Property Ad Guru » Portal & Industry News

roost.com Swaps Listings for Social Strategies

Alice Allan — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 22:52:10 +0000

Until recently, roost.com had been steadily expanding its presence as a US-based real estate search engine. But over the past few months, the people behind this website have been watching Facebook’s exponential growth, and changing their strategy accordingly.

Load up roost.com today and you won’t find a real estate search bar. Instead, the website promises “a social media toolkit for real estate agents, brokers, and professionals.”

So what exactly does the new roost.com offer? Their product is described as a “toolkit” for real estate professionals looking to market their brand via Facebook. Market snapshots, featured listings, and analytics to monitor the results of agents’ social media efforts are all part of the package at this stage.

roost.com explains their move away from Internet leads in a blog post. “The vast majority of agents still get 80%+ of their business via word-of-mouth referrals,” roost.com writes. “The referral sphere is where the business is done – not blind Internet leads.”

roost.com CEO Alex Chang expanded on the move in an interview with inman.com. “At the end of the day, the world doesn’t need another property search engine, but Realtors absolutely need a social media toolkit for word-of-mouth business.”

According to inman.com, the cost of roost.com’s toolkit for agents will be around US$20 per month, while brokerages can expect to pay up to $2,000, depending on their size.

Downturn Drives Sellers Back to Agents

Alice Allan — Sun, 22 Aug 2010 22:36:44 +0000

A few months ago, we reported on the rise of For Sale by Owner websites, asking whether a slew of recent releases were having any tangible effect on agents’ business. This brought out the full range of opinions, from those championing the FSBO approach to those highlighting the value of using a real estate agent.

Now, new research by Nielsen suggests that the economic downturn may be causing sellers to doubt their FSBO plans, driving them back to real estate agents’ offices.

This New Zealand-based research, detailed on unconditional.co.nz, shows just 11 percent of sellers are definitely planning to sell privately, down from 17 percent in 2007.

At the same time, the number of sellers planning to work with a real estate agent has grown, up from 35 percent in 2007 to 47 percent this year.

This all sounds like good news for agents, until we consider the fact that this still leaves over half the sellers surveyed either definitely planning to take the FSBO approach, planning to at least try it before they contact an agent, or unsure of what their sale plan will be.

So how do agents win over those sellers on the fence?

We looked at this issue through the eyes of a number of industry experts in our series “staying relevant in the online age.” Their ideas ranged from offering unrivalled knowledge about a local area to creating and maintaining strong client relationships via social channels.

The question to ask is: what do you provide that no one else in your market can – your unique value proposition? Define that, and you should have no problem convincing sellers that working with you beats the FSBO approach, hands down.

Buyers are Often Sellers Too!

SOBOX Goes Hyper-Local

Alice Allan — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 22:39:34 +0000

SOBOX, the Australian social media tool created by propertyadguru.com publisher Classified Ad Ventures, has announced a move to introduce hyper-local content for its customers.

SOBOX social media packages currently include real estate news and timeless content published to customers’ blogs and other social media accounts on a regular basis. Now, SOBOX is looking to introduce more localized content to help agents engage with local audiences.

Specifically, SOBOX will publish three hyper-local posts per week to customers’ blogs and associated social networks. This content will be tailored for each customer and include local real estate trends and market highlights, as well as broader lifestyle content that is just as relevant to prospective buyers, renters and sellers.

Kelly Millar, CEO of SOBOX, explains how the new hyper-local content will work:

Our dedicated team of journalists will continue to provide quality, relevant real estate content for our customers. In addition to national and state-based news and timeless (evergreen) real estate content, they will also look to source and create local and regional community news that is highly relevant to the local audience.

Providing tailored local content for our customers is part of positioning them as the experts in their areas, not just in relation to real estate, but in regard to local community news and events. Through involvement with and support of the community, consumer engagement is increased.

This upgrade to our content offering coincides with the ongoing education of our customers to publish their own articles, encouraging them as both creators and curators of content. SOBOX’s role as social media partners is vital to real estate agents, especially as so many agents are new to the social media arena.

For more social media marketing tips from SOBOX, check out the SOBOX blog.

Woopra Reveals Top Referral Sources

Alice Allan — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 22:49:20 +0000

Web analytics company Woopra has been hard at work answering the question all website owners ask repeatedly: Where can I get more traffic?

In a recent guest post on readwriteweb.com, Woopra CEO John Pozadzides details a survey of Woopra customers on their top traffic sources. The results contain a few surprises:

To begin with, Facebook and Twitter accounted for a huge 93 percent of traffic from social sources. This raises the question: Is there any point spending time on any of the other social networks out there?

The survey also shows that 92 percent of visitors to the websites surveyed originated from Google. Again, this brings into question SEO and SEM efforts directed at other search engines such as Yahoo! and Bing.

In terms of media websites, YouTube was the dominant force, bringing in 84 percent of traffic. Flickr came in second, but it only managed to account for 9 percent of traffic to the websites surveyed.

Pozadzides says he believes the survey’s data is representative, but there is always a chance that your own traffic sources might be completely different. So, if you haven’t already, start tracking your website’s traffic sources to find out where you should be focusing your online marketing efforts. To get you started, check out our explanation of common web analytics terms.

No related posts.

Ad Spending Up in US, Down in UK

Alice Allan — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 22:44:54 +0000

Small businesses in the US are spending more on paid advertising and getting more online conversions than they were a year ago, according to a new report from online advertising company WebVisible.

According to the company, the average small business advertiser spent US$2,231 on search advertising in Q2 2010 – up 1.4 percent from Q1 2010 and 159 percent over Q2 2009. This increase in spending came even as cost-per-click rose 23 percent on Yahoo!, 9.8 percent on Bing, and 2.2 percent on Google.

WebVisible also found that nearly half of all clicks – 43 percent – resulted in a web conversion in Q2 2010, up 22 percent over Q1 2010 and 39 percent over Q2 2009.

“Over the past year, conversion activity increased on almost all website actions – filling out an online form, watching a video, bookmarking a page or printing driving directions,” said WebVisible CEO Kirsten Mangers.

“For advertisers this is great news,” Mangers adds. “The more options a company provides, the more actions a website visitor will take – giving advertisers multiple opportunities to establish a connection with each potential buyer.”

But WebVisible’s picture of online advertising in the UK isn’t so rosy. Cost-per-click rose by smaller percentages than in the US, with a 5.4 percent on Google and 3.7 percent on Bing. Still, average U.K. advertiser spending decreased by 1.8 percent from Q1 to Q2 2010.

According to the report, Bing’s click-through-rate in the UK dropped by 7 percent during the quarter. Google’s faired better, with an increase of 1.5 percent.

How to Work Social Listing Options

Alice Allan — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 02:02:55 +0000

US real estate marketplace zillow.com has just plunged its listings into the social web with the addition of a “share” button on its home details pages. The question is, how should agents make use of this feature?

With Facebook officially passing 500 million members just a few days ago, zillow.com’s reasons for adding the share button are understandable. Facebook alone offers a huge potential audience, not to mention the other options included: Twitter and good old email.

Of course, the idea of sharing listings isn’t new – US market leader realtor.com offers this feature, as do many other portals across the globe. zillow.com is hoping people will hit the share button “liberally and often”. But is this a good strategy for agents?

Sara Bonert, director of broker relations at zillow.com, summed up the issue in a response to the original zillow.com announcement. The strategy of tweeting listings is “debatable,” she writes, before adding that “this is an easy way to get your listings into your Facebook news stream.”

As we heard from UK agent Edward Gailey earlier this month, “simply posting links to properties bored the public silly,” and that’s where the crux of the debate lies. On any social channel, there needs to be a balance between the listings you display and other information that people in your market are going to find useful and/or interesting.

To sum up, our advice on the listings share button is simple: use it wisely.

Google: We’re Not in Real Estate

Alice Allan — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 22:42:36 +0000

“We are no more in the real estate business than we are in the cafe or the museum business.” That’s the contention of Carter Maslan, Google’s director of product management, who attended the Inman News Real Estate Connect conference in San Francisco last week.

As inman.com’s Matt Carter reports, Maslan is keen to put the emphasis on Google as a search tool. “What we are doing in real estate is really [no different than] what we are doing in [other areas of] local search,” Maslan is quoted as saying.

Google’s emphasis may be on search rather than real estate, but that hasn’t stopped people speculating on how the search giant could impact on established real estate websites. As we’ve just reported on propertyportalwatch.com, one financial analyst recently went so far as to downgrade their recommendation on the REA Group – owner of Australian market leading portal realestate.com.au – to a “sell” based on the potential impact of Google.

At the same time, much of the initial panic sparked by Google’s entry into real estate search seems to have been replaced with a “watch and wait” strategy. As our wrap-up from the Inman Connect conference shows, none of the property portal owners in attendance have seen any decrease in traffic due to Google Maps’ real estate search, but most are still aware that the company could eventually have a big impact on online real estate search.

But at least one industry commentator thinks that day is still a long way off. homethinking.com founder Niki Scevak recently wrote that “Google will never be successful in real estate until they recognise that maps are a poor cousin to other types of user interface designs for real estate.”

Clearly, there are plenty of views on how Google’s real estate search will change the industry, and we’d like to hear your take as well. How have you seen real estate listings on Google Maps change things in your own market?

Location-based Marketing from homefinder.com

Alice Allan — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 23:35:35 +0000

By now, many real estate agents will have at least heard of location-based social networks like Foursquare and Gowalla. Put simply, these online networks – generally accessed via smartphones – allow users earn points and unlock “badges” when they visit certain locations and “check in”.

Some agents are even using these networks as a marketing tool, using check-ins around their town (and even at their own listings) as another way to connect with their community.

But agents aren’t the only people in the real estate industry getting in on the growing location trend. Now, US-based listings website homefinder.com is starting up its own location-based marketing campaign in Atlanta.

The campaign has been created through a partnership with the SCVNGR location-based game. Add a few vowels to that name and you’ll start to see what homefinder.com has in mind.

The game, which is set to take place on 18 September, will see up to 1,000 qualified home buyers visit different homes for sale and complete challenges at each location.

“Participants will have to learn something unique about each listing in order to complete the challenges and will accumulate points as they progress through the game,” homefinder.com explains. “Agents and brokers will get to interact with the contestants at each stop – making it a great time to feature actual for sale homes and have fun with a targeted local home buyer audience. At the end of the day, the top scorer will win an incredible grand prize of a large down payment toward their dream home.”

“It’s all about reaching home buyers in a meaningful new way and forming a lasting connection,” says says Mark Tepper, vice president of sales and business development at homefinder.com. “The convergence of fun, gaming, mobile and social is a really powerful way to achieve that.”

SCVNGR marketing director Melody Tran says the company “hoping this partnership will change the way people buy homes.”

We want to know your take on this campaign. Will home hunters be interested in this kind of game-based home hunting, or will they be more likely to stick with what they’re used to?

Century 21 Deal with homefinder.com

Move Inc. Makes Real Estate Marketing More Social

Alice Allan — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 01:56:55 +0000

realtor.com owner Move Inc. is catching on to the importance of social media for real estate agents, integrating new social features into the latest release of Top Producer 8i.

Top Producer 8i, Move’s lead generation and lead management platform, now offers ability to capture updates, status changes and direct postings from Facebook and Twitter directly into its contact, calendar and outreach programs.

Move says this will allow real estate professionals to maintain a greater level of “instant social media interaction with new, potential and previous clients actively searching the real estate market for information and trends.”

Along with social media, Top Producer’s latest version also has a stronger emphasis of neighbourhood information – a strategy which is helping more than a few agents and websites appeal to niche audiences.

The platform’s updated “Things to Talk About” feature now lets agents display neighbourhood details such as listings and sold information based on the addresses of potential buyers and sellers in their contact system. Move says this provides opportunities for conversations between agents and potential clients about local market conditions.

Monthly subscriptions to Top Producer 8i are available for US$39.99. Of course, those looking for free tips on social media for real estate and local information can always browse through our previous articles – start with “Four Quick Tips for Social Media Success,” along with “Neighbourhood Info the Decision Maker.”

Google Challenging rightmove.co.uk?

Alice Allan — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:48:24 +0000

The Internet is currently abuzz with the news that Google Maps has launched its property search in the UK – a similar service to that already offered to property hunters in Australia and New Zealand.

Now, maps.google.co.uk offers users a “properties” option in its “more” menu, which brings up listings added by agents as well as property websites.

Google says zoopla.co.uk, propertylive.co.uk, ezylet.com, smartnewhomes.com, Vebra, propertypal.com, SpicerHaart, Countrywide, and zoomf.com have all added listings so far.

But there is one portal that is choosing not to participate at this stage – UK market leader rightmove.co.uk. The portal says it welcomes Google Maps’ property search, but that its figures show property hunters still prefer listings displayed in a list format rather than on a map.

“Users appreciate being able to locate an individual property on a map, but seem to want it right alongside the detailed property information and the other research resources that rightmove.co.uk provides,” said rightmove.co.uk commercial director Miles Shipside.

“I’m sure that estate and lettings agents will try a search on their own area in Google wearing a home hunter’s hat, and judge for themselves the quality of the user experience.”

The prospect of Google Maps drawing home hunters away from rightmove.co.uk is an interesting one for UK real estate agents. If a free-to-list service like maps.google.co.uk became the website of choice for home hunters, where would that leave rightmove.co.uk’s subscription fees?

Alongside this question is the issue of private sellers, and the possibility that they could use Google Maps to list their own properties, bypassing agents altogether.

Google product manager Andrew Foster told propertydrum.com that while it is possible for home owners to list on Google Maps, they would first need a website listing their home, and would then have to add their listing details to Google Maps.

“Our experience in Australia has shown that there has not been any significant take up of this facility,” Foster said.

Of course, it’s early days for Google Maps property search in the UK, but we’d love to hear your thoughts on the issue. Do you think this will change the game for UK agents? For agents in countries where Google Maps’ real estate search has already been established – have you noticed any significant changes for your business?