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2 min read

UTour’s Showcase at the 2024 NAHB International Builders’ Show

By UTour Digital Media Team on Feb 16, 2024 1:06:04 PM

As the heart of innovation in the new home industry, UTour is excited to participate in the 2024 NAHB International Builders’ Show. This premier event gathers the most influential minds and decision-makers in the new home industry. UTour is returning to the show floor to connect, share and inspire in this unparalleled environment for networking and learning opportunities. Here’s what you need to know to make the most of UTour’s offering at this year’s event.

Topics: self-guided tours proptech smart homes best practices new homes sales
1 min read

Revolutionizing Home Tours: Harnessing the Power of UTour's AI Assistants

By UTour Digital Media Team on Jan 19, 2024 2:08:49 PM

In the dynamic landscape of today's real estate market, blending cutting-edge technology with unparalleled customer service is not just a passing trend, but a groundbreaking revolution. UTour is leading this transformation, providing an innovative, tech-centric approach to self-guided home tours. UTour empowers home shoppers, placing the reins of their journey firmly in their own hands. This flexibility and ease of process redefine the self-touring experience. However, the real game-changer lies in UTour's pioneering AI Assistants.

Topics: self-guided tours ai assistants best practices new homes sales
2 min read

Revolutionizing the Model Home Tour Experience with UTour

By UTour Digital Media Team on Oct 10, 2023 10:22:44 AM

With the rapid advancements in technology, the traditional ways of touring new homes are undergoing a significant transformation. UTour, the leading self-tour platform for the new home industry, has been at the forefront of this change, offering innovative self-guided home tours to enhance the model home experience.

Topics: self-guided tours faqs best practices new homes sales
3 min read

Self-Guided Tours: Empowering Homebuilder Sales Teams, Not Replacing Them

By UTour Digital Media Team on May 9, 2023 10:36:07 AM

The real estate industry has seen a significant shift in recent years, with technology playing an increasingly important role in the home buying process, accelerated by COVID-19's impact on consumer behavior. UTour’s self-guided home tour platform is one of these technological innovations to disrupt the traditional process to make home shopping easier, smarter, and more efficient. It helps builders sell more homes and allows home shoppers to find their dream homes on their terms.

Topics: self-guided tours faqs best practices new homes sales
2 min read

Maximizing Self-Tours: Best Practices for Homebuilders

By UTour Digital Media Team on Apr 3, 2023 12:30:11 PM

The new home industry is continually evolving and embracing technology as homebuilders across the nation embrace offering self-guided tours of their models and inventory homes to generate more verified, quality leads, improve the home shopping experience and overcome staffing issues.

Topics: self-guided tours faqs best practices new homes sales
2 min read

How to Integrate UTour Into Your Sales Process

By UTour Digital Media Team on Feb 8, 2023 4:10:57 PM

As a builder, you know that when you provide a great homebuying experience, shoppers purchase more homes. You also know that self-guided tours have revolutionized the homebuying experience for builders and shoppers alike.

But with so many responsibilities and such little time, builders often don’t have the bandwidth to launch a new self-guided tour initiative. We are here to help.

UTour makes it easy for builders like you to offer a truly unrivaled on-demand self-guided tour solution to your shoppers to make their homebuying experience less stressful and more enjoyable. Additionally, UTour provides your sales team with incomparable on-demand insights into the interactions shoppers had with your home, arming you with the information to help you sell more homes.

In order to integrate with UTour, homebuilders only need to follow these five simple steps.

1. Add UTour Technology to Your Homes

Select the desired homes available for self-guided tours. Install a Z-Wave lock plus a UTour Hub or compatible control panel (i.e., Qolsys, Honeywell, 2GIG, etc.) in each home. UTour’s responsive and dedicated support staff can guide your team on the installation process, or we can even handle the installation for you for a small additional fee.

2. Promote UTour Homes Through Your Marketing Materials

Through the UTour Builder Portal, you can generate a community-specific or home-specific QR code and URLs to integrate into your marketing and advertising efforts to engage home shoppers via email, search, signage, social media, etc.

3. Prepare Your Team for Upcoming Tours

Select your team members who will receive automated notifications and reports about your self-guided tours and Visitors. These notifications include Tour Scheduled, Tour Reminder, Tour in Progress, Missed Tour, Tour Complete and more.

4. Review Post-Tour Information

Following each self-tour, your team will receive a detailed report in your CRM system and in the UTour Builder Portal that includes but is not limited to:

  • Complete, verified contact information
  • Tour Duration
  • Locations they self-toured
  • Interaction with the Self-Tour Assistant, if installed

 

5. Execute Post-Tour Nurture Campaign

After a self-tour is completed, the home shopper receives automated emails and text notifications with your sales team’s contact information. These notifications encourage them to connect with your team to move forward in the home buying process or if they have any questions about the home they just toured.

Topics: self-guided tours best practices new homes sales
2 min read

Make a Resolution to be Adaptable in 2023

By UTour Digital Media Team on Jan 20, 2023 3:06:40 PM

The conclusion of 2022 was not kind to homebuilders, and if most predictions hold true, the next 12 months look to be challenging as well. While it is natural to turn to past successes when developing your 2023 marketing plan, the current market conditions will dictate a different approach. 

While that may seem to be a negative, all is not lost. New ideas and change may be the very things your marketing plan has been in need of for some time. In fact, it is number one on our list of tips to optimize your marketing plan in the new year. Embrace change to make the new year a success.

Tips to Optimize Your 2023 Marketing Plan

  1. Embrace Change: Change is hard, but the likelihood of limited resources may force marketers like you to be more creative in your planning for the year. So be open to new ideas, different technologies and unique tactics. Embracing change offers the possibility of adopting a new and successful marketing strategy that you otherwise may not have explored. This year offers a great opportunity to be the first builder in your area to adopt a successful new marketing tactic before others do the same.

  2. Know and Understand Your Numbers: While it is important to monitor numbers like lead volumes and advertising metrics, it is just as critical to do a deeper dive to understand lead-to-tour rates, lead-to-appointment rates, appointment-to-sale rates and your local market activity. Knowing that information will only help you spend your marketing dollars and resources more efficiently.

  3. Create Content: Great content is the best way to bolster your paid advertising efforts to convert leads and meaningful sales appointments (and help your sales team overcome buyer objections). If your paid advertising budgets are cut this year, investing the time into creating compelling content should be a winning strategy.

For your marketing plan to be successful in 2023, you will have to sharpen your problem-solving skills and resourcefulness in all areas. As new home marketers, we must embrace this challenge as an opportunity, and in the famous words of Jim Rohn, “Don’t wish it were easier, wish you were better.”

Topics: self-guided tours new home marketing best practices
2 min read

Meeting Buyers Where They Are in an Uncertain Housing Market

By UTour Digital Media Team on Nov 2, 2022 1:29:59 PM

Starting in May of this year, rising interest rates, record-setting inflation and increased home prices have understandably made home shoppers nervous about pulling the trigger on buying a new home. However, the data tells us that home search activity remains strong despite this shift in the market. While homebuilders continue to market and advertise to meet their sales goals for the end of the year, they should consider utilizing solutions like UTour that allow their buyers to control their home shopping experience and commit when ready. 

A “No Pressure” Sales Environment

Home buyers want to tour a new home without a salesperson so they can experience the home on their terms and feel confident before taking the next step. With UTour, potential buyers can schedule a self-tour that fits their schedule and can even book numerous home tours if they choose to. If they have any questions during their self-tour of the home, they can contact a salesperson directly. UTour empowers home shoppers to start the buying process when they are ready, which is more important than ever with the current climate.

Quantity AND Quality 

When using UTour, the quality of prospective homebuyer leads that self-tour homes are much higher than traditional “eLeads” — even if home shoppers are looking more casually for a home. Traditional internet leads only provide minimal information such as a name, an email address and, occasionally, a phone number.

With UTour, when a home shopper clicks the “Schedule a Self-Tour” button on a builder's website or an integrated ILS listing such as Zillow, they are directed to a white-labeled scheduling site to select a date and time to self-tour the home. As part of the self-tour scheduling process, UTour requires each visitor to register and verify their identity with a government-issued photo ID (e.g., driver’s license) or a credit/debit card. In addition, authentication of their mobile phone number is also required. 

This visitor registration allows UTour to provide a comprehensive data record for every visitor including​​ their self-tour history and accurate contact information so your team can connect with them.

UTour also boasts an open ecosystem, meaning that the platform seamlessly integrates with many CRM software systems. When UTour integrates with a builder’s CRM system, Tour and Visitor data can be ingested directly into their CRM system in real-time.

Join the UTour Ranks

Since its inception, UTour has represented the industry’s most robust on-demand self-tour solution and builders have taken notice of this. Many of the top builders in the United States and Canada have utilized UTour to help their customers confidently, and conveniently, access their new homes and have meaningful conversations with a salesperson when they're ready to move forward. With the list of builders continuing to grow to meet the needs of homebuyers in a changing market, utilizing UTour has become a valuable, and expected, tool in the new home sales experience.

Want to hear more and see how UTour can help your communities? Schedule a private demo with our team today.

Topics: self-guided tours best practices new homes sales lead generation
2 min read

Model Home Short-Staffed? Self-Touring Technology Can Be Your Solution.

By UTour Digital Media Team on Apr 13, 2022 11:38:10 AM

Most (if not all) homebuilder sales teams have struggled with staffing model home or community sales centers at some point. From sudden departures to unexpected sick days, keeping your model home staffed and ready for home shoppers 7 days a week is no small feat — especially during the unprecedented “Great Resignation” experienced over the past year.

Luckily, model homes no longer have to be staffed daily to cater to modern home shoppers. By enabling self-guided tour technology in your model home, visitors can independently explore without a sales representative present — even before or after normal sales center hours. 

A Positive Experience for Your Shoppers 

One of the key elements of traditional guided model home tours is having the sales representative share details about the home and community while leading the home shopper through the model. This important experience is also included in self-guided tours, although reimagined to utilize technology instead. 

During self-guided tours, your visitors can get more information in a number of ways. You can set up and integrate a virtual assistant using smart home devices in different rooms. This will allow home shoppers to interact during the tour and receive audible answers to their questions. 

Another option is utilizing the self-tour text assistant, which can conduct the same automated, builder-approved Q&A via SMS text on the visitor’s smartphone. This platform also allows home shoppers to continue engaging via text even after the self-guided tour ends. 

The A.I. voice and text technologies are able to connect the home shopper to the builder’s team as requested. And, you can personalize these messages — and see all self-tour data — directly in your UTour dashboard.

A Positive Experience for Your Sales Team

Once self-guided touring is activated in the models and inventory homes, you will also start seeing the benefits it brings to your sales team as well. And being able to utilize self-guided tours in your model home when your sales associates have the day off is only the start of what’s possible with this technology. 

You can also implement self-guided touring before and after standard model sales center hours. The reality is that 10am to 6pm doesn’t work for a lot of modern home shoppers. Increasing your hours of availability can help you cast a wider net and reach a new segment of home shoppers who otherwise may have never visited on site. 

UTour’s fully-integrated platform will also make life easier for your sales managers. They’ll have access to all of your visitor data, which can also be seamlessly connected to your CRM. Even home security will be handled through our integrations with leading security platforms such as Alarm.com, ADT and Resideo. The added peace of mind will be priceless for everyone on your team. 

Because of self-guided tours, your sales representatives will have more time to dedicate to top prospects looking to transact. UTour will take care of new leads entering the sales funnel by allowing them to explore the early stages of the new home sales process independently on their own schedule. When they reach your sales team, home shoppers will have already completed their initial discovery and ready to take next steps. 

Want to hear more and see how UTour can help in your communities? Schedule a private demo with our team today or download our complimentary white paper: “The Guide to Self-Guided Model Home Tours.”

Topics: self-guided tours new home marketing best practices new homes sales
2 min read

Why Stop at One? What You Need to Know About Multi-Home Tours

By UTour Digital Media Team on Oct 11, 2021 11:52:42 AM

If you’ve been utilizing our self-guided home tours at your communities for a while now, you know that UTour is constantly working to innovate and improve the experience for both homebuilders and home shoppers. Our newest feature continues to do just that. Now, visitors can schedule a self-guided tour reservation that lets them explore multiple homes while using a single entry access code. Here are some of the biggest benefits you’ll see when you launch this feature in your communities:

Topics: self-guided tours new home marketing best practices lead generation