Local Web Wars

Driving into work today, I realized Cincinnati is in the midst of a local Web war.

CincyMLS is a board ofrealtors Web site that tracks all real estate listed with anyCincinnati realtor. What the site lacks in design is more than made upfor in its utility. It allows you to quickly, and easily, zero in onhomes for sale from the comfort of your, uh, home.

CincyMLS announced it is discontinuing this popular Web site.They claim that each realtor posts their listings to their own site, soit does not make sense to aggregate them on their own.

Huh? Making the consumer's job harder and taking a once levelplaying field and tilting it to those realtors that have a better Webpresence makes no sense to me. This move will be a huge loss.

But my marketing heart got a warm glow during my morning commute when I saw a proactive billboard from Huff Realty,directing folks to their Web site. The billboard looks a lot like theirhomepage (more bonus points) claiming they are "like MLS, but better."

It is great to see one of the smaller, local realtor launchthe first salvo in this skirmish. Not to mention, the use ofconspicuous outdoor advertising is the perfect approach to gainingeyeballs and market share. The billboard should find its targetaudience as they are driving around looking at different homes forsale. Huff gets a Gallant for making the best of a bad situation.

Interestingly enough, as I prepared this post, I typed incincymls.org by mistake and found that Remax has purchased this URL anduse it to push people to their site--another sign that the games havebegun.

Local Web Wars
Driving into work today, I realized Cincinnati is in the midst of a local Web war.
CincyMLS is a board of realtors Web site that tracks all real estate listed with any Cincinnati realtor. What the site lacks in design is more than made up for in its utility...
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