XPATIC/Relocation and immigration
Lead generation for relocation and immigration services
The entire commercial window is the few months either side of arrival. Reach someone inside it and you get the work. Miss it and they have already sorted everything without you.
A short window, and an extremely predictable one
Almost every other expat service has a demand curve spread across years. Relocation has a spike. Visa and residency, the move itself, banking, healthcare registration, schools, a vehicle, insurance. Most of it happens within six months.
That concentration is unusually good for advertising, because the audience is defined by a moment rather than a demographic, and that moment is targetable.
It also means timing is the whole game. The same person is a perfect prospect in March and completely worthless in November, and no amount of creative fixes being late.
Where almost all the demand sits
Reachable before departure and after arrival
One client, several services, one acquisition cost
Reaching people before they leave
The most valuable relocation prospect is not yet in the country. They are at home, working through a decision, and increasingly anxious about the parts they do not understand.
That is a reachable audience in the source country, and it is where the least competition sits. Advertising into Spain for people relocating to Spain reaches the ones who already arrived and already struggled. Advertising into the UK reaches them while the problem is still ahead of them.
It also lets you sell the whole package rather than the piece they are currently stuck on, which is the difference between a one-off fee and a client who uses four of your services.
What this covers
Relocation is a bundle, and the campaigns work best when they sell the bundle rather than one component.
Residency and immigration
The anchor service. Urgent, complicated, and the thing people search for first.
Removals and shipping
High value, time-bound, and often decided within days of a completion date.
Banking, utilities, registration
Individually small, collectively the reason people pay for a relocation service at all.
Rental search and purchase
Usually the second call after the visa, and often the largest single piece.
Placement and applications
Families relocate around school places, which sets the timing of everything else.
Relocation and paperwork
Surprisingly high value, genuinely complicated, and a common reason a move stalls.
How we run relocation campaigns
- Source country targetingReaching people before departure, where competition is lowest and the whole bundle is still available to sell.
- Timeline qualified firstWhen they are moving, asked before the phone number. Someone eighteen months out is a nurture contact, not a lead.
- Destination and service capturedWhere they are going and which pieces they need, so the enquiry arrives ready to be worked.
- Checked on arrivalNumbers and emails checked as the lead comes in, repeat enquiries flagged and never charged twice, delivered in seconds while the decision is live.
- Measured on engagementsYou mark which enquiries became clients, and the campaign learns to find the ones who were actually moving.
Questions relocation businesses ask
Can you target people who have not moved yet?
Yes, and it is usually the better position. Reaching someone in their home country while they are still planning means you sell the whole relocation rather than the one piece they are stuck on after arrival.
How do you filter out people who are just dreaming about it?
Timeline is the first qualifying question. Someone moving within six months is a lead. Someone who might move one day is not, and they drop out before they reach you.
Do you work with immigration advisers specifically?
Yes. The same advertising discipline we apply to UK legal services applies here: no outcome claims, no implied guarantees about visa approval, nothing that could be read as advice rather than an invitation to seek it.
Which markets does this work in?
All of them, though the source country varies. Spain and Portugal draw heavily from the UK and Northern Europe. The UAE and Singapore draw from everywhere. Mexico and Costa Rica draw overwhelmingly from the US and Canada.
Is the seasonality strong?
Yes, and it is worth planning around. Family moves cluster around school years, retirement moves cluster around the end of a tax year or a property sale. Both are predictable enough to build budget around.
See what this looks like for your business
A few questions about which services you offer and which routes you cover, then a call to work through the audience and what an enquiry is likely to cost.
hello@xpatic.com