You Should Turn Off Required Registration
Wednesday June 20, 2007
Are you requiring registration of visitors for them to search your IDX listings page? If so you might want to reconsider after reading this article at SearchEngineWatch.com.
Point2Agent provided data for the graph showing an 80% drop in leads generated as a percentage of unique visits to registration forms. Why is this the case? Unfortunately, most of our prospects are more internet savvy than the average REALTOR®. They know that there's usually somewhere on the web that they can find what they want anonymously. They'll avoid your registration or simply provide fake information.
Here's how to generate leads from your website in more friendly ways.
Comments
I agree. Required registration makes your ROI go down.
Hi James,
Thanks for the link to the article… we have chatted before on A/R. Just wondered do you think website lead generation is on its way out based on the article you linked us to? We have been working hard on our website in an effort to start generating leads and hopeful it will payoff in the near future. Just wondered.
Thanks! Jill Fuhrer
Jill:
Thanks for the comment. I didn’t get the impression from the article that lead generation from web sites is decreasing. It’s the way people are locating real estate professionals every day by the thousands. It does, however, illustrate that making them register for a basic listing search is on the way out as far as lead generation.
Generalized statements of what works and does work leads to poor ROI.
Each website and each market are independent. To truely get a useful answer a website should test one element against another.
In this case forced opt in vs soft opt in. But to say just let them have it without any opt in is foolish. Do you really think any loyalty will be gained by “free”. All you are doing is furthering the commoditization of the realty site.
I have seen the exact opposite occur as you story. I manage hundreds of sites and forced opt in gets leads.
Obviously no opt in gets no leads.
Some call to action must be on the site if your goal is to get a lead.
Now another way to get opt in (and I have seen better than 5%) is to give them a taste of the listings then after 3 viewings ask for opt.
This is what Bird View Technologies has recently implemented. But I must tell you generally, in my experience I find the opposite of what you are reporting.
The devil however is always in the details. And I believe as real estate websites become more and more commoditized then the public will want more transparent access. But this trend did not have to happen. But it is only sped up by generalized reports like this one.
Tim asks, “Do you really think any loyalty will be gained by “free”.”
Google has some insanely loyal users. When is the last time any of them paid a nickel?
WordPress is a free blogging platform. They too have insanely loyal users.
“Obviously no opt in gets no leads”
Hmmm… not comlpetely true. I don’t require IDX registration at my main site or blog. There is an added benefit for “registering” but people are free to search the IDX in completely anonymously. And the phone certainly rings.
I’m not advocating “giving away the farm”. Of course I need prospects, and our website and blog do an amazing job of gathering prospects. And 95% (or more) of what we provide on those sites is 100% free and anonymous. When people find a useful resource, they keep coming back. Then when they need help, they pick up the phone or fire off an email and ask for it.
You know what? When a website or blog visitor calls or emails me, they are not a lead, or a prospect. They are a client.
My post is definitely my opinion, and I felt good about some validation from the Point2Agent data.
Tim is a respected real estate internet marketing consultant and I’m sure that those using his site services are reaping rewards in the form of leads. It is true that blanket statements don’t always apply.
Jay is absolutely on the mark in bringing up the popularity of free sites and services. I’ve seen his site and I’m sure that there are a great many prospect leads generated from it. It’s all in what you provide in addition to the search. I use market statistics reports quite effectively, and I’m sure Jay has similar special offerings to generate leads. I particularly like the “free personalized listings website” offer on Jay’s site.
My opinion is still strongly on the “no registration for IDX” side. That would be especially true for those not able to take advantage of Tim’s services.
it makes your ROI go down, but your spam go up. a lot
at least have a captcha or something to stop automated responses
In response to “eskimo.”
The article does not speak to placing your email address or a form anywhere on the search page. Thus, no spam can result merely from allowing free searches.
Jim Kimmons