Is the Listing Router an Effective Call to Action?

Kelley: I have not started my lisitng router yet. I need to set up and see.. I will follow this thread too and see what happens

I am interested to see if there is anyone out there who truly understands the listing router system and has had any success with it.  I get the concept, but I, like most, signed up, I click on it occasionally, and quickly lose interest because I just don't fully grasp what's going on. 

Is this a free AR tool or a pay-per-click?  I wasn't sure after reading things...I don't think it's free

I have had some activity, and I had some credit from other people pages click throughs but it must disappear when the billing is done.  I think I had 3 or 4 click credits last month.  (AR guys - if you are watching this post, please give us a permanent total per month of the credits, so I can track!).  Below is my screen shot of historical activity, not huge traffic but another little piece of the pie.  I did take my links out of the screen shot so you cannot click on them  :)

That's 31 click through from the paid campaigns - who knows how many from the free ones (which annoys me)? 

It is free for your pages, but it cost you if someone is on a blog from Michigan or anywhere outside "your" market area decides to search in your area.  I have two paid campaigns set up and 10 free ones.  I work a lot of smaller markets that I just don't want to commit to spending this money on yet so I am paying for the top 2/largest market areas I work.

I always wait a few weeks to listen to the concerns and let the bugs get worked out before I jump in.  I want to see proof of results.  Good question though.....

I started listing router a couple of weeks after it came out and have had 13 "routed" to my IDX site.    Salem, OR is a town of 150,000 people so I thought that was pretty good since these are our rainy months and tend to be slow.

Listing router is too new for any conclusive data. I have people that lurk for 6 months before contacting me.  It's part of the internet shift.

Unless they are going to do some sort of custom form for each area, there really isn't a way to have anything other than a Search for Homes call to action.  They do need to encompass a nation here.  I don't think there is much they can do about that.

Do I like the placement?  Does it jump out?  Eh...I think that could be improved, but not sure they can do much about the terminology.  Maybe a flashing disco ball that says "over here, hey...you...you with the mouse...click over here...Houses...c'mon..."  well, not really, but you get the idea.

This is a great thought provoking post...and I have to say that I love Melina's comment...too funny!!!

I am also suspending my interest in the listing router for now. But, I have no doubt that admins. of aware of AR'er not so hot response to the service.

Thank you for this insightful tip. I have yet to implement the idx feature but it certainly seems worthwhile!

I just went and read more about this and am still as confused as I was.  Would love to know in plain language what this does and does not do.

Morning Kelly,  terrific post and your analysis is very helpful.  I see a huge amount of confusion over ListingRouter.  The early results aren't very promising are they ?

Listing Router seems to be a big ball of confusion to so many on here.  I know that the AR guys have several posts explaining things, but I think that until several people start touting how much response they're getting from it, most will not give it a try.

I think the listing router has to be done in the right way to make it more of a call to action, make there more incentive, just by sitting there its not going to magically bring customers.

Hi Kelley - I don't think I would have thought about the wording that would draw more to the router.  I think you little study shows that it does make a difference.  It would be interesting to see if there are others who've done what you have, and to see their results.  I haven't done any paid ones, but did set up a number of the free ones for the areas I cover.

Ann

Am getting some decent traffic (I presume) from the above stats.  Really have no idea as I dont have anything to compare it to ?

kelley,

Thanks for the post. Great information here and interesting dialogs.

Kelley - Your question is so astute and insightful. Excellent.

I feel that Listing Router is like gambling.  I write a post it goes to page one of Google, sometimes at the top and then with the lovely listing router someone is directed to another persons website...Great...I have totally opted out of all listing router activities and stopped the gambling.  What is your consensus since you wrote this?  I would be interested in what you think.

Click throughs are costing me about double what I pay for AdWords so I am not sure if Listing Router is a good value. They are both a gamble but AdWords gives you better odds.  I would like to see lower minimum bids to make LR more palatable.