Why Is a Beautiful, Modern Real Estate Brokerage Website Important?

All About Aesthetics

Every day, we get up and put clothes on — clothes we presumably bought, or have had gifted to us, and chose to wear. But why do it? Besides the obvious question of decency, we chose that particular outfit because we like it. As a real estate agent, you wouldn’t typically show someone a home as-is; you’d stage the house. It gives the impression of what could be and entices prospective buyers. Aesthetics matter, and we take aesthetics into consideration so subconsciously every day without even knowing it. Why would your modern real estate brokerage website be any different?

We’ve talked a bit in the past about what is and what is not good design, but even now, design still has this perception that it is purely aesthetically driven. This is mainly because, as designers, we generally produce the visual aspect of your website. Designers are obviously not just considering aesthetics, but in this blog, we’ll focus on two important aspects of why it actually is important to get the aesthetics right, and why having a good-looking, modern real estate brokerage website is crucial for your company.

Credibility

If you dress in sweats to the office or host an open house without furniture, it gives off a certain perception. I think we can all remember early-2000s Dotcom design aesthetics that were highly successful then, but today, those aesthetics bring an eery feeling that the website — especially if it involves money changing hands — might not be trustworthy. In 2019 (craigslist aside), without the right aesthetics, you’re telling people that you do not care about a certain aspect of your business. So who’s to say what other facets of your business you fail to prioritize if you don’t have a modern real estate brokerage website?

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There’s even a scientific theory called the “aesthetic usability effect,” created by the people at the ever-reliable design research firm Nielson Norman group; users forgive some issues if the site counter-balances them with a great aesthetic, as it has the perception of being easier to use — even if it is not the case. Wouldn’t it be easier if there was a way you could instantly pull people into your website that keeps them curious and interested to read more? Take our client, REMAX Results, for example:

RE/MAX Results - Modern Real Estate Brokerage Website

As you scroll through this modern real estate brokerage website, there are bright colors and images of people to humanize the brand. We could have easily just left colors out, kept the spaces white, put up images of houses and it could be perceived to have a “clean” look. But, diving deeper, the Results team has a proven brand they have invested in, and those are just some of the factors that help separate them aesthetically from the rest of the sea of brokerages in their area.

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Usability & Readability

Aesthetics don’t just mean “pretty” objects and shapes everywhere. Using large amounts of negative space, varying sizes of features and certain placement of objects can also be very aesthetically appealing. Taking care to leave room from one section of content to the next will allow your user to not be overwhelmed by your content, and make it easily digestible as they scroll through what your site has to offer. At TRIBUS, we do that with our site right now:

Modern Real Estate Brokerage Website

Here, on our homepage, you can see we made sure to include small, spaced-out, digestible parts that give you just enough information for you to not be overloaded as you open the site — and hopefully interested enough to click through to more content. We have brand color blue that establishes, first as button and then as text links later, that you can click on them to learn more. Furthermore, in other areas of our site, using drop shadows to elevate an object tells the user that you can interact with the object, and that it is important enough to be worthy of your time. Aesthetically pleasing and usable at the same time.

Mastering these two aspects will go a long way in helping reinforce all the other components of your website. If you want to read more on how you can implement aesthetics, better read my other blogs on design trends, and check out how we implemented aesthetics on our client sites here.

Jason is the heart and soul of the creative team at TRIBUS. He invests himself heavily in every single web page design in order to craft experiences that are meaningful for all users. In addition to being an excellent graphic and interaction designer, he’s obsessed with typography and dabbles in video editing. Jason has also worked on a few major branding projects, the TRIBUS brand overhaul being one of his latest accomplishments.
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