To play ball on the Internet, you are going to have to be a "free agent" on more than one team, and all of the teams require you to pay to play. In other words, marketing yourself on the Internet as an independent service provider is going to be a challenge because it is nearly impossible to stand alone or to stand out.

That's where the real Internet players have the advantage and you don't. Because of the sheer size of the Internet, the profusion of Web sites, and the limited time most people have to play online, most Internet consumers will turn to one of these Internet giants before they will attempt to find you. So your strategy should be to have an interactive relationship with these sites, simply because they have the power to route traffic to you. It's your only chance to "beat the Web."

The first step is understanding who the real Internet players are, what their agendas are, and how you can use their proprietary interests to your advantage.

Portals and vortals

There are only a few ways to get on the Internet, and those are closely held assets by any company. Those doorways or "portals" are carefully developed to assist the consumer while retaining or diverting the maximum number of eyeballs to proprietary sites and pages, or to subsidiary or strategic partner sites. The name of the game is content, which generates traffic, which generates clickthroughs in which consumers seek more information or place their orders.

According to Realtor.com, 80% of all Internet users visit the top-rated traffic portals, Excite, AOL, Netscape, Go Network, and Lycos.

Internet service providers (ISPs) such as AOL or MSN control huge amounts of online viewers and that is why each of them has a homes section to retain their huge traffic numbers.

Here's how it works. To install the ISP, or Internet connection, the consumer will typically download the installation program from a disk. The disk will include a browser, or program which can access the Internet. The program will usually default to the ISP's home page, unless the consumer changes the default to a page of his or her choice.

AOL alone has over 19 million subscribers, making it the world's largest ISP, and the only one which does not immediately access the World Wide Web and the Internet. That means AOL's services are proprietary until the consumer hits the Internet access button, and is transported to an AOL version of Internet Explorer.

That's why Homestore and AOL have struck a strategic partnership. Through AOL's real estate page, Homestore gets to expose its listings sites and services to AOL subscribers, and AOL has substantial listings content it would have no other way of acquiring. Everybody wins.

Web surfers don't have to enter the Web through the world's largest ISP, however. They can instruct their browser to default to their favorite Web front page, including that of their own Web-based MLS service provider, news service or other site.

Homestore Defines the "Vortal"

Homestore calls itself a vortal, defined as a portal site with a vertical content category. It is currently the most complete source of home and real estate content on the Web for buying, selling, moving, renting, decorating, and shopping.

The purpose of a vortal is to become the go-to site for consumers seeking home related products and services. In short it is a one-stop-shop with thousands of pages of content from properties for sale, home buying and selling resources, real estate news, tips, advice, decision support tools to photos.

The coin of the realm on the Internet is traffic, and traffic is driven by content, so look for the portals to create vortals within their own domains. In 2000 and beyond, you will see more one-stop-shopping for real estate than ever before.

An example of this trend is Completehome.com, launching in the winter/spring of 2000. This site promises to be a vortal dominated by its franchise brands and the unique services they offer. Instead of MLS generated homes, the site will feature homes from Century21, ERA, and Coldwell Banker. Where the franchise brands can offer advantages over the other portals and vortals, is that they have initiated innovations such as Coldwell's Virtual Open House, which discloses property information upfront to potential buyers. By strengthening the buyer's bargaining position with open information concerning the home provided by the listing agent, Coldwell has paved the way for a faster, easier transaction.

Where does the Realtor fit in?

The real estate portals and vortals have figured out the five most important things home buyers and sellers want to find on the Internet - homes, loans, information/tips, real estate agents, and secondary service providers such as movers, inspectors, appraisers, and others.

Research has shown that offline, people seek Realtors first before they choose any other means of buying or selling a home, and that they use the Realtor's expertise to find other service providers, but the opposite is true on the Internet. Because of the vast eye-catching one-stop-shop appeal of the large Internet players, individual Realtors can not possibly hope to compete. So if you can't beat 'em, you must learn how to join 'em.

See Part II: How to Deal With the Real Internet Players