Evolving customer engagement in real estate

Intelligence, trust and compliance

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has named ‘combating spam’ as an enduring compliance and enforcement priority and also named the real estate sector as one of the top three most complained about industries in 2025.* This indicates there is an active regulator focus on how real estate agencies handle digital marketing.

Recent enforcement actions also show that the regulator is taking a firm stance on email and SMS compliance. There have been significant penalties issued to Australian businesses for missing unsubscribe links, failing to include adequate sender information or failing to honour opt-out requests.*

At Cotality, we see compliance not as a limitation, but as a business principle that can help you build trust with your clients. That’s why we regularly review and evolve how RiTA approaches outbound digital communication, strengthening compliance protections to help our clients meet their spam and privacy obligations.

A smarter approach to outreach

Mass “spray and pray” digital marketing has been declining over time. As inboxes become more crowded across email, SMS and social channels, consumers are quicker to tune out generic outreach.

At Cotality, we’re responding to this shift by helping RiTA customers move beyond simply broadcasting messages to their database. Instead, we’re focused on supporting more targeted, intentional outreach, to help our clients engage the right people, at the right time, with relevant insight.

RiTA’s primary value is not about sending mass messages at scale, but rather about helping agents decide when outreach should happen and with which contacts. Instead of measuring success purely by message volumes, RiTA is focusing on:

• Identifying moments of genuine customer intent  
• Prioritising who you should engage and why  
• Reducing noise and protecting database quality  

Strengthening compliance protections

RiTA customers are encouraged to ensure any marketing SMS or email messages sent from the platform comply with Spam laws, including ensuring that:

• the recipient has consented to the sending of that message (and consent has not been withdrawn);
• the message contains a clear opt-out option; and
• the message identifies your agency as the sender and contains accurate contact details for your agency.

RiTA’s default templates are also regularly reviewed and updated to help make it easy for every message - including those in 2-way automated SMS conversations – to include a clear and functional unsubscribe option, as well as clear information and contact details to identify your agency as the authorised sender of the message.

The commercial advantage of compliance

While some agents may feel that these compliance details make automated SMS conversations feel more formal, a clean and compliant SMS strategy is not only important to reduce compliance risk but is one of the best ways an agency can signal professionalism to their local market.

Property consumers today are highly aware of privacy and SPAM considerations. When a contact receives a text that respects their choice to engage, it helps to build trust in your brand. Embracing these guardrails can offer distinct commercial benefits: ‍

• ‍Professionalism: High standards in communication reflect a well-run agency. ‍
• Trust: Giving people a clear way to opt out shows you value their time and privacy and shows your business’ compliance maturity. ‍
• Financial & brand protection: Helps protect your agency from breach notices, costly fines & reputational damage. ‍
• Database health: Compliance is a powerful tool for database optimisation. Every time someone chooses to opt out, they are helping you refine your audience. It also protects your sender reputation with telecommunications carriers, ensuring your important messages land in the inbox rather than being filtered out as spam.

By focusing your energy on the people who actually want to hear from you, you can help improve the quality of your engagement. This helps lead to more meaningful conversations and better long-term results.

Compliance responsibilities

It is vital for real estate agencies to remember that while RiTA messages are sent by Cotality on your behalf using the platform, compliance with all statutory requirements remains your responsibility as the authorised sender.  

So while RiTA’s default templates and automated guardrails are designed to support best practice, they do not replace an agency’s own obligations to ensure every message sent complies with Australian Privacy and Spam Laws. This is particularly important to remember, given the flexibility agencies have to customise their conversations in RiTA to best reflect your own tone and unique positioning.

By combining RiTA’s intelligence-led engagement with strict, compliant communication practices, real estate agents can confidently build long-term trust with their databases, helping to lead to more engaged conversations, more listings and ultimately, sustained growth over the long-term.
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