D&B Properties: Attracting Clients for Dubai Real Estate Amid High Market Competition in Russia
Attract qualified real-estate leads from Russia for D&B Properties’s Dubai portfolio in a highly competitive market.
Background
In 2021, the real-estate market in the UAE fully stabilised after the pandemic, sparking interest from investors worldwide, including Russia. Several practical drivers fuelled this: open borders, visa-free entry, and attractive “bonuses” such as the golden visa granted on transaction completion.
For Russian investors, buying property in Dubai became particularly relevant in 2022, when substantial political and economic changes led many entrepreneurs to consider expanding their businesses abroad, seek comfortable relocation options outside Russia, or explore profitable foreign investments. It was the ideal moment for Dubai companies to introduce themselves to the Russian-speaking audience.
Goal
In March 2022, D&B Properties approached us, recognising the growing interest of Russians in Dubai real estate. The client was clear about what they wanted: more commercial transactions with a Russian-speaking audience. In marketing terms, they were looking for qualified leads from Russia.
The task looked promising and feasible, but it came with challenges. A preliminary market analysis revealed a highly competitive environment with entrenched market leaders. It was unlikely the existing leaders would concede ground to new entrants. D&B Properties’ status as one of Dubai’s leading brokerage companies, with a strong reputation, let us position the client favourably in the Russian online space.
That reputation as one of Dubai’s leading brokerages was a key asset we leaned on throughout the campaign.
Solution
D&B Properties’ promotion in Russia was a broad, hypothesis-driven effort. The client trusted us completely and agreed to all the ideas that emerged during the project. Over the year-long collaboration we saw significant achievements, but also faced challenges. Ultimately D&B Properties’ work with Russian-speaking clients began to bear fruit — to the satisfaction of the client.
Launching Russian-language landings with paid search advertising on Yandex
When D&B Properties approached RMAA, the client had no Russian-language resources, so our first task was to build a landing page. D&B Properties had two significant advantages that became the foundation of our landing-page strategy:
- Russian-speaking real-estate agents.
- A comprehensive catalogue of Dubai properties with a range of price options.
Creating a single multi-page site to bring everything ‘under one roof’ would have been inefficient, since the audience had widely varying needs. Clients also differed in their familiarity with Dubai real estate — some wanted to speak directly with an agent, others preferred to browse prices and compare options first. We aimed to accommodate all of these needs.
The landing-page design followed the client’s brand book, and we adapted content from English into Russian.
The first D&B Properties landings targeted users who needed professional consultation. These one-pagers shared a common design and content, but each contact form was routed to an individual agent. At the time, D&B had three key Russian-speaking agents covering Dubai. Using UTM tags, we tracked which page performed best, letting leads be directed to specific agents without delay. The format worked well for the first few months, but we quickly realised potential clients were also very interested in browsing properties — the more, the better.
The idea behind the new prototype was built around the D&B Properties catalogue. On the site, users could explore featured projects in detail — particularly those still under construction (through 2026). Most importantly, they could download the current catalogue for free, then request a consultation with a Russian-speaking agent either immediately or after browsing the listings. In this way, we covered all the essential client needs on a single landing page. Later, we developed a separate version, “D&B Properties: Luxury Division,” which showcased the highest-end properties with the same catalogue-download option.
It was clear that organic search promotion of these pages was not a realistic option, so we focused on paid ads in Yandex. Case studies often gloss over mistakes and highlight only successes — but to be honest, we did make a mistake during the Yandex promotion phase.
Yandex.Direct was transitioning at the time from manual bid management in ad auctions to automated strategies. Initially many paid-ads specialists, including us, were sceptical of the update. So we kept controlling the campaign manually, even as leads started to decline significantly. We had to adjust on the fly: we turned on Yandex’s Campaign Wizard and actively tested the new Yandex.Direct algorithms. The optimal solution for the project turned out to be an automated conversion-optimisation strategy, which we used for most of the campaign.
Even so, we still had to adjust keywords, analyse competitors, and test new hypotheses weekly. That approach is essential when the main offer is a high-value product in a highly competitive market — without those systematic moves, no automated service can generate qualified leads. In addition to the base set of options, we ran a separate track for media creatives in the Yandex Advertising Network and text formats for search results. Many design variants were produced, and we continuously refined and developed new creatives.
The work was a success: by the end of 2022 the D&B Properties campaign was generating more than 100 requests per week. From the client’s feedback it was clear that not all enquiries were qualified — which meant real-estate agents were spending a lot of time on them. So we took over the initial call with any user who filled out a form on one of the landings.
We pre-qualified leads using a script that quickly established whether a person was interested in buying Dubai real estate. If the answer was positive, their contacts were handed off to the D&B Properties agent immediately, along with the exact time the person would be waiting for a phone consultation. This made the agents’ job much easier and further built trust in us. Lead pre-qualification was later used in social-media promotion and to invite potential audiences to the client’s special event in Moscow.
Exclusive Road Show in Moscow
Six months into the digital campaign, the client decided to hold an offline event in Russia. Our task was to bring in potential clients interested in buying Dubai real estate to the Road Show.
Part of the audience was handled by D&B Properties, who emailed invitations to their existing database of Russian-speaking users from Yandex. To reach a colder audience, we used paid social and paid ads, as well as Telegram. For the event announcement we published promo content on 15 Telegram channels covering real estate, business, and relocation. Text creatives were varied by channel type so the posts felt more native and built trust with readers.
Clicks on ads across various platforms led users to a dedicated site built for the event. The engagement flow was: a user filled out a form, we contacted them promptly, and confirmed attendance. All the data was then handed off to D&B Properties. The Dubai Real Estate Road Show took place on 1–2 September at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Moscow. More than 100 people attended, and we received positive feedback from D&B Properties.
Despite the success and the growing flow of clients, we knew this was not the limit. We had to keep moving in a segment with very high competition. To grow the campaign’s reach, we decided to showcase the client on social networks tuned to the Russian-speaking audience.
SMM strategy focused on targeted advertising
D&B Properties’ SMM promotion was built on Russia’s two leading social networks. Telegram is the ideal platform for reaching a large business audience, while VK offers unmatched targeting for running high-performing campaigns.
Content was adapted to the characteristics of each network. In Telegram we leaned on a news-style text format supported by additional visuals. We combined commercial posts with informational material about the Dubai business market, giving readers an extra incentive to consider buying property.
We found that the interaction flow for the channel audience — “read the news, want to buy, open the Telegram profile, visit the website, then fill out the form” — was too complex for users. So we built a Telegram bot to provide prompt support for potential clients directly inside Telegram. Through the bot users could reach a D&B Properties agent, schedule a consultation, or browse the catalogue of available properties. The Telegram bot was built in Python, making it fully automated and free of the limits of off-the-shelf builders.
By March 2023 the D&B Properties RU Telegram channel had gained 1,385 active subscribers thanks to engaging content and collaborations with other business channels inside the messenger (+883 subscribers). It was a relatively simple but effective way to grow the campaign’s reach with a focus on useful business content. Alongside Telegram, content in the “D&B Properties | Dubai | Luxury Real Estate” VK group was refreshed with client videos subtitled in Russian. Posts went out roughly every 3–4 days, generating significant organic reach: more than 1,000 new subscribers in a single month. Total impressions (organic plus promo posts) reached about 1.343M. We successfully targeted the desired audience: users aged 25–55 with interests in IT services, financial and legal support, business services, commercial real estate, business loans, real estate, society and politics, banking, markets and taxes, investments, and more.
The main strength of VK was its paid-promotion options and its ability to identify potential clients. The platform’s functionality allowed us to test a range of strategies inside the core lead-generation track.
We used a quiz (a short questionnaire) that rewarded completion with a brochure of current client offers, a contact form inside the VK community, a newsletter-subscription format, and the classic option of clicking through to the website from the ad creative. Audience parameters varied from key queries to attracting followers from other real-estate communities. More than five creative variants were used in a single campaign during the three-month promotion. Once a KPI was reached, the ads were refreshed and new creative combinations were produced.
Over three months the ads delivered 2.91M impressions and 7,050 clicks. We cut the cost per click to 50 roubles, a strong result in a high-end product segment. Most importantly, the work produced qualified leads for the client. Even after the campaign wrapped in June 2023, users stayed active in the VK group. For two months after the project ended we continued to share potential-client data from VK with D&B Properties agents.
Results
There is a lot to say about a campaign of this scale, but let the numbers do the talking — they best reflect its effectiveness.
The D&B Properties promotion ran for more than a year, from March 2022 to July 2023. Over that period we delivered roughly 200 qualified leads, all within budget. The most effective phase began around October 2022, after Yandex.Direct algorithms shifted to automated strategies, yielding 125 qualified leads. Paid social on VK also delivered excellent results, generating 25 leads in three months.
Throughout the project the client was satisfied, especially after we rolled out lead pre-qualification, which saved D&B Properties’ agents significant time. That tool helped us understand potential clients’ behaviour, needs, and purchasing capacity. The spectrum was wide: some clients sought a consultation and later bought; others were reluctant to travel to Dubai for the deal and delegated all the information handling to D&B Properties; some insisted on in-person consultations in Dubai, booking a time slot early during pre-qualification. Client budgets ranged from the minimum threshold (around $200,000) for properties under construction to substantial investments (averaging $500,000–$900,000) for ready-to-move apartments in prime waterfront locations. This feedback let us refine creatives and site forms, test new hypotheses, and fully meet client demand.
By autumn 2023 Russian investor interest in Dubai real estate had cooled, which brought the project to its natural end. Even if it had continued, the strategies above would have required significant adjustments, shifting towards a brand-awareness approach. To be clear: lead generation is a fast-acting track that brings in clients almost immediately, which makes long-term strategies less relevant. In short: testing, testing, and more testing. If a client isn’t ready for real-time adjustments and ancillary activities, it is better to flag up front that results may not meet their expectations.
The people who were most interested in buying property were those who came after seeing our advertising. On average, each manager had 3–4 such "hot" clients ready to buy in the near future. I personally completed a transaction on the first day of the event with a client from Yandex. We are very pleased with the results and see great potential in your work.
