Words: Ashley Rigg
Published: 16th September 2009
Overseas property portal sells up
Dothomes, a UK-owned portal that made headlines in the US for claiming it was “neck and neck” with Trulia.com in terms of US visitor numbers is to sell the site to the highest bidder at an auction next month.
Dothomes is a product of BytePlay Ltd and has a presence in the UK, South Africa and the US. According to its founder he is selling the site because “real estate was never our cup of tea.” Well that’s all right then!
Dothomes is one of thousands of European companies to fail in the US. It attempted to launch into a saturated market with a “me too” product. As a portal you need to be niche, enter the market early or have huge budgets to establish transaction. Ideally you want to have the first two and if you’ve got the last one, it’s advisable to use other people’s money!
The overseas property portal is changing,
expect casualties
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User Comments
The most important thing in competition with US based websites is US taregeted SEO. Google is very territorial. If you look at all major UK portals in most strategic key words in US, you will never find them even near page one. Here is an example of my own real estate portal I use to attract for sale by owners and developers http://www.realestatefair.net. Look up "property buyer leads" - number 1, "international property buyer leads" - number 1, "international buyer leads" - number 1. That's how you get traffic and subscribers in US - do it territorial.
Sal Antsipenka,
www.realestatefair.net