"Best" Overseas Property Portals Revealed by New Study

London, UK (Bluehost) January 7, 2008 -- A new study published today examines the "best" overseas property portals (http://www.globaledge.co.uk/property-portals) for real estate agents and developers selling international property to UK buyers. The research focuses on the natural search rankings of nearly 50 property portals on Google (UK) and ranks each one by the frequency with which they appear in the search results for popular search phrases used by buyers of overseas property.

A new study published today by independent trade website, Globaledge.co.uk reveals the best-optimised overseas property portals on Google (UK). The research undertaken in December 2007 examines the natural search positions of 46 property portals on Google (UK) for property-related search phrases in over 200 overseas buying destinations.

FindaProperty.com is top of the list, appearing in the top 20 in 68% of all searches, with Primelocation.com a close second. The Move Channel is next and is one of three performance-based portals in the Top 10, which also includes Lead Galaxy in fourth and Sunshine Estates in fifth.

Ashley Rigg, director of Globaledge.co.uk says, "We put together this study to provide real estate agents and developers with an overview of the overseas property portal market. 2008 will be a tough year for many international agents. Estate agent marketing (http://www.globaledge.co.uk) will be more important than in previous years as there are likely to be less buyers around. The research should help real estate companies targeting the UK choose better marketing partners."

The research however is not without its problems. It takes no account of paid search spend, which can drive significant volumes of traffic to portals. It also ignores the influence of brand awareness and direct traffic and how web design (http://www.globaledge.co.uk/web-design) and content can influence lead generation.

Countering the criticisms, Ashley says, "Natural search rankings are one of several important factors agents should consider, but in our opinion it's the most important. Natural search listings tend to get more clicks than paid listings and do not disappear when budgets run out. We've also written nearly 50 independent portal profiles which evaluate each portal on a much wider set of criteria to help agents see the bigger picture."

The research is most useful to agents and developers with property to sell in many countries as the aggregated data hides regional variations. Globaledge.co.uk are planning country-and-region specific studies in the coming weeks. If you would like more information please contact us.

Table & Results

To see the full article and the table of results please visit Top 10 overseas property portals (http://www.globaledge.co.uk/news/details/our-top-10-overseas-property-portals/16878)

Methodology

Our system of analysing a portal's natural search listings on Google (UK) looks at the most-used phrases by British buyers according to the Google Traffic Estimator Tool. We combine the most used words, such as "property", with commonly used location names, such as "Marbella". In our study we have taken 238 locations from around the world and combined them in the following way:

X property

Property for sale in X

X properties

X corresponds to one of the 238 regions. These regions are the countries and regions in the property portal section of our website. They all have some UK volume on Google traffic estimator.

We have then added up the number of times each portal appears in the top 20 search results on Google (UK) and divided by 238 to arrive at a percentage figure. Note that if a portal appears in the top 20 for "property for sale in X" and "X property" they are only counted once.

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