Lead Oriented Features in Above the Fold Area
Above the fold area! That might be a new term, but it is very simple, every website these days is longer than the screen it is being viewed from. The area or section of the web page that we can view without scrolling is called above the fold area. This section is very important. Usually each website have company logo and some contact information, navigation/menu and some sliding images in this area. Basically this area is very important to build the first impression of the business. That is why it has to be very appealing and it should offer content that can increase visitor’s interest. For real estate business this area shouldn’t be very dynamic. Usually realtors use a property search in this are with a static content or a video running at the background. Because whoever will land on a real estate website they must be seeking some property to rent or purchase, they might not be as that interested in company profile or management bios. They will be interested in finding the property they are looking for.
The property search is the most important features that every real estate website should offer above the fold. Along with that other lead oriented features such as contact details, email, phone number, menu and important links should be added above the fold such as side navigation pane, any quick links, login links, chat box and such links. Real estate businesses can also have social media links in the top section, but the best practice is to not add too many things in this section. The objective should be to keep the user focused on the property search and CTA (call to action). Small contact form can be added, but better to keep it hidden under a button or icon so it don’t take large space. Such features will help improving online leads. The CTA is most important, usually the real estate business websites have multiple CTAs such as ‘Request Valuation’, ‘Book Appointment/Meeting’, ‘Call Back Request’, etc. The best practice is to use at least one CTA above the fold along with other important features and design elements.
Build a Good Brand Impression with Homepage
Obviously the web design is one of the most important aspect of building a brand image, however the content and information is equally important too. Above the fold area is usually more focused on functionalities, and below the fold area is where a real estate website should provide content and focus on value proposition. It should build trust and present the key points and advantages that the business can offer to the customers and anything else that can distinguishes your real estate business from others and increase visitors trust. Mostly some big businesses use different stats such as total number of available listings for sale or rent on the website, number of agents, and such other accomplishments which will give a sense of authenticity and build trust. The business bio or profile should also be added below the fold, either it could be the very next element or it could also be added at the lower section, but it should be added.
The homepage of a real estate business website can play an important role in online lead generation, it is important that it links to the internal pages and sections. For example, a small but dedicated section for the residential properties and maybe for commercial too, and so on. Other trust signals, such as partners’ logos, case studies, news & updates, customer testimonials, ratings, team bio, etc. are also very important to improve the brand impression. It is crucial that a real estate business website build trust worthy impression. When it comes to real estate people often don’t trust easily, it is hard to convince them because most of the time the acquiring or renting a real estate is a big decision for the customers. Another most important point that real estate businesses often overlooked is the quality of the photos and listing designs. If poor quality photos are used, the visitors will not continue on the website, high-quality photos will always attract more attention.
The footer is also a very important design element. Since the earlier 2018 businesses have started adopting large sized footers, this trend have become mainstream since the late 2020 and early 2021. Currently businesses and enterprises are widely using large sized footers and in some cases full screen footers. We don’t recommend a full screen footer but make sure the footer is reasonable large, at least it should cover the half of the screen and it should include all the contact details, social media, Copyright messages and basic pages such as Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, etc. in it. Moreover quick links and popular listings could also encourage the visitors to explore the website further. These all ingredients both above the fold and below the fold up till the footer will help building a good impression of the real estate business and will increase the online leads and conversions.
Facilitate your Visitors with Property Listing Pages
After the homepage the second most important page is the property listing page and the property detail page. These pages are the turning point for your website visitors. For any real estate business website it is important that it offers a user-centric web design. The aesthetics is important but the usability and user experience is most important for a real estate business website. In Dubai and all around the UAE the general public is very familiar with digital platforms and the competition is also very high, this makes the audience very demanding and raised their standards as well. The users will definitely like the looks but if your real estate business website failed to cater to their needs they will immediately leave. Businesses are losing tons of potential customer just because their website is not properly optimized for usability and doesn’t offer trendy features. The prime objective of anyone coming to a real estate business website is to get the information not to view the artistry of the design. That is why the property listing pages are very important and they should offer all the features which can improve customer journey.
The first and foremost thing is the images, everyone like good quality images, but if you are putting very high definition images which take ages to load, the user will immediately lose interest and they will quit. It is important that you use good quality images and the web design is programed in a way that it could provide optimum loading speed as well. Moreover the title of the property, basic details such as pricing, area, type, etc. and sharing options are important. Another great feature is instant schedule booking, this could be a button at the listing, which opens up a popup-up window to let the user book or schedule for property visit. Allow the users to choose the time and date of their choice, some businesses also offer option to choose a property agent, which is good, but it all depends on your business practices. Make sure you are offering all important options that you could with an ease of a single click. This will help improving user experience and will also increase online leads for your real estate business website.
The property detail page or landing page is the page which opens up when a user clicks on any listing. The page is also called a landing page or detail page. The property detail page is very helpful in generating leads and can be used in various digital marketing campaigns too. Usually the property detail page is designed with a big section for photo gallery and videos or any multimedia. This page should provide the good quality photos of the property, along with any additional media such as floor plan, any downloadable content or location map and such details. Think from a buyers prospective and try to provide all the information they could possible think of. Some businesses also use additional features such as calculators, mortgage planners, and other tools along with very prominent CTA (call to action) button. This will help increasing the online leads. The social media and other digital platform sharing tools are also very important. If possible the real estate business website can also offer the downloadable file for each property which the users can store for their reference or later use. Such feature not only offer convenience but also help building good brand identity.
Increase Conversions by a Dedicated Property Search Page
We have witnessed that real estate businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE doesn’t focus much of the technology or platform they are using. These days the website building technologies have advanced a lot. The platform which used to build the websites are very capable and the modern technologies such as cloud computing and system integration enabled the web designers and developer to innovate new and innovative features. The search engine is a basic need of any real estate business website. However how powerful and effective the search engine is will make the difference. Again a real estate business should think from the user’s point of view. Try to add as many search features as possible. The biggest reason of customer churn for a real estate business website is the inefficient search engine. The users often failed to find the property they are searching for and leave. It is extremely important that a real estate business website offers an innovative, efficient and highly usable search engine functionality.
The competition is very high and the multinational real estate companies are investing huge in their marketing. However, due to the modern advancements in the technology competing with such big competitors is relatively easier. Only a minor extra investment in the search engine can boost the real estate business website performance. Your website visitors must be visiting other websites too, and most probably they will also visit big businesses’ website even if they are not interested in having business with them. This will raise their expectation from you. So, offering them a great search engine could really make a difference. Google Maps can easily integrated with a real estate business website, which will provide you an extra touch, moreover the search page with conversion tools or CTA would boost the conversions and leads. Real estate businesses can easily add additional search perimeters and filters in their search page without even paying any additional cost, all they need is to make a plan and the web designer will do the job. That is very easy and doesn’t require any rocket science. Hence it won’t raise cost. Such features and functionalities are very helpful in increasing online conversions and leads.
Improve Conversions by a Responsive and Mobile Friendly Web Design
A responsive of mobile friendly web design is the web design which perfectly works well in both the mobile phones and in the regular computers/laptops. These days more than 60% of the searches are made from the mobile phones. The mobile searches have already surpassed the regular searches and people tend to spend more time on the smartphone, some studies have shown that people tend to spend many hours on their smartphones on daily bases. These stats are staggering. The rise of social media and high-power smartphones also boost the usage of smartphones. These days most of the times people tend to use smartphone instead of the laptops or traditional computers as accessing the smartphone is easy, and everything is just a few taps away. This makes smartphone compatibility even more important. The responsive or mobile friendly websites are capable of detecting the device from where these sites are being accessed and then they can automatically render the content and design as per the screen size. That functionality is called responsive and such websites are called mobile friendly websites.
With a real estate business website the mobile friendliness or mobile compatibility have risen to one step further. The real estate businesses should make a plan for their responsive web designs. It is not the question of rearranging their design elements here and there and reducing the size of some sections and fonts and all that, it is how your customers will access each and every feature? This is the most important part of building a responsive real estate website. Businesses and corporate sites always try to maintain the same user experience on both mobile devices and traditional computers/laptops. However, for a real estate business website it is not as that important, the important thing is to maintain a reasonable and most convenience user experience for the users on both types of devices. The mobile compatibility and thumb-first or mobile-first designs are also gaining popularity but for the real estate business websites, the web design should be planned in a way that when a user is using it from a mobile device they should be able to tap on various functionalities and features without any problem. That is what makes the mobile experience more customer friendly and ensure higher conversion rates from responsive web design.
Read More: Top Mobile App Design and Development Trends 2021 – 2022
Plan Content for Users and Search Engine and Boost Website Traffic
The real estate business websites are usually not as that good at SEO or search engine optimization. The term search engine optimization refers to a process which makes a website more search engine (SEO) friendly and increase the chances of getting free visitors from the search engines such as Google. The Google is dominating the search market in the UAE with having almost 96% or the search market share. It is a great source of organic website traffic which is absolutely free. As the real estate industry is highly competitive so the online advertisements and paid digital marketing is also very expensive. The SEO can be a great chance to compete with the multinational and big local real estate businesses. The search engine optimization or SEO also provide real estate businesses a chance to dominate the local or regional market in the digital domain. It is fat easier and cheaper to get attention of the prospects in the online domain as comparing to with traditional marketing methods.
The SEO starts with the web design, a real estate business website should have a SEO friendly web design. It means that the entire design and all of the content should be visible or readable for the search engine. On the bases of this content and some other markers the search engine will rank the website. When someone will search for any relevant term/keyword the search engine will present the high ranking websites at the top of the result. Another important aspect of the SEO is adding the keywords in the content and having sufficient content on each page so that the search engine can easily determine the subject and category of the web page. Businesses can also link Google My Business to improve their local visibility. A blog or publication section is a great help for improving the SEO of a real estate business website. Google consider many aspects, but the most important ones are the readability of the website and the content on the website. Make sure your website is compatible with all search engine standards and is also offering useful content that can serve the visitors as well as the search engine. The search engine can easily provide huge free traffic for your website which will definitely increase the possibility of online conversions and leads.
Read More: How Startups can Grow Quickly with a Professional Web Design?
Conclusion
A real estate business website is not just a website in fact it is a great asset for the business. Businesses can generate a huge amount of leads and reach out to the unexplored markets using their website. For a real estate business website it is extremely important that it meets all the needs of the visitors as well as it is capable enough to influence their decision. The real estate business website is the online brand identity of the business. The real estate market is highly competitive in Dubai and all around the UAE. There are huge businesses and multination enterprises who are dominating the market. It is extremely hard for a small or medium sized real estate business to compete with those big enterprises with traditional marketing channels. The digital provide a chance to compete with them. The real estate business website should be user-centric, offering all need features and functionalities that can enhance user experience. If a real estate business will follow the above practices they can easily build a successful real estate business website. If you need a real estate business website or want to learn more on the subject feel free to reach us out through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you.
Check out this blog: Is landing Page Better or the Homepage?
