Zillow.com Forms Network with Nearly 300 Papers
by Jennifer Saba - E&P
The newspapers involved in the partnership with Zillow.com have formed a national online real estate advertising network.
Eleven companies representing 282 newspapers and the real estate Web site will sell each other's advertising inventory beyond classified real estate ads. Newspaper sales people will be able to offer advertisers additional reach on Zillow, while Zillow's sales team will be able to tap into the newspapers' audience.
According to Omniture numbers provided by Zillow, the site reported 5.4 million unique visitors in August, up 24 percent year over year. With the addition of newspapers, the network will reach more than 63 million monthly uniques.
The agreement expands the network to include display non-real estate related advertising. Greg Schwartz, vice president of advertising sales at Zillow, said the Web site will focus on "moving-specific" advertisers like home improvement and furniture companies in search of national coverage. Meanwhile, newspapers, such as the San Francisco Chronicle, for example, can offer a furniture retailer additional coverage through Zillow's San Francisco channel.
The partners will roughly split the revenue.
"This partnership allows advertisers with our papers to reach not only local real estate consumers who live in particular markets, but also consumers who may be moving to particular markets, via their searches on Zillow.com," Lincoln Millstein, senior vice president of Hearst Newspapers, said in statement. "This is a significant opportunity for
advertisers to target a very large number of consumers on the verge of major home-related commerce."
The partnership expansion comes at a time when newspaper advertising revenue, including online revenue, hit another quarterly low.
The Zillow alliance, which was formed in November 2007, lets local real estate classified newspaper advertisers also purchase listings on Zillow.
