An Expert Guide to Real Estate Website Development: A NeoITO Success Story

According to the Forbes list, 223 billionaires made most of their wealth from real estate.

The real estate industry has been a hot niche for investors, property developers and entrepreneurs.

But with pandemics kicking in, real estate is also facing many challenges in terms of reaching the right customers.

One of the best ways to grow your real estate business is by leveraging the possibilities of the internet to connect with millions of prospects worldwide.

In this guide, you’ll learn how to build a top-tier real estate website optimised for conversions.

Let’s dive right in.

Why should you invest in real estate website development?

Before the boom of internet and social media marketplaces, how did you search for prime real estate?

Local newspaper ads and magazines were the primary sources for their classified ads. Now, as the crowd has moved to more digital platforms, you need to play for the crowd.

The growth opportunities are endless, and so are the challenges.

You need professionals to build your website, or it might come back to bite you on your hindside.

If you’re suspicious of the results that a real estate website can get for you, take a look at how it gives you a return on investment.

Note: Not all returns are monetary but foundations that help you build your real-estate empire.

1. To show your expertise

People always prefer the brand over the product. Similarly, people tend to be attracted to who they perceive to be experts in the industry. Websites give you control over how the world should perceive you.

Building credibility with honest opinions and tackling reviews will make your audience believe you more. Leverage all the possible ways on a website, like a blog, testimonials, case studies and so on, to gain popularity points.

2. Lead generation

With a well-optimised and efficient website, the lead generation from the sheer traffic to the website will be a matter of how good your sales team sell.

3. Brand awareness

A website conveys your ideals louder than any colourful brochure. Determine your company brand values and etch them in stone because this is your indirect message to your customers. There are several ways your brand identity strikes the eye of your target audience.

• • • Ads that are close to your brand identity
    • Information you share should not contradict your brand
    • Always interact with your audience and experts in the industry

4. Relevant information

Real estate is a volatile market. An incident can affect the prices of properties. You would be sceptical about buying a home near a place where the crime rate is alarming.

Relevant information on the property combined with UI/UX experience and expert local opinions will generate more traffic to your website.

More traffic = More leads = More Sales

How to stay ahead in the real estate website race

There are many real estate websites online, and for your voice to be heard among this noise, you need to build a solid online presence. To do it right, focus on these crucial aspects:

Strong SEO

Search engine optimisation helps you appear in search results and increase your brand’s findability on search engines like Google.  To ace your SEO game, you must devise a rock-solid content and SEO strategy.

A domain name that stands out

A domain name that stands out will immediately grab your audience’s attention.

A random name won’t cut it, it’s a one-time decision, and you must be careful.

Here are 3 fundamental rules for choosing a domain name:

• • • Keep it short, professional, and in line with your brand identity
    • Don’t use your name unless your reputation is well-established
    • Try to use keywords

Here’s an extra tip; buy misspelt variations of your domain. When searching for something, we often make mistakes and believe in Google to correct them. Sometimes this might take your customer to a whole different webpage.

Buy variations of your domain name that are highly likely to be mistyped so that none of your prospects is lost.

A great user-centric design

Nobody likes taking three steps when it can be done in one, and they don’t want to follow the Marauder’s map to reach what they are looking for on a website. A great UI/UX design is the solution for this.

A real-estate website has all the key information for potential customers and they want seamless website navigation. Proper functionality and user flow must be clearly laid out to give a hassle-free user experience.

Your real estate website must have:

• • • A contact page
    • An About Us page
    • Easy navigation from one page to another
    • Informative and understandable menu page

Must-have features for a webpage

A real estate website design needs certain elements to make it fully functional. These elements should be included at all costs, or a suitable alternative should be placed. The features listed below are the backbone of a top-notch real estate website.

1. Prime listings

MLS (multiple listing service) data is vital to a good real estate website. This Listing service is a local database of properties where you can list and access the details of a property. It allows sellers and property owners to attract multiple agents at the same time.

MLS integration connects an agent’s website to the local MLS database. Even though the access is not exclusive, the process is simple and convenient.

2. Property search

Customers need to know the live real estate available to them, and they have many concepts on their ideal property. Though we cannot always give them what they want, we can show them recommendations close to their interests.

People can search for real estate based on the type ( selling, buying or renting), price, bedroom amenities, and more using filters and updated data analytics. You need to stay relevant with the listings you provide (Include new properties and take out old ones).

3. High-quality images from the best angle of the property

Humans are materialistic beings; the first thing a human eye a is how classy or flashy a thing is before buying it. It isn’t a different story for real estate.

The best real estate website design should always have high-quality property images.

A good picture will attract more customers and increase your chances of conversion.

4. Video or AR/VR

While searching for a property remotely, a video or AR/VR experience will be beneficial for your customers to get a crucial first impression of the property.

With augmented reality and virtual reality creeping into every industry, real estate can tap its full potential by exploring several possibilities.

5. Contact page

While creating a real estate website, a contact page is the most important part of its structure. People want to communicate with the sellers about their requirements and address any doubts about the property they wish to buy.

A live chat option, a direct contact and a speedy call-back system increase the response rate and convert users into customers.

Advanced features you can add

Local area data

Prospective buyers always enquire about their neighbourhood. If you display the stats about the crime rate, cleanliness, availability of basic amenities, price change over the years and other demographics, that makes it easier for your clients to make a decision faster.

Calendar

If a client wants to look over the property rather than making to and fro calls, they can use the calendar to make sure that they can pick from the available dates and set up a meeting according to their convenience.

Calculators

This is not a simple calculator but an interest calculator which can help you determine the mortgage loan term, interest rate and more according to the property you are interested in.

Best loan offers available

This may seem a bit far-fetched, but it’s a good opportunity to get your customers’ attention and interest. You can include the best offers available from banks and financial institutions at that moment to help your potential clients. While looking from a marketing perspective, you can approach these institutions with advertisement options.

Suggested read: UX Design Best Practices 2022: The Ultimate Beginner’s Guide to User Experience

Real estate website development

You can approach a software development company with a real estate web development proposal.  But before that, you need to get a glimpse of how the project is carried out.

1. Gathering the inventory

The structure of the real estate website makes it great. It is built in the planning phase, where you decide what features you need and what advanced features you want—formulating the website that suits the needs of your target audience and working towards it.

2. Team selection

Once you’ve got the basic requirements of your website in order, you must choose a software development company or set up a team to build your website. The budget must be kept in mind during this phase.

3. Prototyping

Building a prototype helps you understand if your website works well. It’s also a quicker and cost-effective way to gather customer feedback before the final release of your website.

4. Development

After choosing the right stack and assessing your requirements, developers will start to build your website. At this stage, you can expect many feedback rounds and discussions.

5. Quality assurance

Quality assurance engineers review everything on your website before making it live. They will check for bugs, design inconsistencies and other issues affecting your website performance

Here are some web development trends for you to look at before you start building your website.

How can NeoITO help you build a real estate website?

A great real estate website ensures a hassle-free experience for users at every stage of browsing. It provides them with every information while keeping the seamless user experience intact.

Our team at NeoITO has helped PropertyOK, one of India’s leading real estate brands, transform its website experience to turn more users into customers faster.

They had a website from WordPress but needed a revamp to suit the interests of prospects. We were able to help them, and the outcome was a more efficient website in Node.js and a constant presence in the real estate market search list.

Read more | Property OK Case Study

Want to build a real estate website that boosts your sales through the roofs? Give our team a call.

Suggested read: Why Choose Node.js for Your Next Web Application Development Project?