This article is the second of a series of insights about The Potential of PropTech and how this type of technology is enriching customer experience and the quality of living.
Technology is updating and improving constantly, expanding the number of possible ways to promote your business. Evolving over time has now become a prerogative, common to all those brands that are choosing to stand out and get an advantage from the new technological offering.
In our previous article of The Potential of PropTech, together with SALTO KS, we explored how PropTech is emerging as one of the most important trends in real estate. It is necessary to remind that the main goal of PropTech is to empower the end-user through the use of technology-enabled services, in order to improve overall resident’s experience. These solutions, in many cases, can indeed be a game-changer that can lead to an increase of bookings and enrich customer experience.
One of the most powerful tools that is cutting through the clutter in the real estate industry is certainly represented by Immersive Reality, which uses technology to create simulated environments that feel real. Immersive Reality comprehends Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). The user is completely involved in a rich visual experience that can resemble the real world or enhance it.
Both Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality are based on the same kind of technology, but the main difference between the two is how they are used.
Virtual Reality tours and the use of Augmented Reality offer the chance to connect with customers on a more personal level and deliver memorable experiences, while letting you gain a competitive advantage. Offering lifelike interactive experiences and a clear presentation for a better understanding of the product will make the client feel involved and so more interested.
VR tours enable customers to explore in detail the inside of a property remotely, while also being a powerful storytelling tool reducing the cost for realtors. Virtual touring helps potential clients to feel & experience a space and a lifestyle that soon could be their own. This has a particular importance for students and professionals that can not visit the property or building because of geographical barriers. VR allows to schedule a remote viewing of the property accompanied by a sales agent without having the clients to travel at all. Another benefit gained from VR tours is the possibility to run successful experiential marketing campaigns to tease the customers even months prior to the actual opening.
When it is not possible to use VR goggles, you can choose to implement a web viewer solution that allows you to embed 360-degree photography and video interactive tours of any property on your website. The 360 web viewer may represent the next generation of effective marketing tools to engage, convince and inspire tenants to book their new room or rent an apartment.
Augmented Reality can be adopted to express digitally the full potential of a space by placing anything desired into a physical area. IKEA Place for example is an application that enables buyers to place furniture in their homes through AR in order to imagine how the interiors will look like together, allowing them to make a more satisfying and quicker purchase. Augmented Reality helps to enhance the emotional connection that customers form with space thanks to the possibility of visualising it. AR can be also used as an engaging business communication tool for showcases, events or presentations.
The internal team and other stakeholders can surely benefit from the adoption of Immersive Reality, for example investors can acknowledge and adjust the identity design prior to an opening and the operational team can oversee how the project develops during the opening process, even abroad.
These innovative ways to promote your business can be integrated in a cloud management system that combines interactive display and collaboration technology with web, mobile, VR and AR solutions. This will make it easier to create high-quality user experiences that can be helpful both for your customers and team.
Many think that immersive visualisation technologies represent the future of real estate and they are already making a huge impact both for companies and the customer experience. AR & VR can save a lot of time and support a better allocation of resources that would initially go to real estate agents and to the arrangement of real viewings. Through a tech-advanced and detailed offering, the overall customer journey will become more efficient making it quicker to turn prospects into actual customers buying services and products.
This trend is going to blossom in 2020 and according to research by Goldman Sachs, Virtual and Augmented Reality will become an $80 billion market by 2025, with $2.6 billion expected for the real estate industry alone. After several years of development of Immersive Reality technologies, now is the right time to embrace the tech revolution and empower your real estate brand through VR & AR.
Now that you acknowledged everything that you needed to know about the benefits of VR & AR in the real estate business you are just one click away to actually implement these solutions in your brand. Check out our Multimedia Services and start your evolution process.
Stay tuned for more articles of our The Potential of PropTech series that will come out soon. We invite you to take a look at our other Insights articles and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter to be the first to receive fresh insights straight to your inbox.
