Testing Ways to Bring Agents More Business

At Zillow, our goal is to be the first and best place home shoppers look to find their future homes. Connecting with a Premier Agent is what takes those shoppers from dreaming to closing.

Over the past several months, our team has been on a mission to build new experiences that delight our shoppers. In the process, we’ve learned a lot about how to display properties in a way that excites shoppers to take the next step and reach out to an agent. Here is a highlight of where this journey has led us:

High-quality images and more relevant, personalized search results help shoppers find the homes that suit their every need.

What we’re testing next

We’re a data-driven company, and we carefully consider the impact any changes to our platforms will have on our agent partners. To that end, we are constantly running tests — small and large — to make sure we’re improving the consumer experience and increasing the propensity of a home shopper to connect with an agent.  

As part of the work detailed above, we’ll soon be testing a new, simplified agent contact form on a small percentage of Zillow home detail pages.

How this test will work

Home shoppers who visit one of the random “in test” home detail pages will see a single button to contact a buyer’s agent instead of agent names and pictures. Once the home shopper completes a short contact form, they’ll enter our standard PA Forward flow, which ensures we’re distributing connections and leads based on Premier Agents’ share of voice.  

During this test, home shoppers will see a simple “Contact buyer’s agent” button instead of a list of individual agents. The test will help determine if giving shoppers multiple options versus a single option results in more leads for agents.

While agents will not be directly contactable from pages in the test, we believe this format will result in more connections and leads for Premier Agents. Similar tests on other Zillow Group platforms have increased consumer submissions to Premier Agents by double digits.  

Immediately upon connecting a home shopper with a Premier Agent, we’ll send the shopper a text and email with a link to the agent’s profile featuring their photo and reviews.    

We’re excited to keep finding new ways to increase the volume and quality of connections and leads for Premier Agents, and we commit to keeping you, our partners, updated on what we discover.