Member Info for UberDealer

Interesting and slightly shocking. I've raised the question with someone in the know so will report back.

You sound like a lazy disgruntled agent, and probably are. You state ' Zoopla is too buyer friendly, it allows buyers to know , how long a property has been on the market'. Who exactly do you think the biggest market for property portals are? Just a thought...but maybe it is for people looking to BUY property. Zoopla gives far more information to buyers than Rightmove...that is a good thing for buyers and they like this...this attracts them to Zoopla. I have heard it said a number of times that people look for property on Rightmove but look for information on Zoopla. Good. I am an agent in a city in the south west. The second highest viewers on our website are Londoners. I log every enquiry and can say that 85% of Londoners enquiring about property are doing so through Zoopla and Primelocation. In our city 8 out of 80+ agents chose On The Market and all dropped Zoopla and we are now benefiting from this. I think it is great that Zoopla gives the buyer all the information they need to make a purchase as that is what they want. They want to meet the agent selling and get one over on him with all their data etc...it is then our job to know more than they do and make them see differently and realise the potential in the property and coax that offer out of them. To be honest I sell just as much property off of a blackboard out the front of my office, on Facebook and Twitter as I do on portals. I hear agents whinging about Zoopla leads being crap and the back end being useless but the majority of these agents don't even know their login for ZooplaPro. Every property appraisal I go on is backed up by a Zoopla Comparables Report which is also backed up by a Rightmove 'Best Price Guide' report. I say 'backed up' as the Zoopla report is far more visually attractive. As for leads from portals...if you are relying on them then you need to get back to basics, learn some marketing skills and stop relying on the portals/internet for leads and sales. Rant over.

http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/zoopla-claims-otm-defectors-returning/ “As latest independent data shows ZPG audience around 100x that of OTM The latest data from independent web monitoring firm Hitwise shows that over the first two weeks since the launch of OnTheMarket (OTM) it has attracted a total of 194,000 visits (an average of 14,000 per day) versus 18.8 million visits for Zoopla Property Group (ZPG) over the same period. The Hitwise data reveals that ZPG’s daily audience has averaged 97 times that of OTM over the two week launch period and that OTM’s market share of all UK property website visits during this period stands at just 0.22% in comparison to ZPG’s market share at 22%. This data implies that at current levels an OTM agent would get the same level of exposure and enquiries in 3 months that an agent on ZPG would get in a single day. Assuming similar visit to enquiry conversion rates for OTM as Zoopla and Rightmove, estimated enquiries generated by OTM over its first 2 weeks would be less than 10,000 (2 per branch) versus almost 1 million for ZPG (or 57 per branch) giving an implied cost per lead of over £65 for OTM and under £3 for ZPG respectively, based on publicly available average rate information. And Zoopla Property Group has confirmed that it has already re-signed a number of agents who had previously cancelled to join Agents’ Mutual as they have quickly realised the damage to their business and reputation of the restrictive ‘only one-other portal’ rule and not being visible to the significant audience offered by all the major portals.

I put my city in to RM search and it shows me everything within 10 miles even though I specified 'this area only'. I put the same city into Zoopla and it shows me the city and within 3 miles around. RM trickery. Just like when they waffle on about their page impressions being x amount higher than Zoopla. Go to Rightmove and search and see how many pages you view before you actually see the properties...RM - 3 pages...Zoopla - 2 pages. Of course agents have now dropped off Zoopla but do not believe RM propaganda. On The Market don't have a chance.

Well worth a read from Barclays Equity Research. http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Barclays-Rightmove-Zoopla.pdf

Agents’ Mutual makes ‘one other portal’ exception for Scottish market. Surely you can't have one rule for Scotland! http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/agents-mutual-captures-scottish-market/

Agents Mutual have projected £Xm budget for advertising. They say they have 4,000 offices signed up but are yet to say whether they are gold or silver members. Gold members having paid £2000 in loan notes in advance (and signed up for 5 years) whereas Silver members merely sign a letter of intent to join in January ('Agents can sign up for Silver membership now without entering any binding contracts at this stage.'). So I suppose in January we will find out what that slender budget may be. I agree with Bountyhunter85 in that portals dominance is regional and read an industry survey the other day where it stated that Zoopla wasn't just most favoured in London it stated 'it owns London'. I'm an out of London agent and 95% of Londoners either enquire via Zoopla or PrimeLocation.

http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/funds-short-rightmove-zoopla-shares-bet-market-falls/

I have also recently heard from a very reliable source the following story. There were a group of 6 or so agents in a region of the country who were all on both portals. They all started talking to each other about joining AM and working together to then get the best deal out of the two big portals so that they could decide who to drop. Doing this all together then wouldn't make a difference as to which one they were on and they would all get the best deal out of it. They wrote to both portals to arrange a meeting a discuss terms etc..for next year when they have to drop other portals. Zoopla wrote back, arranged a meeting with them and put forward a reduced fee for all from next year. RM...didn't even acknowledge the request. Who do you think they are dropping?

The other problem they have is they are not letting online agents or agents without high street offices list. The key to any portal being 'the best' is to have absolutely everything that is 'on the market'. Even if they get all high street agents signed up they are not going to have 'everything'. Just like RM and ZPG don't have everything right now. That's why I believe they are better signing up 16,000 agents (all types) paying £100 per month now rather than imposing tight restrictions and only managing to get less than 4000 of which some have loaned £2000 each. People are lazy and want to go to one site that has (almost) everything they are looking for, like ZPG and RM. Other portals like Find a Property, Need a Property, Nethouseprices and Mouseprice etc...just can't compete. Without a considerable marketing and advertising budget neither will AM. Not going about it the way they are anyway. As for ZPG they might see a small blip in the new year when the possible 4000 agents signed up to AM make their decision of who to drop but it will just be that, a blip. And all the other above mentioned portals will suffer as the stipulation isn't to drop one of the big ones, it is to drop all but one other portal.

Agents Mutual have signed up less than quarter of agents so far. Most of the big national chains are tied in with both Zoopla and Rightmove for a number of years, so cannot drop either. The PUBLIC, who are the most important factor here, want a property portal that has most if not all properties that are available which is why they got to RM and ZPG. On the market will start in January with almost certainly less than third of all agents. The public are not going to go to a portal that has next to nothing on it and especially when the big chains (who generally have most of the property in any city) are not on there. I know in the city we operate in only 2 agents have committed to AM and they are independents. AM are expecting agents to clear their offices of all marketing for any other portal and you will only be allowed to use their marketing in your office and on your stationery, website etc.....Agents have to suffer the cost of reprinting and rebranding sites. AM have it all wrong IMO. They should have let agents stay with portals and build up loyalty from all agents over say next three years...so after 3 years they can be the only website that can truly say they have every agent and property that is available 'on the market'. FYI we are a very successful independent who only use Zoopla and are not committing to AM. Portal popularity is regional and gender specific too, RM is successful in one place but rarely used in others. ZPG is more favoured in London and with females. I have also asked the AM rep what their advertising budget is for the 1 st year, answer: £15m. When I suggested that isn't very much for national TV campaigns and convincing the public this is the site to go to, they replied that agents will need to push it. I asked what the budget is for the 2nd year, answer: Oh we don't know yet. Convincing? No. ZPG have spent £20m on advertising so far this year just to keep up with RM.

If Rightmove charges a single office close to £1000pm to list on the portal and Zoopla charges a single office £300pm would agents choose to drop Zoopla? That's IF they choose to even sign up to Agents Mutual.

I bet those agents are regretting selling so quickly now! Couple of nice big buys today. We're holding ours.