Listings via Text Message and Mobile Phone
Posted in Technology, Tools and Tidbits By Jay Holcomb, Wednesday, September 17, 2008.Hello All,
I joined Inman recently in an effort to immerse myself in conversation with realtors about technology they use or want to sell houses, with an emphasis on mobile phones.
I work for a company (Knovolo) that uses mobile phones as a channel for marketing campaigns. We've been focusing a lot on the Real Estate industry recently, and we've had a pretty strong response from realtors and builders.
Let me explain our Text Link service. Our clients add to their For Sale signs a message that reads:
"For more information, text DEMO to 732589 (REALTY)"
DEMO is replaced by a keyword unique to that particular listing.
The homebuyer that sends this text message will receive a response that contains the basic information about the listing and a link. This link leads to a mobile-optimized web page, complete with pictures, agent contact information, and full listing details.
(You can try the demo above on your mobile phone right now.)
We also recently added a new component to this service. Every time someone sends a text message to one of your listings, you get a text message with the potential buyer's phone number and the name of the listings they queried. That way you can follow up right away.
More and more people are texting every day. Some real estate agents I've met even use texting to communicate with certain clients. Supplement current methods with this stream of communication will help appeal to a broader demographic.
That's my spiel. What do you think?
Thanks for your time,
jh
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Submitted by Mike Sparr on October 9, 2008 - 6:09pm.
Welcome to our community. Mike Sparr, our CEO (Goomzee.com), met you this week at ED Con in Seattle. We hope to see you around more shows.
Submitted by Jennifer Mackay on October 9, 2008 - 6:45pm.
While not an avid "texter" myself, we did have a recent visit to our office by someone showing off this technology.
While I can certainly see the benefits, I also believe the benefit to be based on location.
For example: I've lived in the Los Angeles area for many years which is a very hi-tech location and I can certainly see the benefit of using this technology in a location such as that.
However, since moving to northwest Florida, a low-tech community I tend to lean towards more conventional methods as many home buyers/sellers are not nearly as technically literate as Los Angeles.
If our local technology demographic increases in the coming months-years, I will be looking for this type of service to add to my bag of tricks.
Overall I think it's a good product with a future.
Best of luck.
Jennifer
Panama City Real Estate
Keller Williams Success Realty
2110 W. 23rd Street
Panama City, FL 32405
Submitted by Paul Eastwood on October 10, 2008 - 1:18pm.
Mobile Marketing is going to define an increasingly important demographic / market place.
The growing use of the WEB as a medium radically changed Real Estate. It is my belief that MOBILE marketing will have a dramatic impact too - though probably not as significant.
The challenge for many agents is how to get to grips with this new technology.
We have a 3-part article in the SPS BLOG that looks at Mobile Real Estate Marketing
We've also fully adopted mobile marketing within SPS, so that TEXT flyers, SMS messaging and mobile web sites are now all included in SPS with no extra costs to Agents.
Submitted by Glenn Ginsburg on October 16, 2008 - 3:53pm.
@Jennifer - your comment about being in a low-tech community suggests a deeper issue. We as real estate agents can have all the latest and greatest hi-tech tools, however, if the demographics of the area suggests that it is not utilized why have the tools?
As real estate agents we should be concerned about our ROI.
Glenn Ginsburg
A Delta Realty
Bonita Springs Florida