Google Dumps Real Estate Listings. In December Google announced that they would no longer be adding real estate listings to google maps but at that time they scheduled the change to be in July 2011. Well, those dates have changed.
Google Dumps Real Estate Listings. In December Google announced that they would no longer be adding real estate listings to google maps but at that time they scheduled the change to be in July 2011. Well, those dates have changed.
Greg- For those agents who depend on Google Base to syndicate their listings- well, that is going to be the first thing they will feel, less traffic. While we can all populate our own maps the synergetic SEO of combining many listings on a Google maps was great.
The agents who feel it right away will be those who refuse to spend money on IDX solutions.
If also affects agents who are not members of mls or how are members of mls that don't allow the agents to use the data on their sites. I coach agents in these areas. It sucks that you pay for mls and then can not use it but there are geo areas in this country where that is the case. I am confident Realbird will have a solution for those agents.
Katerina - I had heard that Google Base was being dumped. Thanks for advising how RealBird will be impacted.
Don- They are shifting their focus to shopping, like in stuff and really want to compete in the android market. With Apple and Facebook being real players and competitors Google is rethinking the markets they want to cover. There are a lot of companies who built upon Google Base's API- and they all took the risk. Well, this just goes to show once again, the landlord can change the locks at any time.
I wondered about how this will affect Realbird.
I'm not ashamed to admit that the RealBird search device gets 3 times the visitors as my "regular" website. And my IDX provider says my regular website is in the top 5% of all its websites.
Realbird rocks! Rock on!
Tni- That is huge! That is great! Yes, Realbird rocks! We get great results from Realbird property search and listing syndication.
Katerina, thank you for posting this, I have been waiting to hear from Realbird because one of my websites relies on the google search for properties.... and all I can think about is how many posts are out there with the search on them. I am thinking of going through each and every post to find them and mark them down to pull the search from them.
I have gotten leads, but never phone numbers. OK, one phone number only. I also think my email may go to spam when I respond. I keep forgetting to make the suggestion that when the person asks for more info they be given my email address so they can look for the email. Or else they are ignoring me.. ??? !!!
I love Realbird, I am confidant that things will work out. I am a bit anxious about it though!
I hope Gabe and Zoltan comes with creative solution to work around the Real Bird Search area.
Our MLS is one of the pay me for your own information MLS' and it gets in the way of using our own information. I'm anxious to find out more.
Thanks Katerina. I am using Google Base on one of my websites and this is very important info.
Dan- Just the other year Google was at the NAR convention pushing their Google base on agents and brokers. I can only imagine how many agents and brokers jumped on that opportunity and hopefully did not put all their eggs into that basket.
Katerina - I was worried what was going to happen to Realbird. Thanks for the update.
Realbird is one of my Active Rain discoveries. We are using it in our 2011 Marketing Plan.
Katerina - Thank you VERY much for this post explaining the implications of Google's announcement. As you noted, the RealBird Listing Publisher is not affected at all and for the RealBird Property Search that uses Google Base, we are already working on a replacement data source.
We are also very grateful for the supportive comments. We are working around the clock, as fast as we can, both on business development and on the technology so that we have the replacement data source ready for the same search application by the time Google Base is discontinued in June.
Thanks again for everybody for the support and for your business !
-- Zoltan & Gabe
Katerina, I heard this a few days ago and have a gut feeling that Google is buying Trulia. I had a new Trulia announcement indicating there will be a change there so, if my gut is right, it's likely to happen in the near future.
In the meantime, I'm sure that Zoltan and Gabe will keep us up and running in some way, shape or fashion. I too, get fantastic leads from RealBird and love the ratio of leads that convert to buyers from there. My last one was someone who saw one of my listings, wanted to view the property and purchased it (one phone call, one showing!)--a $1M+ listing! And, I'm not utilizing RealBird to its fullest potential either--I just haven't gotten to everything!!
I have, however, referred at least 50 agents to them, if not more, and they all love the site and love the convenience of using the maps on their websites for property searches. I know that's a biggie for many agents so, again, I feel confident that Zoltan and Gabe are ON IT!
Debe- interesting, according to all the internet speculators I follow, they are stating that Google is NOT interested in Real Estate listings anymore. I guess we will see. They say that Google is more focused on Google Shopping as the ad revenue there will be much more than in listings. Google did say that they want to leave real estate listings to the websites that are very well equipped to focus on listings. So I guess, we will find out soon:)
Hi Katerina. I read about this in their blog. I am not too worried because Zoltan has a good handle on Realbird. I love using it.
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