On The Market.com is on the market

We are founder members, gold members in fact, of the new homes portal, On The Market.com. What does this mean? That we get a key to the Executive Washroom? Well, yes, but more than this, it shows we have thrown ourselves, heart, soul, and wallet, into the new platform.

Here is a link to a description of On The Market that it posted on its launch day on 23^rd January 2015 – http://blog.onthemarket.com/content/welcome-onthemarket-com-new-simple-way-search-property/.

Many estate agents have stayed out of On The Market.com for a variety of reasons, including waiting to see how it does before taking the plunge. Of course, if too may did that it would be unsustainable. Yet if you go around London you will see other estate agents, others as ambitious and forward-looking as Edward Ashdale (well, almost), with their windows plastered with On The Market.com stickers.

So, what has the reception been since the launch? We embraced it, obviously, so much so that we have a video telling people about it – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4v4vpcM9tac.

Talking of videos, you can see On The Market.com's 30 second TV advert here - http://youtu.be/21BRn5dfupc – and we've added it to our own You Tube playlist, appropriately named Friends Videos.

Once On The Market.com went live, Zoopla experienced an early 11% reduction in advertising from estate agents, but commented that the real test for On The Market.com is interest from consumers – http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/zoopla-affected-by-onthemarket-launch-as-advertising-members-fall-10040861.html. Of course, consumers need something to consume and not only is the On The Market.com website customer-friendly, it has interesting news and blog pages, a draw by themselves. It took just three weeks to clock up one million unique visitors to the site – http://www.cityam.com/209726/estate-agent-wars-onthemarket-hits-one-million-mark-unique-users-its-battle-against-rivals.

An early Guardian newspaper report compared availablity of properties on Rightmove, Zoopla and On The Market.com, and even at that early stage, the site was a contender with significant listings – http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/jan/26/property-site-onthemarket-rightmove-zoopla-selling-houses.

Another early report, this time from City A.M., warned that On The Market.com was lagging behind its rivals in Google local property searches. However, we believe that On The Market.com, itself run by Agents Mutual, is there for the long term and in the long term becoming a bigger player on property searches is a very strong likelihood. Article here - http://www.cityam.com/208155/onthemarket-will-need-win-google-battle-it-can-really-challenge-zoopla-and-rightmove.

So, almost a month in and the jury is out on the impact of On The Market.com. Certainly, there is already an impact. What is most surprising is that those early reports seem to want to conclude on the success or failure of On The Market.com when it has hardly begun. Give it twelve months and then the judge can don his or her black cap, or not.

You can view our earlier posts in our Index here.