Where Real Estate Gets Its Dirt

Dominion Enterprises stops selling advanced access websites, lays off employees, consolidates.

The reports start flowing in this morning that the Advanced Access offices in Anaheim Hills were being shut down. Turns out that it was all part of a consolidation effort by Dominion Enterprises in anticipation of their launch of Homes Connect.

According to a tweet from Andy Woolley, General Manager of Homes Media Solutions:

So it appears they are consolidating their sales positions in San Diego and part of that effort was laying off 20+ employees at the Advanced Access office in Anaheim Hills.

I think this consolidation is a good idea. The fact that Dominion Enterprises hadn’t done this sooner is the issue. At one point Advanced Access had 40,000 paying customers. That number is very different today.

Homes Connect looks very promising. To me the single biggest thing about Homes Connect is their emphasis on VOW agent sites. They really have a chance to change the game with agent website vendors who are only offering IDX data.

  1. @Drew I don’t know what you mean by the “common agent” but I’m looking at this purely from a marketing perspective. To me there is tons of competition is the “agent website” space. It’s pretty hard to differentiate yourself, as a vendor, especially when you are only charging $39.95 per month with no set up fee.
    While there may be some downsides to VOW (registration, etc) the message the “agent website vendor” gives to the agent is “our site lets you give consumers want they want, full data access, not just active listings”. That is a strong pitch in my view and a clear differentiation.

    Homes Connect is touting 50 VOW markets now, and another 150 “coming soon”.

  2. Pingback: Hey – We Need Salespeople… | ListingWare

  3. Can’t resist commenting…We were considered as an acquisition target when Dominion first started “consolidating” Real Estate web services. And now it comes full circle.

  4. VOW sites require registration up front to view additional data sets not provided in an IDX feed. Some of these data sets include: Original List Price, Price change History, and Days on Market. A have an IDX/VOW solution on my website at http://www.mplspropertiesonline.com . It allows the consumer to search on the IDX feed and then teases them with these additional data sets. Once registered, they are then searching VOW. We have seen lead capture increases over 50% and over 8 of 10 email addresses are now authenticated.

  5. @Jan Awesome looking website Jan and great feedback. I heard this approach of using IDX data as a gateway is a solid strategy. Here’s another tool you might find useful, http://CloudCMA.com : )

  6. Dominion is getting what it deserves! Th All the spreadsheeting Peter Ill implemented shows what a poor leader he was and the ship is about to sink!

    🙂

  7. DE’s move to close business ops in CA for AA was actually pretty smart. While it does affect many people in negative ways, it also brings new opportunities to a different market.

    DE is a not a charity, its business entity with goals; just like any other company. We have seen this type of move before when they decided to move the NUMBER1EXPERT brand to FL. FYI, Homes Connect is actually doing quite well.

  8. @Chaka Zulu-I don’t typically respond to anonymous posters because I think you are just a bunch of big pussies but here it goes…. As I said in my post I think consolidation is a good idea, it was something they should have done long ago. What I do have an issue with, and some others on Twitter have mentioned, is there is a right way and a wrong way of doing layoffs. They launched their new “Homes Connect” on the same day they laid off 12 employees and claimed all was “well” at Advanced Access. Not smart.

  9. Greg

    Unfortunately more than 12 people were layed off. It really was more like 20, some of which I had personally hired and trained. The unfortunate part is Dominion is treating their current AA clients much like their former employees and creating the illusion that everything is ok when behind the scenes big changes are being drawn up.

    As a former employee/sales manager of 9 years with AA (working under the Morris fam back in the glory days) I stepped away a little over 2 months ago after seeing the writing on the wall. I have since moved on to a company that truly invests into quality product and the advancement of our clients. A concept that left the company when John Morris did back in ’06 with Dominion acquisition…

  10. We were considering another site with AA…sounds like we should look elsewhere. We are looking for a site similar to what Tiger Leads provides but they are area exclusive and our area is taken. Any suggestions?

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