If you’re in the real estate business, you know that success depends on generating leads and converting them into clients. To do that, you need to advertise. But with so many channels and options available, how do you know which ones are working and which ones aren’t? That’s where call tracking comes in. Call tracking allows you to see which of your advertising efforts are driving phone calls – and, more importantly, which ones are driving sales.
What is Call Tracking?
Before we dive in, let’s start with the basics: what is call tracking? In short, marketing call tracking is a technology that allows businesses to track and measure the effectiveness of their advertising campaigns by attributing phone calls to specific marketing channels. This attribution lets businesses see which campaign sources are generating the most leads—so they can adjust their budget and focus accordingly.
How Does Call Tracking Work?
Call tracking works by assigning unique phone numbers to each of your advertising campaigns. With most call tracking systems, you place a snippet of code on your website which replaces your business number with a call tracking number based on the source the user came through (Dynamic number insertion). When someone sees your ad and calls that number, the call tracking system will record information about the call, such as the date, time, duration, source of the call and other details useful for marketing. This information is then stored in a database where you can access it anytime you want.
The Benefits of Call Tracking for Your Real Estate Business
Allocate Your Advertising Budget More Effectively
There are several benefits of using call tracking in your real estate business. Perhaps the most obvious benefit is that it can help you understand which of your marketing channels are driving phone calls so that you can make better decisions about where to allocate your advertising budget. For example, if you see that most of your incoming calls are coming from Instagram ads, then you know that your ad spend is effective and you should invest more there vs other channels. By contrast, if you see that most of your incoming calls are coming from print ads rather than online, then you know that your ad spend is not as effective and you should consider redirecting those funds.
Identify Call Trends
In addition to helping you determine which ads are working, call tracking can also help you identify patterns in the calls you’re receiving. For example, if you notice that most of your calls come during business hours, that’s an indication that your marketing efforts are reaching people who are already interested in buying or selling a property. On the other hand, if most of your calls come during evening hours or on weekends, that could be an indication that your ads are reaching people who haven’t yet decided whether or not to make a move.
Enhance Your Website Journey & Purchase Flow
Using call tracking software can help improve customer experience. It provides you with valuable insights about your current and potential customers’ behaviors and preferences. For example, it can help you pinpoint where users are dropping off in the customer journey and why. This allows you to identify bottlenecks or other issues that may be preventing customers from taking action. With this data in hand, you can take actionable steps towards improving your websites and purchase flows so that customers have an enjoyable user experience from beginning to end. Furthermore, by gaining access to detailed analytics about customer queries over the phone, your can ensure that your content reflects what matters most to their audience—and ultimately leads them towards making a purchase decision.
Improve Customer Experience on Phone Calls
Using call tracking software also has many benefits for businesses looking to improve their customer phone call experience. For starters, it helps identify areas where improvements can be made in order to enhance customer service interaction over the phone. It also makes it easier for businesses to measure performance metrics like average wait times or total number of calls handled each month. With these insights, professionals can easily detect issues that may be hindering their ability to provide a great customer experience; such as long wait times or insufficient product knowledge by agents. Finally, it allows companies to personalize each individual interaction based on the specific needs of their customers—which leads to higher loyalty ratings and better overall engagement levels with customers.
Optimize Lead Conversion Rates
The key benefit of using call-tracking software is that it gives you insight into why certain phone leads are not converting. By analyzing the data from past phone calls, you can identify patterns that indicate why some leads aren’t converting successfully and then adjust your marketing strategy or sales process accordingly. For example, if you’re running an ad campaign and you notice that people are calling but not converting, then you can use the data from the call-tracking software to figure out why that’s happening. Are they asking too many questions or not enough? Are they asking questions that suggest they don’t understand what you offer? Or maybe your ad doesn’t reflect clearly what is being offered. Answering these types of questions can help you refine your approach so that more leads convert into sales.
You can also analyze lost leads by identifying patterns such as common objections or questions being asked by potential customers during the sales process—information that could be used to improve your pitch or adjust pricing strategies accordingly. This data is invaluable for helping real estate agents make informed decisions about their lead generation efforts and ensure they are using the most effective strategies possible for converting more inbound phone call leads into loyal customers.
In addition to this, some call tracking solutions allow you to build retargeting segments based on certain characteristics of the phone call, including key phrases mentioned. Example, you can retarget someone who inquires about condos with your condo listings.
Call Tracking Is Also Good for Client Retention
In addition to helping generate new leads and increase lead conversion rates, using call-tracking software can also help retain existing clients by giving you insight into their customer service experience. By listening in on customer conversations, you can get a better understanding of their needs and concerns—which will give you an opportunity to address any issues before they become bigger problems down the road.
Optimizing Campaigns with Call Data
Call tracking can help you improve your advertising campaigns by giving you insights into what keywords or ad copy are driving phone calls. For example, if you see that a certain keyword is driving a lot of phone calls, then you know that it is an effective keyword and you should consider increasing bids on it. Alternatively, if you see that a certain piece of ad copy is driving a lot of phone calls, then you know that it is an effective piece of ad copy and you should consider using it more often in your ads.
If you want to boost your real estate business, call tracking is a valuable tool that can help you see which of your advertising efforts are actually paying off. By understanding which ads are working and which aren’t, you can save money while still generating leads and closing deals.
Get Started with Call Tracking
Finding the Right Call Tracking Solution for Your Business
If you’re in the process of shopping for a call tracking solution for your business, you might be feeling a little overwhelmed. There are dozens of different providers out there, all promising the same thing: the ability to track and measure your marketing campaign performance so you can make data-driven decisions about where to allocate your resources. But with so many options on the market, how do you know which one is right for you? Here are a few factors to consider when evaluating different call tracking solutions. This should hep you find the one that best fits your needs.
The first step in choosing a call tracking solution is deciding what, exactly, you want to track. Do you want to track inbound calls? Outbound calls? Calls from specific marketing campaigns or channels? Different providers offer different capabilities, so it’s important to understand what you need before beginning your search. For example, some providers might offer call recording while others don’t. If recorded calls are important to you, then that’s something you’ll want to keep an eye out for.
Comprehensive Reporting & Analytics – Consider Your Reporting Needs
Once you know what you want to track, it’s time to think about your reporting needs. What kind of data do you want access to? How often do you need reports? In what format do you need them (e.g., Excel, PDF)? Do you need the data sent to another reporting platform automatically?
If you’re running marketing campaigns, you know how important have granular data is to help you make informed decisions to reach your goals. Some call tracking providers only offer campaign level data. Ask the provider for sample reports and confirm with them how granular their call attribution capabilities are. Are you able to see the Channel, Source, Campaign, Keyword, calling page, caller location? All of these can be very useful for optimizing your marketing campaigns, determining how to allocate budgets and even for your sales process.
Some providers offer real-time reporting while others don’t. Some offer customizable reports while others have pre-set report templates. Be sure to understand your reporting needs before beginning your search so you can eliminate any providers that don’t offer the features or capabilities you’re looking for. A good call tracking solution will provide you with valuable insights into your calling data through reporting and analytics tools. This way, you can adjust your marketing campaigns accordingly and maximize your return on investment (ROI).
Reliability
This should be one of the main factors you consider when evaluating call tracking providers. When it comes to something as important as lead generation, you can’t afford for there to be any hiccups. Your call tracking solution should be reliable—meaning it should have uptime around 99.9%. If it doesn’t, you’ll miss calls and won’t be able to track them properly. You want to ensure that the solution you’re using has regular backups and a comprehensive plan in place if the system were to go down. In addition, look for a company that is backed by a team of customer support experts who are always there to help if you have any questions or run into any problems.
Pricing Model & Usage Charges – Determine Your Budget Requirements
Next, it’s time to think about money. How much are you willing or able to spend on a call tracking solution? Fortunately, there are plenty of affordable options on the market today. However, make sure to consider not only the upfront cost but also any additional fees, such as fees for support or training, integration fees. Also, be sure to find out if there are any discounts available (ex: for prepaying or signing a long-term contract). Or are there free trials? Some providers charge per minute while others charge per call or per month. Be sure to understand how each provider charges so you can accurately compare costs across different solutions. You’ll also want to look out for fees such as per minute transcript and recording fees.
Integrations
A good call tracking solution should integrate with the software you already use. Ensure that it integrates easily with with your customer relationship management (CRM) system and your advertising software. This way, you can automatically populate your CRM with call data and create targeted ads based on information gathered from calls. Here are some key integrations to look out for:
- CRM
- Advertising Platforms (Google Ads, Facebook, etc.)
- Web Analytics Tools (Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics)
- Email Marketing & Automation tools
If a call tracking system can’t integrate with the other systems you use, it’s not worth your time or money.
Call Recording and transcriptions
This is a must! Most call tracking solutions allow you to record and save your calls, as well as transcribe them so that you can reference them later. This is extremely helpful when it comes to evaluating your inbound call handling process. It allows you to track calls and collect data about customer behavior. This data can be used to identify areas of improvement and target marketing efforts. Additionally, call recordings can be used to review calls for quality assurance purposes or to provide training for new real estate agents or staff members on how to handle inbound calls. From a marketing standpoint, it enables you to see whether certain points in the customer’s journey needs to be adjusted. Call transcription provides a written record of customer interactions, which can be useful for training employees or for conducting quality assurance. It can also be useful for businesses that need to provide customer service in multiple languages. By transcribing calls, businesses can ensure that all customers receive the same level of service, regardless of language barriers. Call recording and transcription are invaluable features that can help you improve your operations and better serve their customers.
Call Data Protection
When dealing with things like call recordings and transcripts, it’s important to find a solution that takes data security seriously. Make sure the company has implemented robust security measures and industry-standard encryption methods to protect your calling data. After all, you don’t want your confidential caller information falling into the wrong hands! Also, see if the company offers the option to host your data in a private cloud. This will give you an extra layer of protection in case of a security breach. Ask questions like:
• Where is the data stored?
• How long do you keep data stored in your system?
• Can recordings and transcripts be deleted after a certain period of time?
• How do you ensure my call data is secure?
Customer Support
When something goes wrong (and sooner or later, it always does), you want to be able to reach someone who can help quickly and efficiently. Make sure the call tracking solution you choose offers 24/7 customer support.
Evaluate Ease of Use
One final consideration is ease of use. You don’t have time to waste messing around with a complicated system. You’ll want to find a solution that’s easy for you and your team members to set up and use on a daily basis—otherwise, it won’t matter how robust the solution is if no one ends up using it! Some things to consider include: -How easy is it to set up campaigns and track phone numbers? -How user-friendly is the interface? -What kind of training and support is offered by the provider? If possible, try out each solution yourself before making a decision—or, at the very least, get demos from each provider so you can see firsthand how easy (or difficult) each solution is to use.
Popular call tracking providers for various budgets
CallRail
Real estate is a competitive industry. In order to succeed, you need to be visible to potential clients and be able to quickly and efficiently follow up on leads. CallRail is a call tracking and analytics software that can help you do just that. CallRail allows you to track where your calls are coming from so you can see which marketing campaigns are working and which ones aren’t. You can also use CallRail to record calls and listen to them later to see how your agents are handling leads. In addition, CallRail integrates with popular CRMs like Salesforce and HubSpot, making it easy to keep track of your leads and clients. If you’re not already using CallRail in your real estate business, now is the time to start! This powerful call tracking and analytics software can help you improve lead conversion rates, save time with automatic call logging, and gain insights into your customer’s needs.
Call tracking metrics
Telemetrics
A Canadian-based company, Telmetrics
If you’re concerned about your call data being hosted outside of Canada and prefer to have a Canadian provider, then this may be a good option.
Invoca
Invoca is an AI-based call tracking solution. It’s a bit more on the pricey side, but offers some advanced capabilities you wouldn’t otherwise get with other call tracking providers. Invoca integrates with the majority of advertising, analytics and call centre solutions. You’re even able to build remarketing audiences based on call conversation insights. In addition to this, it’s AI call listening capabilities allow you to categorize calls automatically into different buckets based on your business needs. Ex: sales calls, customer support, seller-related calls, buyer-related calls, etc.
That being said, all of these call tracking solutions do have some setbacks and one of the main challenges in the call tracking industry is there are often spam calls. No matter the provider you use, be sure to monitor calls that come through and flag the spam calls when they occur.
There are a lot of factors to consider when choosing a marketing call tracking solution for your real estate business—but we hope this buyer’s guide has given you a good starting point. When comparing different solutions, be sure to keep an eye out for features like ease of use, comprehensive reporting, scalability, and customer support. With those factors in mind, we’re confident that you’ll find the perfect solution for your business needs!
