Homestore isn't putting all its eggs in one basket. While the company was instrumental in helping Realtors migrate their marketing efforts to the Internet, the company also did most of the heavy lifting to get Realtors to consider the Internet a legitimate advertising medium.

Homestore ponied up for expensive traffic deals with portals like AOL, Excite, Wall Street Journal and Internet Broadcast Systems' network of regional television Web sites in 39 metro areas; search engine placement; advertising during SuperBowl commercials; and wooing trade associations like the National Association of REALTORS® and its subsidiaries with royalty agreements. It also gave over 160,000 subscriptions to revenue partner Cendant to distribute to agents free of charge for one year. Those renewals are about to come up again in February, giving Homestore an estimated renewal base for Realtors that could be as little as 130,000 or as great as 300,000 agents.

Now that commanding consumer traffic is finally justifying some of the expense, (most homebuyers now seek information online and Homestore says it gets 50-75 percent of the eyeballs at online real estate portals) Homestore would like to cash in on another big revenue potential - builders. Will the site have to reinvent the wheel again or will it be able to coast a little on the progress made in the existing real estate market?

To find out, Homestore has created new products and services for builders, and the timing couldn't be better.

According to a new release by the Commerce Department, new single-family home starts rose about 5 percent to 1.473 million, the most in 24 years. New single-family home building permits rose about 3 percent to 1.4 million, also a record. Buoyed by 40-year-low interest rates, and lack of better opportunity in other investment instruments, people are deciding that they want that new home of their dreams, and they are going to the Internet where the fragmented building community is being aggregated under one name - Homebuilder.com.

Homestore is an advertising medium for the Internet. In order to woo builders to the Internet from traditional sources like the yellow pages and newspapers, Homestore has to prove the same thing to builders that it had to prove to Realtors - that the power of aggregation and richer content will draw a greater number of consumers to look at homes online and that online advertising will be more cost-effective than other mediums.

According to the National Association of Realtors, less than two percent of homebuyers went online in 1995. By 2001, over forty one percent used the Web to search for a home. Meanwhile, the newspaper medium lost the ground that the Internet has gained. In 1995, 51 percent of homebuyers used newspapers in their search for a home. By 1995, that number had dropped to 41 percent - neck and neck with the Internet.

Further, Homestore says it has aggregated over information on more than 130,000 models, homes and built-to-suit plans for viewing by consumers, making it the most popular new home site online, says the company. Over 500,000 unique visitors a month view Homebuilder.com.

To capitalize on the advantages the Internet can offer as a medium as well as launch a salvo at Yellow Pages, HomeBuilder.com has launched its "Find a Builder Directory," which the site calls "a product that enables builders of all sizes to promote their company and new homes online."

“Great homes tend to sell themselves, but only when people see them. Working together with the NAHB, the Find a Builder Directory was created to help get builders quickly up and running with an inexpensive and highly effective online presence to showcase their craftsmanship to the largest online audience of new home shoppers,” said Jay Minkoff, Vice President of Sales and Channel Management.

In a press release, the company said the directory offers "more vivid, personal, interactive and customizable information, the Find a Builder Directory is more content rich and costs less than its offline competitor, the Yellow Pages."

The Find a Builder Directory includes:

• Company information – helps differentiate builders with an “About Us” section and communicates other key information, such as the number of years in the business, number of homes built per year, home style specialties, price ranges, communities, quick delivery homes, and more;
• Direct response – connects new home shoppers with builders immediately via an online inquiry form, e-mail, phone, and fax as well as links to the builder’s Web site and/or their new home and community listings on HomeBuilder.com;
• New home promotion – showcases current and sample or model homes with a photograph and text description;
• Constant availability – enables builders to update their Find a Builder Directory listing at any time via the Internet.

For more exposure, HomeBuilder.com has introduced HomeBuilder.com(TM) Marketing System, "an integrated branding, promotion and Web site solution for home building professionals." The HomeBuilder.com Marketing System "enables builders to customize their marketing efforts to reach a larger, more qualified audience of new home shoppers than newspaper, home guides and the yellow pages -- at a lower cost."

"Advertising in print alone under-represents builders' communities and new homes. Every builder's community deserves a presence where the majority of homebuyers and sellers look first -- online," said Jay Minkoff, vice president of sales and channel management. "Arming builders with a customizable Marketing System will help them attract more homebuyers and enhance their image and reputation in their respective marketplace. HomeBuilder.com's Marketing System allows a builder to focus on their construction of quality homes while HomeBuilder.com's unique online media focus helps them get their homes sold for more money while spending less."

Through Homestore's traffic partners, builders' communities and new homes will receive exposure through New Home Listings. Homestore will also build Websites for the builders, and equip them with virtual tours to showcase their models. Packages can be customized or purchased preconfigured for a simpler purchase. And they get in the Find A Builder directory.

Published: January 22, 2003

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.