Is it just coincidence that the day google announces more real estate functionality – discussed on this blog and almost every other real estate blog, network, pub – the NAR announce that it no longer sees Google as a scraping site?!
You may recall I discussed this a while back and now Search Engine Land reports that the NAR board of directors have reversed their policy decision to prevent members from allowing google to index their sites. Indeed, they are now saying participants are not required to prevent indexing of their Web sites by recognized search engines. Surely not a coincidence!
More pieces of the google real estate machine fall into place with the launch of 3D street view. Reported on Geek Estate this is a cool feature from google, which simply shows cities in 3D. The new way to search for real estate perhaps?
What is the picture forming in this jigsaw? A world where the user simply uses google to search for, look at and consider real estate. What does that mean for those in the industry? Get busy with google. There will be much written about this, but as I wrote 2 years ago, you should ensure you are super google friendly in preparation for this very day. Start with the basics, feed to google base, write decent content with place names, references, interesting information, name pictures, ensure your site and content is search engine friendly. Ensure your property titles say something useful and searchable, not just 32 Smith Street, triple check the post code is correct, get into video.
As I say, much will be written on this in the coming months, but there are a myriad of google tools to help you achieve excellent search results, such as google trends, which we commented upon some time ago.
Google has almost completed the jigsaw, be prepared!
Yes, it certainly looks as if google is moving into real estate in a big way. For property portals and agents, the decision seems to be embrace or shun them. Either way in 2-3 years time google will have a dominant position in the property market, mark my words
If Google do launch here and go for the accuracy thats highlighted above it will be a boon to every agent that wants to tout your properties. Not saying this is a reason not to but there are downsides with everything , it would no longer be enough to not put the full address into Right Move to try and throw your competitors off the scent.
This all sounds a little scary. Just part of the Google cog that keeps on turning I suppose. When will it end?? Google want their silicon valley fingers in every pie it seems. Oh well, what can we do…Shame for the little guys out there. A lot of buzz in Edinburgh, about Flat Rent Edinburgh, who seem to be taking advantage of the credit crunch, and trying to add some innovation to the UK rental market. Part of Skyline Property Group.
There is an interesting article on the BBC website about it. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8394252.stm. I’m a graphic designer by trade and have notice that the demand for Google SketchUp (you can quickly draw houses etc) went up recently. As a buyer I would just use it to scan for properties like I do with ‘Rightmove’ so don’t really see why people are getting scared by it.