e27 revisited the conversation we had in 2015 with Paul Trayman, the man behind FazWaz, about how far the platform has grown within the last three years

When e27 first featured FazWaz, the PropTech portal had been launched for just a week. Back then, it was working to stand out by ensuring the listings on their platform are updated and fully backed by accurate data.

Now, three years later, e27 gets a chance to talk to the same Paul Trayman, with FazWaz readying itself to get automated.

Trip down the memory lane

In its first feature, FazWaz branded itself as a data-driven, comparison platform that place listings side-by-side with the highlights of possible fees and costs. The goal was to help users make a better-informed decision, as well as provide a value estimation for sellers. But to get to that point, it was a challenging quest.

“The limitation of the property market information was a challenge. We actually have to come down, go out to talk, and build relationship within the property network. It takes time because there’s not enough amount of correct information and no proper system was built around it,” explains Trayman.

When they were ready to launch, finding local manpower to join the team became another challenge.

“People here are simply more drawn to multinational companies,” says Trayman. But now, they have managed to grow from around 15 people to 70 people spread across offices in Thailand.

On aggressive market distribution

Trayman, who is holding the position of COO in the company, uses the term “aggressive” to explain the marketing strategy the company has accumulated.

“Right now, our website is available in seven different languages, and we have presence in regions across Southeast Asia and UEA,” he says.

Based in Phuket when it was first launched, FazWaz now has offices in five of Thailand’s main cities. The cities feature exciting resorts and housing development projects, such as Pattaya, Koh Samui, Hua Hin, Chiang Mai, and Bangkok. With this kind of distribution, FazWaz believes it has a better market knowledge and customer reach in Thailand.

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FazWazGroup is not just limited to Thailand as it has neighbouring countries in their online listing. It implements a user experience that is expected to be seamless, straightforward, and catered to main options in property, which would be to buy, sell, and rent.

Another thing to note about the way they strategise the property marketing is how they utilise content placement in burgeoning local online media.

“By having partnerships with the likes of Baanthai, The Thaiger, Thaivisa, National Multimedia, and Bangkok Biz News, we have secured a place using FazWaz brand as the go-to property guru in the scene. We provide property contents to these online medias, and that’s how we got the traffic that has potentials to convert into real users,” explains Trayman.

The future of property tech is automated

By the end of this year, FazWaz plans to launch an artificial intelligence, machine learning-powered chatbot. The chatbot is to serve as the front face of the customer service process on their platform.

“We don’t want just a chatbot that’s robotic and answers our customer’s inquiries with templated answer. The purpose of having the chatbot is to reduce the process customers must go through to check a listing. We plan on facilitating the users so they can immediately ask what they are looking for through the chatbot and without waiting, the users will get the results. The chatbot we want to build will be a virtual property agent that assist, not just an answering machine,” said Trayman.

The plan to have a virtual agent will make FazWaz one of the first proptech company to do so. Trayman added that it will further ensure that their customer process is more efficient and productive because of the chatbots ability to respond quickly to queries.

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FazWaz’s internal team will also use the chatbots to help them with the data. As they store a lot of property listings information, it can get difficult to navigate through all of the information. With chatbot, FazWaz is also looking to help to streamline the process of acquiring listing information on their system.

As they are now stepping onto something transformational for both their company and -indirectly- the property tech scene, the company which started off with bootstrap funding is now in talk with venture capitalists interested to invest on their growth.

“We’re not just matchmaking platform between market data with experienced local agents, buyers, and renters with their future homes, we are different than that. We are a lead generation property platform complemented with direct sales option, and soon, an automated online property agent,” Trayman closes.

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Image Credit: Jakob Owens on Unsplash

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