Real Estate Technology

Zillow: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

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As a real estate professional, I'm continually bombarded by the question, "Why does Zillow price my home differently?"

If we go on Zillow's website, this is how they explain it: The Zestimate is created by an automatic software process designed by statisticians, and there is no ability for humans...

Final Report - December 31, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Final Report: Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

At the beginning of our test, we promised to report our findings through the end of the year.  It has been eye opening for us to track our results in this much detail and we appreciate your input and advice along the way.  Below is the 13th and final reporting data for the test.  

Final Weekly Data: December 25 - December 30, 2009

So this is the Data that includes Christmas Day and the week between Christmas and New Years.  As such, we figured this would be a "dead week" for reporting...meaning the numbers would be abysmal.  But, in looking back over the past could of weeks, this reporting data is significantly better than the 2 weeks prior.  Go figure?

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
...

Data Post December 24, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for December 17 - December 23, 2009

Here are the numbers for this week.

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

891
 1,084
 Unique Visitors
 802 912
 Avg Pages Viewed per Visitor
 12.612.8
 Avg Time on Site per Visitor
 9 minutes 2.3 seconds 7 minutes 48.9 seconds
 Bounce Rate
...

Data Post December 17, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for December 10 - December 16, 2009

Here are the numbers for the 2nd week in December.

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

979
 1,192
 Unique Visitors
 858 983
 Avg Pages Viewed per Visitor
 15.39.8
 Avg Time on Site per Visitor
 10 minutes 45 seconds 6 minutes 10.9 seconds
 Bounce Rate
...

Data Post December 10, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for December 3 - December 9, 2009

We saw slight up-ticks for Total Users and Uniques on both sites this week.  It's a little surprising that we haven't seen a significant drop in traffic during what is normally a "slower time" of the year.  Could it be the extended tax credit?  Time will tell.  Here are the numbers for last week:

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,169 1,360
 Unique Visitors
 1,030 1,166
 Avg Pages Viewed per Visitor
...

Data Post December 3, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for November 26 - December 2, 2009

This week's total visitors and unique visitors were down about 13% on the Unforced website and nearly 6% on the Forced Site.  BUT, the total action items (IDX registrations, showing requests, contact forms) increased on both sites.  Basically, our traffic was down, but our leads were up.  Go figure?

Raw Data:

...
  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,060 1,322
 Unique Visitors
 933 1,057

Data Post November 26, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for November 19 - November 25, 2009

It's now officially the "Holiday Season" so we'll see what impact that has on the weekly reporting for the last month!  For this week we saw nearly identical visitors and uniques on each website, but lower than expected lead actions (IDX registrations and inquiry requests).  This is likely due to the start of the usual "seasonal adjustment" for our local market.

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,222 1,404
 Unique Visitors
 1,030 1,136
...

Data Post November 19, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for November 12 - November 18, 2009

The overall lead totals were down this week.  Visitors and Uniques were nearly identical to last week so I think we'll chalk the low lead totals up to time-of-year / approaching Holiday season.  What this does tell us is that we need a higher traffic volume to achieve our goals during a slower time...maybe a test for another day!  Here's the Data:

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,212 1,385
 Unique Visitors
 1,030 1,153
 Avg Pages Viewed per...

Data Post November 12, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for November 5 - November 11, 2009

Well, not much changed from last week.  The total visitors and total uniques are nearly identical and Saint-paul-real-estate.com (unforced site) had slightly better non-IDX lead totals while BarkerHedges.com (forced site) saw the same net total of non-IDX leads and an increase in IDX leads.  A few more weeks of testing and maybe we'll be able to make some sense out of these numbers!

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,220 1,415
 Unique Visitors
...

Data Post November 5, 2009 - Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test

Website Data for October 29 - November 4, 2009

We are now reporting data for our 2nd month of testing for the Forced vs. Unforced Registration Test.  For whatever reason, the week 4 numbers were the highest totals so far and this week the totals dropped a little.  Probably a market indicator, but we'll see what happens in coming weeks.  To track other test results and view comments and posts about this topic, check out: www.forcedregistration.com.

Raw Data:

  Saint-Paul-Real-Estate.com (Unforced)
BarkerHedges.com (Forced)

 Total Visitors

1,314 1,511
 Unique Visitors
...