According to data released by the National Association of Realtors compiled by Internet consumer researcher Com Score Media Metrix, Realtor.com, NAR's official Website, has nearly five million monthly potential homebuyers who house-dream their way through the site.

They logged on for more than 2.5 billion minutes in 2003, and in January, Realtor.com had 5.5 million unique users, with 251 million minutes spent on the site. That's more than one-third of all the time spent on all real estate-related sites, says the NAR, or more than 45 minutes spent perusing 75 pages of property information each month.

"We know that the majority of visitors to our site are seriously looking to move," says Realtor.com President Allan Dalton. "Our 'Find A Home' search function was used more than 47 million times in January alone. Realtor.com is clearly the number one real estate site on the Internet in traffic that makes its way directly to local real estate salespeople and brokers."

Dalton relates the "heavy amount of homes-related Internet usage' to the "robust existing-homes market in 2003, in which overall sales easily surpassed the previous record set in 2002." There were a total of 6.1 million existing-home sales in 2003, up 9.6 percent from the previous record of 5.57 million in 2002.

In fact, home sales have set records for the past three years, while the stock market has declined. And the NAR predicts a near-record year for 2004. We're already a third of the way through the year with record-low interest rates which is stimulating buying in many parts of the country, the exact same conditions that pushed home sales past a record in 2003.

Many Realtors still don't get it

Yet, many Realtors still don't understand the seismic marketing shift these figures are influencing:

• Consumers are going to the Internet to look for properties
• Consumers are choosing to visit Realtor.com
• Consumers are spending a long time looking at page after page of homes

What do Realtors think these consumers are looking at for 45 minutes?

While Realtor.com won't reveal its trade secrets, Dalton is willing to share the most obvious - they are spending the most time on listings with multiple photos.

"Seventy-eight percent of consumers want multiple photos," says Dalton, "and more photos means more property views. Homes on Realtor.com with six photos are viewed 558 percent more than those without a photo."

Yet far too many homes are appearing online from MLS feeds with one or fewer photos to market the home to consumers.

Are Realtors simply failing to adjust from marketing through their MLSs to other Realtors to marketing directly to consumers using their MLS feeds? Are they still stuck in the days when MLS books would only allow one photo?

No, says Dalton.

"The problem is the history of the real industry," he explains, "There is still a profound predisposition on the part of real estate professionals to prevent consumers from receiving information. That was okay when the MLS was proprietary, but today Realtors cannot afford to frustrate consumers because there are too many other places where they can get the information they want."

From get to give, to give to get

What needs to occur, advises Dalton, is a shift away from getting information about consumers giving them the information they want to get them.

The old way, he says, is to put a little classified ad in the paper. "We would never advertise properties," he says, "we were advertising ourselves to get buyers by giving limited information about the property. How can you characterize any property in black and white and abbreviations?"

That may explain why most buyers, over two-thirds by NAR's last count, are heading to the Internet to look at homes and using newspapers less. The data on the Internet, as supplied by willing Realtors, is detailed, rich and satisfying, with multiple photos, property information, related links and much more that makes black and white newspaper ads pale in comparison.

Yet, many Realtors still believe they are properly marketing their seller's home on the Internet with a single photo or no photo.

"A seller doesn't say 'Show me how you are going to Website my home,'" says Dalton, "they say, 'Show me how you are going to sell my home.'"

And woe to Realtors who believe that they are doing a kindness to an undesirable listing by limiting photos.

"Hiring an agent like that is like hiring a wedding photographer to photograph your daughter's wedding, and he tells you he's only going to take one photo because your daughter is ugly," points out Dalton. "Why would you do that to a seller? All the seller has to do is visit Realtor.com to see the home, and there are other homes that are being marketed with multiple photos by other Realtors."

Dalton says that the situation is improving, with fewer listings posting to Realtor.com without photos or with only single photos, but he declined to give supporting data.