PORTALS


The top three portals have a number of similarities; they all operate subscription based pricing and offer similar services to agents. However, they do have slightly different slants on the way they present themselves online. Rightmove has a strong brand and a single portal, while TDPG maintains a portfolio of portals including Findaproperty, Primelocation, and Globrix, as well as the Daily Mail property websites (part of its parent DMGT). Zoopla, on the other hand, has a


distributed model, which could almost be described as the ‘Intel inside’ of the property sector, in addition to its own portal; its distribution partners include Virgin Media, Yahoo!, Upmystreet, and homes24 – the latter supplying content for 60 local newspaper sites getting half a million visitors a month. Subscribing agents are getting exposure to these sites, as well as on Zoopla’s own portal.


THE STATISTICAL CAN OF WORMS Alex Chesterman claims that if you counted all its distribution partners, Zoopla would get more visitors than Rightmove, which opens up the can of worms that is portal measurement. Even if you just take the main portal and omit others in the group, there’s still room for debate. For instance, both TDPG’s Findaproperty and Zoopla claim the number two spot in the market, depending on whether you use ComScore figures or Neilsen – the web measurement houses have different methodologies, both are well regarded. Miles Shipside believes that simply


concentrating on unique visitors doesn’t give the whole story. “ComScore measure visitors and engagement, which are also useful metrics; for example in January they measured that the average visitor spent 47 minutes using Rightmove, which was more than double the time spent on the next highest top four portals.” He also points out that Rightmove is audited by ABCe, which isn’t the case for most other portals. The increasing importance of the portals


has been reflected in generally buoyant pricing. While free-to-list and pay-per-lead products were expected to challenge the prevailing subscription model, subscription has remained dominant, though each major portal has its own take on it. One thing is quite clear; standard listings are now only the entry level; it’s the added features that are where agents now need to differentiate themselves, and where the portals are making their money. For instance Zoopla provides three levels of


If you counted all our distribution partners – Virgin Media, Yahoo! Upmystreet and homes24, Zoopla would get more visitors than


Rightmove!’ ALEX CHESTERMAN ZOOPLA


subscription, with differing features, while Rightmove has a number of packages that have pushed average spend per month up from £308 to £379. Over a quarter of the increase in 2010 revenues came from products that were introduced in the year, such as display advertising targeted on particular search terms. Rightmove now makes over a fifth of its revenues from products other than property listing, and expects that proportion to increase. Miles Shipside says the extra products,


beyond the core subscription, allow agents to address particular advertising goals, “For example, Local Homepage banners are a great way of demonstrating expertise and enhancing brand awareness in a local market, while Premium Listings are a property-specific product which allows the agent to boost the presence of a listing.” As the owner of multiple portals, TDPG


also varies its pricing with the number of sites the agent wants included in the package. Featured listings gain 75 times more views than a standard listing. TDPG also offers a data rental service, allowing agents to select a target audience from the TDPG customer database, according to postcode, age range, house value, gender or recency, for a one-off marketing campaign. Mark Milner says that “Rightmove’s


annual report, published recently, shows record profits, and that this has been funded directly by estate agents who are paying on average 23 per cent more than they did last year. It’s plain to see when looking at blogs and opinion from estate agents that there is strong animosity towards Rightmove and the fact that they take advantage of their market position. “TDPG have not changed our advertised


ratecard for over three years and over this period the quality and quantity of enquiries to estate agents has increased significantly.” Alex Chesterman points out that Zoopla


We do love to buy beside the seaside, Plot your purchase as you sunbathe!


does offer a pay-per-lead model as well as a subscription model, but, “Ultimately the subscription model is the most favoured, and it’s here to stay. We are completely agnostic as to which model agents use, and the smaller ones and startups like the leads model, but the majority of our clients choose subscription.” He believes that subscription’s appeal is


that it makes budgeting easy, with a fixed monthly marketing spend, evening out seasonal fluctuations. But he says while the average branch has an inventory of about 56 properties, many startups only have five or six, making the pay-per-lead model much more attractive.


PROPERTYdrum APRIL 2011 17


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