TBT - Knowledge is Power Listing Data Distribution on the Internet, first came REALTOR Dot Com, and then came SYNDICATION.

Should you send your listings to listing portals, Zillow et al (Written for the Dallas Metro Tex Association Blog in 2013)?

To Syndicate or not to Syndicate, that is NOT the question!

How many times have you heard the pros and cons of listing syndication in the last five years, and the resulting question, “Should you or should you NOT syndicate?”

More times than you care to remember, I am sure. Unfortunately, that is not the right question. 2013 is the year to begin to ask the right questions and to advance to the next phase in the distribution of listing data. It is time to move toward control, specific licensing and eventual monetization.

Syndication is distribution. As it is currently deployed in the industry, syndication is the ability to conveniently distribute listing information to a multitude of destinations of choice, having only to enter the listing information once, into one data repository (your MLS). Speed, convenience, choice…who could ask for anything more?

Syndication is an industry evolution, not an industry revolution. The first serious syndicator of listing data was REALTOR Dot com, which syndicated to AOL, Alta Vista, Lycos (remember Alta Vista and Lycos?) and a few other sites. REALTOR Dot com was “syndicating” listings in the 1990s. No one referred to REALTOR Dot com’s distribution of MLS data as syndication at the time, but today, that is exactly what we would call it.

Today, the concept and the benefits of having the ability to distribute your listing data through a single point of entry should be well understood. The questions for MLS’s, associations, brokers and agents to ask now, in 2013, are:

1. To what entities should I allow my listings to be distributed?

2. What is the real value proposition offered by destination sites? Is the “exposure” promised by the portals all that they claim it to be, or is it more hype, made impressive because it is reported in large, aggregate numbers?

3. How and what does each portal do to de-duplicate when it receives the same listing data from multiple sources? What are a portals’ determining factors in deciding which source is its authoritative source?

4. What, if anything, are the portals doing to reduce the chances of non-featured listings, those where the listing agent pays nothing to the web portal, from being found on their sites by interested consumers?

5. How are the search results manipulated by the portals?

6. Is it in my best interest, the best interest of my customers, and in the best interest of the industry to allow these sites to use my listing data to make commerce for themselves, perhaps at my present and future expense?

7. What are some of the unintended consequences of listing data being freely available to destination sites under current terms and conditions of those sites?

8. What are the destination sites doing with the data that they should not be doing? (A recent question at the TAR MLS Forum last year by MetroTex CEO Rich Thomas really got me thinking about this one).

Of course the answers will depend on who you ask. There are many stakeholders in this game, more than just those consumers interested in buying or selling real estate in the next few months. It is an entire ecosystem, where lots of different players have a lot of different motivations.