Seven Innovative Strategies for Homebuilders to Enhance Customer Care in 2025

How to Sell More Homes by Optimising the Homebuying Journey

When homebuyers start their property search, what are they looking for? 

The first items on their checklist are normally the size and location of the property.  At this point, they can often find an abundance of suitable, even beautiful homes situated in practical locations.  So, beyond planning and placemaking, as a homebuilder, what can you do to make your homes stand out?

Optimising the customer experience for any prospective buyers is one of the surest means of success for homebuilders.  And this experience starts even before their initial search begins, using a range of marketing and presales tools that bring customers flocking.

In this blog, we break down an optimal customer experience for homebuyers into seven steps that you can easily implement.

1.     Social Media Marketing and Customer Engagement

The power of implementing a social media strategy cannot be undervalued by any business.  As social media management tool Hootsuite points out, ‘Social media advertising is a brand’s best bet for reaching new audiences (or even their existing followers!).’  Using a variety of paid ads, organic posts and conversation engagement, homebuilders can drive traffic to their company’s page on the platform, as well as their website.

You might already be posting about your beautiful new homes and launches of new developments, but to stand out above your competitors, it’s important to ‘profile’ your customers to understand what they want to see from you on social media.

Customer testimonials are a great way to illustrate the quality homes and customer care your homebuyers benefit from, as are any awards or sustainability initiatives you have been recognised for.  However, to truly engage a potential customer, take note of the challenges homebuyers face, and post about how you can help your homebuyers solve those issues.

Maybe you offer a scheme to help first-time buyers, or offer to buy homes from customers who are taking their next step on the property ladder. 

Do you map the homebuying journey from the outset, so that your buyers know what to expect over the coming weeks or months?  Great! Talk about this in your social media marketing, and be sure to include a smiling member of your team, to show your potential customers the human side of your business.

‘In addition to unique, regular posts, you’ll respond to comments, likes and shares to monitor your online reputation and hopefully build a community,’ advises Forbes.  Any comments on your posts should be responded to swiftly, whether positive or negative.  Companies who are sure to consider and reply to every comment on social media are sending out a silent message to their followers that they care about every person who takes the time to read their posts and comment on them.  This is a great first impression to make on potential customers.

2.     Website Maintenance and Presales Support 

Once you’ve successfully built an online community, you will notice a lot more traffic to your website, so it is vital that it doesn’t disappoint.  This is your best opportunity to showcase your homes and visually dazzle prospective customers.  Use videos to showcase your development and homes, VR Home Tours to add a cool factor that makes the experience memorable and, vitally, ensure the experience of your website is user-friendly.  ‘According to the National Research Federation, 97% of shoppers have abandoned a purchase over a lack of convenience,’ reveals Retail Gazette.  This is not the time to lose a potential customer.  Ensure regular maintenance of your website so that all of the information is up-to-date and the images look fresh.  Advertising homes on developments where plots are no longer available is a quick way to look disorganised – and could soon deter buyers from your brand.

3.     AI-Powered Virtual Assistants and Chatbots

Implementing AI-driven chatbots for 24/7 customer support allows you to provide instant answers to any customer queries, whether that be at the initial stages of the homebuying journey, or after a buyer has moved in and wants to ask about maintenance, warranties, and the home’s features.  As IBM points out, ‘Chatbots not only respond quickly but also anticipate customer needs, deliver useful messages and recommend new products.’  In the homebuilding sector, a Chatbot could help your potential customers find their dream home on your website, by asking a series of detailed questions and finding the most suitable property within their budget.  Also, the data obtained through these interactions, could help you determine your typical client profile to get an understanding of what types of homes your buyers are really looking for.

However, as well as the use of AI Chatbots or virtual assistants, be sure that your team are ready to provide the human touch for those customers that prefer a phone call or face-to-face interaction.  Well-trained customer care representatives can do wonders for business and the reputation of your brand, so never underestimate these vital members of your organisation or what they could do to help you succeed.

4.     Create Personalised Customer Journeys

Personalising the customer experience is a known tool for increasing customer satisfaction, referrals and brand loyalty.  Buying a home is one of the largest financial investments most of us will make in our adult lives.  Yet, in exchange for this huge investment, so many new homebuyers are handed a pile of generic documents and wished well in their new home. 

Optimising the customer journey means providing an experience that feels personal to every buyer.  Of course, you can’t actually know every intimate detail about each of your customers but you can make them feel special and appreciated by taking the time to personalise important aspects of their journey.

The first opportunity to use this effective method for customer satisfaction is at the point of reservation.  When you supply a plot-specific Reservation Manual, you are showing your customers that you value their business and want to help guide them through the homebuying process to make it as easy and hassle-free as possible.  Opting for physical or digital Reservation Manuals might depend on your client base, but whichever tool you use, your customers will feel valued and excited, regularly checking the information to build excitement as completion day approaches, reducing fall-throughs caused by buyer remorse and minimising delays caused by buyers not completing tasks on time.

5.     Welcome Gifts to Show You Care

Before it is in the hands of the aftercare team, the last method you can use to secure your customers as long-term advocates of your brand is to supply a thoughtful and visually appealing Welcome Gift.  Just like the personalised approach to reservations, providing a Welcome Gift shows your customers that you are willing to go the extra mile to show you appreciate them choosing one of your homes.  If you have had the opportunity to get to know something about these buyers, it makes a nice touch to opt for a gift that leans into their hobbies or interests.  Otherwise, personalising a household item or hamper which can be filled with items for the home is a lovely touch on the day of completion.

Welcome Gifts are also often shared on social media, making a visually appealing image for a post, often with the customer tagging you, which helps secure your reputation and reinforce your online presence and community.

6.     Offer Award-winning Aftercare

Even with every home on the development bought and lived in, if the aftercare you provide proves to be lacking, you will soon witness a mass exodus from your homes and your reputation sinking below sea level.  Contractors TB Projects go as far as claiming that, ‘Exceptional aftercare is just as vital as the quality of our construction work.’  So, how can you ensure your aftercare matches the exceptional customer journey you have mapped to date?

Construction company John Perkins points to their three priorities when it comes to achieving an optimal aftercare service.  Firstly, they ensure, ‘The timely close-out of defects – emphasis on timely.’  This is an essential element of effective aftercare and can be achieved a number of ways.  One is to ensure that homebuyers have access to a detailed guide of how to report any defects, while your team have a failsafe strategy of logging and responding to these reports, as well as providing updates to waiting customers.  Another is to use a portal and app like Spaciable, which allows home users to digitally log defects, receive AI Chatbot advice on remedying them and contact from the relevant member of your team whenever necessary.  As issues can be reported and tracked in Spaciable, this provides a digital audit trail, keeping everyone in the loop and accountable.

The second priority highlighted by John Perkins is to ensure ‘Quarterly visits during the defects period with the client representative.’  This is a good opportunity to check-in on your homebuyers and find out how life in their new home is going.  If there are any defects mentioned on these visits, be sure to follow up within a few days and provide updates for any issues which will take some time to resolve.  Finally, the last item on John Perkins’ list of aftercare priorities is to have a dedicated team to continue supporting your homebuyers after completion.  Although listed last on the priority list, this is a vital aspect of aftercare as knowing who to turn to when something goes wrong can be the difference between reporting a defect and lodging a complaint.  Ensure your residents know where to go for aftercare, either with a plot-specific Home User Guide, or through a digital tool.

7.     Community-building and Happy Neighbourhoods

The sense of community offered by new build housing developments is an increasingly important factor in securing homebuyers.  The Homebuilders Federation even used this as the topic of their recent New Homes Week, showcasing the investment in community-building features used by new build developments.  Their research revealed the, ‘Growing importance of community-centric factors like safety, cleanliness, and neighbourly relationships in the decision-making process of homebuyers, reinforcing the role of developers in creating spaces that nurture both emotional and social well-being.’  So, be sure to foster a sense of community, both with the physical additions to developments, such as open green areas and shared, communal spaces, but also with social engagement initiatives, resident events, and shared smart community features, e.g., EV charging stations, and smart parcel lockers.  The more opportunities you give residents to meet and interact with one another, the more likely they are to find friends among neighbours and create a community on the development.

Implementing these seven steps will help you build an online community, optimise your customer journey, help build lasting relationships with your buyers and increase referrals.  To find out more about how to use our products and services to optimise the customer journey to sell more homes, please book a call with our Head of Partnerships.