“Where did you hear about us?”
In the world of marketing, this has been the golden question for years, giving us an insight into how customers interact with our content and marketing strategies to work out which areas of our advertising work best.
However, in today’s digital climate, does asking this question still hold value? Let’s take a look.
The Golden Question Examined
The majority of the time in the real estate industry, when a buyer is inspecting a home, you’ll ask where they heard about the property from.
More often than not, they’re going to tell you it was via an online search portal.
Why is this? Well, largely because some large portals are known to garner over 10 million views a month, meaning they’re the primary source for individuals looking to buy property.
From this, the only information you’re going to get is that you should start or keep listing your properties on these portals, as this is where the majority of your enquiries are coming from.
However, is this actually worth the cost? Should you have to pay thousands of dollars just to get a handful of people who might place a bid on your listing? Are these portals actually the source of your enquiries?
Think about it – it’s no different than your own website. Each month, you’re likely going to be clocking thousands of visitors if you’ve got a strong web presence and have been in the market for a while. From this, you’ll get a smaller number of leads, and a couple of those leads will convert into sales.
So, think about this – is using generalised questions on largely unqualified leads putting your money in the wrong place?
Consider an Alternative Approach
Some agents trying to break free from the clutches of real estate portals are asking these questions instead:
1) Why are you inspecting houses today?
2) What made you want to inspect this property?
There are a number of responses you could get, including:
- “X has changed in our lives, so we need a new home to achieve Y.”
- “I really like the look of the property’s interior.”
- “Homes like this are hard to find in this area right now.”
- “I want my children to go to X and this property is in the catchment zone.”
Use Better Questions to Get Better Information
In turn, you’ll be able to use this information to make better marketing decisions. With this, you’ll be able to develop fresh strategies that target your market in more effective ways.