Lead generation is the lifeblood of every real estate agent’s success, but it tends to be a time-consuming, inefficient, and frustrating process. Enter artificial intelligence, or AI lead generation.

Designed to collect, analyze, and interpret mountains of data, real estate AI has an enormous capacity to identify promising leads, understand what they want, and create marketing and outreach strategies that appeal to them. This points to a future of substantial efficiency, more conversions, and greater ROI.

In what follows, you’ll learn about several AI lead-generation tools that can help smaller real estate agencies and independent agents find potential leads. We’ll talk about the benefits of these tools as well as a few of the challenges.

But first, let’s take a minute to understand what AI is.

What is AI?

There is no singular, universally accepted definition of AI, but there are many useful ones that are understandable to the nonexpert, such as this one from Nanowerk: “AI refers to the simulation of human intelligence in machines that are programmed to think and learn like humans.”

Generally speaking, AI uses algorithms to analyze data, identify patterns, and then make increasingly more accurate predictions based on the results. In a growing number of industries (and for much longer than you might imagine), AI is being used to automate many of the activities that, prior to its advent, humans were needed to complete.

In real estate, AI can be used to find, qualify, and nurture leads, create client profiles, and personalize marketing. More broadly, using AI in real estate can help you manage data, predict market values, detect fraud, make data-driven recommendations, develop content marketing, analyze preferences to refine house searches, create 3D home tours, and much, much more.

Benefits of using AI for lead generation in real estate

There are several upsides to adopting AI lead-generation software and tools as a real estate agent, including:

• Enhanced targeting: AI-powered tools can help you identify the most promising leads by analyzing data such as demographic information, online behavior, and search history.
• Improved efficiency: Automated messaging systems and chatbots can handle routine tasks such as lead qualification and appointment scheduling, freeing you to focus on higher-value activities—like building relationships with clients.
• Better lead nurturing: AI-powered lead-nurturing tools can personalize communication with potential clients based on their interests and preferences, leading to higher conversion rates.

Of course, the biggest benefit of AI technology is the competitive advantage it gives agents who use it well. Leveraging this technology to give you greater insight, enhance your value, streamline administrative tasks, and optimize your time is one of the most effective ways of staying ahead of the curve.

Tools for AI-powered lead generation

The secret to AI’s ability to help you generate leads lies in the vast amount of data that’s available in the real estate industry. Through AI, companies are giving agents access to tools that can analyze this data more quickly and more accurately than manual means would ever permit.

Here are some specific ways AI can help you generate leads.

Predictive analytics and lead scoring

AI can analyze market trends and predict which properties are likely to sell, allowing you to focus on those properties and generate more leads. More specifically, AI has the ability to scan data from various sources, including social media, websites, and public records, to identify potential leads and score them based on their likelihood to convert. This lets you focus on leads that have a higher chance of turning into clients—saving you time and other valuable resources.

At ReminderMedia, we’ve incorporated predictive analytics and lead scoring into the benefits we provide our clients who send our personally branded magazines. With each mailing, clients receive a report scoring their recipients according to their likelihood to move in the next 12 months. Intended for targeted follow-up, this list enables agents to prioritize their outreach and contact the people most likely to need their services.

Data analysis

Besides identifying potential leads, AI can analyze data to provide insights that may help agents generate more leads on their own.

For example, analysis of property tax records will provide a homeowner’s name, when they bought their home, and its assessed value. If it turns out they’ve owned their home for a long period of time, that’s one potential clue they could be in the market to sell.

Another source that can provide additional clues is mortgage applications. This data will indicate who is looking to be prequalified and what types of properties interest them.

Household data will indicate who’s living in a home and how old they are. Recently retired homeowners or parents whose kids who have gone off to school may be looking to downsize. As an agent, you could help these leads both sell and buy a new property.

One start-up company, Catalyze AI, is using AI-powered data analysis to identify inherited properties that beneficiaries are anxious to list and sell. It has an exclusive relationship with the world’s largest repository of obituary information, which means its users get data before most public entities. Given that 82% of all sellers contact only a single agent before deciding on one, “speed to lead” is typically the winning variable, making this almost immediate access immeasurably valuable.

Listen to a recorded joint webinar presented by ReminderMedia and Catalyze AI to learn more about their services and this widely untapped source of listing leads. You’ll also get coaching tips on how to best approach this pool of highly motivated leads. Click here to become a client and claim a deep discount on your first three months.

Chatbots and AI assistants

Among the range of AI tools for real estate, chatbots and AI assistants are the most familiar to both agents and the general public. Chatbots can engage with website visitors, answer common questions, and collect contact information to generate and qualify leads—saving you hours of valuable time. And AI assistants can relieve you of common administrative tasks like sending emails and setting appointments.

However, there are agents who shy away from using chatbots in particular because they fear potential clients will reject their use. According to Ray Ellen—a former antibot enthusiast—this simply isn’t the case.

Ray is a national speaker, cohost of the This Week in Real Estate (tWire) podcast, and a high-powered real estate agent with his own agency, Pixel Properties Realty, in Little Rock, Arkansas. He’s also been featured in REALTOR^® Magazine and is a contributor to Broke Agent Media. During his interview on Stay Paid, Ray likens chatbots to the answering machines of yesteryear, pointing out that no one was ever offended when they were asked to leave a message.

Today, Ray uses two real estate chatbots, whose ability to provide users with answers to their questions and perform initial follow-ups with leads has him feeling like he couldn’t do much better himself.

You can listen to Ray’s interview to get more details about his use of chatbots, including how callers interact with them, his experience with deceptive bots (chatbots that don’t reveal they’re automated technology), and where he thinks technological improvements can still be made.

Personalized property recommendations

AI can analyze online activity, such as search queries and property viewings, to predict which houses a lead is most interested in seeing and eventually buying. With image recognition, AI can identify features like architectural style, swimming pools, number of bedrooms, and detached garages. When you can target your marketing and offer a lead exactly what they want in a home, you’re going to dramatically increase your chances of converting them into clients.

We’ve only scratched the surface of the ways that AI and real estate make for a perfect pairing. There’s AI in real estate investment, AI in real estate development, AI in commercial real estate, and AI in real estate transactions. The list of its applications is long, and it’s going to get even longer.

That said, there are some things to be mindful of as this technology continues to advance and we find more ways to apply it.

Potential challenges and limitations

While AI-powered lead generation offers many benefits, it’s an emerging industry, and its many applications to real estate and other areas are still in their infancy. For this reason, there are potential challenges and limitations to consider, including:

• Inaccurate data: The ability of AI to make accurate predictions and identify promising leads depends on the quality of the data it can access. You’ll need to be careful when acting on data that isn’t up-to-date or verified.
• Limited customization and personalization: In the end, AI just assembles information—it can’t offer the emotional connection and reassurance that only human interaction can provide and is ultimately needed to close a deal.
• Potential for over-reliance on technology: You’ve undoubtedly heard that no one should put all their eggs in the same basket. AI-powered tools for lead generation are excellent ways to augment your search, but they should not replace more traditional means of identifying leads.

Leverage AI to stay ahead of the curve

The real estate industry has historically been slow to adopt new technologies, but agents who make a practice of embracing newer tools that allow them to work smarter inevitably outpace and outperform those who don’t.

Take the opportunity now to learn about what AI can do for your real estate business, especially when it comes to lead generation. If you haven’t already installed a chatbot, start there. Consult with companies that can augment your CRM with intelligent lead scoring. Explore what you can do to improve your efficiency immediately, such as using ChatGPT to create content for your emails, social media posts, blog, and newsletter.

But remember that AI is not the be-all and end-all of lead generation; more traditional lead-generating activities need to remain a part of your marketing plan. If you’d enjoy some help with that, then check out our postcards for farming (we’ll add 25 free postcards to your first mailing) and our done-for-you online lead generation that’s producing an average of 18 leads per month for as little as $5 a day on ad spend.