5 Best Examples of Digital Customer Experience for PropTech [Updated]

Buying a property or leasing commercial spaces can be a daunting task. There are many factors to consider, including the type of property you want, price range, and location.  

Before the pandemic, a typical process would include a meeting with a real estate agent, visiting open properties to get a feel for the area, and making an offer.

The real estate industry has been slow to adopt new technologies. However, the rise of prop-tech has helped to push the industry forward and brought better digital customer experiences.

With new tools and innovations, real estate professionals can now streamline their processes and provide improved services to their clients.

What is digital customer experience?

Digital customer experience refers to the way that customers interact with a brand or company through websites, social media channels, chatbots, and other forms of technology.  

The goal is to create an engaging experience that makes it easy for consumers to find what they want while increasing brand loyalty.

The significance of digital customer experience in PropTech

Digital customer experience is one of the most important aspects of any business, in today's reality. The prop-tech industry is no different, and it becomes even more crucial as the industry grows.

According to Future Market Insights, the U.S. prop-tech market was valued at $18.2B in 2022 and is projected to reach $86.5B by 2032.

The growing popularity of the industry means that there will be an increase in competition between prop-tech companies, which is why it is important to provide customers with a great experience.

Hyper-personalisation is another growing trend that is becoming increasingly popular in the prop-tech industry. By 2023, the global revenue of customer experience personalisation and optimisation software is projected to surpass US$9 billion. With this trend, customers can receive a specific experience that is tailored to their needs.  

For example, they may be able to view only properties that fit their budget or is prefiltered basis the consumer’s preferred parameters, like proximity to public transport, school, grocery stores etc. This can help make the customer experience more seamless and enjoyable for buyers and sellers alike.

In a study commissioned by CINNOX, Forrester conducted a survey of 1,200 consumers from various walks of life. Even though there is a shift in customer behaviour and expectations, interaction preference is still dominated by their age group and where they are on the customer journey.

The Role of real estate agents in enhancing consumer satisfaction

Real estate agents are an integral part of the prop-tech industry. When you have a team of these professionals, they are the first point of contact for your clients. They help clients purchase, sell and rent properties.  

Real estate agents have access to valuable information about their customers' needs and preferences, which can be used to develop targeted marketing campaigns that increase customer satisfaction.

In essence, they leverage digital tools such as social media channels, chatbots, and virtual reality apps to create a better customer experience by providing more personalised services at every stage of the buying process.

For instance, real estate agents

• Can use Facebook Messenger to send updates about the new listings that match a client's search criteria.

• This saves both time and money because there is no need to drive around town visiting multiple open houses just because they happen to be listed by different brokers.

• The buyer will only see listings from one agent who’d suggest the best properties based on past interactions.

• When browsing online listings together with clients during viewings (which often happens via video calls), some agents can ask questions like "What do you think about this kitchen?" so they can get feedback before showing another property later.

• Some agents even provide property tours using virtual reality applications to give clients a more realistic idea of what to expect before they even step foot inside.

Why are CX and EX important for real estate?

Real estate is a high-touch industry that has typically relied on vast business networks, interpersonal skills and handshakes to transact with brick-and-mortar products—whether clients are buying, selling, or renting a property. Like traditional industries like construction, it has generally resisted digital transformation until now.

The industry is currently undergoing tectonic shifts, which have been accelerated by the pandemic. As buyers, sellers and tenants get used to touchless transactions for social distancing, they now expect the same personalised experience online! Property agents must also work harder to provide humanised digital experiences.

All this has highlighted the importance of providing a great customer experience to build loyalty, nurture repeat business and create brand advocates in a highly competitive market. Agents and employees are not forgotten either as they need tools to stay productive and collaborate effectively online from wherever they are.

When you address your immediate CX and EX needs with a platform like CINNOX, you are also future-proofing your business. Putting all your interaction data in one place means that you are creating a treasure trove of data that can be analysed with powerful machine learning and AI tools to discover valuable insights in the future.

How to improve digital customer experience in PropTech?

Let's unpack the 5 ways real estate agents can harness CINNOX’s technology to improve the digital customer experience.

Great customer service can differentiate your real estate products and services from competitors. At the same time, time-saving tools and hacks for your employees can turbocharge their productivity and keep them from burning out.

1. A tenant enquiring about a property listing

Pieter and Marie are from the Netherlands and they will be relocating to Hong Kong for an expatriate posting. Browsing your property agency website, they shortlist a few rental apartments.  

Wanting to know more, Marie clicks on the CINNOX widget on your website, and your branded video plays while connecting them with an agent.

Behind the scenes, the smart routing feature detected their browsing language and routes them to a Dutch-speaking agent. They are delighted to speak to someone in their native language.

Your agent then suggests they jump to a video call to put a face to names, taking just one click to seamlessly switch while still on the same call.

Coincidently, your agent is currently conducting physical viewings. Using the mobile CINNOX app, she checks Pieter and Marie's browsing history and sees they are looking at the Mid-Levels area with rents of around HKD 30,000 a month.  

Qualifying the lead further, she gets their expected move-in date which helps to narrow down the listings more. While your real estate agency website has helpful VR journeys, videos, photos, maps, and floor plans, nothing beats a personal live video tour from an agent.  

Sensing the prospects' eagerness, she conducts an impromptu walkthrough and adds her commentary on the apartment's condition, enhancing the viewing experience.

2. An agent closing a new residential lease

Anneke, a Hong Kong real estate agent, has just ended a round of virtual apartment viewings with a couple from the Netherlands.  

She clicked with the pair right away, but as a broker, she knows that time is of the essence since they may change their minds at any moment, or another property agent they contacted might win the deal.

Her phone just buzzed. The couple used her web link on the agency website to send a message. They liked the last viewed apartment in the Mid-Levels and they want to offer a 2-year lease at HKD 33,8888 a month.  

Thrilled, Anneke calls the landlord through the CINNOX app, and he happily agrees as the number is very auspicious.

Sitting in a cafe, Anneke prepares the provisional tenancy agreement and attaches it in the live chat session with the tenants. She also reminds them to wire the initial deposit to the landlord once they have digitally signed the contract. Receiving the signed document and a screenshot of the telegraphic transfer, she calls the tenants.

In a video call, Anneke walks the tenants through the leasing process. The landlord's solicitors will prepare a draft tenancy agreement for them to review.  

In the meantime, would they like her to recommend a lawyer that can represent them? Agreeable to her suggestion, Anneke then invites the lawyer to the ongoing conference call.

3. A customer service agent handling an enquiry

Emma is a customer service agent at your property agency. She is responsible for answering enquiries from the CINNOX widget that you have installed on your website.  

Since live chat, web calls, video calls, and Facebook Messenger are unified in one place, she does not need to waste time switching between different apps.

An unusual chat enquiry just came in. Someone wants to buy a farm in the countryside! They just sold their London studio flat and want a change of environment.  

Slightly perplexed, Emma asks in the support group chat if any property agent deals with rural properties. She then sits and waits.

Within minutes, an answer comes from another customer service agent who is currently not on her shift. Using the CINNOX mobile app, the off-shift agent shares that Michael, a property agent in Surrey, specialises in farm estates for city dwellers.  

Thanking the off-shift agent, Emma quickly returns to the live chat session. Emma relays the good news and the prospect is interested since Surrey is a short commute from London if necessary.  

She then asks the prospect if they want to talk with Michael now. They agree so Emma makes the introduction on a conference call, leaves, and then transfers the enquiry to Michael so he can work on closing the deal.  

This a perfect example of keeping the process as seamless as possible within the same platform, and ensuring that the customer is at the center of it.

4. A buyer showing interest in a new property launch

Mark is from Australia and he saw your print ad in his local newspaper. Promoting a newly launched ski resort in Niseko, Japan, your property development firm took out a full-page ad complete with a QR code.  

Interested, Mark scans the code and is instantly connected via a web call to an English-speaking property agent in Japan.

Since your resort is still in the pre-launch stage, there is only a show flat onsite that gives buyers a panoramic view of the ski areas as well as the spectacular Mt Yotei.  

Your agent easily switches to a video call without hanging up, slowly panning his mobile phone to show Mark the views that he can expect from the completed resort.

For the time being, you only have a simple website for visitors to register their interest. Nonetheless, your agent uses the mobile CINNOX app to screen share and play a recently finished promotional video.  

A keen skier, Mark also wants to know if there is ski-in or ski-out access to the chalets. No problem! Your agent shares a link to the VR walkthrough.

Visibly excited, Mark picks out the largest floor plan and starts to talk about financing options for foreign buyers. Your agent mentions that you have a tie-up with a financial institution that can offer loans denominated in Japanese Yen. Mark wants to talk to the financial adviser and your agent invites the expert to the ongoing call.

5. A property manager overseeing commercial tenants

Ishani is the property manager of a large-scale commercial complex consisting of a shopping mall and offices above it.  

Responsible for a mix of retail and office tenants numbering in the hundreds, she leads a dedicated team of accountants, technicians, and procurement and contracts specialists operating in the onsite management office.

Using CINNOX as a lightweight CRM, every tenant in the building has a designated chat room that provides an audit trail of all their interactions. Plus, Ishani also uses the solution as a cloud communications tool to manage chats, calls, video calls, and emails in one place, saving them the cost of installing a complicated PABX system.

Each new tenant also receives a laminated card with QR codes printed. When scanned, a web call is made to a specific team—finance for payments and statements, for example—saving the tenant time from searching for a number. The same teams are also shared via web links in an email, giving tenants an option to chat instead.

CINNOX has also helped her team work collaboratively. If a new tenant wants to move in after hours, for example, Ishani can create a chatroom to notify operations about the loading bay, advise facilities to keep the lights on, inform security about the removalists, and add the external moving company as a contact so everyone is kept updated.

PropTech is within reach for real estate companies

PropTech is the fusion of the old and the new, combining property with technology. Developers, landlords, property agents, and commercial real estate managers can leverage technology to keep in step with digital-savvy customers.

As of January 2023, there were 5.16 billion internet users worldwide, which is 64.4 percent of the global population. Of this total, 4.76 billion, or 59.4 percent of the world's population, were social media users.

In a fast-paced world, customers expect to have easy access to information and services through digital channels. This is especially important in industries like real estate, where customers have many questions and concerns.  

To stay competitive, it is essential to enhance the digital customer experience. Technology plays a crucial role in shaping the customer experience (CX), and digital transformation is the key to meeting these expectations.