Track Individual Real Estate Lisitngs
Posted on August 27, 2008 - Filed Under Tracking |
I love Internet marketing because it is so trackable. How do you track print? Unique URLS, unique phone numbers = unique spending of time and dollars for each. I came across Listing Number today and think that it could be EXTREMELY helpful to realtors advertising individual properties in print. It allows you to (a) use a smaller URL, and (b) track all traffic ad buy and cost per lead–now we’re talking.
What would make this better? A unique phone number to use as well. I am curious about the connection from print to web and think that you may generate more telephone traffic.
Nevertheless, I like it.
September 5th, 2008 at 7:59 am
Jeremy,
Interesting site. Is it a free service? I do like this idea as most real estate agents do not do a good job tracking their advertising. We encourage them to b/c we are confident we produce excellent results. In order to really make this work, it would have to be the only URL in the ad and no MLS # is made available. I do wonder though if consumers wouldn’t simply bypass this URL and simply go to their favorite real estate site, search for the agents name and find the listing that way?
I agree that a unique phone # is important as well. There’s many websites which offer custom toll free #s which you can then have “redirected” to any # you choose. You can then get reports as to who called, when, etc. I’m not sure the cost but I know in times past our advertisers who have used this kind of service have been very pleased. Once again, this would only be quantifiable if there’s no URL in the ad, no MLS #, etc. You’d have to force the reader to call the # otherwise you wouldn’t know if they saw the ad in the magazine, typed in your website (which is in your ad), and then emailed or called you from your website (which probably wouldn’t have the tracking phone #).
I don’t know that either method is 100% trackable simply b/c of the web and how easy it is to find real estate info in a # of places online. All anyone needs is an agents name and they can find their listing inventory. If they have the MLS # then they don’t even need a name. You’d probably have to use both services to get the best data. Although, either would be better than doing nothing at all.
You might like to read my blog about the coorelation between magazines and web traffic:
http://activerain.com/blogsview/643488/Need-More-Traffic-A
September 9th, 2008 at 10:57 am
hey guys -
thought I’d jump in here to answer a couple of the questions:
The service is free.
Our intent is to launch a premium office version that takes some of the legwork out of the process (by using a listing feed to auto generate the URLs) and provides some office-level reporting (useful for brokers who are funding print and want to know their return across the whole office).
re: phone number tracking. I agree that this is valuable as well. We haven’t gone there yet simply because there are so many readily available services. The only challenge I see with them is they don’t appear to be designed to generate the number of unique numbers necessary to differentiate between campaigns.
finally, I ran across a study from Google the other day that showed that 47% of those who saw an ad in print visited the products site (link:http://google-tmads.blogspot.com/2008/08/research-study-illustrates-how.html). Another large percentage did a general search for product info.
I would argue that in real estate one is even slightly more likely to visit the URL in the ad since the ‘real estate product’ is unique. Unlike jumping on google for competitive info after seeing a product ad in print, with real estate, one is looking for the path of least resistance to the info and I think it’s fairly clear the user gets that from the direct listingnumber link. We’ll be able to measure this over time and write it up on the product blog as the numbers come in.