‘OnTheMarket is now producing more lettings leads than Rightmove’, says estate agency CEO

The CEO of a large estate agency says OnTheMarket is now providing more lettings leads to his firm than Rightmove.

Rob Sargent, CEO of the Acorn Group which has 35 offices across South East London and Kent, said he was pleased when he received the latest portal statistics.

“I was delighted when I read our recent statistics on portal leads that our sales leads from OnTheMarket have doubled, our lettings leads have tripled and for the first time our lettings leads are beginning to exceed the leads that are generated by Rightmove,” he said.

The firm has been a strong supporter of OnTheMarket since it launched in 2015 and lists only with two portals – Rightmove and OnTheMarket.

As part of a video testimonial for OnTheMarket, Mr Sargent added: “The quality of the OnTheMarket leads are certainly of a higher level and there is no question that the buyers and vendors who are coming through that channel are a little bit more motivated.

“We view our relationship with OnTheMarket very much as a partnership, we see it for the long term and we see some mutual respect and understanding of the commercials that exist on our side of the fence.

“We look forward to not just getting to the end of every year and being asked for more money for what is fundamentally the same service.

“There is no debate that all the agents nationally in the UK should be using OnTheMarket, we as a business would not hesitate to recommend OnTheMarket and for agents who see the bigger picture, and want to secure their own future, it’s definitely the place to be.”

Ian Springett, Chief Executive Officer of OnTheMarket, said: “These excellent lead results demonstrate how OnTheMarket is continuing to make huge strides forward with the value we provide to estate and letting agent customers.

“Our marketing drive has ramped up since Boxing Day and will continue throughout January with TV and radio campaigns as well as outdoor advertising, so we are looking forward to a strong month for traffic to the website.

“Our continued progress in attracting more agents to support the portal and our early success in attracting house-builders give us encouragement as we focus on achieving our key objectives for the coming year.”

OnTheMarket announced last month that over 3,000 more offices had been signed under new paying contracts to list all their residential properties at OnTheMarket.

This progress built on the support from thousands of firms that were already on long-term paying contracts at the time of admission to AIM in February 2018.

This announcement signalled continuing rapid progress from 30 September 2019 when OnTheMarket had 2,346 more offices signed under paying contracts.

Agent offices listing remain in excess of 12,500 offices, up from 5,500 at the time of admission to AIM in February 2018. The majority of the offices joining since admission signed initially under short-term introductory free trial offers. Conversion of these offices onto paying contracts is a key strategic focus for OnTheMarket.