If a large website quotes an internally measured traffic number, then you could probably reduce that figure by 10-30% and get an accurate number.

Alternatively that may have quoted figures from 3rd party measurement services (netratings.com comes to mind) in whcih cas the 7.5mil UBs would be right on the mark.

Either way, generating revenue by ‘creating’ a business model after the fact is very hard to do. Especially when websites these days rely so much on consumer trust. Changing the site and it’s model can quickly turn visitors away, and kill off traffic.

The quote is not taken out of context, everyone knows that Barton started Zillow to disintermediate Realtors just like he had just done with Travel agents. There is no way he could have raised the amount of VC money with your current business model. Barton quickly found out that unlike travel agents, Realtors had their act together and would not go quietly into the night. Barton knew that the real money was in the real estate transaction and not in Zillow or Realtor.com’s current advertising business model. Once it became apparent to Barton that Realtors had more control than he had thought and he was not going to be able to get a piece of the transaction, he lost interest and moved on to working on his next project; glassdoor.com. I am sure he is still involved in Zillow, but the public does not hear much from him anymore about Zillow; like we did when Zillow just started.
I don’t think this is a bad thing. Everyone is out to make money and companies change directions all the time. Zillow has done some incredible stuff and I think Realtor.com has responded well to the competition. For any of these companies to ever make the type of money that they need to justify their startup capital, they have to become the dominate player in the US residential market. None of these companies will ever make any money with an advertising business model as long as the market is as fragmented as it is today. For an advertising business model to work and make any real return on the invested dollars, they will need to gain at least 20% market share in the US. That is going to be very hard to do and take a lot of time. Time is not on any of these companies side, as their burn rates are very large.
Without a doubt online real estate marketing has been pushed forward dramatically in the last 3 years by Zillow and their competitors. The real question is going to be will they be able to monetize in time to reap the rewards of their work?

Jake

Is a 3 year old quote taken out of context truly all Realtor.com has to differentiate itself? How sad.

Why don’t you directly address my last comment? Would you care to explain to everyone here why REALTOR.com has gone to war with REALTORS in terms of SEO? Why is it that REALTOR.com won’t even recognize REALTORS as the source of their own listings by following their links? You guys are intentionally blocking Google from finding Realtors websites. With friends like that, who needs enemies?

It’s not what you say – it’s what you do that counts – or at least that’s how I was raised.

We found an interesting quote from Mr. Barton in a Feb 8, 2006 CNNMoney.com story…how quickly we all forget.

“Founder and CEO Richard Barton says new tools like the ones being offered by his company are going to make real estate agents less important, and quite possibly lower the fees homebuyers and sellers pay. “Realtors currently sit at the middle of the transaction,” said Barton. “I think in the future they will sit more on the outside offering specific services.” Here’s the link http://money.cnn.com/2006/02/08/real_estate/money_zillow/index.htm

As the official Web site of the NAR, a trade association that’s been in business for more than 100 years, REALTOR.com is in it for the long haul WITH and FOR REALTORS®.

Where I disagree with you is that I believe you can be a (huge) fan of the REALTOR and Zillow at the same time – I know that we are.

Eric

With me, what Zillow has done matters little. One thing that I learned in the previous dot com bust is to follow the guys who were generating the profitability. Ebay, Amazon, Travelocity and others were able to. So many others did not.

While I can debate the idea of traffic vs quality of traffic all day, I think that Zillow’s survival to age four hinges on it’s ability to generate enough revenue to offset the burn rate. Works that way with any business. Profitability is the key.

Curious as to how that’s going. Also curious if it is not going, is there a plan in place to make that happen? That’s the part I see missing. When does the cash run dry. When does the founder stop pumping cash in…or start pumping cash in?

We can debate theoretically about the cash flow generation capabilities of an automated zestimate that may (or may not) get you within 10% of reality. But the real answer here is…does Zillow have a plan to stop the cash bleed?

In my opinion, only time will tell.

Did you just say that anyone who makes an analogy (you know compares one thing to another) has issues? Also, what is the difference between you running around the Internet and Louis running around the internet commenting? I could care less about what Zillow and Trulia do – I figure the industry just lies in wait and stops building your sites for you – you guys will run out of money. Last I checked, Homegain shows a profit, and Zillow? Is your model returning anything to investors?