According to a real estate industry report; by 2040, the Indian real estate market will grow to Rs. 65,000 crore (US$ 9.30 billion) from Rs. 12,000 crore (US$ 1.72 billion). Real estate sector in India is expected to reach US$ 1 trillion in market size by 2030, up from US$ 200 billion in 2021 and contribute 13% to the country’s GDP by 2025.
Urbanization, rising income levels, robust economy, rapid infrastructural development in tier II & III cities, volatile stock markets are some of the micro and macro factors driving this growth.
While this is great news, Indian real estate companies are plagued with trust and reputational issues that could be attributed to inordinate delays in delivering projects, lack of transparency in pricing and project details, non-payment of taxes, violations of byelaws, poor construction quality, and unethical business practices, etc. Many of the negative mentions online could be due to miscommunication, misinformation, or lack of information. These negative mentions impact the way your real-estate company is perceived and makes prospective customers have second thoughts while buying a property from you.
Why Online Reputation Management (ORM) For Real Estate Companies?
- More than 90% homebuyers research online before making any buying decision.
- 85% of consumers trust online reviews as much as recommendations by friends or family.
- 60% of consumers said they do not engage with businesses that have too many negative reviews.
- 49% of consumers do not engage with a business if the rating is less than 4.
- Consumers read an average of 7 reviews before trusting a business.
- 95% of the customers make their decision based on what they see in the first page of search results.
- 65% of consumers rely on search engines for researching a business.
- 78% consumers make purchase decisions based on what they see and read in social media posts.
- 54% of consumers use social media for research.
Online Reputation Management for Real Estate Companies-Best Practices
Monitor: Monitor and track brand mentions on search results, review sites, industry forums, online news media, social media, etc.
Respond: Put a team and process in place to respond promptly to any negative and positive mentions while taking steps to address any issues raised by customers.
Seek Reviews: Reach out to happy customers and request them to share their experience with. You could do this via email follow-ups, Apps, or by providing links to review sites.
Proactive Communication: Communicate timelines, project progress pictures, updates, project delay, and any unplanned development with the customers via different channels. Respect the trust that the customer has placed on you.
Digital Cleanup (Brand Enforcement): Ensure that you enforce your brand rights so that customers engage with official channels for their concerns and grievances.
Managing Reputational Crisis for Real Estate Companies-Best Practices
Reputational crisis is the biggest threat for real estate companies; there is too much at stake and a one-off negative event could jeopardize a project where millions of dollars have already been invested.
- Have a crisis-management team with top stakeholders involved.
- Clearly, think through multiple options before going public.
- Have plan A, B, C, and D too.
- Designate resources with the experience, capability, and maturity to handle crisis situations.
- The PR team should be thoroughly trained on all possible eventualities in this volatile and sensitive sector.
Online Reputation Management (ORM) Tools for Real Estate Companies
It is obvious that ORM for real-estate companies is very important. However, an efficient and foolproof online reputation management can only be done with a customized ORM tool for real estate companies.
Let us discuss some of the best ORM tools for real estate companies:
Reputation.com: A tool for review monitoring, social media monitoring, and sentiment analysis. It also provides reputation management services and offers solutions for businesses of all sizes, including real estate companies.
AiPlex Bridge: It is a premium SaaS ORM tool from AiPlex. It is a comprehensive and unified ORM tool that helps real estate companies with all their online reputation management needs within a single interface. Social listening, ticketing, response management, sentiment analysis, competitor analysis, brand rights enforcement, social media management, review management, crisis management, influencer marketing, digital command centre, etc., within a single tool.
BirdEye: It offers review management, social media monitoring, and customer experience analytics tools. It can be a useful tool for real estate companies looking to monitor their online reputation and improve their customer experience.
ReviewTrackers: It is a review monitoring and reputation management platform that helps businesses track their online reviews and manage their reputation. It offers features such as review monitoring, sentiment analysis, and reporting to help real estate companies stay on top of their online reputation.
Reputology: This is an online reputation management tool that specializes in review monitoring and management. It offers features such as review monitoring, sentiment analysis, and reporting to help real estate companies track and manage their online reviews.
Why AiPlex Bridge is the Go-To Tool for Online Reputation Management (ORM) of Real Estate Companies?
AiPlex Bridge is a SaaS offering from India’s #1 antipiracy and content protection company with a 14+ year history of protecting brand reputations across industries and sectors. Our ORM tool is customizable to meet the unique needs of real estate companies. AiPlex Bridge can be customized for real estate companies of all sizes and shapes; be it a budding developer executing the first project or a billion-dollar real estate global player with millions of sq. ft of ongoing projects.
AiPlex Bridge is developed to be the only ORM tool you will ever need; a Comprehensive & Unified tool for all your online reputation management requirements.