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Whenever Jonica Ray needs to purchase new kitchenware or a fresh set of throw pillows, she shops the links through her Chirpyest shopping board rather than going directly to the retailer’s website. With a few simple clicks, she’s earning a commission on her purchases.
The Alabama-based REALTOR® at KM Realty and an interior consulting professional frequently assists buyers in furnishing their new homes after closing and stages homes for her husband's home building business. "I'm already shopping, so why not earn a little extra?"
Since February 2024, Ray has racked up $1,600 in earned cashback rewards from purchases she’s made with retailers like Pottery Barn, Wayfair, Home Depot, and Target.
Chirpyest, a groundbreaking shopping platform available to REALTORS® through NAR REALTOR Benefits®, has drawn comparisons to popular affiliate marketing platforms like Rakuten and LTK. Offering high cash-back percentages of up to 15% at over 850 retailers (Soho Home, Scout & Nimble, Lulu & Georgia, Pottery Barn, Arhaus, Home Depot, AJ Appliances, to name a few), Chirpyest offers a more accessible path for real estate professionals looking to break into the influencer space and monetize their online presence. Unlike platforms with stringent requirements like LTK which has a minimum of 5,000 engaged followers and high quality regular content, you don’t need to have influencer status to promote a product or service on Chirpyest. “When I couldn’t get approved for LTK, I moved on to the next thing,” says Ray.
That next thing was Chirpyest.
How it Works
After the NAR REALTOR Benefits® email announcement in February, Ray immediately joined Chirpyest and created an account. Next, she downloaded the browser extension in the Chrome Web Store. The extension acts as a dashboard or tool kit for all of Ray’s online shopping.
When she wants to send a link to a client, she creates a link via the “share link” tool. She can create a link for a single product or an entire shopping board for a particular project, organized by address or by room. “This is all done on the backend, so it’s entirely seamless for the client,” she explains. When a client makes a product purchase from a link she’s sent, Ray earns the commission.
For professionals who have in-demand expertise like real estate agents, Chirpyest can provide them with a relatively low-effort side hustle as Ray has discovered. “It provides me with another revenue stream that supplements my real estate income,” says the 34-year-old mom of three. Essentially, she gets passively paid just for having a good design eye. Win-win, right?
Expanding Buyer Services
When people are in the process of buying a new home, they often shop for furniture and decor. Chirpyest allows REALTORS® to seamlessly integrate this aspect of the homebuying journey into their list of services for buyers.
Buyer’s Visualization Tool
Chirpyest shopping boards are not just powerful monetization tools; they’re also helpful buyer visualization tools that allow REALTORS® like Ray to showcase the furniture, art, and accessories in their listings.
“Buyers can sometimes struggle to visualize a home’s potential, especially if it’s a new build,” says Ray. “With curated Chirpyest boards, I can help them transform an empty room into their dream space.”
Amping Up Social Marketing
In a hyper-competitive industry like real estate, innovation can often make the difference between thriving and surviving. Chirpyest also offers design-minded real estate professionals a way to supercharge their social media presence and online marketing through their curated finds.
They can connect Chirpyest shopping boards to their website, blog posts, Pinterest or Instagram for extra online exposure. One of the benefits of this feature is that it allows a REALTOR'S® online followers to shop the items later and earn cash back for any purchases made from their board. Even email marketing is on the table. It’s yet another way they can stay top-of-mind with their clients, reinforce their expertise and initiate post-transaction conversations with them about how to make a house a home.
Making It Personal
Some NAR members have found Chirpyest useful in a personal capacity as well. Tanya Peterson, a 20-year veteran REALTOR® at John L. Scott Real Estate near Portland, Ore., has been giving the platform a test run with her everyday purchases since its February 2024 launch to the NAR community. “I want to use it myself before I expand it to my clients,” she explains.
After she downloaded the browser extension, she used it during a remodel of a rental house she owned in Forest Grove, 25 miles west of Portland. She purchased a new shower pan and enclosure, new plumbing fixtures and new flooring from Home Depot at 5% cash back. “At first, I didn’t think it was doing anything,” she says.“Then I checked my account one day and it said I made $80.”
Since then, Peterson has made smaller purchases, such as pet food from Chewy.com and clothing from Stitch Fiix. In total, she has earned $248 in cashback: “I connected it to my Venmo account, so I can transfer the funds whenever I want.”
She’s not the only one using Chirpyest for personal shopping. Ray, too, touts its usefulness: "I'm already shopping, so why not earn a little extra?"
To add another revenue pipeline and scale your real estate business with Chirpyest's shopping tools, download the toolkit here.