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I do like the idea of the revolving system but don’t necessarily think that it is Trulia’s or Zillow’s obligation to be “fair”. Perhaps this argument could be made for R.com since it is supposedly supporting its members.
I do like the idea of the revolving system but don't necessarily think that it is Trulia's or Zillow's obligation to be "fair". Perhaps this argument could be made for http://R.com since it is supposedly supporting its members.
Since trulia and zillow are increasing their featured listings through recent initiatives-- spotlight ads (trulia) and consortium newspaper classifieds tie-in, there will have to be some system to put the featured folks in line fairly.
As for being on the top of the list, it's may be a few spots and I think many consumers, who view them as glorified ads, will overlook them. I could be wrong. Besides, buyers still drill down past those few featured ones. And as I said, any re-resort results in the loss of featured listing designation-- so you're in front a short time.
I'm curious as to others who do use featured listings, whether they see ROI worth the cost--- I'd love to have a system where you get the first spot right after the featured listings-- like being #1 on google organic search.
Finally, being at the top of Google may not be the same value as being at the top of a general search results page. Surely, someone has the stats on this stuff.
Unfortunately, as you mentioned, most featured homes offer buyers nothing more so featuring them isn't always a good idea.
@Jayson I'm waiting to see a site that does that.
@Heather-- you are probably right-- make the seller feel good.
When a user does a search on Trulia, we only feature the listings that match their specific search criteria. Here's an example: If you search for a 1BR, 1Bath Co-op priced between $700-800k on the Upper West Side in New York, you will only find featured listings that match your criteria. e.g. not listings for anything less than 700K or more than 800K. So it benefits both the consumer and the agent.
Plus, our data shows that the typical featured listing on Trulia gets roughly 4-7 times the exposure of the typical non-featured listing. Consumers are clicking on the featured listings and don't overlook them.
Hope this helps :)
Rudy
Social Media Guru at Trulia
>If you search for a 1BR, 1Bath Co-op priced between $700-800k on the Upper West Side in New York, you will only find featured listings that match your criteria. e.g. not listings for anything less than 700K or more than 800K
Not so. In fact, ALL the search results met my criteria, not just the featured listings. They not only met the criteria in price, they met the criteria in 1BR, 1Bath. The featured listings were no different than the rest.
http://tinyurl.com/4pneqw
Rudy
Social Media Guru at Trulia
It goes both ways the vendors. As a vendor I'm often asked by clients to perform some service for them which I know has about zero actual value in terms of moving property or generating traffic or leads. When I explain the low-marketing value of what I'm being asked to do, I'm often confronted with "It's to impress sellers."
It always makes me pause and scratch my head. I suppose it's a daisy chain of sellers not knowing what actually works but wanting to be impressed, so real estate pros need to impress them and then go asking for impressive actions instead of actions with marketing value. I dunno. I think I'm missing something...
Yes, I agree-- FLs have no more value to buyers than other listings.
Whatever value FL have for agents (not being at the back of the line), it is lost the moment the buyer re-sorts the results.
What ads work best to bring visitors to your site-- are they FL or other ads?
I'm a member of the Canadian Real Estate Association and our realtor.com equivalent does not provide opportunities to "feature" properties. Everything comes up in a search. That may change when realtor.ca launches on July 2, but at this point, no ads are sold to agents.
I purchase a "spotlight ad" on Point2Homes ($25) and a "Top of List" ad on kijiji ($25) to roll out each of my listings. I believe that the P2 spotlight ads generate additional views that cost between 5 and 10 cents depending on the listing. I've also done some experimenting with newspaper ads, using unique URLs. A $200 newspaper ad rarely produces in excess of 50-60 website visits.
I like the Canadian system. It seems fairer than having agents buy their way to the top of the search results.
It is great that you are able to track the visits. Have you also tracked the conversions? If you get less visits but more conversions, I'd say that is a better ROI.
BTW, I like the use of unique URLS. We built the Sellsius link to accomplish the same thing.
http://www.sellsiusrealestate.com/html/popup_se...
Joseph,
CREA has always maintained ownership and control over their national "homes" site. It's a complete piece of crap website but I'm sure it is "fair" for its members compared to realtor.com.
"Have you also tracked the conversions?"
I wish I was that organized and analytical. :) My opinion on the results of "featured homes" is more of a feeling. :) Like, "wow, I'm sure getting a lot more listing visits since I started buying these."
I do know that there is a pretty direct relationship between visits to our website and closings. I could really use some help tracking and improving conversions, but overall, I'm pretty delighted by the return on investment for our web related marketing.
It is relatively a good step that they are doing more and more for the real estate blogs and it is a good thing too that the featured home listing do not charge to the buyers.