Introduction

Customer expectations are a set of behaviors that individuals expect to receive when interacting with a company.

Today, with the presence of big corporations such as Amazon, Spotify and Netflix, a new set of expectations is settling in. Modern customers today expect proactive service, personalized interactions, and connected experiences across channels.

Innovative companies that push the evolution of technology tend to implement new ways of doing business that sets the tone for other businesses to follow.

Jonathan Cohen, Director of Relocation Services at RealtySouth, turned to Roof AI to meet such customer demands. With Roof AI, the RealtySouth team reimagined their online experience to exceed customer expectations.

The results were remarkable and immediate. After only a few months of implementation, RealtySouth managed to get the following results:

• Lead capture for internet opportunities increased by 95% in a single month.

• For the same month, RealtySouth achieved a 3x in ROI on Roof AI.

• RealtySouth unlocked mortgage capture, generating 160 new financing opportunities in the first couple of months.

  

  “Roof AI has no doubt helped us rapidly expand our support of online consumers. In addition to experiencing an immediate increase in referrals vetted, we also learned quickly about the ability to introduce these consumers to other products and services including mortgage. Definitely excited to see how much Roof AI has meant to us down the road as we grow with them strategically.”

  Jonathan Cohen, Director of Relocation Services

The Problem

‘Customer expectations’ are like a moving target. The faster the technological advancements the faster these expectations change.

Today’s customers have the highest expectations yet. Proactive service, personalized interactions, and connected experiences across channels.

It’s not that customers expect so much of businesses. The reality is that today’s customers expect companies to understand and care about them as individuals, and treat them accordingly.

The problem however is that businesses do not have the tools to deliver on such expectations. About half of customers say most companies fall short of their expectations for great experiences.

Like any other business, RealtySouth knew they had to optimize their online experience to manage 3 important customer expectations:

1. Customers expect to be treated like a human, not a number: Personalize everything.

• 84% of customers say being treated like a person, not a number, is very important to winning their business. *
• 59% of customers say tailored engagement based on past interactions is very important to winning their business. *

2. Customers expect immediate, responsive service.

• 66% of millennial consumers expect real-time responses and interactions. *

3. Customers expected connected journeys between business units.

• 70% of customers say connected processes — such as seamless handoffs or contextualized engagement based on earlier interactions are very important to winning their business. *
• Customers are 3.7x more likely to view seamless transitions between channels as important versus unimportant. *

To meet customer expectations, RealtySouth needed a solution that was able to

• Gather important data points to help understand who the client is and personalize the online experience for them.
• Provide real-time self-serve options for repetitive inquiries.
• Integrate the different business units to deliver a unified and connected experience.

That’s when they turned to Roof AI.

The Execution

A- Automatically personalize the home-search process based on user online activity and buying preferences.

Roof AI’s approach is to use data to help personify RealtySouth’s web visitors to understand exactly what their needs are and what they are looking for.

This data consists of online activity, buying preferences and the interactions a visitor has with Roof AI. Dynamic user profiles are then built in the system to help determine how to interact with the customer.

Armed with that information, RealtySouth - using the Roof AI solution - can provide a personalized experience that spans over the lifespan of the home-search process. During that time, Roof AI will keep monitoring the customer’s activity, detect any change in their needs and personalize the experience accordingly.

This personalization strategy is utilized to send accurate listing recommendations that are proven to be more effective and more likely for customers to interact with.

B- Offer customers self-serve options and answer inquiries in real-time.

According to some Salesforce findings *, 64% of consumers and 80% of business buyers said they expect companies to respond to and interact with them in real-time.

It’s becoming more pressing for businesses to meet those customer expectations.

While many real estate sites direct you to fill out a contact form and wait a few hours/days to get inquiries answered, Jonathan and the RealtySouth team used Roof AI’s AI-powered assistant to provide instant answers and give customers self-service capabilities right on the website.

80% of consumers report that immediate responses to requests influence their loyalty to a given brand. *

With Roof AI’s customer service skills, the RealtySouth team was able to provide value to their customers in ways they couldn't do before.

• Schedule showings on the spot
• Get pre-approved for financing
• Answer customer inquiries instantly
• Connect clients with the customer care team for general inquiries
• And make sure to follow up when agents can’t.

C- Encourage further buy-in by autonomously promoting affiliate services to customers.

Netflix, Amazon, Spotify all use activity data to personalize the experience for their customers. They learn from their user’s previous activity to improve the next session.

By 2020, 75% of business buyers expect that companies can anticipate their needs and make relevant suggestions before they initiate contact. *

Not only that but customers expect companies to deliver predictive and anticipatory service in a consistent and seamless experience.

Today, this is becoming the drive for customer loyalty.

Jonathan and the RealtySouth team know that as customers look to the future, they will increasingly expect real estate companies to leverage their data to provide anticipatory services.

To effectively predict and prescribe actions for their customers, the team used Roof AI’s customer data intelligence and predictive algorithms to promote their different services at the right time.

For example, RealtySouth are able to promote their real estate agents when home- shoppers mentioned that they weren’t working with one.

For home-shoppers who were interested in visiting properties, RealtySouth promoted their mortgage services and managed to convert 13% of those home- shoppers into new mortgage opportunities.

The Results

The only way to meet customer expectations today is through the use of technology. Personalization, customer self-service, and connected journeys need tools that can gather valuable customer data, understand it and translate it into actionable interactions that match the customer’s needs.

With Roof AI, RealtySouth were able to personalize the home-buying journey for their customers, provide excellent frontline customer service and give clients a simple yet connected experience through the seamless promotion of their affiliate services.

Doing that enabled Jonathan Cohen, the Relocation Director at RealtySouth, to achieve great results for RealtySouth:

• Lead capture for internet opportunities increased by 95% in a single month.
• For the same month, RealtySouth achieved a 3x in ROI on Roof AI.
• RealtySouth unlocked mortgage capture, generating 160 new financing opportunities in the first couple of months.

(*) Source: https://www.salesforce.com/research/customer-expectations/