Growth through WebChat

A lower-friction path to a moving quote

During the peak of the COVID pandemic, face-to-face engagement became harder just as more business shifted into digital channels. At the same time, many large cities in the United States were seeing an exodus to smaller areas as remote work became more common. A younger, more digitally comfortable audience increasingly expected to interact with brands online.

If we were going to keep growing, we needed to meet customers where they were and give them a lower-friction path to a moving quote. At minimum, we needed to offer more flexibility in how people could choose to engage with our brands.

Built for a digital world

At the time, UniGroup was already in the middle of a broader digital transformation, especially on the customer experience side of the business. We had recently launched a new customer move portal, started exploring what a true CDP could enable, begun early machine learning work with a digital move quoting tool at the top of the funnel, and were integrating a fully remote virtual survey to better understand inventory and service needs before pricing.

Against that backdrop, we partnered with HubSpot for CRM, marketing automation, communication, and a clearer funnel across both sales and customer service. HubSpot’s WebChat product gave us a way to qualify leads earlier in the experience, directly on the website, while also creating a real-time path into the sales flow when a prospect was ready.

It also gave us the ability to deliver automated, highly personalized nurture campaigns for both converting and non-converting leads. That mattered because the moving journey has long periods of uncertainty, and better-timed communication can do a lot of work to keep people engaged and moving forward.

Growth through digital lead generation and nurturing

The combination of WebChat, qualification, handoff, and follow-up created a stronger digital front door for UniGroup. Prospects had a faster way to engage, sales had a better way to capture intent, and customers had clearer communication through a stressful service journey.

The program contributed to $11M in incremental booked revenue.

More importantly, it showed that communication inside a complex service business is not only a support function. It is a real part of the product experience and can shape confidence, conversion, and the quality of the move.