PropTech: Property Technology
PropTech, with its very short definition, is the "combination of Property and Technology" and the abbreviation of these two words. It refers to digital transformation in the real estate industry. Our first encounter with PropTech was the media such as websites, mobile communication, and social media. Recently, the effect created by the Covid-19 pandemic necessitated a stronger technological transformation in the real estate sector as well as in all sectors.
PropTech is an increasingly prominent concept in the real estate industry. As Tekce Overseas Real Estate Inc. we continue our leadership in PropTech in Turkey, by reflecting "innovation" which is one of our 5 core values, in every aspect of our business. We are proud to say that "Tekce Overseas Real Estate Inc is a PropTech Company".
Our PropTech Practices: Digital Transformation in Real Estate
In 2004, we took the first steps of digitalization by launching antalyahomes.com. Its user-friendly structure and the innovations that brought made it the most visited real estate site in Turkey in a short time. In that period, when a showcard was hung on a property, it was considered to have been added to the company’s portfolio. Real estate ads were announced only as newspaper ads in the regional annexes of newspapers.
In these pages, since the ads were listed in alphabetical order, writing "ABARTA ABARTA" (which means "by exaggerating" in Turkish and comes alphabetically in first-order) at the beginning of the advertisement to be on top of the REAL ESTATE SELLERS page was considered an optimization in the current sense.
By 2006, we started our digital marketing investment. We were the customer of Google Ads (formerly Adwords) the very first day when they commenced their operations in Turkey. We were always one of the first implementers of many innovations in the field of digital marketing in the real estate industry.
As of 2008, we have reached the capacity to complete all purchasing processes on online platforms without the need for a physical presence. We realized the first sale that we carried out entirely only through phone calls and video recordings.
2014 was the year when the most important steps of digital transformation were taken, with the full implementation of CRM infrastructure in our company. In order to ensure 100% happiness for our customers, we have moved all our workflow to CRM. In this way, we can follow up with our customers throughout the whole process from the moment they contact us. Also, we can evaluate our team's performance in an effective way and display transparent management. Our CRM infrastructure is our strongest feature that makes us stand out in the field of PropTech.
In 2017, we launched our mobile application in 9 languages with its user-friendly design and easy-to-use service in the App Store and Google Play Store. Although our websites are optimized for mobile web browsing, we aimed to improve the property purchase experiences of our customers by offering them faster loading times and search optimizations with our mobile application.
In 2018, we started receiving payments with Bitcoin, which became a global payment instrument. Technology trends showed us that the interest in Bitcoin in Turkey is notably increasing. So, we have become the pioneer in this field also and we add cryptocurrencies among our payment methods. We have sold 12 properties with Bitcoin in 1 year. In May 2020 we have performed a property sale with the highest value paid by Bitcoin.
Although 2020 started fast, the Covid-19, which was declared as a global pandemic at the end of the first quarter, but the market was in trouble. On the other hand, as the opportunity created by each crisis, it accelerated the digital transformation in the sector. Thanks to our robust digital infrastructure, we have integrated our remote property buying service that we are implementing since 2008, under our registered brand name TeleProperty. Convincing people to make an important and high-value purchase, such as real estate, through online platforms requires a thorough relationship of expertise and trust. With our experience of over 15 years in the industry and our local expert team, we continue our success in this process and continue to guarantee 100% happiness to our customers.
We are delighted to see that all our efforts are appreciated by industry experts as well as our customers:
"Well done agent. Using entirely digital tools to prove you can transact this way. Lastly, I was interested purely because I was working with Antalya Homes about 10 years ago in a past life, promoting developments around the world. They were always forward-thinking so it’s good to see them continuing to push boundaries."
James Dearsley.