February 2008

Portals – the outlook for 2008...

The chase is on to catch Rightmove

MOST people look forward to a new year with optimistic expectations — and the leading property portals are no different.

They have all replied to a questionnaire of mine and not unexpectedly all see themselves gaining ground on their rivals in the year.

Three of them, however, are expecting the demise of a least one of their rivals and that does not include the much-discussed merger of Prime Location and FindaProperty.

Rightmove of course are bullish. They start the year as undoubted number one and aim to finish it that way as well.

Competitors also recognise this and accept that they are really competing for the number two position.

Of course, there are always those who ‘say’ they will challenge Rightmove but no-one has achieved it. Globrix are the latest to ‘say’ they will but are no more likely to succeed than the others.

All the portals are hopeful that a downturn in the property market will force agents to cut back on their print advertising and concentrate more resources on the internet and through the portals.

They do, however, appreciate that they will still need to work hard to justify the investment that agents make in portals.

All are increasing their marketing spend and appreciate that it is necessary to enhance their brand positioning if they are to be successful in attracting more consumer usage and convince agents that Internet advertising is more beneficial than newspaper.

Rightmove were the innovators in TV ads and they have continued with their biggest-ever TV ad spend. They also plan major exposure on radio and on-line.

Ian Springett of Prime Location, however, claims that in fact they are the top spenders.

“Prime Location has spent more on advertising and marketing than any other portal in each of the last three years and we expect to do the same in 2008,” he said.

They, too, had a four-week January campaign and have two further campaigns programmed for later this year.

Sister site FindaProperty are set for a three-fold increase in marketing spend with a £10 million budget for 2008.

They are entering into a joint venture with Northcliffe regional newspapers and half the budget will promote that but it does leave £5 million earmarked for investment in TV, local radio, outdoor and search engine marketing etc.

David Garratt, FindaProperty’s chief executive, said: “To maximise the effectiveness of the TV campaign, we have spent a considerable amount of time with qualitative market researchers.

“The object was to explore the marketing messages that house hunters are most receptive to, and the first of a number of bursts of TV advertising will take place in February.”

Gillian Kent, the newly-appointed chief executive of Propertyfinder, also announces record spending.

“Our new outdoor and online marketing campaign, launched this month across the UK, will be supported by our largest ever advertising spend,” she said.

Hot Property will concentrate on search engine promotion backed up by a broad range of brand awareness.

Fish4homes will continue to ‘piggyback’ on other Fish4 sites promotions and will concentrate on their 500 or so regional titles.

Think Property had, at the time of writing, still to sign off their spend but say they will continue their aggressive online campaigns which enabled them to achieve peaks of success in 2007.

Meanwhile, all the major portals have updated their sites in the recent past, other than Fish4 who are scheduled to update early this year.

Prime Location and Rightmove were the latest to revamp their sites at the end of 2007 and the sites do reflect the different propositions that these two portals offer.

Rightmove is efficient and to the point. It keeps you in the site and the standard telephone contact with the agent is through its 0845 system.

Prime Location on the other hand provides all the links to the agent site in a prominent position and seems to actively encourage one to get further information direct from the agent — albeit still within the confines of the Prime Location site.

Prime Location, Hot Property and Think Property are the sites to show the properties available on a web 2.0 map that allows you to change the view to satellite or hybrid.

Think Property is the most advanced at this stage with the ability to overlay additional information such as transport links, schools etc. Propertyfinder shows results on a street map but without the display options of web 2.0.

Mr Springett said: “Early indications in January are that the (new Prime Location) site will produce materially more leads per visitor than the old one.

“Also, these leads will be of higher quality because the visitors are able to assess more readily whether or not a property is in the right location and of the right type for them.”

Improving property display seems to be on the agenda. Findaproperty are providing video display and Think Property have their new moving image display. Others say they are working on video.

Similarly, more work is going into providing sites for the mobile user as more and more consumers are using PDAs and the like.

Fish4 are investing in mobile site technology that will be delivered by the end of the second quarter of the year.

Shawn Leutchens of Hot Property thinks these developments are for next year. “Enhanced mapping features will continue to attract attention and enhanced search capabilities will provide additional value to consumers,” he said.

“The use of mobile media and video will continue to develop though neither is likely to come to the fore until 2009.”

Rightmove place great store on the facilities they provide for agents on their site.

Miles Shipside, Rightmove’s commercial director, said: “The Best Price Guide and our other free reports in Rightmoveplus are priceless in the tougher market.”

The idea is to give agents the best possible price comparisons to get the property on to the market at the right price in the first instance.

FindaProperty see sellers and landlords increasingly wishing to short list prospective agents using the internet (e.g. to identify the three or four agents they want to come around to value their property at the weekend).

Mr Garratt said: “Accordingly, we have sought to make it easier to search for agents on the site, and for agents to showcase their credentials through the use of featured agent buttons.”

One ‘enhancement’ that may not go down quite so well with agents is the Think Property proposal for what they are calling a Finance Centre.

Chief executive Mark Goddard said: “The Finance Centre is an exclusive partnership with a company called Money Expert - this will allow users to search and browse for financial services, and it will be integrated into every property search.” Some agents may be concerned about the impact on their own financial service sales.

Mr Goddard added: “We have a full development pipeline for 2008 already and will be increasing headcount in this area to bring a very different new homes experience to our users, as well as continuing to develop our agents’ reporting tools.”

In addition to the joint venure on the advertising front, FindaProperty have announced that they are entering into a partnership with Northcliffe regional titles as part of their expansion drive.

Mr Garratt: “We will be powering the property channel of Northcliffe’s ‘thisis’ websites, which act as companion sites to each local paper (for example thisisexeter.co.uk is the online companion for the Exeter Express and Echo).

“The local newspapers’ advertising sales team will be selling FindaProperty.com alongside print advertising in the property supplement. FindaProperty.com will also be heavily promoted in the local newspapers.

“The joint venture has been rolled out in Kent and Essex, the South West (Devon and Cornwall) and will be rolled out in the other Northcliffe areas over the next couple of months.

“This has been very positively received by agents who have been clamouring for a viable alternative to Rightmove — for example we already have over 300 agency offices on the site in Devon and Cornwall and another 100 plus in the pipeline.”

Others talk aggressively of expansion. Prime Location expects to have 9,000 offices on board by the end of the year.

Mr Springett talks confidently of other proposals as well. “We will also expand our market-leading position in international property, further improving the functionality of the overseas property search and expanding further the portfolio of agents and properties we carry,” he said.

“New homes is a particular focus this year and we are expanding our sales team and improving this section of the website.”

Think Property are also aggressive movers. Mr Goddard does not hold back. “We are anticipating that with all the new consumer activity and our focus on functionality that a clear position number two slot by the end of December 2008 is more than realistic to maintain,” he said.

It is clear that everyone is chasing Rightmove but have no great expectations of catching them.

Be assured that Rightmove do not sit on their laurels and they will continue to make enhancements to both the consumer offering and their support for agents.

I also expect to see them develop services on their www.aboutmyplace.co.uk website and for them to drive increased revenues from there.

Although some agents are questioning the cost of being on Rightmove, it is a brave agent who withdraws — not only because of the public awareness of the site but also because of the strategic information agents can get from the site.

Cost will undoubtedly be a factor in 2008. Think Property are committed to their low cost model and Propertyfinder are committed to their price freeze.

Ms Kent said: “We will continue to offer agents the ability to freeze their prices at current levels. Since introducing this option in late 2007 it has been extremely popular with agents.

“We don’t believe that the 30 per cent price increases implemented by our competitors are in the best interests of our clients and so we will continue to offer great value pricing for all agents.”

With the competition hotting up, the support of agents will still be key to the portals’ survival — none of them have a business without your support.