Tuesday, November 08, 2005

"You get what you pay for..." - Not always the case.

While we have all heard the phrase, "You get what you pay for." I have found that there are many cases where this is just not the case. Sometimes I feel that LinkURealty could fall into this misjudgment, however looking at similar companies and other internet based companies, this statements falls short of realistic.

Perhaps when buying a physical object the statement seems to ring more truthful, when buying services online, it is just not true. For example, a BMW over a KIA? Yes maybe, but when it comes to LinkURealty services and websites compared to the competition, well it becomes obvious the phrase "You get what you pay for." is quite the mis-statement.

LinkUSystems' goal for LinkURealty is to be the best and #1 real estate website provider in the market, while it will take some work to get there, the path seems clear that LinkURealty is on the way. Why? Well looking at the other dominant competition, the only thing growing quickly is their consumer base, while the product and service shows little improvement. Since LinkURealty began in July of 2003, they have exceeded the features or met the features offered by most competitors, especially top competitors. Seeing that most the competition has 3-5 years over LinkURealty and deeper pockets, it is a surprise that still no service is the dominant player in the industry. I think this is because of price and features. There are so many features that other companies charge additional fees for. However a lot of these features could be added with no additional cost and simply be an added value to their system.

The LinkURealty approach is much different when it comes to real estate web design and the real estate web sites that we create. While I cannot get into the exact details of the plan, it basically offers an agent additional features and functionality while maintaining its low monthly price. When it comes to features, design and cost, the LinkURealty ZSERIES out performs most if not all it's comparable competition. In fact there are similar companies selling websites for anywhere from $199 up to $1000 and sometimes more for websites that don't have nearly the amount of features the ZSERIES offers and quite frankly are just weaker products.

One of the biggest differences in all is the LinkURealty XE real estate web site package, which features a "true" semi-custom design so agents and brokers can have the look and feel of a custom site while paying just a fraction of the cost. Many competitors claim to have customized websites or semi-custom websites, such as Advanced Access and Z57, however they couldn't be further from the truth. A Z57 website, with a price tag of about $499-$699, offers very little customizations to their web designs, unless your willing to pay the fees, even then the designs are still lacking a real professional look. Advanced Access claims the same, their price tag ranges anywhere from $499-$799, however only feature a makeshift splash page design with no actual web design through the entire website, just a long left column with links. Agent Image is probably one of the only true Semi-Custom websites offered, with very high quality designs, however their pricing is very expensive ($799-$5000+) and their features are lacking. In either case, agents and brokers want a site to look good, they don't want their site to look like it only cost them a few hundred dollars, which some of these sites look like they cost less than $100, but the XE real estate websites offered by LinkURealty provide customization options no one can duplicate and all for $399. Now you may think, "that seems to cheap, and you'd be better off with a $600+ website", however if you haven't seen it by now, you don't always get what you pay for, sometimes you pay for it, but end up with much less.

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