27
Jan
Why Google Maps Real Estate was dropped
Released in July last year, Google Maps Real Estate sent a
shockwave throughout the property industry. All aflutter, many
Estate Agents immediately desired to promote their properties
mapping section of Google.
In another move less than two years later, Google have announced
that they will be completely removing the service as of the 10th of
February. The reason that Google dropped its Google Maps Real
Estate service was simply down to a severe decline in traffic.
Announced in a
Blog post, Google’s Brian McClendon stated “In part
due to low usage, the proliferation of excellent property-search
tools on real estate websites, and the infrastructure challenge
posed by the impending retirement of the Google Base
API (used by listing providers to submit listings),
we’ve decided to discontinue the real estate feature within
Google Maps on February 10, 2011.”
Troy
Stanley, CTO of Resource Techniques comments, “Whilst
this is quite a surprise move from Google, it underlines how
property related websites are not just about listings. It simply
boils down to sites that offer a great user experience –
something that is engrained into every single of our
Estate Agent websites.”
“User experience is our mantra here at Resource
Techniques. It is no longer enough to only have a vast amount of
property data and expect people to flock to your website in hordes.
The user has to be the focal point when building any property
service. After all, they will be the ones using the end
product.”
“Without a rich user experience, people will not feel
compelled to continually return. There is no doubt in my mind that
a rich user experience is the make, or break, of any Estate Agent
website.”
“Look at it this way, you wouldn’t go to a
fairground if they only had the Teacup ride.” He added.
“Estate Agents do not take the chance. Make sure your
website
not only reaches the website benchmark, but soars completely over
it.” Troy
Stanley.
Looking back at Google’s announcement of the listing
service, Estate Agents and property professionals started to
question
Rightmove’s throne and believed that it was
a little bit of history repeating.
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