Rightmove sales leads most likely of top 3 portals to request to book viewings online

Rightmove sales leads most likely of top 3 portals to request to book viewings online

In April, BestAgent Marketplace began automatically importing all sales and lettings enquiries from all three main property portals. Its goal is to automate all basic daily tasks for single branch agents, and allow suppliers to connect their products.

The sample size is small currently, but some trends are appearing already (all figures rounded to nearest whole percentage point).

• Sales applicants more likely to book viewings online: Overall, of all applicants imported across all three portals, 49% of sales applicants tried to book a viewing online, compared to 40% of lettings applicants.
• In Sales, Rightmove applicants are most likely to book viewings online: 68% of sales applicant enquiries from Rightmove proceeded to book a viewing. By comparison, OnTheMarket sales applicants tried to book online 43% of the time. Just 17% of Zoopla sales applicants wanted to book a viewing online.
• Lettings: RM and Zoopla almost neck and neck: Of all lettings applicants imported across all three portals, just over 45% of RM applicants proceeded to book viewings online. This compares with just under 45% for Zoopla. OTM is behind in Lettings with 31% of their applicant enquiries proceeding to book viewings online.

We are publishing these findings out of interest. We do not think that this leads to any specific conclusions, because these figures are averages of portal leads from agents around the country. Local figures are likely to vary based on town or region, local supply versus demand levels, property profile and price range as well as quality of presentation.

Reducing time to book viewings.

The BestAgent platform automatically imports applicants from all portals, BestAgent websites and agents’ own applicant input. It then automatically invites all matching applicants to book a viewing online when a new listing is added, or a price is reduced. Applicants are able to respond with viewing request for a precise time with 4 clicks and no typing required. Agents are able to accept the proposed time with 1 click, or suggest an alternative time with 4 clicks, but no typing required. Agreed viewings are then synced with any Calendar type, iCal, Outlook, Google or Yahoo with one click.

The existing real time data feed allows agents to instantly publish new instructions to all three portals from the client’s property. BestAgent’s automation then sends all registered (and imported) applicants an invitation to book a viewing online for every new instruction (and price reduction) within minutes.

This facility has resulted in some new applicant enquiries having a viewing booked and confirmed with the agent in under 15 minutes from the time of first enquiry. Typically it happens within a few hours. This is a significant improvement over the long term average of the 3.5 days recently reported as the time taken for an applicant to get a viewing booked in on a new instruction.