Estate agents using OnTheMarket have come out in defence of the new portal.
“We’ve had nothing but positive experiences thus far with OnTheMarket” explains Lloyd Williams, branch manager of Roderick Thomas agency at Clifton in Bristol.
“When OTM had the backing of Knight Frank and Savills it was a no brainer where to go. Our average detached house outside of Bristol is £1.1m from my office” he says.
“For us this switch has paid off, and in Bristol since we have opened we have had much success against our competitors in the higher end that didn’t join OTM. Only two agents in Clifton Village remained with Zoopla” he adds.
Williams says much of the negativity against OnTheMarket in the media has been as a result of experiences of the lower end of the market or those connected with Countrywide, the estate agency group with links to rival portal Zoopla.
“With much of the lower end agents now turning to online only and thus being squeezed further, they will find it hard to operate and not end up as an online agent themselves” he believes.
“For those selling at £200,000 the savings of £2,000 if using an online agent seem significant - hence the reason Zoopla is expanding with the online-only agency base” he says.
Meanwhile Keller Williams, the US-owned franchise agency that currently has around 90 agents across the UK working from three ‘market centres’ based in Leeds and London,has also spoken up for the challenger portal.
KW UK chairman Donald Morris says OTM offers highly competitive charges for member agents, is more attractive and easier to navigate and view than Rightmove and Zoopla, and is doing “an excellent job” given it has only been public for nine months.
“Given time I believe it could be as popular as Rightmove or Zoopla” he says.
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There you go, balance!
Springett faceplams " you weren't supposed to tell the Urchins until we had properly sewn up removing the boards properties from everything but OTM . We want our own portal for £1million properties to make sure that the grubby urchins can't compete but we want them to pay for it . You weren't supposed to let on "
I cannot believe what I am reading - Keller Williams is a non-High Street, virtual/online agent, no different to Purple Bricks. Is this a joke EAT??
I'm confused. An agent ditched Rightmove to go with OTM and then said OTM was junk and went back to Rightmove so today there is an OTM orchestrated testimonial from a one of their agents bad mouthing Zoopla? Doesn't make sense.
OTM trying to fill the holes in the sinking ship, bet they were prompted to give that piece of PR content, I would love to see the balance of enquiries and deals they have really done, no one else in the country has come forward to WOW I'm so glad I joined OTM ..... that maybe because no on has had a result
I guess this proves what people have been saying - good portal for the high-end agents but yet to really break ground with the majority of the market...
I had a visit from an OTM rep the other day trying to persuade me to list on their portal.
It was one of the most negative pitches I've ever encountered, essentially saying that I should join OTM in order to give RM and / or Zoopla a kicking because they were nasty horrid people working against my long-term interests (I paraphrase slightly).
Not once did he claim that OTM would generate more leads, or better quality leads, or benefit my bottom line in any way.
Spot on Steve. I had a similar visit from the rep. They wanted me to sign a letter of intent yet seemed keen to acknowledge that OTM isn't doing very well against Zoopla in my area. I can only assume the reps are salaried and not on commission.
What a joke of an article, I assume the agents Springetts brother or cousin
For a quick laugh go to http://www.agentsmutual.co.uk/testimonials.html
Surprising article, I looked at the OTM site to check the facts and whether these comments could be taken seriously.
I did a search on the OTM site for Clifton (Bristol) 43 properties came up. Interestingly it appears that Roderick Thomas has nothing for sale.
Would like to know what is meant by the ‘switch has paid off’!!
Zoopla has 38 properties.
I can only assume that if you have nothing for sale it frankly doesn't matter where you advertise!!
Fair enough! We only be hearing good things about Rightmove and Zoopla, its good to hear positive opinions/ reviews about OTM too (not only negative).
There is a saying in business which we have all heard a million times.
"Go with your gut!"
circa 5000 branches did this in January but many more did not.
OTM cannot expect to grow membership just coming round to agents, having a cosy chat sticking the boot in about z (they really are so far away from challenging rm). And then asking for a non-binding letter of intent and walking away with a smile!
They need to radically grow membership which will in turn grow stock and traffic before apathy sets in and it truly becomes a dead duck.
Having re-read the article Keller Williams ,who are supporting and on OTM , are saying they have 90 people working from three "centres". Im not a rocket scientist but isnt that a virtual agent ?
Sit your applicants down in front of two screens, one showing properties on Rightmove and one showing properties on OTM and ask them which site they prefer to look at. I'm yet to met any house hunter who prefers the Rightmove layout and its constant ads. On the Market is clear and relaxing to surf.
Well done EAT for showing some balance today, although I'd expect a few more agents to come out and complain about OTM in the next few weeks, it's certainly what I would be encouraging any returning agent to do if I were a director at Zoopla at this moment in time.
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