Rightmove new home page

Happy New Year to you all

And Rightmove start the New Year with a new look home page as below:



I am guessing this is the beginning of their marketing drive and I suspect there may be a few comments on the choice of design/style. Do I like it? Well, one has to ask why, what is it doing there, is it functional, usable and secondly, one has to remember that this is not a start up changing the style of their page, this is the market leader updating a 10 year plus strong brand so one would hope a little research has gone into these changes.

I suspect the 'eye' theme is going to appear in their marketing literature that will soon be hitting us online and in the newspapers. If I am correct then I sense a classic branding mistake whereby they have probably produced a respectable marketing campaign targeting the user by adopting the 'eye'. The mistake is that they have then realised the marketing literature brand has no synergy with the website and thus have quickly updated the home page. I must say I can see no other explanation for the new home page look. It does draw my eye (sorry) to the search box, but no more so than if this space was white and it does feel to me to make the rest of the page redundant, i.e. the eyes are too strong and the rest of the page pales into insignificance. If this were the intention then why not just have white page and search box. Indeed, the Rightmove logo (and recognised brand) is equally diminished.

That said, I note it is also appearing as secondary navigational banners throughout the site and it may be clearer when the marketing drive kicks in later this month (my guess on timeline). I may be completely off on this one, but it just feels like a mistake I have been guilty of in the past.

Happy Christmas

Just a short note to thank you all for reading the Blog over the past year and to wish you a Happy Christmas and better New Year.

And yes, this is not a scheduled post, I am actually sat here on Christmas eve wired into the Net. Will I resist tomorrow, probably not as I doubt Santa will bring me the perfect mobile phone. I now have an iphone and a storm and neither do the job I need (back to the old Blackberry curve).

Anyway, I may disappear for a few days over New Year so the Owl may be a little queit. Back with a bang in the New Year as I am working on an economic plan that will not only save the world, but save the Country and thus the property industry. I will be tackling environmental issues in the Summer!

Bleed the World

Please find it in your heart to give generously to bankers in need this Christmas:

Connells Group 'helps' estate agents

Shrewd, opportunistic or just plain old vultures?

The Negotiator reports on the Connells Group fee-share scheme.

Broadly translated this means Connells will relieve an agent of their stock for a share of the fee revenue if and when one of the properties is sold.

We are told that agents can expect to receive 30% of the fee revenue generated by their transferred stock, depending on property type and no doubt subject to conditions.

I would like to have a look at the terms and conditions so if Connells or anyone wants to send me a copy that would be great.

Helpful is putting a bit of a spin on it if you ask me. Helpful for Connells maybe, but for the agent it will only help to potentially pay creditors if they are closing under a cloud (and who doesn't).

I have a better proposal. If an agent is at death's door we will give them a website, a back end system, free uploads to numerous portals, no hosting costs, nothing to pay. All they need is a computer at home.

We will only take a cut for our technology when a property is sold and then at a rate that is affordable. Now that is real help, agent stays in business and can continue to market property which also helps the vendor. Indeed, we can transfer a domain name before the bailiff kicks in the door and bobs your uncle.

I need to think this through, but it is a bona fide offer and genuine help for struggling agents.

Christmas message to the nation - we have property portal overload

More and more property portals are still appearing.

I keep banging on about it, but who needs more of them, the industry; the consumer? Neither!

I also keep banging on about how portals have lost sight of the end user so it is very encouraging to read brand strategy from a company that is 11 years old and look at why they called their site daft.ie.

Eammon from daft.ie (Ireland's leading portal) commented on a property portal watch tongue in cheek post about crazy portal names that their name was very much customer focused and intentional. The post raises two very important points:

1. It speaks volumes when we can look at the industry and comment on literally hundreds of portal names and pick out the crazy ones for entertainment value.

2. We need to create brands/awareness/usability for the 'demand' side of the market, the consumer! Portals spend too much time looking at the 'supply' side of the market, the agent. Indeed, look at what Rightmove are up to, spending millions on building on brand awareness. They don't care that they annoy the hell out of agents because they know they can capitalise on their brand and drive more traffic to their agents. Thus cutting off traffic to the hundred and one new portals.

If Rightmove had the balls to create a free to list or performance based model would the market really need any other portals? (before I am lynched for being pro Rightmove please read this again and think about what I am saying - I don't think they have the balls in any event!)

Anyway, that's enough banging, anyone would think I worked for enormo (the porn company?!)

Rightmove share sale - Connells out but still in

Rightmove announced on Friday that Connells sold its 18.1% stake in the business.

Rightmove shares dropped further by 11% closing at 163.25 pence.

Although this means Connells are out, it doesn't mean they are not still 'in'. At the same time Rightmove announced that they had sealed a deal with Connells to extend their contract through to 2012. For the full statement have a look at thisismoney.co.uk

No doubt the EAT website will be busy on Monday.

Fannie Mae former boss says it wasn't their fault guvnor

They told me I was mad to build a castle on a swamp, so I built one - and it sank, so I built another one .....

Mr Raine, former boss of Freddie Mae, the giant US mortgage company, stated in written testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that the housing crisis wasn't Freddie Mae's fault. No no, the world economy was already in free fall. Indeed, losing $14bn and now being run by the government was all the other boys fault mum, honest! The BBC poignantly states that Mr Raines left Freddie Mae following an accounting scandal!!

It strikes me that it was no more than greed all round, simple as that and Fannie Mae happily fed that greed to get fatter. Indeed, big corporate syndrome securing around half of the $12 trillion US mortgage market leads to arrogance and complacency. Let's say that again, $12 trillion!

The quote above is of course Monty Python. One day lad all this will be yours :)