9 things you didn’t know about real estate marketing
9 things you didn’t know about real estate marketing
How can we best promote SE Asian real estate?
South East Asian property markets are definitely dynamic. Rule number one to successful advertising is surely to understand your market — so who are today’s consumers and how can real estate professionals best reach them?
One person who has tracked the prodigious rise of this market is Kent Wertime, co-CEO of Ogilvy & Mather Asia-Pacific and co-author of “DigiMarketing.” Kent was the keynote speaker at yesterday’s Property Report Congress Singapore, and he shared a few of his insights with us.
It’s safe to say that the future of ASEAN real estate markets will be highly dependent on the growing population and affluence of the middle class and young consumers, in major and secondary cities as developers and investors tap into underserved segments of the market….
Here are a few things we learned:
1. The middle class is unstoppable
The world has become a lot less poor in the last 25 years, Wertime said, citing the results of an Ogilvy & Mather research that tracked 3,600 middle consumers across the region. Much of this emerging middle class will stem from South Asia and Southeast Asia. Despite still having widespread poverty, India’s wealth is growing exponentially, with the country slated to get 397 million of middle-class consumers in the next few years. China, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Egypt, Philippines, Vietnam, Brazil, Mexico, and Myanmar are close on its heels.
As countries become more middle-class, this ballooning wealth will galvanise social issues to the fore. “The middle class have always driven social change more than any class of people,” Wertime said.
2. The middle class will centre on cities
This emergent class will be “more urban,” said Kent, describing cities like Manila and Ho Chi Minh as “velocity markets” rather than the usual label “emerging markets.” Tier 2 and 3 cities in ASEAN, like previously underserved metropolis Davao, will be registering incredible growth. Consequently, marketers must also expect a great upheaval in terms of smart city value creation, as the middle class continues to demand inter-connectivity and efficient infrastructure to serve their capricious needs.
More: Airbnb is now banned in New York City
3. Bigger investment on the environment
One of the hot-button social issues that middle class consumers will be very invested upon is the environment. Consequently, more brands will be under pressure on how they participate in the society and address social button. Asia has seen a growth in urban farming initiatives across cities in the region, a sub-trend.
4. Women wear the trousers
We also learned that women are not only catching up with men in terms of tertiary education, but even leapfrogging them in some instances.
More women are entering the workplace than ever before, and there are far more female entrepreneurs.
More than ever before, major brands are now viewing women as their target buyers, and shifting their advertising angles accordingly.
Kent explained how one paint company found that husbands and wives would come to the paint shop, and men would leave – with the woman ultimately making the final buying decision.
“Women are great change agents,” he said.
5. Technology is king
77 percent of consumers say their lifestyles are changing faster now than at any other point in their lives. Technology is playing a huge part in this change. Middle-class mobility is a phenomenon to reckon with, with e-commerce is taking hold over Chinese markets. Digital storefronts are supplanting brick-and-mortar stores in some locations in the mainland.
6. Looking at contribution values
Marketers should now look at their audience as more than individuals but as consumers that each offer a high network potential. Marketing must now place emphasis on strategies that elicit a faster, longer chain reaction among audiences. These could include the use of viral videos, blog postings, voting, consumer critiques, co-creation, crowdsourcing, customer feedback surveys, and loyalty clubs online, among others. Vietnam is now one of the fastest video content markets in the world. “It’s not who you’re selling to but who you’re selling to that can help you sell to others,” Wertime said.
7. The new Muslim consumer is here
Another key trend to consider is Muslim futurism, a market which will grow to 1.8 billion consumers over the next 10 years. The halal industry is a critical engine for such runaway growth.
8. Millennials are rising
Millennials use their disposable income differently than past generations; they’re looking for experiences, and have a greater desire to travel and try new things than previous generations have done.
Incidentally, millennials now compose 25 percent of ASEAN consumers. This market can be a very elusive one to capture, however, since these consumers tend to become early adopters of technology and are updated on world events via social media rather than traditional news outlets, among other quirks.
9. Local beats international
One of the biggest insights from Ogilvy’s research is the increasing demand for indigenous brands, with consumers tending to opt for local offerings over international ones. For example, Filipino consumers are more likely to choose Philippines fast-food outlet Jollibee over international companies such as McDonalds or KFC. This is good news for local brands who can expect homegrown support for their offerings.
Read next: Thai developers make inroads into post-Brexit Britain
Source: Property Report