UK Portals Battle for Decreasing Traffic
December 23, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · Leave a Comment
Internet traffic analyst, comScore has released November figures for the UK. These will be a Christmas present for some, and a source of discontent for others, as the race to claim the overall top spot for 2008 reaches its final stages.
With declining web traffic overall to real estate websites in November, the competition has been heated.
rightmove.co.uk still leads with almost twice the number of unique visitors (1,994,000) as its nearest rival, findaproperty.com (1,069,000) at number two.
Over the last two months findaproperty.com has overtaken propertyfinder.com, who has been relegated to number three (1,030,000).
Controversially, the Digital Property Group, which owns findaproperty.com, as well as findanewhome.com (33rd with 96,000), primelocation.com (4th with 908,000) and homesandproperty.co.uk (8th with 300,000), claims to have closed the gap on rightmove.co.uk.
In November the difference between the number of unique visitors to rightmove.co.uk and the Digital Property Group’s portals was at an all time low of only 211,000. Mark Milner, chief executive of Digital, was quoted in Estate Agent Today as saying: “We have firmly established ourselves as second in the market place and are most certainly gaining ground on the market leader.”
However, the Digital Property Group makes its claims based on combining web traffic for all their portals together, whereas rightmove.co.uk is a single website.
It isn’t the only claim the Digital Property Group have made about the November figures. Earlier this month findanewhome.com claimed it had overtaken UK market leader smartnewhomes.com as the most-visited new homes portal. smartnewhomes.com issued a statement suggesting that the number one spot was only held by findanewhome.com for a short period of time, meaning smartnewhomes.com is still the market leader.
Meanwhile propertyindex.com has issued a statement claiming it has not only overtaken one of its biggest competitors, globrix.com, but also bucked the market trend by doubling its visitor traffic in November. propertyindex.com came in at number fifteen on the list (211,000), with globrix.com at number twenty one (171,000).
Visitor numbers to propertyindex.com in November were reported to be more than double the amount recorded for October and five times the volume of visitor traffic reported for June 2008. By contrast traffic to all real estate websites in the UK fell by around 20%. In November total UK real estate traffic was 6,595,000 while in September it was as high as 7,719,000.
propertyindex.com’s chief executive, Lee Bramzell is putting a very positive spin on the comScore results:
“The fact that we’ve seen our traffic increase in a declining market bodes extremely well for the future. It’s certainly not all doom and gloom…”
“Industry insights such as the comScore figures are invaluable to new portals and will no doubt send a clear message to all estate agents and developers planning how best to market their properties for sale and rent in 2009.”
The comScore Top 10 for UK real estate in November 2008 was:
1. rightmove.co.uk
2. findaproperty.com
3 propertyfinder.com
4. primelocation.com
5. realestate.com.au
6. nestoria.co.uk
7. vebra
8. homesandproperty.co.uk
9. Trovit UK Homes
10. houseprices.co.uk
Competition in New Home Portals
December 16, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · 1 Comment
findanewhome.com has overtaken previous UK market leader smartnewhomes.com as the most-visited new homes portal according to Hitwise figures from November.
findaproperty.com
December 12, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · Leave a Comment
findaproperty.com is one of the major players in the UK market. It has a traditional search facility for properties for sale and let in both the UK and some overseas markets but its main differentiator is its inclusion of comprehensive editorial. There’s information on the housing market and guides on all different aspects of the buying, selling and renting process as well as very good local information such as crime rates, school tables, tax rates and comments from locals.
The findaproperty.com audience is house hunters in early life stages – renters and first time buyers through to those working their way up the ladder.
Luxury Property Portals on the Increase?
December 12, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · Leave a Comment
In these challenging economic times you’d think property portals would be focussing on the cheap and cheerful, but the luxury end of the market still seems to be expanding.
Most recently the iproperty.com group launched a magazine to accompany its own luxury portal, iluxuryasia.com. iluxuryasia.com was established earlier this year and draws on its contacts in all countries through its sister websites in the iproperty.com group to collect what it claims is the largest database of luxury real estate for sale and rent from key Asian cities.
In the UK there’s old favourite primelocation.com which launched in 2001. The Digital Property Group are actively keeping it separate from their other three portals (findaproperty.com, homesandproperty.co.uk and findanewhome.com) in an attempt to retain the top end of the market. primelocation.com claim to have over 2 million visitors per month use their portal to view 230,000 “prime” properties to buy, and 60,000 “prime” properties to lease, from 4,000 agents.
In October we also reported on the rather quiet launch of propertyfinder.com’s luxury offering propertyfinder.com/premium, which will be going head to head with primelocation.com.
In the US, condogala.com also launched this year and showcases condos and luxury property developments from all corners of the globe.
A recent post from renthusiast suggests that things are hotting up the US. The website of long running New Jersey based magazine uniquehomes.com has been recently redesigned in order to keep attracting affluent home buyers.
It will face competition from luxuryhomes.com and luxuryrealestate.com which both offer wider global representation. There’s also Leading Real Estate Companies of the World’s offering, luxuryportfolio.com, and established player intlistings.com, just to name a few.
Prices Wars at findaproperty, primelocation
December 11, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · 2 Comments
findaproperty.com and primelocation.com, both owned by the Digital Property Group, have revealed their new “value based” pricing structure.
The value based pricing model takes into account factors such as the agent’s location, number of properties advertised, and the average value of the properties. The company says the price of advertising on their portals will therefore better reflect the potential value they can offer to an agent’s business.
The main change seems to be that agents are being encouraged to advertise across all four of the websites owned by parent company Associated Northcliffe Digital (AND).
AND is the digital consumer division of the Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT). In addition to findaproperty.com and primelocation.com it also owns homesandproperty.co.uk and findanewhome.com.
Some reports say that advertising across all four portals is now mandatory, but the company have assured agents that they can still list on single portals.
Estate Agent Today have published comments from a statement from the company saying:
“Agents can continue to advertise on a single site if they wish to do so, while missing out on the proven value brought by advertising on all four portals.
“Being listed on FindaProperty, Primelocation, Homesandproperty and FindaNewHome helps member agents to reach wider audiences than ever before; connecting them with more than 3.7m consumers per month.”
The new price structure means listing properties on all four sites could effectively result in a price increase for some agents and a reduction for others.
The portal owners argue that keeping the websites separate keeps them focussed on their distinct markets, and that agents will benefit from advertising across all four, targeting different segments of the market.
globaledge.co.uk Top 50 Property Portals
December 7, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · 2 Comments
Independent trade portal globaledge.co.uk has recently relaunched to celebrate its first birthday.
The new improved website is designed to help real estate agents and property developers do business overseas, providing networking and business opportunities as well as advice on industry matters.
New features include development finder, agent finder, interactive events calendar, news and alerts with business announcements, plus data on portals which allows agents to compare pricing and google rankings, aimed to help connect the global real estate world.
The website also offers the Globaledge Search Index where agents can research consumer demand for overseas property and make better business planning decisions, and marketing reports and online marketing advice to help improve lead generation and sales.
Now they’ve revealed the latest top 50 overseas property portal rankings.
Interestingly, themovechannel.com came out top, appearing on Google for 60% of the 535 regions analysed. It beats rightmove.co.uk, findaproperty.com, and primelocation.com.
The top five overseas portals are:
1. themovechannel.com
2. findaproperty.com
3. hotprop.com
4. rightmove.co.uk
5. leadgalaxy.com (venture.co.uk)
Many estate agents look to this rankings list and the information it provides on pricing and Google rankings as a guide to help them choose where to spend their advertising budgets.
The bulk of the information is only available to premium subscribers of globaledge.co.uk. Further information about the methodology behind the rankings is available at the website.
Metropix acquired by Daily Mail
December 5, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · Leave a Comment
Leading supplier of floorplans to the real estate industry, Metropix, has been acquired by the EDR Landmark Group Ltd, a subsidiary of publishing company Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT).
The announcement was made on Metropix’s blog yesterday. They write:
“The sale is the culmination of a competitive bidding process handled by PricewaterhouseCoopers Corporate Finance that commenced in April this year.
“We’ll now be working alongside the Landmark Information Group, Britain’s leading supplier of land and property search information. And we’ll also be in the same stable as several other well known names in real estate, such as primelocation.com and findaproperty.com.”
Metropix was established in February 2004 by Max Christian and Brian Farrell, who remain with the business. The company says that on average, over four floor plans are created using Metropix every minute of every working day.
Their customers range from national estate agency chains, such as the UK’s Countrywide and Sherry Fitzgerald in Ireland, to thousands of independent real estate agents and private individuals across the globe.
Since pioneering the world’s first technology to automatically generate 3D floor plans and Walkthroughs direct from a 2D plan, the Metropix product range has expanded to include Google Earth 3D models, interactive floor plans, and maps for both online and print.
Top 5 Crazy Names For Property Portals
November 28, 2008 by Emma Sorensen · 4 Comments
Around the PPW office we’re always hearing of new portals with crazy names. So we thought we’d put together a list of our favourites.
Is Globrix Under Pressure in the UK?
November 6, 2008 by Simon Baker · 9 Comments
The much hyped Globrix was recently quoted as saying that pay-to-list portals have had their day, however with decreasing traffic is it Globrix that is under pressure?
UK Portal Fees May Increase for Some
November 4, 2008 by Simon Baker · 2 Comments
Recently we reported on an announcement that fees would not be rising in 2009 for major UK portals primelocation.com and findaproperty.com operated by The Digital Property Group. But all is not as it first seems.
Loading ...
