Rightmove denies editing property alerts to detriment of agents

Estate agent Trevor Kent has queried whether Rightmove is editing its property alerts.

Kent said to EYE: “Do Rightmove have power of death” over what it sends out to property searchers.?”

Kent claims that, posing as an applicant, he is receiving fewer properties on the alerts than for recently new properties or reductions actually posted.

Kent said that a recent Rightmove property alert told him he had 16 properties that met his search requirements.

In fact, just 14 actually arrived in the alert.

Kent said this was not unusual for two to be dropped, and claimed that when sometimes more are announced, more properties are dropped.

However, Rightmove said that while searchers are told how many properties have come on the market, a maximum of 14 are actually carried in an alert, and that the selection may be “randomised”.

Kent asked Rightmove:

(1) what criteria are employed to decide which property listings are included in an ‘edited’ alert and which are not.

(2) whether the listings chosen not to be sent initially are circulated later; and

(3) if this is the case, how long is the delay before the subsequent alert is sent containing the previously omitted listings.

(4) is it possible that two or more agents submitting an identical  listing (i.e. the same property) to you at about the same time could find that you had alerted on one agent’s listing but omitted

the second agent’s identical listing in the same alert by your ‘selection’ process?

Kent told EYE: “Do Rightmove have the power of life or death over circulating our instructions?

“For a change I am not seeking to amuse my fellow agents with bits of nonsense as per my irregular ‘This That and The Other’ column. No, this time I am serious.

“As I’m sure all of you are, I am registered as an applicant with a wide search parameter to receive ‘alerts’ as they call them, offering me the latest instructions and price reductions in my area.

“There is no better way to keep on top of one’s local market. However, it has concerned me for some time that, should real buyers adopt the same modus operandi, it might well be Rightmove who chooses what they receive and what they don’t, in the way of new listings.”

Kent added: “I have previously brought this up conversationally with Mr Shipside but apparently this is not seen as a problem.

“However, I think it is. After all, applicants deserve and, I imagine, expect to receive ALL instructions, not a SELECTION edited for them by Rightmove.

“Surely agents too, advertising on Rightmove, expect all their instructions to be circulated in exactly the same way to every registered ‘alerts’ subscriber, not sometimes rejected for circulation because too many instructions came in at a particular time.”

A spokesperson last night said: “Rightmove sends out over one million property alerts every day to users, to make sure they are the first to hear about new properties coming on the market, and to prompt them to visit Rightmove to see all relevant properties for sale or to let.

“In October there were 43m Rightmove property alerts sent for sales and lettings.

“Users can choose the frequency of alerts that they receive, from instantly, every 24 hours, every three days or every seven days.

“After various user testing sessions, the Rightmove property alerts were redesigned last summer, leading to increased open rates and conversion for agents.

“In each property alert we let people know how many properties have come on the market since the last time they received an alert, and the email shows a selection of up to 14 properties, selected at random.

“The selection is randomised so that new properties in the same area are given the chance of the same amount of exposure. So one user could receive a different set of new properties within the email than another user with the same search criteria.

“The email gives users a taster of new properties on the market, and encourages them to visit the search pages on Rightmove to see all relevant properties

“If a property is on the market with two agents, the listings are treated as two separate properties, so they will be chosen at random in the same way as other properties.”

Originally posted here.

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