Visum, the online estate and letting agents

[greengriff]

visum.co.uk

We're long established, but not very well-known. I'd very much appreciate some community feedback (don't be afraid to be harsh if you think it deserves it!) on our site, the deeper the better! If you go as far down the rabbit hoe as creating an account and an ad (but not paying for it, obviously) that would be awesome!

 

[Shopclicks]

The question I have to ask is why Visum? Is there a meaning in there that I'm not getting?

 

[fisicx]

Number one problem is house buyers. They default to the likes of rightmoove, zoopla and other platforms for buy or let properties. They want a platform where they can see all the local properties.

Some may look locally using Google or some other search engine and some may even discover a property you are listing. But then they compare the listing details with those on the likes of rightmove and find you very wanting.

Which then brings us back to the whole point of the site. What exactly are you offering?

I can see you have a valuation service (which doesn't seem to work most of the time) but when I did get it to accept my address I'm taken to a form I have to fill in to get the valuation. Not a good UX.

The homepage form shows me reviews but the way it's structure it appears that these are reviews for the valuation service.

All of which suggests you are just a random estate agent with random properties around the UK. There is something about selling for £129 but your pricing guides suggest there are lots of add ons. Things that a traditional estate agent does as part of the package.

I registered but again the UI/UX isn't very friendly. For example, the description box doesn't allow formatting.

What exactly is the purpose of the website? Is it to sell or let houses? If so then you need to be a local service. Nationwide means you need to be listed on the nationwide platforms or be very visible for local searches.

 

[fisicx]

Just played with the search. Put in my location and got a bunch of results nowhere near where I live. A search for Aldershot returns a flat in Edinburgh!

The images are mostly rubbish, no floorplans and no details of local amenities. Which is why people use rightmove - because the listing are much better.

 

[UKSBD]

Initial point of view

You lost my trust in about 2 minutes and I doubt I would give you the opportunity to gain it back.

I don't mind providing an email address to get info.

But when I am tricked in to having to provide information and agree to your terms and conditions in a deceptive way you've p***d me off enough to abandon the site and go elsewhere.

 

[Mark T Jones]

I can't comment on functionality etc, but to me the message from your site is 'we are cheap'.

Being cheap attracts a certain type of customer 'champagne tastes on beer income', which may be what you want?

Purple Brisks has essentially failed in theis space, having just been sold for the price of a packet of Smarties. Others have failed to get any traction.

So, I guess my question is - what is the plan behind the site?

 

[UKSBD]

What exactly is the purpose of the website? Is it to sell or let houses? If so then you need to be a local service. Nationwide means you need to be listed on the nationwide platforms or be very visible for local searches.

I could be wrong, but I think the number one purpose of the site is to provide people who don't have an estate agent a way of advertising on Rightmove

A much needed service, but I believe Rightmove only allow agents to do this so they have to make themselves look like an estate agent so as to get around what Rightmove require.

If they aren't to concerned about annoying Rightmove, they need to make it a lot more clearer that this is what they are providing (assuming I am correct in what I think their main service is)

 

[greengriff]

Just played with the search. Put in my location and got a bunch of results nowhere near where I live. A search for Aldershot returns a flat in Edinburgh!

The images are mostly rubbish, no floorplans and no details of local amenities. Which is why people use rightmove - because the listing are much better.

Perhaps you're confusing what we do with what Rightmove does? But then again if you are getting confused, then I'm sure plenty of other people will be. Rightmove is a listing service to display properties that are available for sale or rent from estate agents. We are an estate agent. Do we not make that clear?

 

[greengriff]

I could be wrong, but I think the number one purpose of the site is to provide people who don't have an estate agent a way of advertising on Rightmove

A much needed service, but I believe Rightmove only allow agents to do this so they have to make themselves look like an estate agent so as to get around what Rightmove require.

If they aren't to concerned about annoying Rightmove, they need to make it a lot more clearer that this is what they are providing (assuming I am correct in what I think their main service is)

This is correct. And we are compliant with Rightmove's requirements as we've listed with them for circa 20 years.

 

[greengriff]

Initial point of view

You lost my trust in about 2 minutes and I doubt I would give you the opportunity to gain it back.

I don't mind providing an email address to get info.

But when I am tricked in to having to provide information and agree to your terms and conditions in a deceptive way you've p***d me off enough to abandon the site and go elsewhere.

Hi. Can you elaborate please? What's deceptive?

 

[greengriff]

I can't comment on functionality etc, but to me the message from your site is 'we are cheap'.

Being cheap attracts a certain type of customer 'champagne tastes on beer income', which may be what you want?

Purple Brisks has essentially failed in theis space, having just been sold for the price of a packet of Smarties. Others have failed to get any traction.

So, I guess my question is - what is the plan behind the site?

Hi. You're sort of right. What we're after is people who are savvy enough to realise that in a lot (but not all) cases, estate agency and lettings agency is money for old rope, and want to avoid overpaying in exchange for doing a little of the work themselves. That's not what Purplebricks are/were - they are trying to compete directly with local agents, offering the same kind of service but without a local office.

 

[greengriff]

What exactly is the purpose of the website? Is it to sell or let houses? If so then you need to be a local service. Nationwide means you need to be listed on the nationwide platforms or be very visible for local searches.

We are listed on the nationwide platforms. Our issue is getting people to find us despite us having no 'local' presence. This is the goal that Purplebricks/Housesimple/Easypropert and dozens of other defunct businesses tried to achieve by burning through tens off millions of pounds of investor cash.

 

[fisicx]

If they couldn’t get it to work even with their huge marketing campaigns why do you think you will be any different?

If you want to get found you need to invest in marketing. Maybe not TV adverts but certainly PPC so wherever people begin their search for a local estate agent you are right at the top of the pile.

When we were looking to let we had visits from all the local agents. The ones that viewed the property brought with them a wealth of information about the local market. Unless you can offer the same service you wouldn’t even get a look in.

The fact you weren’t visible on Google when we did our research means we would never discover you.

 

[fisicx]

Perhaps you're confusing what we do with what Rightmove does? But then again if you are getting confused, then I'm sure plenty of other people will be. Rightmove is a listing service to display properties that are available for sale or rent from estate agents. We are an estate agent. Do we not make that clear?

Not it’s not at all clear what you do other than harvest my details in order to provide a valuation.

 

[fisicx]

There is nothing above the fold on your website that says you are an estate agent.

The whole focus is the valuation form (which doesn’t work)

 

[Shopclicks]

If you want to get found you need to invest in marketing. Maybe not TV adverts but certainly PPC so wherever people begin their search for a local estate agent you are right at the top of the pile.

Disagree. PPC and other advertising media is the reason PB failed. The prices for the kind of service offered by the OP will not support PPC advertising in this space. Local on-page optimisation is far cheaper and sustainable. Purple Bricks didn't do this but rather paid a fortune in advertising and failed.

Building a recognisable brand over time is the best way forward here.

 

[greengriff]

If they couldn’t get it to work even with their huge marketing campaigns why do you think you will be any different?

If you want to get found you need to invest in marketing. Maybe not TV adverts but certainly PPC so wherever people begin their search for a local estate agent you are right at the top of the pile.

When we were looking to let we had visits from all the local agents. The ones that viewed the property brought with them a wealth of information about the local market. Unless you can offer the same service you wouldn’t even get a look in.

The fact you weren’t visible on Google when we did our research means we would never discover you.

Because we're not trying to do the same thing as them.

Yes, maybe PPC is the way ahead, but we need to be sure it's not wasted, which it would be if the website doesn't keep people.

Then you are not our kind of lettings customer, which is fine, we're not trying to please everyone. Our kind of lettings customer is someone who already knows the local market and what their property should fetch (as many/most landlords do). We're not looking for people who don't have a clue and need their hands holding. Those people genuinely would be better served by a local agent.

Yes, the lack of google visibility is a major issue.

 

[greengriff]

The whole focus is the valuation form (which doesn’t work)

It is working for me (I just tried it now). What happened when you used it? Or did you mean 'it doesn't work in achieving our goals'?

 

[Mark T Jones]

Hi. You're sort of right. What we're after is people who are savvy enough to realise that in a lot (but not all) cases, estate agency and lettings agency is money for old rope, and want to avoid overpaying in exchange for doing a little of the work themselves. That's not what Purplebricks are/were - they are trying to compete directly with local agents, offering the same kind of service but without a local office.

Purple Bricks evolved a lot - initially they were doing pretty much what you are doing now.

On the rental side you will be competing with Openrent who appear to be well established.

I'm playing Devil's advocate, but as a rule 'cheap' isn't a sustainable plan on its own.

 

[greengriff]

Purple Bricks evolved a lot - initially they were doing pretty much what you are doing now.

On the rental side you will be competing with Openrent who appear to be well established.

I'm playing Devil's advocate, but as a rule 'cheap' isn't a sustainable plan on its own.

No I agree. But it has to be 'cheap enough' to make people think it's worth the effort. PB was a bit cheaper, but couldn't make it work, raised their prices to pretty much the same as many local agents and couldn't make that work either. As far as I am aware openrent lose money too. Not losing money is my number one goal! Although if we'd been smarter/less ethical we'd have taken the investor money and run a decade ago and I'd be sitting on my yacht laughing.

 

[fisicx]

It is working for me (I just tried it now). What happened when you used it? Or did you mean 'it doesn't work in achieving our goals'?

I entered my address and clicked the button and got an error message.

I did manage once to get the autofill addresses to display but on all other occasions it failed.

On my phone the cookie things only has an accept button. I don’t want to accept.

I don’t know what your goals are? If you are trying to attract those who want to do things on the cheap that’s fine. But most sellers need some handholding.

Here’s a thought. Bin the valuation thing and use the space to sell your services. Actually tell people what you do.

The valuation thing needs to go on the listing form.

Which needs a whole lot of rework. It’s not very user friendly and even for a savvy seller some contextual help is needed. For example: the sort of images that sell and how to best compose those images. The description editor needs formatting options. Even something as simple as headings and lists.

 

[greengriff]

I entered my address and clicked the button and got an error message.

I did manage once to get the autofill addresses to display but on all other occasions it failed.

On my phone the cookie things only has an accept button. I don’t want to accept.

I don’t know what your goals are? If you are trying to attract those who want to do things on the cheap that’s fine. But most sellers need some handholding.

Here’s a thought. Bin the valuation thing and use the space to sell your services. Actually tell people what you do.

The valuation thing needs to go on the listing form.

Which needs a whole lot of rework. It’s not very user friendly and even for a savvy seller some contextual help is needed. For example: the sort of images that sell and how to best compose those images. The description editor needs formatting options. Even something as simple as headings and lists.

Thanks. Very much appreciated.

 

[fisicx]

But.....

Everything begins with the marketing plan. How you plan to market your business will determine the structure and content of the website. For example, you may discover your target client hangs out on the landlords forums. So a PPC advert on those site can generate a lot of leads. Which means you need to structure the landing page for them. They already know what you do so your job now is to get them to sign up. Which they do on one form not the two part one you currently have. You also need to explain on the page how it works along with the costs. Add in some case studies of happy clients showing how they let a property and saved xxxx.

That's just one example, when you engage a marketing company they will do the analysis and come up with the marketing plan. You can then rework the site to meet the needs of the plan.

Don't change anything right now as it may be nugatory work.

 

[UKSBD]

This is correct. And we are compliant with Rightmove's requirements as we've listed with them for circa 20 years.

I think what you are doing is a much need service and is great

I don't know how strict RightMove are but I can imagine the service you provide could really annoy estate agents and Rightmove need to keep them happy.

Are you allowed to blatently promote what you do or do you have to be slightly cagey about it and have an estate/letting agent business as a front to what you do?

 

[UKSBD]

Hi. Can you elaborate please? What's deceptive?

The main form on your homepage makes it look like I can enter my postcode and get an approximate idea of value of my property (much like a lot of other sites do) where as all it is, is the 1st part of filling in a form and providing you with info.

Like I say, I don't mind providing the info, but the way you are doing it annoys me enough to not fill in that form.

Even worse, by filling in your form I am agreeing to your terms

 

[UKSBD]

As far as I am aware openrent lose money too. Not losing money is my number one goal

Looks like somebody pumped £20m in to them a couple of years ago

I think your biggest problem is that if you are too good you will upset traditional agents, and if not big enough Rightmove will filter what you are doing to keep traditional estate agents happy.

 

[greengriff]

I think what you are doing is a much need service and is great

I don't know how strict RightMove are but I can imagine the service you provide could really annoy estate agents and Rightmove need to keep them happy.

Are you allowed to blatently promote what you do or do you have to be slightly cagey about it and have an estate/letting agent business as a front to what you do?

We bear in mind the caveat that an awful lot of people in court are convicted by what they say, rather than what they do! Accordingly we are careful what we say. We do of course offer a full agency service, but the vast majority of clients aren't interested in it.

It's quite possible that Rightmove have softened their stance over the years and wouldn't care less if we just said 'cheap way to Rightmove', but given the hurdles we had to jump through to get set up with them, and the number of times other agents complained and tried to get us delisted, I've no desire to poke that particular beast unless I have no choice!

 

[greengriff]

The main form on your homepage makes it look like I can enter my postcode and get an approximate idea of value of my property (much like a lot of other sites do) where as all it is, is the 1st part of filling in a form and providing you with info.

Like I say, I don't mind providing the info, but the way you are doing it annoys me enough to not fill in that form.

Even worse, by filling in your form I am agreeing to your terms

Thinking back to when we implemented that, I seem to recall we decided to put it over several pages to reduce crowding on that page. The accuracy of the valuations the tool provides seems to have declined a little, so, along with your complaints, I'm wondering if it's time to bin it. I'm going to ask a colleague to have a closer look at how much interaction we get from it.

 

[greengriff]

Looks like somebody pumped £20m in to them a couple of years ago

I think your biggest problem is that if you are too good you will upset traditional agents, and if not big enough Rightmove will filter what you are doing to keep traditional estate agents happy.

We do tread a fine line, I know. But I think that given the number of variations on our theme that have come and gone over the last decade or so, both traditional agents and sites like rightmove have accepted that people like us are going to be around.

 

[fisicx]

Do you want people to do a valuation or do you want people to list their property?

 

[greengriff]

Do you want people to do a valuation or do you want people to list their property?

We were hoping the valuation tool would lead people down the rabbit hole to using us.

 

[fisicx]

We were hoping the valuation tool would lead people down the rabbit hole to using us.

Nope, doesn’t work like that. But even if it did you don’t want the tool on the homepage. Put it on its own page and have an instant assessment. Or not bother at all. As all you will get are the tyre kickers.

Make it a feature of the listing form: they fill in all the fields, press a button and you show them the current valuation. You have this an incentive to sign up.

 

[UKSBD]

We were hoping the valuation tool would lead people down the rabbit hole to using us.

As it is at the moment it would do the exact opposite for me.
I feel cheated straight away that it isn't doing what I think it is going to do
Cheated enough to abandon the site without looking at anything else.

 

[Shopclicks]

The focus needs to come off your home page as the starting point of your visitor journey. While the page isn't optimised very well for search, that's not a bad thing. But you need to get rid of the clutter and optimise the homepage for branded searches only. If the visitor does land on the home page, get them through to the correct page with one click within the page content.

That said, your landing pages for vendors and landlords should be totally focused on the specifics of that service. You want these pages to appear in search results for search terms related to that service. Don't make your visitors work to get them to take action.

This means keyword research. What search queries does each of these pages answer (for Landlords & for Vendors). You use those search terms in the titles and content of the pages. The structure of each page is important (where you use titles and title tags) and where they sit in proximity to relevant content.

Create pages for further reading, not jump-to sections (some of those are simply wrong). Try to include any important information in the flow of the page content.

Get rid of the background images which make text hard to read.

Your meta information needs to be page specific. Title and description.

Do away with the sticky menu. It's content blocking, especially on mobile.

Your Customer Line field in the footer is empty.

Your Facebook share button appears broken.

And I still don't know why Visum?

 

[greengriff]

The focus needs to come off your home page as the starting point of your visitor journey. While the page isn't optimised very well for search, that's not a bad thing. But you need to get rid of the clutter and optimise the homepage for branded searches only. If the visitor does land on the home page, get them through to the correct page with one click within the page content.

That said, your landing pages for vendors and landlords should be totally focused on the specifics of that service. You want these pages to appear in search results for search terms related to that service. Don't make your visitors work to get them to take action.

This means keyword research. What search queries does each of these pages answer (for Landlords & for Vendors). You use those search terms in the titles and content of the pages. The structure of each page is important (where you use titles and title tags) and where they sit in proximity to relevant content.

Create pages for further reading, not jump-to sections (some of those are simply wrong). Try to include any important information in the flow of the page content.

Get rid of the background images which make text hard to read.

Your meta information needs to be page specific. Title and description.

Do away with the sticky menu. It's content blocking, especially on mobile.

Your Customer Line field in the footer is empty.

Your Facebook share button appears broken.

And I still don't know why Visum?

Thanks. Can you clarify your 'why Visum?' remark please? Do you mean the message 'sell your home for £129' isn't a good reason why people should use us? Or something else?

 

[Shopclicks]

Thanks. Can you clarify your 'why Visum?' remark please? Do you mean the message 'sell your home for £129' isn't a good reason why people should use us? Or something else?

No, I'm just wondering why you chose the name Visum? It doesn't scream property.

 

[greengriff]

No, I'm just wondering why you chose the name Visum? It doesn't scream property.

Ah I see. Yes, we've realised it was an error. Back in the day when we chose it (it's latin for 'vision') we thought it was snappy, memorable and smart. Instead people just get it wrong and have no idea what it's about. When Purple Bricks launched I thought their name was utterly stupid, but it is, of course, memorable because it uses common words, and 'bricks' conjure up the image of property. As to why Housesimple changed their name to 'strike' though, I'm completely at a loss!

 

[Shopclicks]

As to why Housesimple changed their name to 'strike' though, I'm completely at a loss!

Time will tell I guess. They use the word in their marketing 'Go on Strike', etc. It's not very clear messaging though.

 

[Fagin2021]

As a matter of interest, (and slightly off-topic), are there sites where individual homeowners can list their property directly - without going through any intermediary - or does legislation prevent it ?

 

[greengriff]

As a matter of interest, (and slightly off-topic), are there sites where individual homeowners can list their property directly - without going through any intermediary - or does legislation prevent it ?

I'm sure there will be 'for sale by owner' types of websites, but nobody is allowed on rightmove/zoopla/onthemarket except via an agent.