Building a great commercial real estate website can make it easier for your agency to connect with potential clients and close more deals. Perhaps best of all, websites can do a lot of the work for you. Instead of talking directly to people who may or may not want to pursue properties seriously, you let your online listings fill some of that role.
Unfortunately, not all commercial real estate websites have the features that they need to attract traffic and get people interested in properties. If you want to get more out of your website, make sure it has the following features.

Great Real Estate Websites Let Visitors Filter Listings

Your commercial real estate website should let people browse the properties that you represent. You may need to talk to a website developer to make this feature work well for you and your clients since it involves connecting a database to your site. The database, however, will help you save time while giving interested buyers the information they need.
You don’t want to force clients to search through every listing before they find something that appeals to them. Adding several filters will help people focus on the types of properties that appeal to them. Some of the filters you might want to use include:

• Price
• Size
• Location
• Asset Type
• Building & Lot

You might want to include subcategories, too. For example, clicking Asset Type could open a more detailed list with filters like:

• Office Buildings
• Retail
• Restaurants
• Hospitality
• Industrial
• Mixed-Use
• Multifamily Residences

The more specific you can get, the easier your clients can find the properties that match their unique needs.

They Provide a Lot of Information About Listed Properties

Commercial real estate websites should also provide as much information as possible about their property listings. Ideally, you can provide information about each property’s:

• Land acreage
• Building height
• Building class (A, B, or C)
• Tenancy
• Year built
• Sale type
• Parking
• Zoning
• Size
• Frontage
• Building FAR (Floor Area Ratio)

You can make commercial properties more attractive by adding a paragraph or two that describes their features. A straightforward list helps, but some people will respond better to evocative language. By highlighting the property’s positive attributes online, you can get clients in a positive mindset before they even visit the site.

The Most Effective Sites Make It Easy to Share Content

People browsing commercial real estate websites usually want to buy, lease, or invest in property. They don’t always find what they want, but they might discover listings that they think will interest their business partners.
Websites and their listings become more effective when you make content easy to share. Consider adding features that will let visitors share directly to social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. You can also add an email icon that will automatically generate a message and link. That way, the visitor only needs to add their partner’s email address to send the information.
The easier you make it for people to share content on your commercial real estate website, the more often they will do it.

The Site Lets Visitors Use Multiple Media Formats to Explore Properties

According to the National Association of Realtors, the free most valuable features that you can add to your website include photos, detailed information about the properties, and floor plans.
Don’t let this short list limit the types of media you use to show off your favorite properties. Instead, try to engage your site’s visitors with more innovative media options like videos and 3-dimensional walkthroughs.
A 3D walkthrough will take the most time and money to create, so you might want to reserve it for high-priced commercial properties. A video, however, doesn’t have to require many resources. Your smartphone probably has most of the tools that you need to take attractive videos. Then, you have someone edit the footage and maybe add a pleasant soundtrack to improve the production value.

The Website Removes Properties as Soon as They Get Sold

Your commercial real estate website needs to list all of your available properties for sale. It’s equally important to remove property listings as soon as they get sold. If you leave listings in the database, you could mislead potential clients and investors. The result will make your agency look unprofessional. You might also find yourself responding to phone calls and emails about properties that have already been sold. That’s a waste of time that doesn’t serve anyone.

The Commercial Real Estate Website Has the Newest Listings

As soon as you know that you have permission to represent a commercial property, you need to get the listing added to your website. The faster you add the listing, the more likely it is that you will attract interested buyers. You never know when someone will visit your site. If you wait so much as half a day, you could miss the perfect client.

Improve your Commercial Real Estate Website With Help From ProspectNow

ProspectNow can help you turn a mediocre commercial real estate website into a great site that helps people properties that truly interest them.
Once you get started with ProspectNow, you can access a database that includes over 40 million apartment and commercial properties. Use the database to identify interesting real estate in your area. Since the database includes the name and contact information of each property’s decision-maker, you can reach out to the current owner or lessee to ask about representing them.
You can even use ProspectNow to learn about a business’s SIC code, revenue, number of employees, and other information that can help you target potential buyers.
You don’t have to commit to a membership today. Sign up for a free trial so you can determine whether ProspectNow has the features that you need to make your website more useful.