ILG Blog

Article originally posted on builderonline.com

Homebuilders can harness the power of industry-leading insights with cutting-edge technology.

Data analytics isn’t merely a nice-to-have feature for professionals working in the home building industry — it’s a powerful tool that drives efficiencies from the showroom to the boardroom and builds a customer experience that boosts sales and satisfaction.

The power of this technology is clear: Interior Logic Group (ILG) data insights reveal that home buyers spend 3 hours on average online before their design appointment, and options sales tend to be about 30% higher when online design tools are used.

Let’s look at one practical example of how data boosts efficiency in a traditional showroom environment:

A buyer sits down with a designer to customize the kitchen in their new home. After some conversation to gauge the tastes and budget of the customer, the designer presents three or four backsplash options, for example, and after some discussion, a decision is made.

The process is important, but subjective and time-consuming, putting pressure on both the buyer to quickly make choices and the designer to understand the buyer’s tastes and spending limits.

Virtual design platforms have enabled designers to add a valuable step into the process before the buyer ever enters the showroom. This technology allows buyers to investigate — at their leisure — all the options and create their customized dream kitchen in a virtual space before engaging with the designer. This technology also enables the designer to develop a truly informed understanding of the buyer’s preferences and how they fit into the overarching trends in the marketplace. The buyer knows what they want when they walk into the showroom and the designer can have the selected samples ready to review and can focus the conversation on budget and manage the customer experience.

The data gathered by the platform is not only helpful to the buyer and designer, but also to the home builder. There’s tremendous value in understanding which products buyers ultimately choose, which ones are never selected, and which products are frequently viewed but never selected.

Robust, instant, customized daily insights and reporting are just some of the features that appealed to Ben Clarke, Vice President of National Home Gallery, Options, and Customer Experience at Richmond American Homes, who recently began working with Roomored, the nation’s leading virtual sales and design platform.

“While a lot of home builders are moving away from personalization in favor of pre-packaged design options, Richmond American Homes is always looking for solutions that allow our customers to retain their creative vision in a way that’s cost-effective for us,” says Clarke. “In service of those goals, we’re very data-centric, so Roomored’s virtual sales and design platform checked all the boxes in helping Richmond American build to our maximum potential.”

As a national business, Clark says, Richmond American Homes works with its regional design centers to analyze sales data and various trends to find the right combination of product offerings. Adding a virtual design platform to their tech stack enables decision-makers to act swiftly with powerful information.

“Roomored will give us info on what buyers like but aren’t buying. That information is useful because it will allow us to ask questions like ‘Are we offering the right mix of options?’ ‘Are we pricing options correctly?’ ” says Clarke. “We expect Roomored to help our organization analyze more objective data with ease and gives us agility and confidence in our forecasting and product rationalization, which has a big knock-on effect with our sourcing and manufacturing partners.”

With modern solutions like Roomored, home builders can harness the power of industry-leading insights and forward-looking strategies that help them understand which products buyers value. With that knowledge, home builders can ensure they’ve got the right products available at the right price at the right time. All of which drives design center efficiency and optimizes outcomes.

Learn more at Roomored.com.

Whether you’re a builder interested in upgrading your home design process or already getting started with Roomored Design Online, you’ve come to the right place. As you may already know, Roomored’s virtual design technology is a first of its kind, immersive online platform that can streamline the home design process. Design Online allows interior designers and homebuyers to access their builder’s entire catalog of design finishes and apply them instantaneously to their unique floor plan, creating an incredibly realistic 3D visualization experience. And with such innovative technology, comes a wide variety of bells and whistles to help homebuyers express their preferences. From the “favorites” and “search” features to the social media and email share functionality, there are so many components that increase efficiency and make this platform such a game changer for interior designers and homebuyers alike. Keep reading to familiarize yourself with the top 6 Design Online features and be sure to follow us on Instagram to stay up to date on our latest and greatest product enhancements (@roomored).

1. Design Inspiration Packages

Design inspiration packages are customized combinations of photo-real countertops, cabinets, flooring, backsplash, and more, that homebuyers can select as a starting point to inspire their design. Your interior design team can create these and apply a specific package when sending a homebuyer their individual Design Online link, based on their unique style/preferences. For example, if your homebuyer is a big fan of neutrals, our “Taupe-tastic” design inspiration package might be a good starting point for them (shown below).

2. Favorites Feature

The favorites feature allows designers and homebuyers to favorite, or heart, the finish options they find the most appealing. This empowers users to easily find their favorite finishes while browsing through thousands of photo-real options. Each finish option a user favorites is easily identifiable by the red heart shown on the right side of the finish thumbnail, or by clicking the “Favorites” tab (shown below). Plus, every finish option a homebuyer favorites appears on the designer dashboard, so your interior design team knows exactly what a buyer likes before they even arrive in the design center.

3. Search Feature

The search feature allows your designers and homebuyers to type consumer-friendly terms, including colors, materials, patterns, and more, into the search bar to narrow down selections and easily find the specific finish options they’re looking for. For example, users can type in “blue,” “mosaic,” or “subway” to find specific backsplash finish options, like in the image shown below.

4. Finish Option Details

Not only can Design Online users visualize 1,000+ photo-real product options within an immersive online experience, but our platform also highlights the product information for those options. So when your interior designers and homebuyers decide on a blue mosaic backsplash like the one shown below, all they have to do is click the “details” button and they’ll find all of the information needed to order the exact product.

5. Design Viewpoints

Roomored Design Online is the only truly 3D visualization technology in the marketplace. It boasts infinite finishes AND the ability to design from multiple vantage points, which provides a better overall design experience and allows your buyer to view their home from multiple angles – just like real life! This ensures that your interior designers and homebuyers can visualize exactly what each finish looks like within their specific floor plan, as well as when it’s combined with other finishes. See examples below!

6. Review & Share Functionality

The Design Online Review & Share page allows users to easily view all of their saved designs and the list of finish options they selected within each design. Plus, there are social sharing buttons, as well as email sharing functionality, so your interior designers and homebuyers can easily share with coworkers, friends, and family. The Review & Share page also has the favorites feature mentioned above, which allows users to favorite their top designs; this definitely comes in handy when you can create an unlimited number of designs!

As you can see, Roomored’s virtual design technology is full of innovative features and functionality that truly streamline the home design process. Plus, we’re always updating our Design Online platform to further increase efficiency and improve our clients’ experience. For more information on Roomored Design Online or other product offerings, visit www.roomored.com or email us at [email protected].

Article originally posted on builderonline.com

Shea Homes differentiates itself from the competition with a visualization platform to boost customer satisfaction.

With all of the uncertainty that 2020 has cast over the world, it’s no surprise that so many people are focused on their home—one of the few remaining safe havens in a challenging environment.

For builders, this requires a more in-depth understanding of how buyers seek to nurture and protect their most prized possessions: their families and their homes. Today’s buyers want an accurate, visual experience for home selection and design—and they want the option to do it all online.

Home Building Solutions in the Age of the Coronavirus

With people placing a greater emphasis on making their house a space that’s truly theirs, it’s not enough to provide only a showroom and model home experience. Homebuyers want to genuinely understand how their choices will impact their everyday living experience, particularly as so many are using their home for additional functions—as a workplace or classroom, for example—beyond traditional uses.

They want a more customized, realistic view of their future home, which is available only from builders that have embraced visualization technology.

Roomored’s online design tools provide unlimited finish options, including flooring, cabinets, and countertops, enabling builders to offer real-time product design and selections directly to homebuyers — without the customer having to ever enter a design center, showroom, or model home.

Quick, Capable, Efficient Technology

When COVID-19 shut down much of the homebuilding industry in mid-March, Shea Homes, an industry leader known for its commitment to innovation, was already leveraging online design solutions. Ken Peterson, Shea’s vice president of sales and marketing, notes that the use of Roomored’s virtual platform provides “unparalleled fidelity and speed” when it comes to model home designs, and it puts Shea ahead of the competition.

“We were looking for ways to use technology to streamline the design process,” says Peterson. “After years of research and first-hand experience, I understood that customers were overwhelmed. The pandemic didn’t make it easier to narrow down your home customization options.”

They want a more customized, realistic view of their future home, which is available only from builders that have embraced visualization technology.

Roomored’s online design tools provide unlimited finish options, including flooring, cabinets, and countertops, enabling builders to offer real-time product design and selections directly to homebuyers — without the customer having to ever enter a design center, showroom, or model home.

After adopting Roomored, Peterson says Shea changed the way it does business, cutting back on its dependence on model homes and design centers. “Customers want to see their exact homes with all their options, not static renderings designed in AutoCAD,” he says. “We’ve seen quicker sales, more satisfied customers, and more confident and frequent upgrades.”

Many builders are doing away with model homes altogether in favor of virtual modeling, touring, and home customization. Builders like Shea Homes are also using this technology to build intelligence for future planning and to keep projects on track with reliable, automated fulfillment—guaranteeing the right products are procured with the right volumes and at the right prices.

“We don’t have this tech only because it’s cool,” says Peterson. “We have it because it solves business problems—like those presented by COVID-19—and it makes selling homes, products, and services easier.”

Visualization tools that help convert shoppers to buyers are now available and easy to add to the homebuilding process. Learn how Roomored can propel home sales and customer satisfaction at Roomored.com.

Now that you’ve added Roomored virtual tours to your website (congrats!), it’s time to show them off by attracting prospective home buyers. Below you’ll find 3 effective ways to drive traffic to your virtual tours, which can increase your session count, overall engagement, and leads generated.

Paid Search Advertising

Running pay-per-click ads on search engines, like Google, is one of the most effective ways to drive traffic to your website and Roomored virtual tours. “Search ads allow you to anticipate the wants, needs, and desires of your potential customers and serve ads to them that are highly contextual.” According to Neil Patel, paid search ads are one of the biggest drivers of ROI. In fact, advertisers make $8 for every $1 they spend on Google Ads on average, according to Hubspot.

The advertising on search engines combines the targeting capabilities available on social media platforms, like location and demographics, with the search terms (a.k.a. keywords) your target audience is typing into their search bar. It really doesn’t get more targeted than that! Plus, users are highly motivated to click. Once people get to a search engine, they’re “looking for something specific and will click on the first result they believe is going to be the most helpful to them.” According to Moz, the first page of Google captures 71% of search traffic clicks and has been reported to be as high as 92% in recent years. Second-page results are far from a close second coming in at below 6% of all website clicks.

It’s incredibly easy to measure and track your PPC ad performance, too. All you have to do is connect the Google Ads tool to your Google Analytics account, and you can analyze and adjust keywords to improve your performance over time.

For more information on paid advertising, including keyword research and how to get started, click here.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is another great way to drive traffic to your virtual tours. It’s an inexpensive, yet effective way to reach prospective home buyers and encourage them to take a certain action, like taking a virtual tour. In fact, many Roomored customers have successfully implemented drip email campaigns to increase virtual tour sessions and overall engagement.

You can target specific contacts by segmenting your contact database into lists based on interests, lifecycle stage, demographics, and more. From there, you can create and A/B test a variety of email campaigns to find out what content is the most effective at driving traffic to your tours.

Not only is email marketing an effective way to drive traffic, but it’s also a great way to follow-up with the leads your Roomored virtual tours generate. Setting up an automated email campaign that is triggered once a contact converts will streamline engagement and move potential home buyers further through your sales funnel.

For information on email marketing best practices, click here.

Social Media Advertising

According to Hubspot, every month, there are nearly 2.5 billion active users on Facebook, 1 billion on Instagram, and 330 million on Twitter worldwide. Take a moment to let those numbers sink in. “Because of the sheer number of active users on these platforms, advertising spend invested in social media channels is at an all-time high and projected to exceed $8.5 billion this year.” Many of those active users will be looking for a home in the future, whether they start tomorrow or in 3 years, and this is your opportunity to get in front of them and increase brand awareness.

Social media advertising on platforms like Facebook and Instagram allows you to reach a very specific audience through their unique targeting capabilities. In fact, you can get as granular as location, age, gender, and user interests, like “new home sales” or “interior design.” Plus, there’s a wide range of ad types, including photo ads, video ads, story ads, and more, to capture your audience’s attention. The best part? Your Roomored virtual tours come with high-res imagery and walk-through videos, which can serve as eye-catching ad content for driving traffic to your virtual tours.

To learn more about social media advertising and the most popular social media platforms, click here.

Whether it’s through paid search advertising, social media advertising, or email marketing, driving traffic to your virtual tours is an effective way to increase overall engagement and ROI. For more best practices and information on Roomored products, click here and keep an eye out for our next blog post!

Full article is available to read on constructutopia.com

Homebuilding and multifamily construction has seen a recent boom in virtual home sales and design solutions. Roomored COO Chan Walker and client Shea Homes share insights into the conveniences and opportunities that virtual sales and design software offers homebuilders and their customers in today’s socially distanced world and beyond.

Read more on constructutopia.com