I had the pleasure to meet with a Technology Trainer from RE/MAX International this week and learned some interesting facts about RE/MAX as well as some new features that agents are currently benefiting from which I will discuss in another blog post.
I have been very impressed with the new look of RE/MAX.com . The layout and design are much improved for the consumer which is great to see as well as the many cool features a consumer can utilize when doing their home search.
What I am most impressed with are the statistics though. Right now, RE/MAX.com is generating well over 2 million unique visits per month ! That is well ahead of the friendly competition of Coldwell Banker and Keller Williams - see graph below.
This traffic in turns benefits RE/MAX agents through lead generation. With the consumers that sign up to the site, approximately 194,000 leads per month are generated which leads to 6,480 daily leads that are distributed to agents every day !
Also, there are no referral fees for the leads unlike some of our friendly competitors that assess a referral fee for Internet leads.
I was very impressed with this traffic and what RE/MAX is doing to increase their brand presence through national advertising and branding campaigns. I was not really aware of this information as I concentrate on my own lead generation but it is great when I get that text and email and have another lead waiting for me in my inbox ! In this market, every lead has value !
As an agent, are you benefitting through lead generation from your corporate site ?
As a consumer, what are your favorite search sites and why ?
I may be a little biased but one of my favorites is The Somers Team !
Feel free to subscribe to our blog or our monthly newsletter to stay up to date with our latest posts and information on the Philadelphia Real Estate Market. You can also sign up to receive the Philadelphia Real Estate Blog via email.
So I have to ask what is the pass thru rate of leads to agents and then on into closings
Hello the Sommers - Totally off topic comment. Your post is very timely. We were discussing corporate websites in the context of agent retention. The group was divided into two groups - Group A felt that the broker should essentially hand them leads and the agent wasn't responsible for marketing and developing leads. Group B was the type-A personality who believed that your power and value is based on how many leads were generated directly for the agent. I am definitely in the Group B category. The best person to generate leads and business opportunities for me is me.
Eric - Good question. Like anything else, what an agent does with that lead is up to them as far as converting the lead to a client. I dont have the exact statistics on that !
From my personal experience though I have received a decent amount of these leads per month. Many I forward to my team folks and know that several per year have been converted to clients.
Ryan - I agree with you ! I am a Group B as well as we are fortunate to generate so many of our leads from referrals, past clients, our sites, blogs...etc. It seems to me that Group A agents will certainly stay at a firm longer if they are relying on the broker for leads and will leave earlier if they feel they are not getting enough leads from the broker/office. At RE/MAX, most of the agents are on a fixed expense and a result, generate their own leads. But it is a nice bonus to participate in receiving these leads, no matter how much business you are doing. Is a very interesting discussion on how this relates to agent retention as well.
RE/MAX Leads rock... today I went to the latest training session on Leadstreet and love the new remax.com site and the free new miro-sites we all have been given for free. Since the new site went up I personally have seen a flood of leads new leads coming in to me. It was explain by the tech support that the reason most likely the changes in the way the demographics are now set up by the new site. It is important to set up your profile, add your contacts and add the areas you service, otherwise if you don't you don't get leads. We will be making this a top priority for our team.
Mary - It is great, isn't it ? The free agent sites are great too, especially if one is just starting their web presence. Is superb that you are benefiting from receiving those leads and even better their they have increased for you ! That is awesome. Yes, we set up one of our sites too - will do the other one in a few days as there are two of us : ) . We will also be stressing the importance of this to our team members.
Hannah- I can understand why you like Helpfulhannah the best !!! And you have a great blog too !
When we ask our clients where they go (if not on our site) to look for houses most still say it's realtor.com and the site that is via our MLS system here (the big boy). Then there are many who look on craigslist (which was kind of surprising to me). We are starting to get great stats from our site so that's positive on that end. ~Rita
I have never received a lead from corporate yet. I wonder if they do give out leads.
My site generates leads. What I find funny though is how many leads I DON'T get anymore from Realtor.com
Rita and Brian - That is great that you are getting great stats from your site. We have also been very happy with our stats for The Somers Team. We use Google Analytics for Tracking. Realtor.com is still one of the most high traffic sites for consumers but I would not be surprised that they may lose market share to Trulia, Zillow and the like.
Russ - I would ask them !
I'm seeing more leads but so far most of them aren't going anywhere. But as with anything it is a matter of timing.
Christopher and Stephanie:
REMAX of New Jersey site works very good too. There has been a heavy commitment to Internet marketing and followup.
Richard
I've never seen the "old" Remax.com site so I cant compare. But I like the new look. It's clean. I like a simple, non-colorful (background) site.
I can't share much about Leadstreet but I do know some Re/Max agents who would swear by never leaving Remax because of it.
I've heard that consumers like to search by map. Hence, it is one of the newest tool I added for my brand new website. www.Frisco-TX-Homes.com
Rhonda - I hear you about Realtor.com. We have subscribed in the last couple of years to Realtor.com in order to enhance our listings but are having second thoughts about renewing. It is expensive ! Also, we have had too much tangible results from it. I think they are also losing market share to the likes of Trulia and Zillow as well as sites like RE/MAX, not to mention specialty sites and so forth.
As a consumer, I think that the best site to search is weichert.com. It's always been the fastest for me, and gives you the full information without having to subscribe. I think the new RE/MAX site is much better than the old one, but I still think that Weichert's is better because of the simplicity and how easy it is to use.