Jones Lang LaSalle has a brand new look to their website - what might be called by the cognoscenti, Web 2.0 in style. Having recently launched their jlltv.ie they are certainly one of the busiest property companies in Ireland in terms of marketing and profile raising. The animation sequence at the start, featuring bird's eye views of famous cityscapes, does not include Dublin - reflecting the fact that this is a localised version of the worldwide .com site.
It certainly looks fresh and up to date, but I'd wonder is it really the kind of style that a commercial property company needs for selling themselves.
Relieved to see Property Partners have freshened up their website: the old one was becoming extremely painful to look at. Unfortunately, there's a bit of the "missed opportunity" about this as many aspects of the new site are just the old ones touched up cosmetically. The navigation area is still very unpolished-looking, and the placement of the black-background treatment of the logo on blue is really not very pleasant to behold. (It even includes the web address, when you're already there! Like finding a location map on the door of an office you're visiting!)
The supplier responsible, Strata 3, claim the following on their website: 29-02-2008
Property Partners Goes Live
Strata3 have launched a comprehensive portal for Property Partners. The system designed & developed by Strata3, features residential and commercial property sales & lettings for agents throughout the country. The site in effect links 50 property companies through a single web system.
Yet, really much of that architecture seems to me to be what was there already and all they have done is tweak the graphic overlay. Pity. Maybe it was one of Colliers Jackson-Stops terms for agreeing to a commercial property alliance.
The ERA Ireland website offers property hunters the chance to choose to search in Polish. Unfortunately, it is only the standard content of the site that is translated and the information on individual properties is only available in English.
Surely at this stage in this demographic shift, there's some competitive advantage to be had for some canny agency to provide actual property information in Polish, and perhaps even employing a Polish-speaking negotiator.
In an attempt to attract buyers back into the market, developers of new homes have recently been using a number of innovative methods. Most notably, of course, price reductions top this list as well as offers to pay the mortgage for a certain period of time or to stump up part of the required deposit. Membership of an adjacent golf course is also a favoured sweetner. Kings Court in Castlepollard, Co Westmeath provides the prospective buyer with one of three options: free childcare for two years, a new car or a full turnkey furnishing with every home. All are inclusive in the overall price but which one would you prefer?
It wasn't a moment too soon in coming, but JP&M Doyle's new website (one of the 4pm sites) you could say is nearly worth the wait. It is streets ahead of the old one.
There's some pretty big claims, including: "We have a number of unique marketing tools, which no other estate agent can offer you". We can't quite find what they are on the website. Maybe someone could let us know ...
Property Week has launched two new services recently ...
1. Developer.IE has been set up to hold in one place information of particular interest to property developers, especially:
Development land on the market
Development projects going on
Profiles of property development companies
The most important feature of the site is a Development Land Interactive Map that enables developers to see at a glance the location & summary information of particular sites and then click for more information/the brochure if interested.
is a simple site aimed at giving property companies a chance to target the precise audience they need to in their recruitment drives. Contact Paul on paul@propertyweek.ie to place your free* ads & notices.
Free to subscribers of PropertyWeek until end February 2008; free to all property companies who register with us until end January 2008.
Sherry FitzGerald has launched a new website. Have a look and let us know what you think (anonymously if you wish, of course).
For the occasion, Mark FitzGerald has written a new overview of the company, from which:
"In a Sherry FitzGerald business, the culture isn't what one finds in the yogurt in the fridge in our offices, rather it's the standards by how we conduct our business day in and day out."
"We don't deny that like all businesses we need to make a profit, but we believe in the mantra as echoed by the late Bill Hewlett of Hewlett Packard "Profits are like oxygen and blood, you need them but they are not an end in themselves"."
You've surely noticed the battle on for domination of the online property advertising market. Propertynews.com announced last week that it "has captured over 65 per cent market share of all property for sale on the island of Ireland"; it called itself "the leading and fastest growing property portal in the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland" (presumably combining the two markets, in which case it might as well have said "only property portal"!!), and "number one website"; and it claimed to carry "listings from over 1,000 estate agents and auctioneers" (again, presumably combining North & South).
No sooner has a claim been made, but a counter-claim follows. In a recent radio campaign, MyHome.ie was quite dismissive of these kinds of claims. Daft.ie use its website to show the figures for their claim to be "Ireland's busiest website". And both Daft.ie & Propertynews.com are now themselves advertising on radio; Funda is on television (with snails, ducks & so on); and MyHome.ie is fighting back with all its indignant might (including the property pages of the Irish Times). There must be much to protect.
And indeed, property advertising attracts an incredible amount of entrepreneurial interest. There are so many Irish property websites out there now it is becoming hard to keep track, so we're going to do so here.
This item will be added to as we come across them, and we have a feature in the pipeline on how the main ones compare to one another:
