NRT to Outflank Zillow / Trulia / Realtor.com with Websites? Hmm…
NRT is going to launch two websites by the end of 2014 – one that will include automated valuations like Zillow Zestimates & IDX, and the other which will put all their local operating company websites under one URL.
Sounds like exactly what the portals have been doing for years.
Why would a consumer go to either of these websites instead of Zillow, Trulia, or Realtor.com? What does NRT plan to offer that is unique? How are they going to gain traffic? Buy it from Google? Surely, they don’t believe simply launching two new websites will give them a massive boost in leads. Even if the websites convert at a crazy high percentage, they are still worthless without traffic. And traffic requires a lot of time, or a lot of money.
The portals shifted to focus on mobile around 2010. That was 4 years ago, and NRT is just now launching a new website initiative? What am I missing?
Sam DeBord
Posted at 08:50h, 06 AugustI’m waiting for the meat here as well. Wanting to drive traffic, create referrals, and “outflank” the biggest players in the space doesn’t mean anything until we hear what you’re going to do differently. There’s no doubt they have the money, but there’s a big gap in this story so far.
Drew Meyers
Posted at 10:03h, 06 AugustEveryone “wants” to do that. But few want it enough to actually do it themselves rather than just keep paying the portals.
They should do this – http://geekestateblog.com/coming-soon-brokeragefranchise-network/
Or this – http://geekestateblog.com/tinder-real-estate/
Basically, anything other than build a website…
Chad McBain
Posted at 05:11h, 08 AugustWell they have plenty of cash and now have some interesting technology as I doubt the Zip Realty purchase was done for the agents they have so we shall see what happens. As for finding out the plan, I would ask you Sam to let us know as you are as likely as anyone to find out before most 😉
Sam DeBord
Posted at 07:53h, 08 AugustIt sounds to me like the Zip purchase will be used first as technology for all franchisors/brokers to do lead generation, but that’s just the rumor I hear in the wind.
If people weren’t so excited about “outflanking” the major portals, we could focus on that fact that this isn’t about beating them in traffic, as Matt Carter pointed out. It’s just grabbing a relatively small portion of market share and effectively converting the traffic. Ben Kinney’s Blossor got the same crazy “Zillow-killer” media blitz, because everyone likes to say it, but he wasn’t positioning it as a portal killer.
Chad McBain
Posted at 09:19h, 08 AugustIndeed, I was listening to an interview with Bruce Zipf ( I believe it was him) and he made it quite clear that while internally it was called “project flanker” the actual purpose of the web portal was not to be a Zullia killer at all. Rather a referral based lead generator for the NRT agents and brokers. Thanks for your input.
Matt Carter
Posted at 10:03h, 06 AugustSome key points from the story: The NRT websites are aimed at “reducing the company’s reliance on leads rom Zillow, Trulia and realtor.com.”
…
“Last year, NRT handled 1.5 million Internet leads for its agents … [70 percent of which] came from more than 700 [non-NRT] real estate-related websites that the company uses to generate leads — the top sources being realtor.com, Zillow and Trulia.”
…
“While ‘Project Flanker’ may represent a departure from traditional brokerage websites, Realogy CEO Richard Smith said the company does not expect it to attract the kind of traffic generated by third-party listing portals. ‘It is not intended to compete against the big portals like Zillow or Trulia,’ Smith said Monday during Realogy’s second-quarter earnings call. ‘It is a very different approach to the markets, very smart, I think it is very strategic.’ ”
…
“NRT is hoping to not only boost the number of leads it generates
in-house, but to more than double the number of high-quality “scrubbed”
leads that it can collect a 35 percent referral fee on from select
agents.” …
…
“To better manage and convert the leads generated by the websites, NRT
plans to introduce ‘a highly integrated contact relationship management
system’ … ‘We believe these strategies will increase our
referral closings from the 4,500 we closed in 2013 twofold over the next
several years to 13,000 closed units.’ ”
Drew Meyers
Posted at 10:05h, 06 August“It is a very different approach to the markets, very smart, I think it is very strategic.”
What exactly is the approach?
Matt Carter
Posted at 14:44h, 06 AugustI guess we’ll see what the approach is when the sites launch. The point is NRT doesn’t say they are out to get the kind of traffic Zillow and Trulia do — just enough to do an additional 8,500 referral closings a year. while relying less on the portals. They have 42,000 agents. Does that sound far fetched?
Drew Meyers
Posted at 14:54h, 06 AugustI don’t have the math to know what 8500 referral closings would cost them. But they are still buying them…just from a different source. Google.
I bet Jeff Manson does know the math.