The man behind YOPA - the online agency that last year secured investment from high end traditional company Savills - says he expects his operation to achieve a turnover of between £4m and £8m in 2017.
Daniel Attia, interviewed in Management Today, goes on to say: “At the moment, online is about five to six per cent of the [sales] market. We want to see that grow to at least 25 to 30 per cent over the next three to four years. We’re investing in growth.’
He also says his firm has little difficulty recruiting agents, who complement the online element by having local representatives who visit the properties of clients.
“The earning potential of our agents is actually higher than on the high street. Recruitment isn’t that difficult if I’m being honest. A lot of agents are reaching out to us. They see this as the future of estate agency” says Attia.
The article does not reveal the scale of funding secured from Savills, but Attia says his operation - co-founded with David Jacobs and Andrew and Alistair Barclay - is learning a lot from the collaboration.
“People will adamantly defend their business model and not look at competitors’ business models with an open mind – it’s this whole thing of hate your competitors. That’s the culture we started with, and we changed that. We’re really impressed and can learn a lot from people in our space doing good things. It’s very toxic for a company to be insular” Attia concludes.
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I really think it's a case of 'anything you can do we can do better'. ReMax is an interesting business model in that it focuses on the effectiveness of the salespeople as the main driver of successful estate agencies.
Their franchisees set out to attract the best agents in an area by giving them the best back up,and the biggest share of their earnings. This approach actually feeds off the local competition, poaching the best people from your competition kills them quicker than poaching their property.
So if online can attract the best talent they will do well but their ability to do so will depend on them being able to offer that talent what they want, not just more money but more back up more support and an ethos and vision in which they can truly believe.
This is where I start to question the future of Online because when you boil it down I just don't think there are enough cost savings involved to offset the attractiveness of a high st presence to the top talent in the area. Even as a showroom or a massive billboard, or a symbol of what a company stands for, local offices are a valuable asset.
Done right they create the impression of a premium service and enable a self fulfilling prophesy of success to occur where the client gets a better service and a higher price and the agent gets a premium fee, as a top salesperson I know which proposition would attract me.
Call-centre agents as a whole, currently have less than 4% of the market, DOWN from a claimed (note, claimed by call-centre agents) '6% and climbing' in 2016.
"At the moment, online is about five to six per cent of the [sales] market. We want to see that grow to at least 25 to 30 per cent over the next three to four years."
Steady on! I'm not as anti-online as some, but such statements are really ridiculous. It took online-only agents about 17 years to reach a 5% market share, and that's only doubled in the last few years because of Purplebricks (who count themselves as a hybrid anyway!). It's not going to rocket to 25% within three to four years, no matter what the likes of Attia and Russell Quirk say.
Most agencies have a strong online presence anyway, with purely online vehicles now eager to paint themselves as hybrids. I seem to remember Mr Quirk saying something similar not so long ago. Online-only will continue to make up a very small part of the market, to say otherwise is just deluded. Hybrid agents might grow considerably, but that's a different kettle of fish.
That said, I do quite enjoy the YOPA adverts in a silly, tongue-in-check way. Much, much better than the cringeworthy to the extreme "Commisery" adverts recently launched by PB. They make me want to chuck things at the telly!
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