Case Study
Real Estate
A real estate startup analysed the homebuyer decision journey and tested out an automated service that connects buyers to sellers efficiently.
Visioning Workshop
Competitive Research
Customer Experience Design
Channel Engagement
Contact Centre Management
The founders of a real estate startup knew that digitalisation will change real estate sales in a big way. On one hand, we have changing demographics and increasing digital literacy. Nearly 50% of all real estate sales are already made by predominantly younger and digitally literate groups (relocations, expansions, divorces, inheritances). On the other hand, we see a growth in the self-service market. The introduction of property listing websites has already triggered growth in the self-service market segment and is causing the number of "do-it-yourself" real estate sellers to continue to rise. The most popular tool for a homebuyer is the use of property listing websites to conduct their home research and evaluation. Because property listing websites primarily serves as a lead generation tool for real estate brokerages, a homebuyer is likely having to contact multiple real estate agents. From a homebuyer’s perspective, this proves to cause the most friction in their decision journey. The startup aims to tackle this specific pain point and called Genova Digital to design a customer experience that will transform how homebuyers interact digitally on a virtual real estate sales platform.
"Currently, many real estate companies are using a myriad of property technologies catering to very specific needs, but when we look at the end-to-end homebuyer experience, it’s never been more disjointed."
The team began by studying the homebuyer path from research and consideration to purchase. Our user research confirmed that digital is critical: 95 percent of homebuyers research and evaluate homes online. Homebuyers also found the “decision journey” through the buying cycle to be disjointed and frustrating. Competitive research also shown that more than half of property listing website visitors wound up not scheduling an appointment because they couldn't find the house information they need to make a decision. The most important insight was finding where the client could most effectively invest in digital assets to address existing pain points, and select touch points to elevate the entire homebuyer experience. While many homebuyers used property listing websites to do their research, poor (or lack of) customer service was also a major reason for high bounce rates on these platforms.
The client did a soft launch to test the new customer experience with the market. Marketing budget was shifted from paid media to channel engagement and media production. To support the required build capabilities, Genova Digital helped launch a channel engagement academy for customer service employees.
"The current real estate business model is antiquated and inefficient. With the team at Genova Digital, we were able to reinvent the current model that focuses on customer needs, and provide them with a seamless process to buy, sell or rent houses."
The pilot launch proved that by using technology to support homebuyer decision journey, it was possible to speed up the entire sales process, increase home value, and have a consistently remarkable experience. The success of the pilot also led to successful second funding round, that allowed expansion of program.
"Genova Digital is a true partner to our company. Aside from the tremendous success of our pilot launch, the pre-launch work on customer experience was great for the team to get clarity on who we serve and how we should allocate our resources. Members of our team have credited the work as leading to some of the most compelling and clear internal debate they have ever had."
Speak to our team.
Let’s talk about your business.
All Case Studies