This week’s Agents MVMT podcast ‘Pass the Syrup’, presented by Ben Madden, features Perry Power of Power Bespoke, Joe Parry of Archer & Co as well as Fine & Country & Sophie Lang of Lang Llewellyn & Co.
The guests discuss Rightmove, and more specifically, why so many agents are so against the portal, and yet continue subscribe to the portal.
Is it just the costs which leads to frustration with the property portal? Does the perceived lack of development play a part, or do agents just want to have their cake and eat it?
In this week’s social hand grenade, the guests review a particular post that gained a lot of traction online, rightly so?
As always, the guests share their funny stories and call out the Waffle of the Week, and as usual, Sam Offley of Agents Together, and Chris Watkins, make an appearance.
If you would like to take part in the Agents MVMT initiative, provide a feature or be a guest on the podcast, contact Ben Madden directly at ben.madden@fineandcountry.com.
Blimey this is a well known fact doh…..
Rightmove started best part of 23 years ago and was the first major portal, at a time when web portals were in their infancy and many agents were new to the game! RM offered a web site where agents could advertise under their own name but was linked to RM and wider audience without having the hassle of getting their own web site and this gained traction within the industry, as back then it was free and then moved to not so expensive. Call it a revolution, that the public loved.
Big corporates are the main stay with shareholders like Countrywide, Connells, Halifax and Rya & Sun Alliance companies. Many others followed as who was Zoopla? Other web portals came and went just as quick.
It was the high street agents that made the animal it is today. It became so big that it created an atmosphere of ‘you had to be on it’ or left out by losing vendors instructions. All sorts of shenanigan’s followed between waring agents ‘in or out’.
It became so big and remains today that agents created an animal they fear to leave. That fear stems from losing vendor instructions, even if it means being stuffed with exorbitant membership fees’.
RM were (are) no fools. Everything they do is calculated, up went the fee’s to a point that many an agent has left for Z or OTM the only other real competitors, but importantly RM base is so strong and committed by the big players, it isn’t needing to change. Some of the big players no doubt happy to see the small ones drop off, after all they are competitors! But it is that fear factor of losing business that the remainer’s pick-up …… or do they?
We left RM over a decade ago when it all got silly with fee’s and preferential treatment. No longer a level playing field and never looked back. Why because the customer followed us and they do also still look on RM etc. All we had to do is change our marketing strategy to customers, kept them informed and actually used RM fee’s to our advantage ….. it works.
Along came OTM, a golden opportunity …… lost, but that’s another story. It is however still there and works, just as Zoopla does. The public have learnt to shop around, so that fear of losing vendor’s is nothing but fear.
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Another story is that otm simply made rightmove stronger within months of launching their lying marketing campaign.
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I think it also has to be asked ‘why do so few agents think Zoopla is the devil?’
Probably something to do with £ to enquiry ratio. That is all this is about really isn’t it: enquiries – why else advertise the property?
In our area Z provides nearly as many enquiries per £ as RM and interestingly a slightly higher % of Z enquiries end up as tenants vs RM, quality is a factor too.
RM is a great portal with superior market share but it also costs an arm and a leg, more than our office per month and that is the bit which really stings as you get the feeling you are being rinsed. It has negatively affected growth in tricky markets also.
If we had to make a choice then it is obvious which portal we would stick with and I think that is the bit RM really need to pay attention to. The last few years have shown us that things can change much more quickly than we ever thought possible. Agent loyalty is to survival when the proverbial hits the fan.
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Zoopla refuse to put ‘ new price ‘ as a new listing like rightmove do.
This is a huge thing for agents trying to keep their vendors happy in a tough market.
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People moan about Amazon and still use Amazon
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Lets be honest, it doesn’t cost RM 3,000 per month per branch to host YOUR listings. They are reporting massive profits. The larger agents get massively favourable fees too. This is why agents have an issue with them, not because they ‘not proper agents’. If we are going to judge whether someone is a proper agent based on whether they list on RM or not or moan about RM and their pricing I think we have massively lost sight of what a proper agent actually is, it shoudl take more skill than listing on RM.
Thankfully I have no skin in the sales game as I hate sales, so I can only speak from a lettings perspective, but, having run the numbers Zoopla produces far better leads that convert at a higher percentage than RM so I am not going to pay 2.5k a month for a product that gives me less than one that costs me in the hundreds, that’s not good business sense and you are not a business person if you are not running those assessments and making the right choices accordingly. That has nothing to do with me not utilising the data. Most of my LL enquiries come from local connections, recommendation and Google.
I think those agents that are moving away from RM are actually beginning to perpetuate change in consumer behaviour and more and more people are actually beginning to understand that they need to look at ALL of the portals to see what is on market and the more noise we make about this the more it will shift, same as we did create the beast by promoting it and doing their job for them.
If we saw RM innovate regularly I think people would be more accepting of their charges, but, it really is just a listing/enquiry platform. Therefore a cost of under 1k per month would be more appropriate.
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Rightmove have many agent over a barrel with staggered contract dates and various discounts, the very fact that agents use RM against their fellow competitors shows theres never going to be any unity, agents just cant stick together… the smaller independents are the ones that are subsidising the stakeholders, corporates and larger agents. RM know that if the smaller agents leave the larger agents benefit with less competition, the only solution for independents and smaller agents is to find a way to break free, we left RM over 7 years ago with No adverse affect to our business what so ever… smaller independent agents are in a different position they pay more per branch but the savings they could make by leaving can be put into different marketing strategies… This takeover of OTM is yet another opportunity for agents to break free from Rightmove the last two chances were missed maybe this time the penny will drop and agents will win the third time lucky
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I think rightmove are running the risk of losing sight of the value of money.
Take any thriving little old market town anywhere in the uk, there are 4 indies on the high street and 1 sleazy corporate. Assuming that all 5 are on RM that equates to over 10k coming out of that local economy per month, every month, infinitum or until those agents either cease with RM or cease period. And for what value to the community at large?
Bring on the creative destruction of AI I reckon, I’ll send my bot out interrogating on my behalf across the entire web, in time I will of trained it to ” knock on doors” to explore what if any opportunities are there and to report back to me sharpish, the low hanging fruit of portal listings will be just one data point.
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What benefit do estate agwent give to the community
They exist to make a profit and for no other reason
Nothing wrong with that its what businesses exist for
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It may come as a surprise to learn that agents ARE part of the community, they shop in the shops, drink in the pubs and play roles no different to any other, that might be an agent running the line at a school football match, you might be sat next to one at an AA meeting, you’re fishing next to one on the next peg, that one, she does some logistics for the foodbank over xmas… etc….And of course agents will also do the bad stuff in the community too, that one doesn’t like necky developers and will assault them on principle etc…..
Thing is, even if that 10k per month was used purely to remunerate staff and nothing more, you might find the indie restaurant on the high st very grateful that mr and mrs agent and their 3 kids are having a night with them to celebrate X, Y or Z.
Emotional intelligence should tell you that firing it all at a PLC is not the same.
Should.
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I’m trying to create a portal that is 100% agent owned. But….honestly….i’m starting to think that portal fees are only an issue for the smaller, lower-volume agents? Lot’s of agents complain, but do absolutely NOTHING (except moan on forums and social media).
OTM might soon become VERY similar to RM in terms of subscription fees. The only agents and industry commentators that support them are most likely shareholders! Agents need to get a grip. And fast. There aren’t many chances left. Agents are all building businesses that are reliant upon an external platform that they have no control over!
Forget the notion of “just promote your site on social media” – utter rubbish. It will complement your business, yes. But no consumer wants to be searching multiple social media accounts to find a property. The same with search engine optimisation too – nobody wants to search Google for a home. All they want is one, simple, aggregated, filterable list of properties that directs enquiries and financial opportunities directly to agents. It isn’t rocket science.
[Sentence removed as it breached posting rules]
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Hmm, this piece does get one thinking, mainly about the price justification. Let’s dive in a bit, shall we?
The big reason agents stick with Rightmove is the lack of solid alternatives. No one wants to risk losing market share by trying to boost a new platform up to Rightmove’s level.
I’ve met loads of estate agents, proper ones at that, who aren’t fans of Rightmove. If it was just the ‘non-proper’ agents complaining, why would there be a whole Facebook Group dedicated to discussing Rightmove’s downsides?
Now, the bit about enquiries and conversions seems a bit off. In a perfect world, sure, if 20 enquiries came to one agent alone, they’d likely convert more. But let’s be real, those 20 enquiries probably landed in the inboxes of five other agents too. So, the conversion maths here doesn’t quite add up.
Paying £3000 a month in 2023 feels a bit steep, especially when tech has made things cheaper.
And about charging ‘proper decent fees’ to cope with the cost – that’s an idea, but will it just end up costing the public more? Is that the right way to go?
Lastly, this article does have a bit of a Rightmove cheerleader vibe. Was there a little nudge from Rightmove in the background maybe?
This whole thing does leave one with more questions. It’s a bit of a head-scratcher, isn’t it? Was this backed by Rightmove by any chance?
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