Avenue 8 Brand Studio

Building self service marketing capabilities design tool for the realtor.

Overview

Avenue 8 is a real-estate brokerage focusing create a new way to buy the dream home.

Previously, existing realtor have tried to use the online design tool for their marketing assets but found they are putting extra time on design and with low design ability, while our internal design resources are not able to scale custom design support.

We also received a request from the graphic design team, hoping us to provide a tool for users to make self micro adjustment, so as to reduce internal operational efficiency.

role

Product Designer

Duration

3 months

Outcomes

Web app

Mobile App

Problem Framing

•How can we create a seamless experience for agents to promote their listings and their personal brands?
‍
•How can we save agents time on design not let them put extra effort and time on it?

🎯Goal
  • Save agents’  design time.  
  • Use better marketing methods to help them improve their business
  • Reduce graphic design team internal operational efficiency.
📍
User need + Business Objective
  • Majority of our agents use the Avenue 8 brand studio to promote their listings and personal brand instead of other tools
  • Our staff is only involved with paid (custom) marketing, and all organic marketing creation is automated and edited by agents

User Research

I created a research plan to identify the key questions we needed to answer and collect evidence to support recommendations.

🧐 learning Goal
When and where can we increase support of agent marketing needs?
👉 Control vs. speed
👉 Execution vs. strategy
👉 Algorithms vs. suggestions
What is the ideal user flow for DIY editing?
👉 Digital vs. Print
👉 Listings vs. Create Your Own content
👉 Ready-to-go content vs. custom control
Who We Heard From
💻

5

Virtual interview with Avenue 8 realtor

🔍

8

Virtual interview from userteting.com

Empathy Map

Aaron is a young, hustler agent who is tech adept and isn’t afraid to do things differently than his predecessors and mentors.

🗣 Say
  • Wants control over his marketing assets to standout from other agents, including other Avenue 8 agents.
  • Would love our brand calendar if it could help him plan, schedule, and post his online brand presence.
  • Admits the algorithms are pretty spot on, and doesn’t mind them.
🙌🏻 Dose
  • Isn’t afraid to use multiple platforms if it gets the job done: Canva, Ripl, InShot, Spark Video.
  • Uses the same templates in Canva over and over, sticking in a different listing than the last time.
🤔 Pain
  • The current design tool can’t help him build an impressive personal branding.
  • Eager to improve brand awareness, but lack of system management and strategy.
😇 Gain
  • Artistic details are important but wants suggestions.
  • Digital is where he wants pre-populated, snappy content.
  • Print is where he wants more control and time because it’s more expensive and is only after a sale.

Tamar is an established, high producing agent who hates having to use yet another tool when there are very simple ways to market herself today.

🗣 Say
  • Wants pre-populated newsletters with ability to customize and share
  • Wants the brokerage to be posting Avenue 8’s listings on its social media accounts to promote and support agents
🙌🏻 Dose
  • Very little marketing design because photos and captions feels more authentic and less “advertise-y” than Avenue 8’s templates.
  • Only uses certain types of marketing assets for certain stages of a listing e.g. digital = listed/coming soon, print = already sold.
🤔 Pain
  • Suffers through more steps and effort using the app than she would through traditional means.
  • There is very little effort she has to do to get business, so doesn’t feel like she needs to invest time or effort into using the app to generate templates.
😇 Gain
  • If the old way of marketing real estate isn’t broke, don’t fix it.
  • Doesn’t feel supported beyond the main assets we offer. There is so much more to marketing than digital/print.

Insight

🤔

If you are an OG-

marketing materials pale in comparison to word of mouth and referrals.

👉 Control vs. speed

👉 Execution vs. strategy

👉 Algorithms vs. suggestions

If you are a hungry hustler-

knowing what to post, making content, and managing when to post is too overwhelming today.

👉 Control vs. speed

👉 Execution vs. strategy

👉 Algorithms vs. suggestions

Competitor Research

Pros
  • Template Swap: can change asset type and template while editing
  • Template Matching: For Side A/B, search results filter down to only ones that match. 
  • Side-by-side: can preview multiple pages next to each other and add pages
  • Full suite: agents can make an entire campaign from asset types offered 
  • Previews: design mockup (aspirational).
  • Invite: can add team member (don’t have access to modal)
Cons
  • No RTR: can’t see how the agent’s own property fits with the selected template
  • No Marketing Strategy: can only see asset types, not how they combine to form a campaign
  • Not Realtor focused.
  • Flexibility: Giving users too much flexibility/control over design - such as adding elements like stickers, changing picture sizes
  • No Marketing Strategy: can only see asset types, not how they combine to form a campaign

The Problem

The current design tools not only require real estate agents to spend efforts and time in designing🤯 and repeatedly copy paste content and photos, but also lack management🗃 and strategy formulation📊. They only got a tool, but not a service for real estate agents to grow their business.↗️

Solution

We believe build a  simple customization design tool that making it easier for agents to access automated marketing templates across channels and platforms will help streamline how agents grow their business🏠 and save time⏰. The platform should help users spend efforts on content🔖 rather than design. Highlight efficiency, speed and accuracy.

Ideation

👍🏼

Agents really likes the auto populate feature, it could help them to avoid manual input typo.

👍🏼

Everyone we spoke to wanted to start with recently used.

👎🏼

Agents want options but they don’t want to spend a ton of time discovering them.

👎🏼

Traditional agents feels lost during use it and doesn't know what to do next.

👎🏼

No one really liked Most Popular:Likes was sometimes read as “I shouldn’t pick this template bc multiple people used it.”

👎🏼

Need to pay attention to whether the agent has the right to use the listing information and photos.

Final Design Highlight

✨
Simplify the page content and emphasize the order process rather than design templates.
✨
Real time render the listing info and apply to the template
✨
Show  the amount of used than the amount of likes, so that users who want to follow the trend or want personality can both get the information they need.
✨
One click apply all listing information to avoid typo and repeated uploading of photos. Minimize content input time for realtor.
✨
Use data to guide users to set marketing strategies. Not only provide excellent design platform, but also become the marketing assistant of realtor.

Outcomes

Adoption
📈
64%

utilization rate increase weekly, completion rate reached 87%

Feedback
🐶🐱🐻🐼
96%

Positive review from active users

Revenue
🤑
182

realtors shows interest to join the company for this service.

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Feel free to reach out for collaborations.
Let’s connect!