Trulia and Google bag another big one
By following others.
Apparently my griping about how C21 was going to be left behind by KW may be for naught. Realogy (ERA, Century21, Coldwell Banker, Sotheby’s) is stepping to the plate:
From a press release:
Tomorrow, Realogy Corporation will announce a new online listing distribution strategy that will result in all CENTURY 21 listings becoming accessible through the Google and Trulia Web search portals. This strategic move will make it easier than ever for buyers to find a home perfectly matched to their lifestyle and needs, while providing sellers with unprecedented marketing exposure. This strategy is a fantastic point of differentiation from our competition.
…
It’s a fact that over 58 percent of all Internet searches on “real estate” and related terms are conducted on Google and its search partner sites. Meanwhile, Trulia.com is one of the fastest growing sites in the real estate category and reports that it refers over two million buyer visits to external listing sites each month. Seventy percent of Trulia users surveyed indicated that they
This is good for buyers of real estate, as both offer better searching capabilities and data display than many local MLSs, and good for sellers as it expands the reach of their Realtors’ marketing. But … how will redundant data be dealt with? What is to stop a seller from uploading his or her house to google, the Realtor, a friend, etc? How will data integrity be ensured?
How long until the local MLS‘ are irrelevant?
Sometimes leading is knowing when to follow.
Update: Inman has coverage as well, as do Trulia.
Technorati Tags: century 21, real estate, trulia
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[...] Trulia and Google Bag Another Big One by Jim Duncan - Real Central VA [...]
[...] The downside of Trulia’s new partnerships By Jim Duncan Things move quickly! Very soon after the announcement that Realogy would be sending their data to Trulia, I notice that Trulia’s listing for one of my listings no longer goes to my website, but instead goes to Century 21’s website. Traffic to my site goes down, and now any potential leads that I might have gotten will instead be routed through Century 21. My response time will inevitably be much slower (assuming I get the leads at all). Not to mention that I have many more photos on my site and my site is much easier to customize to maximize my listings’ best features. [...]
[...] Hitwise, Zillow and Realtor.com By Jim Duncan There has been much talk the past several days about Hitwise’s announcement that Realtor.com is still the reigning champ in the online real estate search arena. (Here are the Top 20) But … the big news is that Realtor.com/NAR are now recognizing the threat to Realtor.com is real. Realogy’s partnership with Google and Trulia is real. Unless Realtor.com does something dramatic AND FAST they may become another footnote in the history of the internet. [...]
[...] In the days that followed there was speculation that either Trulia or Google eventually could become the mythical “national Multiple Listing Service,” replacing all of the local MLSs with one mega-MLS. Jim Duncan of the Real Central Virginia blog asked how long the local MLS will be relevant? [...]
[...] All three of these possibilities are related to each other. If super-regionals are better than the current market definitions, why not just jump straight to a national MLS? Are the regionalization efforts going on right now simply a last gasp effort by the current MLS leadership to ward off the inevitable take-over by one of the national portals? The rise of the new listing portals may be the latest incarnation of the complaints against the MLSs’ attempts to structure rules for distribution of the MLS data. As the new listing aggregators run into these rules, they complain and seek alternative strategies at the same time. At the same time, even while being attacked by the DOJ through the NAR litigation, some of the biggest franchises have decided some of the listing portals are more friend than foe. Perhaps all three of these developments are creating a “perfect storm” of circumstances that will alter the MLS model forever. [...]