New York-based broker Corcoran Group has launched a new iPhone application to help real estate consumers connect with properties.
The app is very well executed and joins StreetEasy and Redfin as among my favorite real estate apps.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb91e0jqQIk[/youtube]
To promote the new app, they commissioned Swedish artist Kari Modin to illustrate the key features of app. The ads will run in media outlets, online and on phone kiosks throughout the city.
The images are striking and I think it’s an important takeaway here; while real estate search apps are a hot ticket item right now — and I would suggest that any decent sized brokerage should be seriously evaluating their mobile strategy for 2010 — simply building and releasing an app isn’t enough.
It needs to be fully baked into to your overall marketing plan and supported through a well-imagined and targeted advertising campaign, which Corcoran has done.
There’s a land rush going on right now for screen space on smart phones and the window of opportunity for any broker to stake a claim will likely be short-lived. A few years from now and there will be likely dozens of “me-too” apps in any given market. Now’s the time to strike.
