What’s the Best Time to Contact Real Estate Leads?

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As a coach at Rental Beast University, most of the concerns agents express to me are about leads–once you get them, what do you do? How can you get their business? Following up with a lead is important. And, it’s just what you say, but when you say it. But, where can a beginner agent start? Let’s see some stats on the best times to respond to real estate leads. The following behavioral study conducted by the Lead Management Organization reveals when sales representatives had success around calling web-generated leads, and what methods worked best in capturing leads. Get ready to take some notes.

Contacting Real Estate Leads:

• Wednesdays and Thursdays are the best days to call leads (by 49.7% over the worst day) and qualify (by 24.9% over the worst day).
• 4 to 6pm is the best time to call to contact a lead (by 114% over the worst time block).
• The odds of calling to contact a lead decrease by over 10x in the 1st hour.
• The odds of contacting a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 100x.

Qualifying a Lead:

• Thursday is the best day to contact a lead in order to qualify that lead (by 19.1% better than the worst day).
• 8-9am and 4-5pm are the best times to call to qualify a lead (by 164% better 1-2pm, the worst time of the day).
• The odds of calling to qualify a lead decrease by over 6x in the 1st hour. After 20 hours every additional dial your salespeople make hurts your ability to make contact to qualify a lead.
• The odds of qualifying a lead if called in 5 minutes versus 30 minutes drop 21 times.

What do we get from this? Thursday at 6pm is the best time to make the first contact with a lead (contact and qualify). If your lead contacts you first (like, for example, if you get a Rental Beast lead on your phone), time is of the essence! If this apartment-hunter is filling out information, they might already have some time on their hands to share their goals and wish list with you. Contact your lead at once to qualify them and get yourself on the path to getting their business.

Methods Used to Contact Real Estate Leads:

Email:

InsideSales.com recent’s research shows that:

• 32% use email as a preferred method to communicate with prospects.
• 61% of first contacts happen via email
• Only 6% of sales reps use a single call and voicemail as a sales cadence.  

These stats suggest that, while email might not be the overwhelmingly preferred method to contact prospects, it is the most common. Scott Mark, a Partner and Field Marketing Specialist at InsideSales.com, explains why reps prefer to email rather than call. “Sales reps prefer email because clients are too busy to take the call in the first place. Most clients or prospects don’t want to talk on the phone,” says Mark. “Email is non-threatening – they can reply when they want to, they don’t have to have a conversation on the spot. Email gives the customer more freedom.”

But is an email the best way to contact your lead?

Contacting a lead by email might be the most common way that is lead is contacted; however, is it not always the most successful. Let’s check out another popular way of contacting leads–phone calls.

Phone Calls vs Emails:

Despite email’s popularity, phone calls are, often, more effective than emails at garnering a response.

• Phone outreach has a response rate of 8.1%, compared to .03% for email.
• Recent stats show that the average office worker receives around 121 emails per day. In this type of crowded medium, it’s hard to stand out and get someone’s attention.
• One study shows that 57 % of people who receive a cold email think it is spam without even opening the email.

Texting:

We can easily test the success of texting as a method of communication—How many unread emails versus texts do you have right now? If you’re like most people, you probably have far more unread emails than text messages. Here are the stats on texting:

• 98% of all text messages are opened compared to 22% of emails.
• A separate study found 9 in 10 texts are read within three minutes of delivery.
• Millennials and members of Gen Z, in particular, prefer texting to calling. 68% of millennial Americans describe themselves as heavy texters.

What can we get from this?: While emailing might be more common, phone calls are often more effective and text messages have the highest open rate, particularly with younger clients.

So, which one should you choose?
I recommend doing all three— sending your client an email and a text message and then following both methods of communication up with a call. But remember: always qualify your leads! Once you get a lead, make sure to ask them the lead qualification you need to ask to make sure this is a viable client for you.

Related: How Do You Ask for a Credit Score? Tackling 3 Difficult Client Qualification Questions

In Summary:

Try emailing and texting Thursdays at 6 and follow it with an email. These stats are a great starting place, but, remember to think beyond the numbers. The “best time” to contact a lead might not work for you. If your Thursday evening calls are going unanswered routinely, switch it up and find what works best for you!

Want to learn more about RBU? To learn more about the Rental Beast platform or to request a no-obligation demo visit Rental Beast for Real Estate Agents.

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