Zillow premier agent

[Tison Velez]

Good morning BP friends,

I have been doing real estate in Tampa for about three years now and am looking to increase my sales. I did 20 sales last year and I am trying to hit 30 for this year. I am also active military and work with a ton with other military members throughout the first part of the year. I have lots of clients from January to August when members are transferring to new duty stations, but after that sales really drop off. I have been mulling over the idea of paying to be a premier agent for some time now and was curious what everyone's thoughts were.

I did find a few old threads about this subject, but nothing new since Zillow has changed the way they assign/ handle leads. Having talked with a Zillow sales member I would be bound by a contract for 6 months and the cost associated with this would be $800- $1000 per month. Any suggestions or input from any agents that are currently using the platform would be greatly appreciated. TIA 

Tison

[Will Fraser]

Hi Tison,

While I am not using the new Zillow platform I have the luxury of viewing the dozens of agents in my office and their operations.  Zillow works and that's a fact.  Their new platform is performing better than the old and that's pretty clear, too.

What is less clear and what I want to bring up here as I do with every agent in my sphere, is this:  is Zillow (or any other similar lead source) the HOW and the WHAT that you want in your business.  Let me illustrate:

You can pay Zillow $6,000 over the next 6 months and they WILL connect you with people buying homes.  They MAY be able to connect you with warmer leads, who have a higher conversion rate than the paltry rates seen in Zillow 1.0 (and across other online lead sources),   That might be a way that you could add those 10 sales.    What will be true of each of those clients, though, is that they found their agent through a "paid dating site" setup, where they shop and click a button and an agent appeared.  Presto Zappo!  Cool beans.

What would happen if you took that same $6,000 over the next 6 months and used it to take people out to a $25/person kind of restaurant (in my market that would be pretty great, not the Ritz) and have lunches with people in your market, possibly even past clients, and build relationships with them by adding value to their lives and getting to know them deeper over a tasty meal?    At $25/person factoring in you and the other person ($50) you'd be looking at 120 meals over those six months, or 20 meals per month.    That would mean nearly a face-to-face opportunity to add value to the people you already know or will meet.  That over time will build up people around you who chose you (because they know, like, and trust you) instead of someone a website sold their data to).  Those people may also refer other people in their world to you, because . . . they know, like, and trust you.

So, all in all as an outsider with some vantage points into Zillow 2.0 I'd say it looks more promising than 1.0, but it may not be the way you want to build your business.  As your reflect on your strengths, passions, and vision for the next few years in real estate it will help you match the growth plan you use in real estate to your style of biz.

I hope this is useful to you,

Will