Have You REALLY Looked At Your Website?
I’m very grateful for the readers of my blog, and especially the comments which inspire me to give out some more useful information about webdesign and Internet marketing in general.
A reader (Casey) recently posted a comment to my previous post “How to get your site visitors (NOT) doing what you want”.
Casey wanted some feedback (which I am happy to do), and I hope that you will relate my feedback I am giving on this website PropertyWishList.com.au to your own site in evaluating its effectiveness. You can open the site I am evaluating in another browser window to check it out as we go.
The first comment I want to make is not to launch a site until you have tested the site.
Testing encompasses a lot of things, not the least to make sure everything works technically. Another test should encompass what users think of the site. Now I’m not talking about you, your offsider, or your web developer. When you have been working on a site for any length of time you can become quite blind to what the site obviously needs. Find someone who fits a typical user. It could be a friend, an acquaintance, or a respected business person. You will want to go through the site and do what I am doing – evaluate it from a user perspective.
Your task for them should be clear. Does our site encompass everything that you (as a user) want and need to be of benefit to use this site? (this is especially the case when your site is a “service” website).
If necessary get them to fill in an online form, or ask them to just make notes and give you a call, or send them to you via email. You many even want to offer an incentive.
So lets go…
How do I think this site stacks up against the competition?
While it might bruise some egos, send out a collective *groan*, and put you in a spin, what I about to say could have been alleviated if you had assessed the wants and needs of the users first over what your competition offers.
I heard something recently (can’t remember where) the saying “Never be the first one to do anything”. I’ve pondered this good advice and now know why. When you are the first to do something you never get it right. You just set the benchmark for someone else to do it better. 
I’ve used real estate sites often. In fact very often. For the past 3 years I have been trying to sell a property which I have moved on from (due to re-locating).
Realestate.com.au is by far the biggest competitor (and I have used this site extensively when searching for property to buy), so first know who your competitor/s are and evaluate their website for areas which don’t work or could work better. Do this from the prospective of a user and make notes. Then do it from the prospective of a developer (and take notes).
In the instance of PropertyWishlist.com.au…
The home page is great. Nice and clean, easy to read.
The site navigation great.
Tag-line is a bit of a worry.. I don’t see it as a new way, though good marketing can really make this a feature in itself.
For Buyers.. I would change to “Find Your Property”
For Sellers – I would change to “Sell your Property”
Why? You are appealing to what you want your site visitors “TO DO”.
On the homepage it should be evident what the benefits of your service are.
In this example I see 2 benefits only.
1 – Free Registration (which I wouldn’t really call a benefit as such)
2 – Saving time looking for properties (which other sites do as well)
Expand upon the benefits!
The problem as I see it is the benefits are not highlighted as well as they should be. The text under “For Buyers” and “For Sellers” is wishy washy. I feel the benefits should be bulleted. ie:
For Buyers
- No more searching for hours online to find your perfect property
- No more wasting time with properties which don’t fit your needs.
- Property Wishlist matches what you want against all of our listings and only sends you details on those properties which meet your needs.
As I see it no different to realestate.com.au. with their property alert function. What is needed is to expand the areas of search perameters. After all you dont just buy a property on location, number of bedrooms, and if it has a garage or not. Think about the buying process.
You look at a home or property. Does it have ALL the things you want and need? If not you move on to the next property having wasted a whole Saturday morning, which can then drag into many, many hours of locating the right property. You know why? Because the inforrmation given about the property was not enough. You had to physically go there to find out it didn’t suit. What a waste of time!
Wouldn’t it be better if your website gave a lot of additional perameters which would assist the buyer in finding a property which closely matches their “perfect” property? Hell yes!!
Sell the benefit!
- No more traipsing around looking at properties which don’t suit.
- No more wasting fuel.
- No more wasted weekends.
- No more compromising what you want because you’re tired and fed up with looking.
- No more feeling let down by yet another property which doesn’t suit you or your needs.
I had this idea about 3 years ago, and the only way I feel it would be a true time saving benefit would be in the search parameters (which are set up in the seller account). And you need to sell the set up process to sellers and buyers when you are asking them to spend more time filling in the info. Make it easy for them to do it (drop down boxes, check boxes, radial buttons)
For instance, most online real estate sites do not go onto enough detail about the property. After all, when you are looking for a home you just don’t want to look at homes which are in a certain location, have x number of bedrooms, and in a certain price bracket, and show a few pictures. There are so many aspects you look at when you purchase a home. Every aspect of the home should be listed so that when the search is done it more closely meets your search parameters (or needs).
BUYER REGISTRATION
This is flawed. If you really want to stop people wasting time you have to be able to give parameters which will closely match the Vendor property.
User name – did not indicate if it was case sensitive
Password – did not indicate if it was case sensitive
Email – did not say if this address was to be confirmed (double opt-in). Though I did find out it is not.
DESIRED AREA – Without knowing every intimacy of Australian locations I did note that the area I would look in was not listed (QLD – Wide Bay/South Burnett. This would stop me registering immediately, so make sure you have ALL the areas applicable for Australia.
DESIRED SUBURBS – I can see this being a problem. For instance, do I need to separate the suburbs by a comma? or is a space sufficient? There is a system which can (once you select an area) populate the suburbs of that area, and the user can highlight the various suburbs (usually using Control/Shift). I don’t know why you didn’t use this system.
PROPERTY TYPE: Does not include “communal share” or “retirement complex”. These are 2 more areas where there are potential buyers and sellers. They are both niche areas, but none the less important to include.
PURCHASE TIMING – Not sure why this is even included. I don’t see th relevance to the seller either. They either want to sell or they don’t want to sell. In any case settlement time can be negotiated between the seller and the purchaser.
LAND SIZE: When looking for a property land size is relative to the size of the structure on the land. For instance, the land size could be 800m2, and the structure take up 750m2. This then means you have a big structure (say house), and very little land around it. This would mean more to me looking for a property than just pure land size – unless there was a block plan included to show the available land area. I’ve always thought this parameter meant diddly squat and still does unless you are looking for vacant land. In all other cases you would physically have to eyeball the property to gauge if it meets your needs.
If you really want to stop wasting peoples time then ALL information about what the buyer is looking for should be included.
For instance, if I was looking for Land, then areas to be populated should automatically re align to the specific of the land. ie; flat, undulating, bush block, cleared, with permanent water, dam, with town water access, fencing (yes/no). Sure a picture can speak a thousand words, however with these search parameters specified by the seller at registration the buyers can also specify similar requirements and get a much closer match. This is very easily done and just forms part of the database.
BEDROOMS – should include built – ins, fans, airconditioning, gas heater, open fireplace, ensuite, etc
BATHROOM – should include, spa, shower, exhaust fan, bath, disabled friendly, (not all bathrooms include these items and to be able to specify the specifics helps the potential purchaser weed out what they eventually look at).
GARAGE – Should include if it has remote garage function/workshop area/rear access, etc. Carport is missing (single/double/tandem – attached/detached)
TOILETS – Missing. I would not look at a home which did not have at least 2 toilets (one separate), and it would be a waste of my time looking at a house which didn’t have this. Include.
LAUNDRY – missing. Should indicate internal/external/in garage/or other. My son lives in a place which has concealed laundry behind doors just off to the side of the kitchen area.
KITCHEN INCLUSION; dishwasher, microwave space, built in pantry. It should include what type of oven the property has eg; underbench, free standing range, wall oven/cooktop. Should also ask if gas/electric.
Before we go any further I just want to reiterate what makes this stand out from realestate.com.au.
We are all time poor. To have a website which includes all of this information, and then uses this information to weed out properties which don’t suit is going to be a huge benefit to to the user. Of course a property may not have all the things a buyer wants, and this can be further adjusted by a check box with “MUST HAVE’ .
This way the user could indicate all the preferences, and the search could still return listings which have MOST of what they want.
COMMENTS/WISHLIST.
This area is cumbersome to the system and is not necessary if you include additional search parameters which really address the different areas the purchaser requires. I would ditch it.
PARKING – missing. On street/On site.
The lesson here is to think like the user.
SELLER
I undertook the registration process. I wasn’t sure if I had to input my personal address, or the address of the property. This needs to be clear.
SERVING AREA – The area I wanted to allocate was the Mid North Coast of NSW (where I have a property I would like to sell). Unfortunately this was not a selection, so I took the next best which is North Coast (though completely different area). This also made me think that the STREET and SUBURB input field was the actual address of the property I was selling (though I’m not sure).
TERMS AND CONDITIONS
This I read.
ONLINE SECURITY – Specifically reference to passports and credit cards and bank details? A simple PLW will never ask for any personal information to be sent to them via email. All personal information is collected through our website only.
TRADEMARKS – (bad grammar) “From time to time Other trademarks which belong to third parties may also be displayed on the website from time to time.”
YOUR CONDUCT – “You also agree to abide by all or any applicable laws or regulations. ” (of what state/country?)
“Breach any laws or regulations applicable to your use of the WL website of any other laws or regulations. (missing P)
EMAILS: “PWL sends various emails to members regarding buyer & seller alerts, registrations, cancellations, etc. From time to time you may also receive emails from PWL notifying you of news, promotions or updates. You must notify us if you want to stop receiving emails from us” (A link to your “Contact Us” page would be appropriate. Cover your ass.
PRIVACY POLICY – should have reference to Australian Privacy Laws.
SELLER REGISTRATION – 24 hours is way too long. This should be a “We have sent an email with link to confirm your registration. Simply click on this link to finalise your registration.”
HOW IT WORKS (http://www.propertywishlist.com.au/how_it_works.php)
I evaluated this area of your website and make the following suggestions…
First off what is a “Wishlist”? You have to assume all people are stupid, so this should be the first thing that is addressed, then the rest of your instructions make sense. Key words within your text should be hyperlinked to more information. For example the word “register” should hyperlink to the registration page. “wishlist” should open a popup to what a wish list is all about.
“Then sit back and wait for your perfect property to arrive in your email inbox! You also have the option of being a seller too”. I would change this to:
Then sit back, relax and let Property Wishlist get to work for you. We’ll send an email direct to your inbox to notify you when we’ve found a match for your ideal property. You also have the option of being a seller too (hyperlink “seller” to selling registration) Simply click here if you would like to register as a Seller on Property Wishlist. (hyperlink “register as a Seller on Property Wishlist”
FOR SELLERS
1. REGISTER & SUBMIT PROPERTY
“Register & submit your property details. Then either wait for email alerts of buyers seeking your property or manually search for buyers through this website”. I can’t believe you have this option for sellers to manually seach for buyers. This would be enough to seriously piss off any buyer who felt that your system was allowing sellers to contact them directly. This completely negates the purpose of buyers signing up and completely negates the automated search process.
BROWSE WISHLISTS: Why on earth would I want to browse someone else’s wishlist? This is mad. If someone really wanted to browse they should be browsing available listings within the area they specify only. Whoever thought up this idea should be shot.
2. THE INTERESTED BUYER ARRIVES
“When an interested buyer has been found, log into your account & forward the details of the property, buyer gets alerted of your property (sellers just paste a web link of their property into the box but if you are a private seller that does not have your property listed online, you have the option of adding your property details to the website, for buyers to view)”
Yikes.. this is gobbledy gook and totally confusing. Read this over and tell me it isn’t. This whole area needs to be re-worked. If I can’t understand it what hope have Internet novices?
Maybe something like…
“Should PropertyWishlist match a buyer to your property we will alert you (as the Seller) by sending you an email advising (?) At the same time our system will generate an email to a prospective purchaser advising them of links to properties which match their WishList. If (after viewing your property details on our website) the prospective buyer wishes to know more about the property or view the property they will contact you directly.
Small points…
Change everywhere you use PWL to PropertyWishlist. You want to reinforce the name (nor PLW).
Add a Tell-A – Friend option.
The big question I have to ask is “How are you making money?” Free registration for both Buyers and Sellers?
Got me beat.
So Casey that’s it from me. I’m not convinced this site will do what you want (and one assumes it’s make money). I’m happy for you to prove me wrong, and this website can be successful just through a whiz bang marketing campaign alone (if you throw enough money at it) People are reluctant to try something new unless you give them a good reason to. I’m not asking you to substitute my judgement for your own. It’s your call.
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