How to Create a Property Listing Website?

Would you like to launch your property listing website in 5 minutes? Then this blog is not for you. I have gathered all the information and made it available here for the real estate professionals who understand how the real estate website business works.

Trust me, creating a property listing website isn’t something you can accomplish in just a few minutes. While some vendors offer quick solutions by providing initial listings from multiple listing services and allowing you to use their website builders or templates, it’s important to remember that anything built quickly often lacks durability and quality.

I’ve been in real estate website development for a decade, and I’ve seen many businesses thrive by starting with the right development team and proper project management. Establishing a strong foundation with well-thought-out plans takes time and cannot be accomplished in a week.

A robust and long-lasting property listing website requires careful planning, development, and customization to meet the specific needs of your users and business.

Most importantly, your online property listing solution should attract more property owners and agents. To achieve this by making property owner happy, you have to find a unique niche or your unique selling point. This is the core vital of your property listing websites.

This blog will cover everything starting from finding your unique niche for your website, how to name your online real estate business, How to create a property listing website, how to launch without actual customer listings in the beginning, and how to plan your marketing strategies for your new business.

How Real Estate Websites Are Transforming Property Listings?

In the late 1990s, it was just a mailing list and then after a period, a general classified ads website craigslist was used for online property listings. Startup founders took the next step of having a unique niche website only for property listings later.

Cyberhomes was introduced in 1995, specifically for real estate property listings. From that moment, there were lots of listing portals that started releasing and the advancements kept moving from online presence to, virtual tour of real estate, data insights from artificial intelligence and now virtual real estate called meta verse is emerging.

So, do you think there is still space for launching your property listing website? Yes. But you have to build a strong business plan. Find your unique niche where your target audience will be addressed by their unique problems that no other brand can solve.

How to Beat the Competition with a Unique Niche?

Why do we need a unique niche? Why can’t we launch a similar website like Zillow? Here is the simple answer to this question, your target audiences from real estate marketplaces are looking for something new. They won’t express their difficulties as they are already using the existing big brands to solve their problems to some extent.

To make my point clear, let’s take Zillow a well-known online property management website. They have crazy numbers of users, but few of them have difficulty with their unique feature called “Zestimates“. It’s an automation validation tool that helps buyers and sellers to calculate property values. When you google the drawbacks of Zillow, this will be on the top.

Now, this hints that you need to find your unique niche or discover a solid system that overcomes the common drawbacks among well-known brands. Okay, but how to pick a unique niche?

Let me explain this with an example, take commercial properties. This is one of the common rental properties of all the well-known brands.

So, if you pick your niche to be an exclusive property listing platform for commercial property buyers and sellers, how would that sound? You will seamlessly narrow down the big market with potential buyers of commercial units, right? This is wow!

And, there are many other advantages when you pick a unique niche. such as,

1. Narrowing down a big market into a specific target audiences.
2. More specific focus given to niche market audiences’ problems and solutions
3. Marketing strategies can also be narrowed to a group of audiences.
4. High chances of bringing niche target people to your business from the common solution providers.

Let’s look at some real-world unique niche platforms that were released in the last couple of years.

Unique Niche Real Estate websites

Starting a business is easier than finding a unique niche in the real estate property marketplace. You need lots of patience and research skills to find the right niche and you have to plan all the business plan around the same niche.

The first example is a unique niche on property type and the second one is a unique niche on target audience.

Coliving.com – Coliving Homes with Friends

Almost everything is the same as Zillow but they have their own niche of co-living. This website was founded in 2018 by Daniel Beck. Take a look at the founder’s notes to understand how he found this niche.

The idea of building a marketplace for coliving homes began in a startup house in the summer of 2014. Our founder, Daniel Beck, visited Silicon Valley for the first time to see iconic landmarks such as the Golden Gate Bridge, as well as tech giants like Google, Facebook, and the Apple campus. What marked him were the countless driven and optimistic people he met while staying there. All of them had issues finding great housing. As exciting as remote work and relocating to new cities can be, it can also lead to feelings of loneliness and disheartenment. It was from this experience that the idea for Coliving.com became clear: Daniel wanted to create a platform where everyone could discover communities of like-minded individuals. coliving.com aims to connect people with the communities that best suit their needs..

So, how this website is different from the regular listings website? Even I had the same question. And, that made me check their website. That’s when I found how they have modified the common features to specifically support their niche audience.

The rooms types are private and shared and the advanced search filtering have a unique filter called “Community”. In here, the users can select what community they belong to like CEO, Digital-Nomad, Investors, Professional, etc.

Now, why these people should use this website? Of course, you should have understood by this time, By narrowing down options to specifically curated coliving spaces, our platform ensures that users can find environments where they can thrive alongside like-minded individuals.

So users who are looking for a temporary stay or a long-term community, will find this to be the ideal platform to discover and connect with like-minded people will definitely prefer this website over Airbnb.

JamesEdition.com – Luxury Marketplace

You guessed it right! Their target audiences are luxury people. JamesEdition is a global online industry targeting luxury people of different business sector including real estate, cars, jewellery, jets, watches, yachts, extraordinaire, residential development and vacation rentals.

This website allows sellers to post their offers and the same gets published after editorial review. It is an upmarket form of a classified advertising portal in the beginning.

The strict curation of all listings have resulted in several media coverages targeting billionaires. Some listings have been posted to Top Gear and The Guardian websites.

It has been referred to by some as Craigslist for the rich people or even “Craigslist for billionaires”. The advertised goods are so rare that the website has received regular coverage by other websites, print magazines and TV stations.

Now, they have completely changed their business into a marketplace from classifieds.

How to Name your Real Estate Website Business?

As you can see the previous stated example, It is conveying the business model in the business name itself. Zillow (Zillions of Pillows), they are deriving the name from the business model and the target audiences in the real estate industry.

What does this say? To reach wider audience and increase visibility for your real estate business, having a unique, memorable name related with your business model is highly essential. Your name should be positioned well with your target audiences to stay competitive in the online real estate market.

Lets see some of the Dos and Don’ts when you name your business. This is purely from my point of view.

Dos:

1. Make it easily pronounceable.
2. Spelling should be understandable when they pronounce your brand name ( like Zillow)
3. Make it short.

Don’ts:

1. Don’t go too deep on your native language-based name. Sometimes it will be harder to remember.
2. Don’t use numbers unless it’s required.
3. Don’t narrow it down so much on your business model. Because your business model may expand in future.

I’ll help you remember these do’s and don’ts. First, consider you as a listing agent. You’ve discovered a distinct niche in property listings: commercial spaces available for hourly rental, ideal for organizing quick meetings and gatherings.

In this case, I would recommend the name ‘Assemblr‘ for your venture. It not only aligns with your business model but also resonates verbally with your target audience, effectively connecting them with your brand.

Now, having provided enough insights on naming the app idea, let’s see how to develop this unique idea as a product.

How to Create a Property Listing Website in 6 Steps?

Having been in development for two decades, I firmly suggest that the best method of moving forward with turning your idea into reality is by hiring the right technical team.

In my opinion, it does not matter if you are building this dream for your passive income or primary business, whatever the reason one thing is sure, leading in the wrong direction may empty your wallet.

There are millions of web development companies and thousands of instant website builders who can make things quick and easy by integrating open source CMS (Content Management Sytems) like wordpress website to materialize your property management websites. But the reality is, its not just about how quickly you are going into the market. Its about how efficiently you are entering into the market.

This idea here is not about having single property website that one admin can manage everything about one property. It’s about owning dynamic solutions where all the real estate agents, property owners, and buyers joins and going to do many concurrent transactions. So, it needs more patience. Let me explain the process step by step.

1. Find an Unique Logo

After finalizing your niche, the next step should be finding an unique logo for your business. You need UI/UX experts who can correlate your business model into graphics.

They understand that every color means something about your business. So design a logo which should be suitable for your website, and mobile app (logo, splash screen) and most importantly it has to be print-friendly for your brand t-shirts and other brand materials such as coffee mugs, pens and other stationaries.

2. Buy Your Own Domain Name

Consider this domain availability when you name your business. But it does not mean, you have to fully depend on the domain name. You can find different domain extensions such as io, .ai, and .co. Once your logo is done it’s time to buy your domain.

3. Launch Your Landing Page

I usually go with a landing page even before starting the web development process. I strongly believe that the landing page should engage with the target audiences. And, I always prefer adding unique content about how the new business is going to help the customers.

Let me explain this with Assembler, to capture the customer’s attention, showcasing mockup designs of the property pages will effectively highlight how our platform makes commercial spaces visible and accessible for our unique niche. These designs emphasize the distinct differences that cater specifically to quick meetings and group assemblies.

And, here is the answer to the question that has popped into your mind, Why landing page first?
It’s important to shout out loudly that you are building something new. You have to start spreading the news and collect some early customers’ contact details.

4. Define the Wire Frame

Once you define the scope of the work (SOW), it’s time to make sure the requirements are achievable in terms of UI/UX. Based on my experience you will have to face many obstacles when working on a wire frame after the requirement-gathering phase.

But once the wireframe is done, your project idea becomes 99.9% executable. Wireframe should cover everything, like the user profile, property list, agency website, and transaction flow.

5. Kick Start Your Development

Convert those wireframes as HTML or any tech stack-based front-end language and start the development works. It’s highly recommended to study how the real estate marketplace acts in the regions your online portal is going to operate.

Hire a professional real estate app development company to help you with this complete development process.

6. Beta Launch

Try to get the early customers and share with your closed circle the beta version and get their feedback. Collected feedback is the key to enhancing your beta for the public launch. Having early customer testimonials will cultivate a good impression for the early visitors of your real estate website.

Challenges in First Public Launch of Real Estate Websites

Until the beta launch, you can share sample property listings. However, it’s important to note that your customers are searching online for practical property solutions, not just demos. This will be your initial challenge post-launch. You ought to transcend from showcasing samples to meeting real-world property needs.

Setting Up Your Real Estate Business Online Presence

Before inviting more property owners to list their properties online, you can use real property listings data from third-party vendors using MLS (multiple listings services). MLS is a database of property listings from other renowned real estate websites.

You can buy this access from popular vendors and integrate the listing from other websites. There is a system called IDX (Internet Data Exchange) that can be used to retrieve these listings from MLS database.

I can read your mind, your query is, In a website developed for a unique niche, what difference will the common listings bring about? Just go for it! To begin with, you can use these services. Once your customer base is increased, you can slowly withdraw these listings and make your website filled with only niche-specific properties.

Marketing Strategies For Your Brand New Real Estate Website

Unlike other business websites, real estate websites need more feeds and data ready to deliver at the click for your prospective clients who are looking to buy or rent properties. So, generally, the marketing strategy for real estate website development is segmented into two parts.

In the first phase, you have to do the complete marketing efforts to get more data into your brand new real estate listing website. In the second phase, you have to invite buyers to browse multiple listings. This marketing campaign involves so much money so it needs to be planned wisely.

Phase 1: Attracting Real Estate Agents and Property Owners

This is where you are building your foundation by defining great marketing strategies to enlist real estate agents and property owners on your brand-new property listing website. This phase focuses on establishing your platform as a valuable resource for industry professionals, fostering trust, and building a robust inventory of listings.

To get it done like pro let’s discuss some of the offline marketing strategies first.

Networking Events

Events that are closely related to the real estate industry are the first preference. Getting to know the local market always makes it easy for you to connect with a local real estate agency. Be prepared when you go for such events, take with you, proper visiting cards, start general conversations, and talk about your new business with multiple agents.

Print Advertising

Place ads in local newspapers, real estate magazines, and community publications to reach a wider audience. These ads can be in two formats. In the first phase, your ads should attract the agencies real estate agents, and property owners. Learn about another format in the second phase.

Press Releases

Target the top three press release websites and negotiate the price with them. There are popular websites such as PR Newswire with two million monthly traffic, EIN Presswire and GlobeNewswire.

Prepare an appealing press release content for property owners and real estate agencies. Make sure your website address is properly linked in the press release content you have prepared

Media Outreach

Prepare an appealing story about your new business which should include your entire experience in the industry. In addition to this, it should also say, how you are utilizing the same for your new innovative business idea, and what impact your idea would bring to the global and local markets.

Pitch your story to journalists and see if they can cover it in the popular media either for free or paid. Reach the bloggers and influencers in the real estate industry with the same story to earn media coverage.

Industry Partnerships

Prepare a business plan for a referral campaign and approach the real estate associations, brokerages and property management firms in the region where you would like to launch your website and collaborate with them by offering unique and attractive price offers. This is to ensure that they bring business to you. This business deal should be designed to benefit both of you.

If possible, design and develop a separate real estate agent website link in your own website for these kinds of collaboration, This could make customers feel more confident about your business.

Let’s move on to online marketing strategies. This strategy may need a team to execute them well in different channels.

Email Campaigns

Contact the companies and data providers for the real estate business and get the data from their local databases such as clients’ names, email addresses and other contact details. You can also buy these data from the online provider such as ExactData and collect all the contacts.

Form a team of email campaigns. Buy bulk emailing tools like MailChimp and then upload all the contacts. Next, you need to design a formal introduction email, along with required follow-up emails based on different actions. This will help you win a minimum of 1% to 3% of potential clients.

All these emails should have a minimum of one link to your website landing page or to an integrated set of contact info forms where your interested visitors can fill in their details.

LinkedIn Networking

As LinkedIn is a professional network, your job as the founder is to connect with real estate investors and other professionals in the industry. Begin by engaging with them through formal interactions like liking their posts and commenting on their innovative ideas. Once connected, share your business idea with them.

Additionally, regularly post about your business and its solutions. Share industry-related updates, news, and insights to attract and connect with the right professionals in your network.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising

This strategy needs experts like the best marketing agency for startups, especially those who are specialized in ad campaigns. Fix your budget before you start the ads campaign. The ads and ad copies should have the right lead magnets to increase your new listings.

Phase 2: Attracting Customers to Browse Listings

This phase scales up your business with potential buyers. The marketing strategy for real estate buyers should be completely different from the phase 1 strategy. The strategy for the buyers should drive more traffic and engagement on your property listing website.

Once you have a solid base of listings, it’s time to attract potential buyers and tenants to your website. This phase focuses on increasing visibility, driving traffic, and creating a user-friendly experience.

Let’s learn about how to attract more customers by optimizing your website.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO):

SEO completely depends on the popular search engines like Google and Bing. To rank your website better on search engine result pages, you have to follow all the guidelines recommended by the search engines.

Those guidelines need to be followed from the beginning till the end. There is also a process called on-page SEO which involves link building to dominate the search results with your website rankings.

Content Marketing and Social Media

Planning necessary content for your customers plays an important role in search engine optimization. If you keep adding quality content that is helpful for your target audience such as guidelines, and awareness of the real estate industry, it will boost your online presence.

For example, if any buyer looking for a query like, “What are the regulations to buy a real estate site?”, you have to cover this topic in your content by showcasing all the government rules and regulations involved. Also make sure the content you create for your website is unique from others.

User-Friendly Interface

All the effort you put into driving traffic to your website will be wasted if your site isn’t user-friendly. A poor user experience can deter potential buyers and hurt your conversion rates. Ensure the website is easy to navigate, visually appealing, and optimized for mobile devices.

For example, if one user comes to view properties, the menu should be clearly visible and placed in the right place. Also, you have to prioritise details like property information in a way your user prefers.

High-Quality Listings

Make sure your niche-specific listings are high quality in terms of images, information and visibility. You have to restrict the property owners from uploading low-quality images.

You can help them with guidelines like how to take quality photos and upload them. You can also integrate virtual tours like 360-degree photo viewing, but being with high-quality photos is enough.

Lead Generation Tools

Your website should have properly implemented contact forms, CTA (call-to-action) buttons, and if possible a live chat plugin. This is to make sure your visitors can be converted into leads. Having a social media integration with the most popular social network is also a better lead generation option.

Value-Added Services

Offer additional resources like mortgage calculators, market reports, and neighbourhood guides to enhance the user experience. You can also add more content about this value-added service to get more users from search engines like Google and Bing.

Online Advertising Campaigns

You can hire the best marketing agency for your startup to advertise your new business on social media and search engines. They can run targeted ads on Google, Bing, and social media platforms to reach potential users actively searching for property listings or real estate services around your region.

Similar to leveraging online advertising campaigns, there is another pivotal step in launching your property listing business. It is choosing the right and reputed team to develop and manage your property listing business.

Start Your Property Listing Business with AppKodes

We at AppKodes have delivered different types of business solutions for our clients which include rental businesses with unique niches (Yacht Renting Business, Heavy Equipment Renting) and real estate websites with unique niches of “Week End Reunion” where people can find places for weekend getaways.

The features are a little different from the common renting business. We can help you with the market research on finding the unique niche, naming your business, buying domain and server infrastructure, software development and to some extent marketing as well.

In short, Appkodes is the one-stop solution for your real estate business needs. What are you waiting for? Talk to our sales team now and share your startup idea and let’s give it a shot and make it big together.