Why isn’t there an independent advertising network, made specifically for real estate, that targets bloggers, social sites and even the more established sites online?
The Problem
Let me lay it out from the advertisers point of view. You have a service, property or product that you want to advertise and get the word out on. You’d love to advertise on sites that are relevant to your demographic or geographic region.
It would be nice if you could get a package to advertise on sites like Trulia, Hotpads, Homegain, Zillow, and eppraisal.com, etc… In fact, you’d like to advertise on blogs of people within a specific area too, so being able to tap into independent real estate bloggers and geographically target the Active Rain network would also be nice.
Well, you can. The only thing you have to do is contact each one of these parties and work out a deal, cut 15 different checks and create advertising creative in 15 different sizes and formats. Hmmm, it’s not so easy to manage, and it’s no wonder that advertisers balk at the idea. It’s just not efficient.
The Solution
Let’s say an independent (meaning not part of any existing technology solution or company) party creates an ad network targeted at real estate. It’s a tool designed to harness what is possible with technology online, use the power of segmentation by demographics and geographic targeting to provide real value.
Why it works:
- Advertisers can finally reach the long-tail of real estate online
- The network’s size allows it to specialize and give proper attention to publishers and advertisers
- Publishers (blogs, web sites and social networks) can be pre-vetted for quality
- It’s a simple to use tool that makes it a one-stop-shop for buying ad space
- The payout can be larger than what other “meta-networks” (think Google) can provide
Challenges
In a competitive space like real estate, publishers tend to think that they can handle their own advertising platform just fine. That, and no one likes giving up control. What happens is marketing dollars only go towards the “big players” and each dollar spent is not as effective as it could be. The large sites will continue to protect their own monopoly on ad dollars, but it’s not in the best interest of marketers to let this happen.
Some will say, “why don’t you just use Google, it’s an ad platform designed to reach the long tail?” Simply put, the big meta-networks can’t give either the advertiser or the publisher the attention that they need. Secondarily, the payout for the publisher is not near what it should be for the space that they’re providing.
What about trust? Why should bloggers and big publishers place their trust in an outside entity to manage their revenue stream or their marketing budget? Besides creating a simple and powerful tool, the second hardest part would be building trust. However, if it works, that’s all the proof that both publishers and advertisers need to make it a viable platform. So, testing, adding value and relationship building are the only ways to counter this argument.
Summary
In the end, it’s a tool for advertisers that makes their lives easier. When you provide a tool that allows people who spend money for a living to do it easier and see a greater return, you’re bound to create a winning situation for both parties.
(Why not something as simple as what Federated Media does, except for the real estate vertical?)
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22 users responded in this post
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Interesting thought
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Great post. Some interesting ideas here. The trust issue actually cuts both ways and the more expensive problem to solve there is actually getting the advertisers comfortable with their brand appearing across the ad network’s sites. The solution is obviously to give advertisers granular control, it’s just a much more expensive software product than one that’s purpose-built for a single site.
On a related note; Zillow just launched a self-service ad creation and targeting product. I’d love to hear your feedback on EZ Ads because you’ve obviously given this topic some thought:
http://www.zillow.com/ezads/GetStarted.htm?s_cid=ez-emm-ns1
Hi David. I’m on board with what you’re doing at Zillow, primarily because we’ve been doing the same thing since January on our eppraisal.com zip code sponsorships.
However, what I’m getting at in this post is an idea that maybe we need to take a closer look at what our advertisers really want (Zillow included). Yes, I know it’s great to control your own space, but the truth is that the lives of advertisers (who control the money) would like a better solution – one that fits their needs, not ours.
Imagine if you could buy ads for a zip code on eppraisal.com and Zillow all from one place? Pretty neat idea, isn’t it?
Vertical advertising network. Nice! Is there is model for this in other verticals? RE ads, excluding lead gen, I think are about $1 billion and will grow 50% by 2009. I guess this is big enough but could existing ad networks do this?
Thanks Erik,
The sponsorships look cool; I had not noticed that. Are you not syndicating those to the “pro” users who have your stuff embeded? That would seem like the first step to testing out your suggestion.
Thinking this through some more, it’s probably a flawed assumption that the long tail of RE publishers would be interested in advertising revenues. That’s not how publishing in this industry typically works – the long tail is in it for leads. A local realtor who is blogging for leads can’t afford to allow the lead to go to a (competing?) advertiser.
David, I would think that there would be a little more customization allowed within an ad network like this.
For instance, real estate agents would likely not want other agents advertising on their personal blog, however they might be interested in making additional revenue off of a service provider advertising on it.
This applies the opposite way of course too, why not have a system that allows the publisher and the advertiser to set their parameters?
To answer your first question about embedded ads using our weblink to “pro” members – we don’t do that because it is supposed to be a completely unbranded (by us) valuation engine for their web site. It wouldn’t be the right vehicle for testing of an ad network in my mind.
The essential precursor to this wonderful concept is the redefinition of a brokerage firm’s “market”, which heretofore has been deemed vertical and local, rather than horizontal and universal, the later being the long tail.
Industry imposed market definitions (the impediment to creative business models) are squashing the ROI effectiveness of advertisement dollars because most real estate brokerage business models still believe (although erroneously) their market to be local.
Real estate brokerage business models have traditionally thrown advertisement dollars at non-segmented local markets close to home in order to simply placate sellers…forget effectiveness. Now, however, ideas such as this can have legs, perhaps even wings, enabling highly selective cubby hole ad placement that makes everyone, especially the consumer, a winner.
REALonomics.net believes that we are in a Third Economic Wave (Era), in the unfolding of the real estate industry’s economic continuum. This idea is a natural fit into the consumer-centric market models that will dominate the future of the industry.
A great innovative post, indeed!
Donald Teel – Founder
e-Partner
REALonomics
[...] Erik Hersman for real estate ad networks. [...]
[...] Erik Hersman for real estate ad networks. [...]
This functionality exists for the Condo vertical….check out The US Condo Exchange at http://www.uscondex.com
They take your listing and distribute it to websites, cable tv stations and newspapers, globally, representing over 15 million viewers a month, for something like $99/month.
Donald, the point about verical/horizontal is critical. I think that’s what a lot of people are still trying to get their minds around. I’m a fan of REALonomics, and I bet this idea fits right in line with where you see things going.
Mr Condo, I didn’t know that about US Condo Exchange, I thought they were just a classifieds vertical. Have you seen a lot of success happening through spreading the media to other platforms like TV and newspapers as well? Do they get enough air time or proper placement to be noticed?
I like the idea. Services like this exist that will give advertisers the ability to load your listings into multiple free sites like HomeGain, Homescout, Trulia and Google base. Postlet and Housevalues offer this type of service.
Since its free exposure – the more the merrier.
The issue with a service that allows advertisers to buy ads from multiple sources from one vendor is the value propositions of the ads and prices of the offers varies greatly.
A featured listing on one site may be sold on a long term subscription basis, on another on a cost per impression basis, and on another on a per lead/click basis.
HomeGain offers a hybrid advertising product called Source4Sellers whereby Realtors can “Claim their Zip” and get featured exposure and leads from where ever HomeGain renders a free home valuation.
http://www.homegain.com/agent/realestateagent?ht=hp_rnav_agent_enter
HomeGain also sell visits to individual agent and broker sites through its buyerlink products.
Since the value proposition between HomeGain’s products and Zillows varies perhaps there might be some way of working together whereby Zillow would pass along to HomeGain its prospects that would also like HomeGain products and HomeGain would do the same.
What do you think David?
Louis, the fact that there are so many different types of ways to advertise on these various sites is a complication. Being a technologist, I believe that they can be overcome with some ingenuity.
I’d like to think there’s a way for advertisers to get on to all of the player’s sites, not just the ones that vFlyer and Postlets list to right now. For instance, the format to advertise a listing is already there via these services, however there’s no way to “claim a zip code” for sponsorship on all the platforms and have a listing or ad show up on blogs that you choose as well.
That’s a point that I’d like to touch on more, the advertising on blogs makes sense, especially if there are enough of them. If you bring Active Rain’s “Localism” site into the mix, then there are.
That’s an interesting idea: a swap of visitors between HomeGain and Zillow… Since I’m sure the remainder of that particular discussion will take place offline, fill us in if something happens.
Great post. I was looking for one recently as I came across a strong travel ad network and think these are very scalable and defensible businesses. I did find one but they were trafficking adds to their own 200 sites…more like a large web domain owner using adify.
Erik
Another question is what is the true market for such a buying system. Many realtors feel threatened by zillow , lead generators and listings aggregator sites.
see:
http://www.futureofrealestatemarketing.com/why-homegain-beats-zillow
http://www.reliberation.com/blogs/myrealcoach/archive/2007/03/23/the-truth-about-zillow.aspx?CommentPosted=true#commentmessage
What has been the reaction of Realtors to eppraisals?
Louis, I think you’ll see a lot of realtors and brokers not jump on it right away, that’s why you test it out with a few specific websites and advertisers. Let them work out the kinks and see if it’s successful. After a short pilot project, I believe that many others would jump on board. In the end it’s about getting more business for companies and agents, if it works then people will do it.
Real estate agents have been very receptive of eppraisal.com. It’s primarily been because our position has always been to work with them and connect them to buyers/sellers, not to disintermediate them.
Erik
I wish you success. In many respects, what people think houses are worth is a very relevant factor, along with comps and what a realtor thinks he/she can get for a particular home.
[...] A change is coming, who is ready? I opined a couple months ago about the need for a real estate ad network that would allow marketers to easily place their ads on both real estate specific sites (such as Homegain, Move.com, eppraisal.com, Trulia, etc…) and on the ever growing social scene found via social networks an blogs. [...]
[...] And to give credit where credit is due, it’s also a concept in the real estate space that blogger (and occasional FOREM contributor) Erik Hersman first brought up in his post on Realty Thoughts over a year ago (see The Need for a Real Estate Specific Ad Network). [...]
[...] “And to give credit where credit is due, it’s also a concept in the real estate space that blogger (and occasional FOREM contributor) Erik Hersman first brought up in his post on Realty Thoughts over a year ago (see The Need for a Real Estate Specific Ad Network). [...]
[...] And to give credit where credit is due, it’s also a concept in the real estate space that blogger (and occasional FOREM contributor) Erik Hersman first brought up in his post on Realty Thoughts over a year ago (see The Need for a Real Estate Specific Ad Network). [...]
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