OnTheMarket boss Ian Springett has reiterated the portal’s commitment to “fair pricing” – while heavily criticising Rightmove.
In the latest round of portal wars, Springett told EYE: “We recognise that agents are experiencing a tough time with lower than usual transaction volumes; reduced lettings fee income; the possible onset of recession; and the instability from a looming general election with uncertainty around Brexit.
“Our pricing pledge – announced in September – means agents who entered the new five-year listing agreement in February 2018 will enjoy a price freeze for their listings fees in 2020 rather than being charged an increase of up to 5% as allowed for within the agreement.
“Many agents may remember how Rightmove behaved in the difficult years following the 2008 banking crash. UK annual housing transactions fell 44% from over 1.6m in 2007 to 0.9m in 2008 and did not begin to recover until 2012.
“Between 2009 and 2012, Rightmove increased its average fees per advertiser by 72%, taking its profit margin from 63% to 73% in the process.”
As well as blasting Rightmove over its pricing, OTM is also taking it to task over its leads.
Springett said that in September, OTM provided agents an average of 34 leads per £100, compared with Rightmove’s 16 leads per £100 during the first half of this year, based on an average advertising monthly rate per branch of £1,077.
Springett said: “We have heard time and again from agents that OTM’s leads are of excellent quality.”
One agent, Philip Norgan, of Martin Kemps, in Aylesbury, says he dropped Rightmove after analysing leads from all three portals between last June and March this year.
He said that 90% of enquiries from Rightmove for viewings and valuations went on to produce nothing.
He said: “In March 2019, genuine Rightmove enquiries that resulted in a worthwhile opportunity cost £151 each, based on our fee.
“We took the view that it wasn’t working for us and in June we left. It’s been quite evident that business levels have increased rather than decreased.
“Since leaving Rightmove, our staff have more time to do important things, less stress dealing with enquiries which don’t go anywhere and no loss of enquiry levels. In fact, they have increased.
“We have so far saved thousands and know that our analysis has allowed us to streamline our marketing costs to produce the most effective results for our vendor and landlord clients, which means that our business has prospered against a difficult trading backdrop.”
We have invited Rightmove to comment on Springett’s claims.
OK Ian….
Beat your drum every week with “evidence”, “agents examples”, “comparisons”, “reasons to change”, “real facts & stats”……better/stronger marketing, dump the cr@p tv ad and re-launch with a hardhitting/positively memorable ad…..
……then maybe you might just shift from being the static 3rd portal to “the viable contender”.
Will be interested to see if this is an sustained effort/campaign by OTM, or just a random effort to rally a flagging portal.
“Backed by Agents. Run by Agents” your slogan says Ian. Lets see what you/OTM can push next week, the week after, the week after that…..
Prove that OTM can replace Rightmove Ian.
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So why is Ian Springett (OTM) complaining about Rightmove when my OTM subscription is nearly as much as Rightmoves’ now since we closed a branch and OTM insisted due to some obscure clause in our contract that we will still get charged for that now closed office for the next 3 and a bit years. The invoice still shows the 2 offices split but won’t cancel the closed office. Not really a way to get us all on side is it Ian – I know of 2 other local agents who are cancelling at the end of their fixed term contract for the same reason. Yes Rightmove is still VERY expensive BUT OTM is not the answer because too many of us will be leaving in the medium long term due to false promises, over charging, complete lack of respect and courtesy, and lies.
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Another example of their arrogance………all the portals sing from the same hymn sheet.
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This noise from IS smacks of desperation
The cash is running low
The share price is running low
Public awareness is running low
His salary will be running low
Take a bow IS you’ve messed up a great idea along with the founder agents who failed to stick with the mutual and took the shares instead
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Onthemarket is agents last chance to survive, so they need support.
Iam not sure they can win the battle on numbers though.
Right move is dominant and that’s it.
O.m. need to work from ground up.
Pick a few areas to try and get a rightmove switch off…then when customers in the area see rightmove has no property they will search elsewhere.
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Anyone else had a rightmove survey? I think they will going for a record when results are in:
Most hated product with a monopoly , goes to rightmove!!
Well done you rats.
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Springett said that in September, OTM provided agents an average of 34 leads per £100, compared with Rightmove’s 16 leads per £100 during the first half of this year, based on an average advertising monthly rate per branch of £1,077.
I do not think that the above is relevant. The number of leads per property is the figure I’d be interested in.
Rightmove can be very bullish with their pricing just the same way that agents can do the same during their valuations.
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Never really know why there’s so much animosity towards OTM.
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Annie Mosity lives on Rightmove’s front lawn. She only visits OTM on particular occasions.
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You haven’t been paying attention then I would suggest.
Set up as a mutual for agents by agents, founder members on long contracts paying monthly subs and fighting the good fight. Then as soon as it was possible the board pushed through a float that seriously lined their pockets and started letting agents join in for free.
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Yes and as per my post charging me over £700 a month for 2 offices, 1 of which hasn’t existed for months now!
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Thought the £99 / office suggestion from a few days ago was a good one, no freebies just a low price for everybody to get on board. How much does it really cost to operate a portal and make a profit. We’re an original gold member and can’t see any benefits apart from just forking out every month and seeing the thing just drifting along. Haven’t seen a rep since we joined, although I wouldn’t be bothered if I felt I wasn’t being made a mug of
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Since the flotation that was designed to produce funds for the fight, how much have you heard from the Ian and Helen show????
How often have you been visited by OTM when you spend so much with them??
How genuinely serious have they been about taking on RM??
The fact is that they haven’t tried hard enough – they have taken the cash and provided P Poor service along the way…..the founder agents are as much to blame – they should all have come off Rightmove on day one………month one or at least year one when pledges to existing clients had ended……
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The sudden flurry of press activity is because they are worried about an exodus of out of contract OTMv1 agents when the five year anniversary arrives in January…
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Agreed
Panic Panic
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If you conducted a random survey of people in the street and asked them to name the best website to look for a property I will bet a pound to a penny that the answers will be, in order:
‘Purplebricks’
‘Rightmove’
‘Zoo – something or other’
End of.
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Indeed APE. The ridiculous, repetitive and truly petty comments about OTM mask the real failure of our industry to grasp the opportunity to bring RM to heel. Countless articles have reported agents hatred of RM’s unjustifiable fees yet bizarrely many of these same agents have roundly sought to carp and criticize those who try to compete (including the NAEA’s own effort), rather than embrace the opportunity and address some of their alleged grievances from within.
Perhaps they follow a different agenda to the rest of us, who, like me, are genuinely concerned about lower transaction volumes and the threats brought upon us by our elected representatives in the form of Brexit, Stamp Duty, Tenant fee bans, landlord taxation and much else. Adding RM’s generous offer to increase their charges by 10-15% each year, which is hardly likely to win many friends, you’d imagine we’d all run to join any serious attempt to dislodge their avaricious mindset.
So JEL, does RM make you feel a mug yet ? How many years have you endured being fleeced before that idea crossed your mind ?
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“you’d imagine we’d all run to join any serious attempt to dislodge their avaricious mindset”
When one comes along please feel free to let us all know.
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I’m a bigger mug in the eyes of Rightmove….we all have the same concerns and fears every minute of every day.
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Interesting that no one seems to comment on how potential vendors react to OTM when questioned about them on instruction appointments. In our patch we always ask the same question when up against any of our competitors who are using OTM and are not using Rightmove ” we will expose your property to the widest possible audience and that will include Rightmove and Zoopla. Some of our competitors don’t do that ( too expensive ) so you could miss out on a sale/best price etc. Oh by the way have you ever heard of OTM? “. Who are they? Is that Morrisons? Sign here please.
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Exactly.
Millions raised and millions wasted by OTM – poor service and an arrogance that is without justification – traded on fear and the herd mentality rather than traded on a genuine desire to be better and a true contender.
OTM has relied on a cartel of agents who have failed to collaborate – it will always be thus.
Founder Agents have only themselves to blame; yet they choose to blame only IS when they are all responsible.
HO wmany founder agents removed RM from their websites, branding and office displays???? A handful maybe.
This has been like a parachutist who was too scared to let go fo the plane……..
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I know agents that would have a field day on your patch, “Rightmove, they dont sell your property we do, they’re the online portal that charge a fortune to advertise your property so the agent can charge you an arm and a leg and sit back and do nothing, you may as well use Purple Bricks if you want that kind of service, we dont use RM and the savings we make are passed on to our customers, we have genuine buyers on our books and I have a list of potentials with me today”.
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“…we dont use RM and the savings we make are passed on to our customers…”
Exactly what “saving” would be passed on – and how?
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If he sells five a month thats’ a mahooosive £200 off each one…..winner
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Simple maths, I paid £1,500 a month to RM and pay less than a third of that to OTM, don’t need any though, We sell houses not portals!
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Sorry, HIT MAN – but your “simple maths” explains nothing other than you are saving a grand or so a month.
How are you passing this on to your customers?
And most importantly, why?
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Wheres rummage4 peebee?
For years weve heard the it’s coming hype, you got your own article last year to say it’s coming, is it here yet?
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AJP123
May I suggest you make an enquiry via the appropriate channels.
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The continuing story of OTM is one of missed opportunity . Lost goodwill amongst agents seemingly never to be regained with an inflexible approach . A poor advertising campaign . A logo that makes most punters think the estate agent is supporting a RAF benevolent charity The overrding suspicion that they put more effort into enforcing contracts than they do in increasing market awareness and retaining membership
Time for changes at the top
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This will no doubt become fully evident in the next few months as the 1500 or so that didn’t sign up to the new agreement leave the sinking ship – fewer members and lower revenue on the way.
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When your whole business strategy is all about focusing on a competitor rather than on what your own can deliver, you know you have problems. Becoming rather tiresome seeing this same monologue over and over again when their entire strategy is to replicate it. OTM isn’t here to save the industry from portal costs, it’s to line the pockets of those who set it up – it’s there for all to see in the way they have conducted themselves.
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Rightmove is a great, over 99.9% of their page views has to be answering the stupid questions non-buyers normally ask agents; How much is that property on…???
Agents should look at the money they spend on Rightmove as a valuable service- ‘the not answering the phone to nosey neighbours and competitor agent’ service. It’s a 24/365 service that looks after itself an saves agent staff from constantly being on the phone or answering emails.
Their value is not being a great lead generation tool but a filter for the same old, same old.
If they would just learn to only send genuine leads through to the agents with the listings the applicant is keen on everything would be much better for agents and the applicants… quality enquiries in place of unmanageable volumes of crud.
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Why do onthemarket still allow portal juggling, a local agent keeps marketing the same properties and they are sent out at least once a week as ‘new properties’ in their emails. this week I have had them twice, same agent, same property. I have complained but they have stated they don’t care. As for their stats on email send outs that figure is completely skewed. I get one email per new or reduced property (sometimes over 10 email alerts a day) and on the weekends emails just repeating what they sent during the week. Unlike Zoopla or Rightmove onthemarket send out far too may email alerts daily which not only fustrats their figures but frustrates me as well.
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EAW1
“I have complained but they have stated they don’t care.”
If this is correct and you have that in writing, then I suggest you supply the information to Frau Renshaw.
#portaljuggling was confirmed in 2016 by the then NTSEAT as breaching 2008 CPRs.
An Agent deliberately manipulating their portal listings is one thing. A portal knowingly turning a blind EYE to it is something entirely different – but both need those in the industry who are aware of issues to bring attention to them.
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Onthemarket is agents only chance to undo what brainwashes them into thinking that Rightmove is the answer, a few posts on here criticise OTM over their costs and moan that they are tied in to a contract, we all have business choices to make it looks like some cant manage their own businesses. When the Sh** hits the fan is when they are paying RM over £1k a month and laying staff off because of poor business management thats when your competitors will employ your staff and leave you behind.
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