Real estate Web site Zillow.com has signed up with the on-demand rich media provider Scene7 to enable real estate agents and homeowners to upload and share photos of homes for sale on its Web site.
Since Zillow.com launched its expanded offering to allow agents and homeowners to post homes for sale and for homeowners to publish their “Make Me Move” price on its site free, nearly 70,000 homes have been posted on Zillow.com. Most of these homes’ profiles include multiple photos.
“Seventy percent of all U.S. shoppers use the Internet first to research local products and services, especially products that can’t be acquired directly online, or high consideration items like automobiles and homes,” said Doug Mack, CEO of Scene7, Novato, CA.
“Consequently, consumers have developed basic expectations about what they want to see when browsing online,” he said. “The saying ‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ still holds true when shopping for a house, especially since nearly three-quarters of American consumers today use the Internet to begin their searches for homes for sale and other real-estate-related information. ”
Scene7 dynamically sizes and reformats all images posted on Zillow.com to fit within its platform. Users can zoom and pan on high-resolution product details. Additionally, when modifications are made to any page template, images can be converted automatically to the new sizes by changing the URL command embedded in the new page template.
“The community-as-content-creator model and social networking sites are becoming the hottest items on the Internet,” Mr. Mack said. “As this trend continues, I expect to see more and more sites where the community does the publishing, looking to leverage Scene7 On-Demand to enable users to upload rich media.”
