Reviews Radically Reshaping Real Estate?

Austin, TX, October 30, 2014 -- Nearly nine out of 10 of people now trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. The New York Times went so far as to say, "If you provide a service or sell a product and you are not reviewed, you might as well not exist." More specific to real estate, a recent survey from Google shows two in three customers "researched prospective real estate agents extensively online prior to working with them."

According to Real Estate Confronts Agents Reviews, a White Paper released today by T3 Experts, these are among the primary reasons online reviews are significantly affecting the income of top agents and teams. Real Estate Confronts Agents Reviews summarizes several years of research, in addition to the results of a survey T3 Experts conducted earlier this year. Other highlights from the White Paper: 88 percent have used online reviews; nearly 9 out of 10 people now trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations, and 15 percent search online for a local business "almost every day" (this statistic was 7 percent in 2013).

"The survey results show that agent reviews are increasingly affecting who wins and who loses in real estate, and to a fairly dramatic extent, " said T3 Experts Co-Founder and New York Times best-selling author Stefan Swanepoel. Other key findings from the survey: while agents think reviews are important, most are not generating sales from them; agents need help understanding, implementing and executing strategies that lead to transactions; Social Media sites showed surprising strength and can be legitimate sources of leads; portals (primarily Zillow and, to a lesser extent, Trulia) play a crucial role in in this process, and "top lead generators" outperform typical agents by a factor of as much as nearly 3X (and that performance gap widens at higher levels of production).

"One of the most significant trends affecting business today is the rise of the 'information-empowered consumer,'" added Swanepoel. "People want information on everything, all the time. And ratings and reviews are a large part of this trend. To show how far this trend has evolved, consider this: the online taxi service Uber now lets their drivers rate their passengers, and they share those ratings across their system. Stop and think about that: Uber drivers are rating people at how well they perform as taxi passengers. If we're being rated at that micro level, I think it's safe to assume we're going to be rated as real estate professionals. What does this mean for agents and teams? What are the things they should and should not be doing to leverage this trend to their advantage? These are the things Real Estate Confronts Agent Reviews addresses. The intent is for the White Paper to be the go-to reference for any top agent or team looking to increase their financial results using agent reviews as the driver of that increased revenue."

Real Estate Confronts Agent Reviews may be downloaded at http://t3experts.com/t3-reviews. The survey may be downloaded at http://t3experts.com/reviews-survey. T3 Experts was founded by Swanepoel, Jack Miller and Michael McClure. The firm helps top agents and teams build their incomes by implementing systems and best practices.