Drawing on user-feedback, and incorporating the latest technology, Private Property has launched an all-new app, which introduces South Africa’s first property feed to the market.
The new app changes the way you search for property, making it simpler, faster and a whole lot smarter. Marco Torino, Business Analyst at Private Property, shares everything there is to know about the new app.
Presenter: Founded in 1998, Private Property is South Africa's leading property website and a one-stop shop for property search using class-leading technology. Private Property has just launched their awesome new app, which is a must have for property shoppers. The new app makes it really simple to search for property and is South Africa's first property feed. How cool is that? We're chatting now to Marco Torino, the man in charge of innovation, who has been responsible for project managing the build of the brand new app. Welcome to Afternoon Express.
Marco: Thanks for having me, Dan.
Presenter: It's such an exciting world, and I've always been a big fan of Private Property, market research, market news. You guys have got really cool videos, virtual reality tours of neighborhoods. There's just almost nothing that Private Property doesn't have. Now it's got its new app. Tell us why you built it.
Marco: Well, we listened to feedback from the users from the old app, and we wanted to make the property search experience simpler, more fun, and easier to use. So in order to do that, we decided to rebuild the app from the ground up, and we're really pleased with our results.
Presenter: Nice. So let's talk quickly about why it was necessary to build an app when you've got such a dynamic site at the same time. Has it got to do with the needs of the consumer?
Marco: Well, we know our consumers are busy and don't always have time to search the website to look for properties to see if they've missed out on anything. Now, instead of trying to search and find properties, the properties now will find you through the app.
Presenter: That's so cool. I know from my personal experience of trying to look for property in regions, it's first of all a hassle to have to go on every single time and retype in the same filters as you go. But then there's also a lot of emails that come in afterwards. Spam, I like to call it, because my inbox is filled with them. Does this app try and eliminate that?
Marco: Yes, it does. It's South Africa's first property-based feed app, and how the feed works is how we're familiar with the feed that we experience in social media apps like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, where you follow whatever you're interested in. So in our app, you follow suburbs or areas that you want property in, and as soon as a property is newly listed, you will receive a push notification in your app telling you that that property is available in your area.
Presenter: That's so cool. And I'll need to do that-- I don't need to do that whole process every single time I go onto the app. It'll do it once off--
Marco: You set it up once, and you will receive--
Presenter: That's so cool.
Marco: --an instant notification every time there's a property that matches.
Presenter: Stunning. How narrow does that go down? Because you mentioned regions and particular areas, so if I set a notification for - I don't know - the CBD in Capetown, will I receive a whole bunch of thousands of properties that are released there or can I narrow it down even further than that?
Marco: You can customize the feed with our filters. You can filter by property types, price range, pet friendly, fully furnished, and many other filters, so you only get exactly what you're looking for.
Presenter: Stunning. I love the website already. I think it's so user friendly. There's such cool content on there like the virtual realities that you can do: you can walk through properties, beautiful imagery, you can get beautiful descriptions. Do I lose out on that if use the app?
Marco: You get the same functionality and capabilities that are on the website, just it'll perform better and you'll get a better user experience using the app.
Presenter: Yeah. Well, it's like a no-brainer, almost. It feels like everything that's on the website is also on this app as well, plus so much more. It's such a cool place to be because we're fatigued by information at the moment in South Africa. And it's really nice to know that I can choose what I want to receive and when I want to receive it. It makes property searching so much easier. How has been the response been on the app so far?
Marco: We've had really good feedback so far. We've had many favorable ratings and reviews on both of the app stores, and we've seen a massive increase in our users' engagement since the new app was launched.
Presenter: Stunning. Marco, well, congratulations. I've had a look at it. It is incredible. It's so much easier to use. And for somebody like myself who is starting to enter to that property space, to be able to have something so simple like this to do it just fits my lifestyle. So thank you guys for creating it and congrats.
Marco: Oh, thank you.
Presenter: It's awesome stuff. Really, South Africa, it really is. Make sure that you guys are receiving properties that suit you. It's awesome. For more information, you can go to privateproperty.co.za. You can read about their new app there, and make sure that you download it so that you won't miss out on your dream home.
The app is available for Android and IOS, on the Google Play store and Apple app Store.
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.privatepropertyandroid.app
iOS: https://itunes.apple.com/za/app/private-property/id352305891?mt=8
