Steve Aldrich

The part about "non-members" being UN-fettered is KEY here. Come on folks; Why would an association take on it's own members, when there is ZERO legal recourse against non-members? How about spending those dollars on membership enhancements, as opposed to member business shackling?

News hits too close to home... Last week Countrywide sent me a letter informing me that my info was part of this breach. Nice touch that they offered 24 months of credit watch product free to me... BUT, The documents they sent disclosed that loan applications and "other documents" in addition to the data in their systems had been taken. I have a wife, and they made no offer to provide her credit watch services along with me. If our documents of application were compromised, I now must purchase "on my own" this service to ensure her ID has not been stolen or used inappropriately.

If we step back and ask ourselves why we care if the listing data on these sites is accurate or up to date, we have to admit that there are only a couple answers: • We want bragging rights. (not my favorite answer, but valid non the less) • We actually do care how the customer perceives and associates trust with the industry. (my personal fave) In a very quick non-scientific test, I viewed each of the sites listed in the test above. What I found was that 2 (yes only two) provide any indication of when a listing was last updated. Without such information, one has no confidence that the product is fresh, as opposed to growing mold like a week old loaf of organic bread. Of the two that have “last updated” info, only one provides the number of days on the site. They also provide both data points immediately next to each other. So if it says Updated last (7 days ago) and number of days on site = 25, I have a higher confidence factor that this is a fresh and useful listing. So, who were the two? Redfin and Zillow. Who gave me both data points in an easily consumable fashion? Zillow. If you want to increase consumer confidence and create relevance in their minds; there are (at least) two things that are needed: • Provide value add information like the “last updated”. • Clearly define for the user what your sources are (industry leaders, or other), and how often they typically update their info. This is a scary thing to do if you are a site that is not updated at least daily. BUT if you really key in on this difference, and inform the customer that this is your secret sauce, you win that battle of “fresh or stale” in their minds. I wonder as I write this; exactly who is the customer of the sites listed in this article. Clearly, they all need higher and higher Unique Visitor counts in order to sell their brand. But, is the visitor their customer or are the sellers and/or their agents? If a website’s business model is to sell “online shelf space” for “inventory” provided by agents and sellers, what is their obligation to fully disclose to the visitor how old that inventory is? More importantly, what is the driving force that would cause them to expose the fact that their shelves are full of stale product? In the current frenzy to have bragging rights of the most properties, the most visitors, the most metro-areas served; where is the freshness of the information for the user or website visitor considered. Two places I can find. Steve Aldrich www.SellingTheLifeStyle.com