Call capture hotlines have been around for many years now. Real estate agents are using them to generate leads, increase conversions, track and test their advertising campaigns, and stay in contact with their clients and prospective clients. You will find call capture hotlines in the arsenals of some of the top agents in the country as well as newbie agents just starting out. They can be used to supplement marketing that is already working or to help create a marketing campaign from scratch. You will find people that swear by them and by the success that they have brought them in their real estate business and you will find others that don't believe they work at all. So if they are so flexible and widely used, why don't they work for everybody?
Call capture hotlines are a tool just like any other. If you don't know how to use it, you will not get the results you seek. If, however, you educate yourself on how to use that tool you can use it to get the results that you seek and more. Here are 3 secrets experienced and successful users of call capture hotlines know and use to increase leads and conversions:
- The Right Copy Will Encourage Calls. When it comes to ad copy there is a certain psychology that you need to employ if you want to encourage people to pick up the phone and dial your toll free number. Statistics show that people looking to buy a house want "Free 24 Hour Recorded Information". Let's break it down:
- FREE - 90% of Americans report using a toll free number and studies show that using a toll free number in your advertising can increase your response by 30%.
- 24 HOUR - 94% of people looking for a new home do so at odd hours of the day or night.
- RECORDED - 53% of home buyers avoid calling a real estate agent for fear of getting into a high-pressured sales pitch.
- INFORMATION - 88% of home buyers browse neighborhoods in their cars looking for homes for sale. 94% of people find it important to have access to home information as they browse from their vehicles. Luckily, 78% of people carry a cell phone. Using the right copy on your advertising will greatly improve the number of leads you generate from your call capture hotline. Using "Free 24 Hour Recorded Information" in your ads will break down barriers, tell your prospects they are going to get the information they need, let them do it at their convenience and ultimately increase calls to your hotline.
- Get Callers To Connect To You. Obviously call capture systems are great at generating leads by capturing your caller's information even if they just listen to your recording and then hang up. However, wouldn't it be great if 1/3 of those people also pressed that key to connect to you right then and there? To ensure that this happens, your property listing recordings need to encourage them to do so. You can do this in a number of ways. First, you can let them know that due to changing market conditions the pricing information on the property would need to be updated nearly every day. Let them know that rather than re-recording the messages daily, they can simply press "7" and you would be happy to get pricing information for them. Secondly, make sure you are creating excitement with your recordings. Spark their curiosity with statements like, "Homes in this neighborhood are the most sought after properties in this community. Press 7 now to find out why." Or another example might be, "The family that currently lives in this home hates to leave it. To find out why, press 7 now." Give your callers a reason to connect to you live to increase your conversions. Just make sure that when they do, you can fulfill your promise to satisfy their curiosity.
- A Personal Touch Converts. One of the things successful agents do on their call capture hotlines is to make their own recordings. Don't be tempted to use a professional voice service to make the recordings on your call capture hotline. People like it when the voice they hear in the free recording is the same voice that answers the phone when they get transferred to a live person. They like it so much it can increase your conversions up to 30%. An increase in conversions of up to 30% is completely worth the few minutes it will take you to make that listing recording.
Real estate call capture hotlines are great marketing and lead generation tools. But just like any tool, if you don't use it correctly you will not get the results you are looking for. The above 3 secrets that successful users of call capture already know will definitely get you on your way to getting the most from your hotline. Use the right copy to encourage your prospects to dial your toll free number, encourage them to want to speak to you live by sparking their curiosity with your recordings, and make sure those recordings have an added personal touch by being in your own voice. Those 3 simple tactics will easily increase your leads and conversions and help you get the most from your call capture hotline.
