SmartZip, a company known for providing analytics-based real estate investment ratings, has rebranded as a "predictive marketing" company and expanded its scope beyond real estate.
On Friday, the company relaunched its website, smartzip.com, to reflect the change. The site now showcases SmartZip’s predictive marketing platform, which identifies and markets to homeowners most likely to buy home-related services in the near future.
The change has been in the works for about a year and half, according to Avi Gupta, SmartZip’s vice president of marketing and operations.
"We were trying to find ways for people to leverage the (investment) analytics, and working with the real estate industry" made the company realize its clients could benefit from "a fully managed marketing program," Gupta said.
The platform is an extension of the company’s recently updated SmartTargeting offering, which predicts which homeowners are most likely to sell their homes in the next six to 12 months and then markets to them on behalf of real estate professionals through direct mail, email and online campaigns. SmartTargeting launched in the summer of 2010.
SmartZip is known for its investment analytics, particularly for its HomeScore and InvestorScore ratings, which help prospective homebuyers gauge a property’s investment potential. SmartZip has licensed its analytics to sites such as RealtyTrac, RealtyStore and Homes.com, and the company plans to continue to provide them and feature them on other sites, Gupta said.
As part of its rebranding, SmartZip has also expanded its customer base to include lenders and solar energy companies, in addition to real estate professionals, and plans to extend both its predictive marketing and licensing services to other industries.
"I think our knowledge base about homes, homeowners and their communities can be very effectively put to use by online businesses, online advertisers, as well as marketers," Gupta said.
