Are UK portals charging too much given the current economic climate? That’s one of the questions asked in an industry survey by UK property website homesalone.co.uk. The results suggest that the majority of agents believe portals should be doing more to help them.
The survey covered 264 estate agents and 75 solicitors and conveyancers, and found that 34 percent of respondents received the most business enquiries as a result of their portal advertising. 53 percent did not believe that advertising in their local press was good value for money, with one agent stating that newspaper advertising brings in “virtually no results at all.”
Opinion on market-dominating property portal rightmove.co.uk was divided, with 33 percent of respondents saying they could not run their business without the portal, and 36 percent believing they could. 11 percent said they were already operating their business without rightmove.co.uk.
45 percent of respondents said they can see another portal being able to compete with rightmove.co.uk in the future, while 19 percent did not think this was possible.
When asked “Should portals provide better value given the current market?” an overwhelming majority - 72 percent - said they should. “By pushing up the costs, rightmove.co.uk is in danger of alienating the very people who made them number one,” said one agent.
“The web portal companies should look at decreasing their costs in line with what the current market is doing,” another agent is quoted as saying. “If the market is slow (as it is now due to the downturn in finance) then an allowance should be made to reflect this with advertising costs. Any newspaper and glossy magazines should also follow suit.”
“We live in interesting times for agents and conveyancers in the UK; it’s a time when many are realising the need to make a change,” comments homesalone.co.uk. “The old methods no longer work so well. Whether it’s the market, strong competition or a change in technology, the business model of the traditional agency seems to be challenged.”
homesalone.co.uk moved to a free-to-list business model in August 2009. At the time, the portal said this was partially in response to the number of new portals launching in the UK - a trend homesalone.co.uk argued was providing little value to agents.
What’s your take on the results of this survey? Let us know your thoughts in our comments.
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