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Trulia is Not the Real Estate Agent’s Anti – Christ

You may have read about the latest controversy about Trulia “stealing Google juice” either on BloodhoundBlog, Inman, or here on Active Rain. I’ll start this post off with a fair warning: I DISAGREE WITH MOST OF THESE POSTS. Here’s why:

These posts claim that by using Trulia’s widgets, you are hurting your website traffic, and moreover, that Trulia is maliciously and covertly stealing that traffic. Trulia does well in search engines for many reasons; they have countless highly optimized pages, they continually add new content to their site, yes they have lots of links back, they have a huge amount of people using (and reaping the benefits of) their service (which means more visitors). The fact that Trulia places “no follow” tags on links doesn’t mean that they’re secretly trying to steal your Google juice. See this comment by Rudy from Trulia (from BHB post):

“Yes, we have no follow tags on listings on Trulia. Nothing wrong with that. It’s standard practice online and some of the top sites around the web such as Flickr and Wikipedia use this method as well. As far as I can tell the same goes for Realtor.com and Yahoo Real Estate. We follow the industry standard. We’re not being disingenuous nor sneaky, it’s been the same story from day 1.

He goes on to say, "We funnel all "link love" to agents via our profile pages. So we definitely help agents with their SEO".

So why not stop using Realtor.com and some of the other popular online resources and tools that bring your website and listings traffic?

As for widgets in general, of course companies have an ulterior motive when they supply free widgets – it’s free advertising for them. But that doesn’t mean that the widget isn’t helpful to you or your clients. Widgets can expose your listings and help potential buyers (ie. map and calculator widgets), which they will appreciate you for providing them with. There is such a thing as too many widgets, but a smart widget can be very helpful indeed.

On another point – isn’t the true goal to get your listings noticed so buyers will see them… and BUY? How much exposure might you lose if you stop posting your listings to Trulia, a site that gets thousands of unique visitors per day? In addition, when you place your listing on Trulia, doesn’t your ad link back to your site? Aren’t more buyers to your site better than less buyers to your site? Syndicating your listings is an invaluable marketing tool in this market and in this time.

Hating and sliming Trulia’s name isn’t going to make them go away. Why not spend that effort into marketing your listings and use the tools and benefits Trulia offers you? Trulia is not the Real Estate Agent’s Anti-Christ.

Posted by Real Estate Advertising - Misty Lackie on 05/08/2008 04:16 PM

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88 Comments on Trulia is Not the Real Estate Agent’s Anti – Christ

MAY

2008

Misty, I don't believe Eric or Broker Bryant went so far as to say that Trulia is the anti-Christ and certainly I did not read any comments recommending that anyone stop using Trulia to post listings.

Of course, we want to sell our client's homes. And of course, Trulia, Realtor, Zillow, and numerous other sites are exceptional tools that can and should be used to help in this endeavor. And, no, we should not blame any of them for trying to make a fair profit for helping us.

However, the other side of this is that we are all running businesses that demand we compete for attention in our markets. Unintentionally aiding another company to take some of that attention away from us, may not be the wisest move (even if they are not a competitor).

Hi Misty,

Great information! I learned something new about SEO today. It just never stops!

Thanks Erik for your comments.

No - there was no comments on Bryant's blog that indicated to not send your listings to Trulia but there sure has been a lot of that in the blogsphere this past week.

I still see no proof that Trulia widgets or any other widget for that matter takes away Google juice, which Bryant's blog does say.

I guess I don't see it as another company taking the attention away but instead another tool and resource that can put attention and traffic your way.

Bill - I am glad you were able to learn something through all of this :)

MAY

2008

Misty- I happen to be in agreement with you as far as the widgets from Trulia go. I also agree that we need to market our listings where ever we can. It is our duty to our sellers. Katerina

Misty - I agree with your points. I have the "if you can't beat them join them" attitude when it comes to online exposure. You are not going to take away Trulias thunder anyway. The goal should be to give your clients the most exposure.

Misty: THANKS for this post!!! I happen to agree with you 100%!

Misty - Realtor.com should be the one competing with Trulia...not individual agents. If agents want to bash someone, it should be Realtor.com (who we financially support) for not offering all of the features that Trulia offers (and for free!!!!).

Tina in Virginia

Thank you Katerina - your opinion holds a lot of weight in my book because I see what you have accomplished in search engines.

Bill - You get it. You really get it and others should learn from you. I have also seen what you have done in search engines and the amazing web presence you have created for yourself. I see you everywhere. Not only for your website but I see your hub pages, your squidoo pages, your AR pages all over the net. Any buyer who is searching your area for Real Estate is going to quickly know who Bill Gassett is.

Tina - As always - I take what you say very seriously. You have quickly learned the major seo methods and I see you everywhere on the net too. Tina Merritt = Virginia Beach Real Estate.

Thank you Kathy - I feel like I am in the minority here but until someone can show me solid proof against my standpoint I will stay in the minority. So far this thread has produced comments from Agents who dominate the search engines for their area and utilize the valuable tools that are offered to them so they can sell thier listings faster. Maybe that's why they are not threatened.

Misty: I'll stand beside you... In fact I am re-working my blogs and adding Trulia widgets to them.

Misty...

My bottom line problem is that the widgets drive the potential Customers right out of a Salespersons Blog.

That is so bad. The whole idea behind Blogging is to capture your readers and convert them into Customers.

The widgets defeat that purpose. I am no expert of SEO. But I am an expert on YEO

I can't possible engage someone who didn't stay long enough to be engaged :)

TLW...ROAR!

"The Lovely Wife"...Broker Bryant's...Wife! - and that is a valid concern and one that actually makes sense and has some solid reasoning. That I understand! It's all this other stuff about it taking away Google juice or rankings that I am not convinved on.

Trulia and I have an agreement. I contribute some content to their web site and they give me a link. That's about as far as it goes. I don't link to Trulia and I son't expect Trulia to contribute content to my web site.

I am parking to read all of the comments.......being fairly new to the blog world, I am a deer in the headlights anyway. Your post was great, and I clicked on TLW's link and that made sense as well. See, no clue here, lol. :)

Zillow is the realtor's "Anti-Christ". Them and their Zestimates are a joke. All they make our comps do is look unsupportive, when in fact, our comps are based on factual data. Zillow needs to have a server crash...

We all have our beliefs. There are truths to both sides. It all comes down to risk assesment. If you take a chance on certain SEO options and they work then great, but if they don't work all of a sudden things aren't so great. I'm inclined to believe there isn't any problem with Trulia but that's because I haven't had any problems. That doesn't mean their methods work for me though. I can't say we've had a financially successful relationship.

Misty, personally I don't like widgets. I like simple. If trulia or others take your customers, it won't be because of the widgets. there might be a few good widgets, but people lose sight of their purpose and easily over do it.

a widget is not real, it does not exist and has no purpose. if you make it visible, it becomes a distraction, like the big ole fuzzy dice on the rear view mirror.

Hi Misty,

I'm just curious as to why you're so passionate to defend Trulia? Do you have a relationship with them or does this originate from you being in advertising? Just wondering...

I can never understand the zeal with which people oppose that which they do not understand. Trulia and Zillow and Realtor.com all have their usefulness. It is your job as realtors or webmasters or consumers or whatever role you are playing today to determine the usefulness to you and capitalize on it. No need to rain on someone else's parade because the don't share your viewpoint. If you take the time to understand how their systems work as Misty seems to have, you can the work within those systems to benefit your clients and yourself. If you don't want to, pass.

Hi Bob - No - I do not have a relationship or an arrangement with Trulia. It's not really a matter of me being passionate to defend Trulia but instead being passionate to defend what I feel is mis-information. As you can see from my AR blog I am not normally confrontational and in fact I avoid confrontation whenever possible but some of this recent stuff being put out about Trulia's widgets affecting individual agents site rankings is over-blown.

Chris - THANK YOU! "It is your job as realtors or webmasters or consumers or whatever role you are playing today to determine the usefulness to you and capitalize on it"

I could not have said that better.

We can always learn from others sometimes we don't agree but we can make our own mind up after we read each opinion. Thanks for yours

I think you missed the point.

Trulia takes the content that YOU generate. Then, they use that same content to muscle in front of you for the information. Sure, we want to expose our listings in every way that we can, but would you give money to someone that pushes their way in front of you in line for concert tickets so that they can buy you seats?

i like Trulia, a lot. I really like Rudy and everyone I have met there. I had the widget on my outside blog. After reading BB's post I went to my blog, as a consumer and went to the widget and put in Ann Arbor. It took me to all the listings in Ann Arbor and off my site.

So why would I do that ? I have a great IDX search site, I want the consumers to stay there and search. I want them to use my site, IMO it is sticky with Google Maps and Google satellite images.

So I felt it was best to take the widget off. Now I love widgets, some even call me widgey on here because I love them so. I love Trulia Voices and actively participte there, mostly to be helpful to consumers.

I sent a client to Trulia looking for homes in St. Louis, a neighbor of mine. But, I'm not going to send consumers that come to my blog there. Does Trulia hurt my placement on Google? (not yet) But, I work hard to write good content.

Misty, I, too, like to share my listings wherever I can. Truila is just one place. Real Estate Shows sends them to a few other places as well ;-) I love the comments. So much food for thought......where else can we garner such great information and insights as here on the Rain? ;-)

Thanks Missy for your comments. Your concerns about widgets or anything for that matter, taking people away from your site is completely understandable. I see that as a valid concern and something all webmasters should pay attention to. You will not hear me argue against that point.

The point I don't agree with is the one that has been made over and over again that having a Trulia widget on your site will hurt your sites search engine rankings.

Yes, I see you have worked hard to write good content and see you place very well in search engines (even when you had the Trulia widget). You have also accomplished lots of good quality back links. You are doing the things that are needed to stay on the top of search engines.

If Agents want to dominate the search engines for their area they need to do more of what you, Bill, Tina, Katerina are doing just to name a few.

I don't think you should stop posting to them. I just don't use many widgets for a variety of reasons.

MAY

2008

Hi Misty -

Here's a blog post written by one of the foremost SEO experts in the world proving that widgetbait, alone, can make pretty much anything rank. The industries they used the widgetbait on (online dating & payday loans) are actually more competitive than real estate. This also shows that Google will penalize widgetbait if it's abused (something Trulia might want to think about.)

Here's the link. After you give it a good read, let me know if you have any questions.

O.K. Misty,

So full disclosure is that you advertise listings and need the content to be relevant the same way that Trulia does so it should be as no surprise to anyone which side of the fence you are on. Here is your bold point, but, it is only half of the story:

"On another point - isn't the true goal to get your listings noticed"

Let's add the IMPORTANT point ---> on sites that WE control.

Let me add one more thing - if you, trulia and the rest went away, properties would still get noticed. You do understand that, right? So don't try to jump in and say that you or any of the others add value. The only way you add value is by displacing agents. By definition that makes them a competitior.

The moral of the story is that as agents, we want to link to things that add value, not to things that only add value if they get ahead of us and certainly not if they are just trying to get where we are to offer what we already have. Linking to Trulia does me or any other agent zero benefit. Remember, if they were not there, consumers would simply find the information on other sites - preferably one that I control to make my listings look the best or on my site for buyers to find homes.

Why on earth would we contribute to sites that want our positions in the search engines?

Misty, I disagree with you completely. You say "The same goes for Realtor . com and Yahoo real estate". Well guess what, they are in competition with you as well! You are in competition with any of the large national real estate portals. I personally would love to see them all go away but that is not very likely. What was your last realtor . com bill? They charged me $2000 last year just to sell my data back to me! They did not drive out to photograph the properties, they did not write the descriptions but they were more than happy to blackmail me into paying to have links back to my own web site because if I did not I would end up being the only agent in town not getting business from R .com

You are also right about it being the industry standard for large companies to treat us like crap, I may add it's very similar to the way all credit cards charge outrageous rates. Just because it's the industry standard does not mean they are looking out for their clients best interest.

Because I have a business to run and Realtors I need to help get ranked in the top of search engines, I need to back away from this and focus on those things.

I urge you to read the post at http://3oceansrealestate.com/blog/a-perfect-example-of-co-opetition-the-real-estate-industry-barry-nalebuff-would-be-proud.html

I think Kevin does an outstanding job at cutting through many of these issues/concerns and I couldn't even come close to explaining it like he did in his post.

Kevin's blog post is definitely interesting, but it does nothing to address the issue we're talking about here. Let's also remember that Kevin consulted for Trulia last year, and he obviously still considers many at Trulia friends (check out the responses to his mock "trulia proof" post.)

What did you think of the SEOMOZ widgetbait post I referenced?

Read his mock last night and got a kick out of it.

Skimmed though the SEOMOZ article but will need to read it over more in detail when time permits. From what I got so far from it though, is widgets can help the site that is providing the widget in search engines. I never claimed that by Trulia having link backs doesn't help them. I believe I have even stated in other posts that the link backs on Trulia's widget do help them. It is 1 of the pieces in the large SEO puzzle that will help sites rank.

It is not the only factor though and a widget on an individual agents website is not going to take that indivdual site out of the rankings if that site has all the major SEO pieces in place. That is what my arguement has been about.

Misty -

Read that post - don't skim it. Read it. That was their primary source of "building 10's of thousands of links per month." It's what DRIVES their link building campaign for keywords more competitive than ours.

Misty cannot possibly understand as she is not a real estate agent, working hard in the field and also working hard at night on her real estate website. As far as the other real estate agents who posted here agreeing with her, at least put a "no follow" on the trulia widget, work with them but don't send them your juice - you are already giving them enough. If you don't know how to do that, just ask.

Anyone who makes personal attacks on this thread will be deleted. Dis-agree - fine but when you start making personal attacks because you do not have the same opinion is when I will click the delete link.

It is just not smart to help our competition pass us in the rankings and give them credibility.

The links from the widgets do just that - help Trulia pass us and give them credibility - and it is really that simple IMO.

Wayne

Misty: I can see your point and I believe I see it clearly. Keep your head up, some of the comments are out of order.

I agree with TLW ROAR as I also have huge concerns about placing content on my websites that promote competitors (of all/any kind). Ultimately it does come down to personal preferance as stated by Chris.

I feel Robert has made one of the best points thus far, and the point made was about making the links on the widgets a no follow link. Why would you give them the support they are unwilling to reciprocate.

I personally choose not to use their widgets, but if I did choose to use it I would make it be a no follow link.

As for Eric encouraging you to read widgetbait, I'd advise him to go back and re-read it. The referanced blog and blogs listed within it shows that google is moving towards banning this type of linkbaiting, and is currently working out the details of this gray area. The end of the widget bait article shows that even their new webpage that they were marketing has been flagged before it even opened.

Spending huge amounts of time trying to convince Realtors that removing a widget from their site will increase their chances of ranking better = $your hourly rate * hours spent

Attempting to hurt Trulia's reputation and rankings by using scare tactics on Realtors = $ at the end of the day Trulia will still rank.

Educating Realtors on how to properly optimize their sites using onsite and offsite techniques rather than obsessing about link back's from widgets = $valuable

Achieving thousands of top Google rankings for area specific searches on Agents property listings without associated link backs to our site = Priceless

Misty,

Do take this the wrong way, but what you are saying is like believing in WMD's in Iraq. Just because you don't want to believe something doesn't make it not true. Links are the cash of the internet, whoever has the most will be the most powerful. That's why a link from a large site like AR is valuable, but it wouldn't be without AR also having a lot of links. By giving Trulia, and other big sites a link, you are voting for them with the search engines. Trulia then in turn also encourages you to contribute unique content. So what happens? Their site starts to appear in your market. How? By getting agents to promote it for them. I'm sure Rudy is a nice guy, but they are in business to gain business and that business is going to be at the expense of agents. It has to be. It's their business model to use agent's own content to make money by taking their clients. If you are that sure that your giving a link away to Trulia doesn't matter, why not give links to everyone in this thread that disagrees with you? -Charles

Links to everyone in this thread who dis-agreed with me. I would love to.

Everyone in this thread that dis-agrees with me - please send me your website links and a 1 paragragh description of your services and I will create a page on our website with links back to you.

That's very generous of you. I'll send you my paragraph shortly. I would appreciate a straight link without the nofollow of course.

Thanks!

Of course Robert - you will have a direct link titled and anchored specific to your business or service.

Misty,

On your "More About Me" page under "Areas Of Expertise" you claim SEO Expertise. In fact this is your statement; "We aggressively build incoming links to your site" "In order to successfully achieve top 10 and to stay there". Yet you are strongly advocating giving away links to what has proven to be a ruthless competitor.

As Robert Lipply pointed out, you are not a real estate agent. Yet you are here claiming to be an SEO expert that supposedly helps agents rank their websites.

I get emails & phone calls daily from Advertising people that claim they can make my website rank higher if I hire them and occasionally I engage them in conversation and I soon realize they don't know anywhere near as much as they claim. You seem like a pretty sharp lady, but you are wrong here as so many in your business are.

You don't live in our shoes trying daily to compete online for real estate buying or selling clients. What you do is try to show what a great SEO expert you are to gain real estate agent clients, and you are seriously misleading them.

Just so you know, I am on page 1 of Google for my target keywords and I am ahead of Trulia and I plan on keeping it that way.

Oh... and by the way. In your comment here on 05/09/08 at 10:04 AM you state; "I never claimed that by Trulia having link backs doesn't help them.”, Yes You Did!

Right here http :// activerain .com/ blogsview /500642/ Trulia -Widgets-Are-they on 05/07/08 at 9:48 PM, The Blog post is about exactly that and it is titled Trulia Widgets. Are they stealing your Google juice? . On 5/7/08 at 9:48 PM you state “in regards to this particular topic , I just don't see the proof .”
You claim to be an SEO expert, so if you don't see the proof it is because you don't want to, it was spelled out very clearly.

Don't take this as a personal attack because it is not meant to be. I think agents should be wise to SEO and make good business decisions on their advertising dollars. You probably offer a good service to your clients, I just think you are wrong on this issue.

In reading through this cavernous thread there seems to be pockets of heat here and there that are projecting shadows and inadvertently drawing attention away from the brighter reality above.

Okay, a terrible rendition of a Plato allegory but helpful none the less.

But first, full disclosure. I am a minority partner in Misty's business, Go Smart Solutions, LLC and could just as easily go by the moniker, "The Ugly Dad". Also, while we syndicate members property flyers to Trulia we also equally distribute them to over 30 other ad sources. In addition, we do not have any business arrangement or ties with Trulia.

Now, our support of Trulia stems from our firm belief that sites like Trulia, Zillow, Yahoo and other online listing sites are beneficial to the real estate community because they can add value on their site and provide agents valuable exposure that they may not have the resources and wherewithal to provide on their site.

Getting back to the widget issue, if I may. It seems to me that one can only make the claim that Trulia widgets are keeping their site from ranking if they can find their site even remotely close on a Google search and, even then, at most the Trulia listing would move them down on spot in most cases. This is even true for those who take the larger issue that the widget links provide a significant link back lift for Trulia when viewed in the aggregate and, thus, help them get high rankings.

I think there may be some confusion as what Trulia widget, to paraphrase the great Johnny Horton, "is making such as fuss". Using the example that Jim provided on the previous thread, I see a Trulia Map widget at the bottom of Dave's page with pinpoints locating all of his property listings. If I hover over a pinpoint I get a small picture of the property, some terse details and an invitation link to view "more..". Clicking it brings up Dave's full page listing of that property that resides on his site, not Trulia's. Does this widget add value to Dave's site for his viewers? I think so and, of course, so does Dave.

As to the Trulia links on the bottom of the widget, yes, they take the viewer off site and into the larger Trulia site where other competing listings are located and the concern voiced here over that is real, I'll not deny that; although, it does open a new page rather than replace the agent's page. However, even there Trulia has shown itself to be a white hat enterprise by coming on these boards and giving permission to anyone who would want to remove those links.

Lastly, to badly paraphrase (my last one this post ... HONEST!) William F. Buckley (RIP), anyone who thinks that not utilizing a helpful widget from a popular real estate search site will somehow make it less so and, in turn, improve thier site are "Standing Athwrart The Future" and it really needn't be the case.

Best Regards!

Just shot you my "about me" paragraph - thanks for the profile page!

Please don't turn my comment around. My comment "in regards to this particular topic, I just don't see the proof"

I don't see the proof that by an agent placing a widget on their website it is going to make their website rank worse or hurt their rankings.

I have stated mutliple times that the link backs to Trulia do help them.

"No single raindrop believes it is to blame for the flood"

And if you re-read the "More About Me" page under "Areas Of Expertise" you will see the other things I have outlined in regards to SEO too. One of the points I have been making over and over again is relevant link building is only 1 small piece of the puzzle. Yep, that is part of SEO but so is the other stuff mentioned in the "Areas Of Expertise" section.

I feel like a broken record here.

Hi Misty, I am a professional SEO plus a Chicago Real Estate Brokerage owner REALTOR.

Here is the point you are missing from a previous comment about the widget bait. When Trulia sneaks in links to their city pages with City Anchor text urls through the widgets placed on REALTOR sites which have nothing to do with that widget, Trulia is using a black hat SEO tactic. You know it, I know it and Matt Cutts knows it (as he says in the SEOMoz widget bait blog.) That realtor in that case is literally selling a link to Trulia and the price of that link is streamlined use of Trulia servers rather than any single dollar amount.

Hi Falcon, allow me to give Misty a breather.

We have not "missed" that point and in fact have repeatedly acknowledged its validity in this thread here and here and here and elsewhere in other threads.

Trulia does not "sneak" in links but rather displays them readily at the bottom of their widget. "Sneak" in Black Hat SEO parlance refers to people who obscure or hide the links using the same font color as the background color or use the CSS style setting "display: none" to make it invisible or any other number of techniques to stuff the item with hidden links, keywords, &c. Whether they should be adding that link is debatable but it's hardly nefarious of them.

Does Trulia benefit if an agent decides to leave the links present? Sure, some. Does the agent benefit having the widget on their site. Sure, some.

It then comes down for an agent to decide whether their benefit is more important than whatever benefit Trulia gets, no?

Misty,

Didn't intentionally turn your comment around. That was the topic at hand.

Also, one agent placing the widget on their site does not mean Trulia will out rank them or hurt their placement, I would agree with that. The problem of course lies with tens of thousands of agents linking to Trulia. Not just linking to them but in most cases giving them Home page links.

Your offer to place links on your site for people that have disagreed with you here is very generous. That is a one way link that everyone will appreciate from a new page with no PR. I am not knocking the gesture what-so-ever, just pointing out the difference between your very nice offer and the links Trulia obtain.

I thought about poking some holes in The Ugly Dad's comment but I'm done. At the end of the day some of us just walk away agreeing to disagree.

I can see Patrick likes a play on words, so as far as this topic is concerned. I don't see any sence in beating a dead horse. ;)

I think that at this point it would be interesting to point out a few facts.

Linking to Trulia helps them rank higher then you
High rankings makes them look like an authority
Trulia is hoarding link juice with their linking practices
Trulia could set up their site to only show your listings when a customer comes from your site, but they don't because they don't care if you loose the customer
There is no such thing as a free lunch. Trulia just happens to be very good at hiding the price you are paying for their widgets
By linking to Trulia and using all their widgets Trulia looks like the expert, not the real estate agent. This is not the point of having a website or blog is it?

My opinions, but most likely are correct:

Love Rudy all you want, but he is an employee of Trulia so it's his job is to convince the public that Trulia isn't real estate agents competition.
Trulia makes most of it's income from traffic, Per Impressions Ads, therefor they really don't care about agents or the customers. They only care about ranking high in the SERP's and driving lots of traffic.
If a customer goes to Trulia and starts poking around odds are very strong you will loose that customer
The price of featured listings will go up as Trulia becomes an expected advertising platform for listings. Basic economics, as demand increases so will prices. More important, as perceived demand increases so will prices.

So I guess if you think that helping a huge national portal become stronger and stronger then link to Trulia.

If you feel that Trulia has real estate agents best interests in mind then link to Trulia.

If you feel that you won't loose customers by sending them to Trulia then send your hard earned leads to Trulia.

If you really think that there is a such thing as a free lunch then keep on sending Trulia your valuable link juice and customers.

People try thinking for yourself and stop buying into what Trulia is shoveling. When Trulia becomes large enough you will look back and say "how the heck did they get so big" and "who do they think they are to charge us that much to display our listings, without our listings they aren't anything. But my customers demands that their home is advertised on Trulia so I guess I have to pay it."

I said I was done but I just had to give Ken an atta boy. I agree with almost everything.

Ken you state that "When Trulia becomes large enough...", too late. According to quantcast Trulia's Estimated Monthly Unique Visitors is 2.6 Million. That is more than the Largest Real Estate Brokerage RE/MAX does at an Estimated Monthly Unique Visitors of 2.4 Million.

Hi Dennis,

"I can see Patrick likes a play on words, so as far as this topic is concerned. I don't see any sence in beating a dead horse. ;)"

To paraphrase Twain, "The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated".

And, hey, my other moniker is "INDY", as in, "I'm Not Dead Yet"

You just had to know that those two were coming :-)

Without a doubt :)

Misty, I just sent you my "about me" paragraph - thanks for the profile page!

Just wanted to throw out another "attaboy" at my boy Ken.

Patrick sorry about the late response. At the end of the day it is not what benefits to the agent or trulia. In this game it is all about what benefits to Google. Since trulia probably has a bigger advertising budget relationship the poor agents are sadly out of luck. P.S. I am the odd duck here and name is Mert. Nice to meet you.

Nice Eric. Mert, nice to hear from you.

I think the point you are missing here Misty is the shear volume of links they have from these widgets. It's not 100 or 1000. It's 10's of thousands if not 100's of thousands. Remove those links and trulia loses it's largest source of credibilty (agents), from which it is able to be credible and generate many of the "editorial" links and it would be sure to lose its ability to rank so high for local terms as well.

Without ranking high, they lose their value. If they went away, not one agent would lose one buyer or seller as the homes would just be found on a local website, which also happens to be far more useful in providing accurate info.

Does that help clarify things?

I don´t believe the redirects or widgets are why they are ranking, it´s the natural exposure given partially because of that.

MAY

2008

Hi Mert, just call me Pat and it's also a pleasure making your acquaintance. I mainly start out with Patrick just to remove any gender ambiguity. I think each side of this debate have diligently defended their positions so I'll not prolong the agony of repeating mine.

While I may not venture onto AR often (Misty's a real slave driver) it was great meeting everyone here. Although, she did give me some time off earlier tonight to take her youngest sibling to the drive-in to see Iron Man ... something Rudy of Trulia, what with that cute little one keeping the parents busy, most likely will have to wait to see when it's released on DVD. I guess one could look at that disadvantage as a kind of karma for stealing everyone's Google juice :-)

Have a great weekend everyone!

Congrats Dennis - just wanted to let you know that your profile page we created for you on ClassifiedFlyerAds.com ranks on the 1st page of Google for search phrase "Homes in Florence Oregon" and on page 2 of Google for "Florence Oregon Real Estate". Hope this gives some juice to your site.

Anyone else who wants to benefit from this kind of "juice" can simply setup their profile page on ClassifiedFlyerAds.com for free.

Nice... I'll have to look at ClassifiedFlyerAds.com a little closer.

Thanks,

MAY

2008

Trulia is blasting up in the engines in my market. They are putting my top search engine placement in jeopardy. I ran an experiment. I used a tool to locate all links on my site to Trulia, Zillow and Realtor/com. I then removed all of the links and a Trulia widget that was on an older post.

The next day Trulia dropped 4 or 5 positions in the search engines in my area.

I was transferring my authority in my own market to Trulia in Googles eyes.

I took it back.

Hi Laurie, that shift in Trulia PR may have been coincidental to your removals? Google PR is very dynamic and can change significantly within a day. For example, I got the following results using the following search terms:

TERMS: long beach real estate

PR 1 - Your Site <- Congradulations!

PR 2 - Trulia

TERMS: long beach ca real estate

PR 4 - Trulia

PR 6 - Your Site <- Still impressive

and it very likely will be different again by mid-morning.

I have been monitoring the local engines here for many short tail terms and am witnessing the Trulia takeover of many of them. The listings provided to them have given them enough power to take over the top of the engines in almost every market and market niche.

Whether you all want to believe this or not, it is true.

As an authority site in my market, I have been able to outlast most.

Trulia is only a part of the problem. There are so many existing and upcoming sites like it, it is going to become more and more difficult for local Realtors to keep or attain top search engine placement. This is the position they want us in. As the market begins to turn and Realtors begin once again to flourish, they will be there just waiting to charge us higher and higher fees to have our listings exposed, to advertise and most likely, in some cases, sell us back leads in our local areas.

I wrote about this on my lead generation post a while back.

Yahoo, Homegain, Realtor., Homes., Movato and many more are moving into position with the Zillow monster looming right behind them.

Do any of you remember when the directories owned the first 5 or 6 pages of Google and a little Realtor could only be found on Page 6?

We are heading there again because Realtors keep giving up their power to these sites based on false promises.

You can question it all you want, it is history repeating itself.

Oh and by the way, this is not just happening at the state and city level, this is happening at the neighborhood/farm/niche level. Go ahead put in a neighborhood name from your area along with real estate/condos.

I'm with you. I like trulia. I get great exposure for my listings and lots of traffic from them to my web site.

MAY

2008

Mature and healthy debate is welcomed on this post - differing opinions and discussion is helpful to everyone.

HOWEVER... references of violence towards women, accusations against someone's intelligence, and immature comments will not be tolerated and will be deleted.

To those who plan to post immature and unprofessional comments on this thread - I suggest you find something more constructive to do with your time, as any inappropriate comments will be quickly removed.

I want to reiterate my opening statement by saying differences of opinion and healthy, mature discussion is encouraged here - not demeaning dialogue and unprofessionalism.

I suggest that everyone who feels the urge to attack or slander another person read the Active Rain guidelines at http://activerain.com/blogsview/44665/ActiveRain-Community-Guidelines

Take special note of these...

Do not personally attack another person.

Do not slander another person.

And...

"We encourage free speech and defend everyone's right to express unpopular points of view. But we don't permit hate speech which contains slurs or the malicious use of stereotypes intended to attack or demean a particular gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, or nationality."

Misty: WELL said!

Misty, I have to say your view may need a rethink. Long term it isn't just about getting your home seen. If you let the big companies continue to outperform you and sell advertising space to your competitors with your information helping them you will continue to slide and not compete for the same business. I didn't realize that they put no follow on their or should I say my listings.

There lame excuse of being like wiki is garbage because they are way more likley to be getting used for spam, Where Trulia is just shutting off google juice to you while taking the max they can take for themselves.

Oh they let you have it on your profile, people aren't going to your profile they are going to the listings. There is a difference between sheering the sheep and skinning them. I suggest Realtors look long term and build their own brand or make real estate agent ran sites like those with the model of craigslist. Thanks AR for not being like some of these sites behind closed doors.

"Atta Girl" Misty! (I just had to throw one of those in the ring to counter balance the "atta boys" going around ;)

And thank you for your comment above - it's a true shame that "professionals" need to be reminded of this point.

This post and thread have been very educational - I am not an SEO expert or blogging expert BUT I am not

about to let Trulia take the inventory we struggle to get and use it to trump us on the internet search

engines. That Trulia (& Yahoo & Zillow)have been trying to take over our advertising niche is not news. But I

am dismayed at the herd mentality that rushes to put their inventory on Trulia-Zillow-Yahoo so they will be

noticed.

Thanks for the information - it has been helpful.

MAY

2008

Congrats Eric - just wanted to let you know that your profile page we created for you on ClassifiedFlyerAds.com ranks on the 1st page of Google for search phrase "austin tx condos" and on page 2 of Google for "real estate in austin tx" and "austin texas real estate". Hope this gives some juice to your site.

Congrats Robert - just wanted to let you know that your profile page we created for you on ClassifiedFlyerAds.com ranks on the 1st page of Google for search phrase "Tampa Bay Real Estate" and on page 2 of Google for "Tampa Bay FL Real Estate". Hope this gives some juice to your site.

Glad we were able to get all 3 of you who took us up on the link back offer to rank.

MAY

2008

Wow, that's amazing. We were gone for a few days so I missed it. Now it's nowhere to be found.

Robert - still shows on my end when I do a search in Google for "Tampa Bay Real Estate". Shows as the 4th result down on my end as...

Tampa Bay Real Estate - Tampa Bay FL Real Estate - 6 visits - May 16

We are the expert Tampa Bay Real Estate agents who are eager to win your trust. Other areas we service:. Palm Harbor FL Real Estate · Oldsmar Real Estate ...
www.classifiedflyerads.com/ad/rss/24628/ - 11k

See screenshot below...

tampa bay real estate

I see your screen shot and I believe you but are you signed in to google? If so, sign out and try again. It's gone on my end. Good job though, it shows what an authority site you have.

I get the same result when I am signed into Google and signed out. Tried it on IE and Firefox and from 2 different computers.

Hi Robert, I, too, see you on page 1.

You're down one slot to fifth but the results went from 1,420,000 as shown on Misty's screenshot above to 1,440,000 on my screen, which may have something to do with it.

Congradulations, btw

Regards,

Pat

AHHHHH, I see it when I check the different google datacenters. Maybe 1/2 to 2/3 of them are showing it #4 and some #5. Very good, thanks again. Not an easy term to achieve.

So, my next question is, of course :-), how long do you plan to keep my profile page where it is on your site?

Your profile flyer will stay active in our real estate service directory for 6 months. If you want something with more longevity you can setup a free account and fill our your profile page and about me section. Your account and profile page will stay active until you remove it. You can also create flyers (listing and service flyers), which will be placed within our directory and submitted to search engines and other directories. You are given the ability to remove directories you do not want your flyer syndicated to.

Of course, we can't guarantee how long your profile flyer will stay ranked in Google.

MAY

2008

Hi Bob, while it's still on Page 1 on several datacenters (as of this post), you're right in that it is dropping off others as time passes.

Best Regards, Pat

Misty,

Good post, but many of the points you made are the base for our argument....

they have countless highly optimized pages

They sure do. Trulia uses MLS data to rank above local Realtor websites. Type in any listing address you have. Do you rank above Trulia? Probably not.

they continually add new content to their site

Correction...you continually add content to Trulia. They manipulate "your content" to outrank you. Did they contribute any data or additional information about your listing? Nope!

yes they have lots of links back

Lots of Realtors are currently linking to Trulia in the way of widgets. How many links (w/o nofollows) does Trulia provide you?

they have a huge amount of people using (and reaping the benefits of) their service (which means more visitors)

Because Realtors continue to promote them, such as this "fanfare" blog post. Some of the less savvy agents even use their widgets. God Bless them.

The Question of The Day

So why not stop using Realtor.com and some of the other popular online resources and tools that bring your website and listings traffic?

NAR signed a deal with the devil (Move, Inc.). They own the MLS data! I consider the NAR/Realtor.com the worst partnership ever. They take our MLS data (that we manually enter) and sale it back to us in the way of overpriced enhanced listings, featured agents, etc. We do not need them either, but I'm afraid your messing with the 800lb gorilla here. How do you win in this fight? You could learn more about the issue here: http://www.narwisdom.com/

On another point - isn't the true goal to get your listings noticed so buyers will see them... and BUY?

You are absolutely right. Again, type in any address of listings you have. Local Realtors have you covered. Why bring in a non-member, non-Realtor/broker/agent from San Francisco to broker your advertising? How many times do you need your listings syndicated? Is IDX not enough? Really?

Trulia's New Logo Taunts Realtors Who Use Widgets

MAY

2008

Ok, I know pretty much nothing about SEO except that links help and I've done one whole blog now garnering me 5 comments. So, you could say I'm learning and not overstep the bounds there. ;) However, I do use Trulia to reply to consumers asking questions and have gotten prospects that way, FWIW. Pretty low tech, but high touch.

Just signed up on Trulia and put my listings on after getting onto their site and finding my listings with an out of town agent's information. Now I want to reread the comments on this blog and do more research.

MAY

2008

> Just signed up on Trulia and put my listings on after getting onto their site and finding my listings with an out of town agent's information. Now I want to reread the comments on this blog and do more research.

Maybe you should of read more about Trulia 1st.

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Trulia is Not the Real Estate Agent’s Anti – Christ

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