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David Clare / July 21 / Inspiration, Property, Social Media

Top 5 smarthome technologies (compatible with IFTTT)

Whether you are developing property for rental, and want to give that polished feel, or you’ve recently moved into a property yourself and want the most modern finishes available to you, smarthome technologies are going to be way up there on your wishlist.

The smarthome is one of the best examples of the ‘Internet of Things’. So many appliances and utilities can be connected to your home’s WiFi network, and by extension your smartphone, tablet or other services that make use of the APIs in the tech, allowing you to control your home from wherever you may be.

The smarthome technologies we feature below are not just fascinating because of what they can do alone, but all of them can also connect to a service called IFTTT (if this, then that) which allows them to speak to one another. For example, you put a romantic playlist on Sonos, and your lights turn red. Oh the romance!

Take a look at our top 5 smarthome technologies, that are both awesome in their own right, but also talk to one another for all sorts of hacks!

1. Nest

Nest thermostat learns your schedule and the temperatures you like. In theory, you should never have to touch the thermostat again, and even knows when you’re away, or likely to be back. Through IFTTT, you can even use location to let it know you’re on the way home.

2. Alexa

Amazon’s Alexa is designed around your voice. It’s always on, allowing you to ask for information, music, news, weather, and more. With IFTTT you can even use it to control other smarthome technologies, such as turning the Nest thermostat down.

3. Hue

Philips Hue connected bulbs let you take full control of your lighting, turning to whatever colour you fancy, or blinking for alerts. Through IFTTT, you can even set the colour of your home to match your latest Instagram, or to flash when you’re tagged in a Facebook post.

4. Musaic

Musaic is a Smart Hi-Fi system, allowing you to enjoy your music in every room. Through the IFTTT integration, you can set your Hue lights to go into disco mode when your party playlist plays, or even sound an alarm if someone breaks in.

5. Danalock

Danalock lets you control the access to your properties. Through the IFTTT integration, you can set it so your front door unlocks when you arrive at the house, or to lock via text, or at a certain time of day that you set, so you can always be sure.

Have you used any of these smarthome technologies in your properties? Let us know on Twitter, @ElevationComms.

David Clare / June 15 / Marketing, Property, SEO, Social Media, Websites

Rightmove vs. Zoopla vs. OnTheMarket

Ever wondered which online real estate listings site has the most visitors, what their key demographics are and what differentiates them from the rest? Well, we’ve prepared this brief guide to give you all the facts you need, in just a couple of minutes.

Website traffic

Rightmove: 53.8 million per month
Zoopla: 25.6 million per month
OnTheMarket: 4.1 million per month

As you can see, Rightmove dominates the market by a great margin. But there are key differences that make the other sites worth checking out.

Key differences

Rightmove: Far more listings, better awareness among the public, used by 90% of estate agents
Zoopla: Smart features such as prices property sold for in the same area, recently acquired Property Software Group and USwitch, so may grow fast
OnTheMarket: A disrupter with lower costs to list, but also restricts estate agents to their portal alone

So Rightmove looks like it is here to stay, but both Zoopla and OnTheMarket look set to attempt to overtake its number one spot. This will depend on whether Zoopla’s acquisitions turn good, and if OnTheMarket doesn’t scare buyers away with their restrictions.

Are you a realtor? Where do you list your property? Let us know on Twitter @elevationcomms.

David Clare / April 18 / Marketing, Social Media

Use AI for property marketing automation

Last week, Facebook announced a new technology at their F8 conference. We covered the event in our blog post here, but the key breakthrough we’re interested in, is AI chatbots.

Facebook is allowing brands to develop AI chat programmes to interact with customers, partners and clients of pages, helping speed up the time it takes for a response. If done right, this will hugely increase engagement and accelerate people through the sales funnel.

Facebook aren’t the only ones doing this. All the big tech companies are. Amazon, Google, Apple and Microsoft all have their sights set on AI, and it’s proving to be as popular, and likely appearing sooner, than the current hot topic, virtual reality.

How will AI chatbots help property marketers, though? Well, they allow bots to speak to bots. By developing a high-quality AI programme, you will be able to allow potential clients the ability to gain immediate responses to questions, hook in with other tools and services (i.e. measurements, industry benchmarking etc.) and get the information they need while providing you with a full transcript and contact details.

Imagine logging into Facebook and having a conversation with a brand, one that seems just as real as speaking to a human. This is the AI chatbot experience. It will become the norm, so stay one step ahead and start developing now!

Want to find out more? Contact us to see how we can help you develop your first AI programme today.

David Clare / April 15 / Marketing, Social Media

Facebook F8: how it affects property marketing

Each year, Facebook hold an annual gathering of developers at their F8 conference. This year’s event featured over 40 sessions came with some major product announcements in a keynote talk by company founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg.

While previous F8 conferences have only had a minor effect on the property marketing industry, this year’s has seen major announcements that could really matter to you. Here’s our top 5 list of announcements you need to know about.

1. Messenger Platform

Facebook is now letting brands tap into conversations through the messenger platform. They’re doing this with AI chat bots, meaning brands will have the ability to solve customer queries entirely by automation. This is a great way to engage followers and answer their questions about properties in an instant manner.

2. Bot Engine

To coincide with the new messenger platform features, Facebook has launched a bot engine, called wit.ai. This will allow developers to create AI chat bots so that you can make the most of the new feature. While it may require some developer investment, we’re betting you’d be one of the first property marketers to be using the feature, so it is worthwhile! Speak to us if you need help.

3. Surround 360

Facebook have launched a physical product, with the new $30,000 Surround 360 VR camera. This camera will allow marketers to take full 360 videos of a property so that potential customers can have a full virtual reality experience. Find out why VR is so important to property in our post here.

4. Live video API

You may have seen notifications from media brands informing you of their live broadcasts on Facebook. Until now, only select outlets had been given access to the feature, but now they’ve opened up the API to allow you to use this too. If you run webinars, this will be a great way to engage your audience. We have a dedicated video team, find out more.

5. Quote Sharing

Facebook new ‘quote sharing’ feature allows people to choose specific pieces of text to share, within a piece of content. This means that your content strategy will now need to make sure that you’re highlighting key messages in such a way that makes people share using this feature.

Want to see the full keynotes for day one and day two on F8? Enjoy:

Day 1 at F8

Day 2 at F8

David Clare / April 7 / Marketing, Social Media

Desktop still has its place in a mobile world

Mobile marketing is a massive opportunity for marketing property. Smartphones and tablets often have high-resolution displays that simply show photography and video in the best possible light. The devices go beyond the office and content aimed at this format has the potential to reach the audience 24 hours a day. But does this mean desktop should be ditched entirely? This blog investigates just that.

We all know that mobile is king. People access the internet through their mobile far more than they do desktop. In fact, mobile accounts for 51% of digital media usage (versus 42% for desktop), and a massive 80% of Twitter and Facebook traffic is through a mobile device. Desktop, on the other hand, is lagging behind and seen more of a work device than something people actually choose to use.

But while a focus on mobile is absolutely essential. For marketers, especially property marketers, it is worth considering the benefits of targeting people who are using a desktop. To explain why we need to look at how and why people use desktop computing. Just take a look at the chart below to see the differences.

(Image source)

Perhaps the focus on the headline stat, that people are using mobile more than desktop, is misleading. The chart highlights that it really depends on the activity people are performing as to which device they use. In the case of shopping (retail), entertainment news, business / finance, news, health information and portals – desktop is actually used more often than mobile.

Why is this so? There may be a few reasons. Firstly, portals are the lowest on the list as it gains the most desktop use – the likely reason is due to the low user experience (UX) delivered on mobile devices for portals and intranets. But it isn’t always just about UX. Health information, news and business / finance are rather serious topics, that will often include long reads. And how about time of day? Surely we use the desktop more for work? The below chart certainly suggests this is true.

(Image source)

Of course, the above chart is based on data from 2011, so this may have changed. However, it does certainly make sense that the desktop sees more use between work hours because it is still the dominant screen within an office. For intensive work on apps such as those included in the Microsoft Office suite or Adobe Creative Cloud, a desktop simply gets things done better.

So what can we learn from this? Well, mobile is huge. Your website and online presence should most certainly be mobile friendly, if not mobile first. But take into account the type of content and reader you’re aiming for. As a property marketer, you’re likely aiming for an audience who will be interested during work hours, and who may be looking for depth of content. The research shows that desktop, in this case, is hugely important. It is your social, blog and video content, on the other hand, that should be entirely mobile orientated.

Still confused? I don’t blame you. It takes much more than a 500-word blog to develop a mobile marketing strategy. So why not get in touch and have a deeper conversation around what is best for you and your needs? Contact us here.

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