Many thanks to the folks at Inman News for posting an article about our new Vendor Alley Jobs Board.
You can read the full article here:
A Smarter Solution – Real Estate Job Hunting 101
Thanks Katie!
MOVE puts on the white hat.
Recently I wrote a post about “What’s MOVE’s next move?”. The following week Curt Beardsley, a VP at MOVE, did a lot of demos to news and industry people about what they’ve been working on. My business partner Dan Woolley and I were lucky enough to get a demo.
Dan and I have known Curt for quite a long time. In a nutshell Curt’s first company, True North Technology created the first web-based MLS system. Yup, that’s right he invented the internet based MLS system, take that Al Gore!! They were bought by GTE Enterprise Solutions, creators of T-III, which is where he met a guy named Errol Samuelson. Errol now is the president of Realtor.com.
Anyway we were lucky enough to get a demo of new tool for real estate professionals they call, “Find“.
The first thing I have to say about Find is that its freaking awesome! The way it blends public records data, MLS data, on the fly heat mapping, and pychographic data just blows your mind. But MOVE figured out that the key to understand this data is centered around the way you search. You might even say that you need to make sure you can “FIND” what you are looking for! I’ve seen other sites/products that try to pull off the natural language searching and most have failed. Find nails it.
Find is intuitive, fast and as a software developer inspiring.
But the technology is only half the story. It’s up in about 40 MLS providers around the country and it’s free to REALTORS. The only catch is MOVE would like MLS providers to provide their sold data to MOVE.com to implement the solution.
And what does MOVE what to do with this sold data? Sell it to direct marketers? No. Use it to build AVMs? Nope. Slice and dice the data and create derivative products for the mortgage industry? Not even close.
Here’s what they want to do:
Improve the consumer search experience on Realtor.com.
That’s it! In a nutshell, make the National Association of REALTORS flagship site, Realtor.com, (already #1) even better. I’m surprised that more people aren’t writing about this.
In the past the industry has been pretty vocal about what it doesn’t like about Realtor.com. I’m sure that there will still be a lot of Realtor.com “haters” out there, but with all the hype around MLS data it’s refreshing to see a company who is focused on improving their service and creating new tools that give real estate professionals back the edge. And that’s definitely something I agree with.
Don’t fear the ReaPeR?
Remember how you could play albums backwards and hear secret messages? On The Beatles album, “Abbey Road” many people heard the phrase “Paul is Dead”, which caused many fans to believe that Paul McCartney had died in a car crash.
Some messages are not so hard to understand. Take the 1976 hit from Blue Oyster Cult, “Don’t fear the Reaper”
“All our times have come
Here but now they’re gone
Seasons don’t fear the reaper
Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain..we can be like they are…”
MRIS sent a message to RPR that was loud and clear. “Thanks, but no thanks”. This is significant and symbolic in a lot of ways.
1. MRIS is the largest MLS provider in the country.
Not being able to get the largest MLS in country to sign up doesn’t bode well for the future.
2. Dale Ross, RPR’s CEO, is the former CEO of MRIS
If you can’t get the MLS you used to run sign up, then who can you get?
3. MRIS covers Washington D.C. the very place RPR hopes to sell the MLS data.
If you can’t get the local MLS to sign up, then how good is your coverage?
Plus 2 other significant developments have happen.
1. Laura Wolford has left the VP of marketing position or MRIS and has been replaced by Rob Hahn (as a consultant), the blogger/consultant who declared “The death of RPR” is now running their marketing department. Not a great sign for RPR either.
2. Also, rumor is that MRIS is working on a home grown version of RPR, where they get to keep all the profits. Doubters might say that this will prove to be unsuccessful. These doubters are wrong and have not been paying attention to what MRIS CEO David Charron and his team have accomplished in the past several years.
“Come on baby…don’t fear the reaper
Baby take my hand…don’t fear the reaper
We’ll be able to fly…don’t fear the reaper
Baby I’m your man…”
Of course the MRIS board of directors could change their mind, but when you add all these factors up it doesn’t look good.
“La la la la la
La la la la la”
It’s clear now that RPR not offering MLS providers a way to share revenue generated from their respective data was a mistake. Some companies are not only allowing MLS to “dip their beak” , but go for a swim!
So the solution is pretty clear, the MLSs have spoken…. MORE COW BELL RPR!!!
