How to use WhatsApp Business for real estate businesses

WhatsApp Business API is widely used by big brands worldwide. Businesses have been learning to utilize all the effective tools for customer communication, marketing through instant messaging, and selling efficiently with social commerce strategies. 

Learn all you need to know about the WhatsApp Business API.

On the WhatsApp Business API, you get to create your own business profile, set up automated replies and chatbots, integrate with existing CRM or e-commerce platforms, and build a safe space for customers to make seamless purchases without switching apps.

Now, the real question is, how do you use it for your business? 

Of course, enterprises from various industries will require a more tailored solution to maximize the outcome of adopting WhatsApp Business. In this article, you’ll find examples and methods on WhatsApp for real estate businesses where you can learn to use WhatsApp Business API to reach your business’s full potential.

Social commerce sales are expected to increase at around 30.8% annually from 2021 to 2025 and rise further for years after.

Why use WhatsApp for real estate

Similar to all other businesses, real estate companies need to communicate with customers productively. On the WhatsApp Business API, you can do more than just chat with your prospects and clients. Below are some benefits for WhatsApp Business for real estate:

Display agent names using an official WhatsApp Business account

Buying a property is a major decision, and when doing so, customers prefer to know who they’re talking to. While real estate agents or short-term rental managers, can still contact potential buyers on their personal WhatsApp accounts, there may be a lack of brand consistency or professionalism as the business scales with a larger team. For example, your agent may accidentally provide the wrong information without the guidance of a more experienced teammate. You won’t be able to supervise these conversations and might lose prospects just because of that.

Furthermore, your brand will also get less exposure as they might not know which company the agents belong to. You might even suffer the risk of having these agents bring your customers to your competitors as they leave.

Moreover, when a different agent needs to take over specific contacts and sends a WhatsApp message for real estate updates to them, users who are not able to identify the phone numbers or the business will mark the unknown contact as spam or block them, resulting in lost WhatsApp Business accounts that are banned forever.

Nevertheless, with WhatsApp for real estate, all your agents can use the same WhatsApp Business account to talk to their assigned customers. Even though they’re using a shared phone number, each of their names can still be displayed to the customers. In this case, your contacts can feel the warmth of human connections and identify the agents if they’re satisfied with services from your real estate business.

WhatsApp allows rich media messages

As potential customers approach your real estate company to inquire about a certain property, there is no way that you only use words to provide relevant information. This is why WhatsApp for real estate is a good solution as you get to send PDF files for brochures and attach relevant images and videos to showcase the projects.

WhatsApp solutions allow real estate agents to build quick, in-depth connections

WhatsApp has a high open rate of up to 98% as compared to emails with only 17%. Incorporating WhatsApp Business for real estate is bound to generate better results as the popular messaging app is great for promoting customer engagement. Those who are interested can easily reply to your WhatsApp message where real estate agents can take over the chat immediately to provide instant, accurate support on the phone.

Broad customer outreach with WhatsApp marketing for real estate

eDM marketing has a long-standing history, but WhatsApp marketing for real estate will bring forth more impressive results. Other than having 2.78 billion active users on the app, WhatsApp includes many useful features such as broadcast messages and interactive chat buttons that will help your real estate business reach out to more new users. It is also easily integrated with Facebook and Instagram, creating a great ecosystem for lead collection.

Reliable business profile for messaging

On WhatsApp Business, your real estate company profile can also be featured on the account. You can publish your business address, operating hours, catalogs for recent projects, and more to push for visibility. As your target audience drops you a WhatsApp message, they can also learn more about your business and maybe even visit you in person.

Ready to get aboard? Here’s how you can use WhatsApp Business for real estate:

WhatsApp marketing for real estate

WhatsApp marketing is about reaching the right audience effectively and collecting MQLs for the sales team to close deals. 

WhatsApp click to WhatsApp ads and QR code to collect leads

Click to WhatsApp ads and QR codes have emerged as invaluable tools for real estate businesses seeking to capture leads and engage with potential clients more effectively. 

With click to WhatsApp ads, real estate agents can strategically place enticing ads on Facebook and Instagram, allowing interested prospects to initiate direct conversations with just a single click. 

For instance, a real estate agency can run targeted ads about a stunning property listing, where interested buyers who click on the ad will be redirected to a WhatsApp chat with an agent. This immediate and personalized interaction not only expedites the lead-generation process but also establishes a sense of trust and convenience for potential clients. 

Plus, since click to WhatsApp ads have free-entry point conversations, you will be able to chat with these high-quality leads for 72 hours free of charge, unlike normal situations where people drop your business a message or when you organize broadcast message campaigns.

Check out the usual WhatsApp conversation pricing for 2023.

Other than click to WhatsApp ads, there are WhatsApp QR codes that you can include in your real estate marketing materials. Having these QR codes on your brochures, flyers, property signages, or even digital promotions can significantly enhance your lead-capture efforts. When prospective buyers scan the QR code using their smartphones, they are instantly brought to a WhatsApp chat with your WhatsApp Business account. 

For instance, a potential buyer walking past your showroom can scan the QR code on the poster to seek more information, schedule a viewing, or even negotiate terms. If you have an automation set up for the event, a chatbot can first generate questions to understand the user’s intent, and the chat can then be automatically routed to the most suitable agent based on location, preferred languages, the purchasing stage, and more.

WhatsApp Broadcast to engage potential home buyers

When a new project gets launched, how do you deliver the latest updates to your potential customers? WhatsApp broadcast campaigns, in this case, are definitely one of the most helpful features to be included in WhatsApp marketing for real estate. 

Once you collected contacts from events or showroom visits, you can send a WhatsApp broadcast message to these groups of prospects to follow up after a week or two. You can gather feedback about their experience and use chat buttons to encourage quick responses on whether they would like to get more updates about future projects. 

Other than obtaining WhatsApp opt-ins, these WhatsApp broadcast messages are also great for you to segment the users into different groups for more accurate retargeting campaigns. In other words, you can draft a message specially for different groups of audiences and reheat leads effectively after a specific period of time.

Explore how you can schedule WhatsApp messages in advance.

WhatsApp sales for real estate

Most of the time, real estate businesses have a large sales team to cope with customer inquiries, lead site visits, coordinate with lawyers and insurance agents, and more. The tedious and time-consuming processes make effective communication more difficult; hence, the management of WhatsApp messages for real estate needs to be planned strategically.

Auto-assign conversations to agents according to location and language

No matter if it’s for their own stay or investment, customers expect quick and high-quality services from sales agents as they intend to spend a large sum of money on a property. To ensure that these potential clients get attended to as soon as possible, the workflow for your real estate sales team must be flawless. Using WhatsApp for real estate, you can auto-assign conversations from prospects to the most suitable sales agent.

Imagine David, 35 years old, who’s settling down in the city with his family, is planning to buy a house. He drops a WhatsApp message for your real estate business about Residential Project A after visiting your showroom last week. The chatbot your team has set up previously immediately replies and asks for his preferred language. He selects Spanish, his native language. Then, a message pops up for David to choose the project he’s interested in, followed by some FAQs such as: 

• Target completion date of the project

• Types of layout

• The price of each selection

• Request for human assistance

As your real estate agent takes over the conversation, he will already have the basic details needed to support David further. This will save up a lot of time from answering FAQs or going back and forth trying to understand the customers’ queries.

Use the WhatsApp in-chat payment link to collect booking fees

Real estate clients often take a longer time to consider before making a purchase. Once they decided to buy a property, they will have to pay a fee to secure the booking. Instead of scheduling in-person meetings again and again, you can send an in-chat payment link to collect the fee directly on WhatsApp. If the bank loan doesn’t get approved after that, you can simply initiate a refund, all without switching apps.

Learn more about the WhatsApp-Stripe integration for instant in-chat payments.

Monitor the performance of your real estate agents

As mentioned in the sections above, a lack of accuracy or quality may occur if the real estate agents use their personal WhatsApp accounts to communicate with the customers. With WhatsApp solutions for real estate, supervisors or team leads can monitor all WhatsApp conversations to maintain the standard of your services. You can even create incentives for the high performers and motivate the rest of the team with healthy workplace competition.

Today, my entire sales force, all my agents, are using the same platform where I am able to monitor the results in general.

Keith

CRO of iBilik

See the success story of iBilik, the largest platform for co-living in Malaysia. Explore how their sales agents manage customer communication with 800,000 unique website visitors monthly.

Seamless internal communication between agents

WhatsApp for real estate also allows real estate agents to co-own WhatsApp conversations and collaborate on closing deals faster. When necessary, you can even loop in homeowners insurance agents to the same chat room for efficient coordination. You will no longer need to create a separate group chat for each process and confuse the clients, especially if they’re first-time buyers.

WhatsApp customer service for real estate

Here’s how you can use WhatsApp messages for real estate to offer your clients the best customer service:

Automatic reminders for house viewing appointments

Automatic WhatsApp reminders or confirmations can be sent to those who have scheduled for house viewing nearing the date of the appointment. Other than leaving a good brand impression, such simple WhatsApp messages can avoid no-shows and clear up the agents’ schedule for customers who are really interested if some of them have last-minute arrangements and cannot make it on the date and time arranged previously.

An example of the WhatsApp message for real estate house-viewing appointment reminder will look like this:

Hi {first name of your customer}! I’m {agent name}, your real estate agent from {company name}. This is a gentle reminder for your house viewing appointment on Aug 3rd (Thurs), at 3 pm. Please reply YES to confirm your appointment or NO if you cannot attend or would like to reschedule. 

You can also use WhatsApp chat buttons so they can reply with just a click instead of typing out the words.

Schedule follow-ups with WhatsApp Business automation

Prospects often go quiet after the meeting, and automating the follow-ups are also important to maintain the connection. If they are no longer interested, you can also send out WhatsApp surveys to understand the reason and request ratings for your service. These are all critical to cultivate brand loyalty as you never know when they will return to you for more advice or recommendations for other projects.

WhatsApp CRM integration for customer segmentation

If you’re using existing CRM platforms such as Salesforce or HubSpot, you can also integrate it with your WhatsApp Business account for proper customer segmentation. From there on, you will be able to see the customer details such as personal information, lead source, lead stage, labels, and more right next to the chatbox. This means that your customer support team can provide prompt and accurate assistance to potential or existing customers even if they decide to message your business months after the previous interaction.