First off, I agree that (to some extent), we all have situational ethics. We try to stay objective, but to think any of us totally is objective is not wise IMO.

I respect your knowledge level of SEO and the fact that you are holding down the #1 spot for San Diego real estate attests to that. I would love your input on the following:

1) Do you think there is a difference between the third party folks? are they all good? all bad?

2) Do you think Trulia’s practice of getting links from #1 expert by getting links on their templates is good SEO / bad SEO / or it just is was it is.

3) Is is possible for HomeGain (whom I used to rail against) to have cleaned up their act to a point where they are different from the others (at least to a degree)?

As always, I appreciate you visiting the blog and look forward to your insight.

I don’t “endorse” anyone except myself, and the services of some close friends. Morgan Carey and RealEstateWebmasters would be an example. He builds a better real estate website than anyone else currently on the market and so I say–use his. I endorse him enthusiastically.

In my world, the first and most important thing that you can do is to build your OWN online assets. This means that putting your effort into building the online assets of others can be and usually is counter productive. Period. Point. End of story.

That is what I do and the services I provide is consulting to help people in ALL industries to build their online marketing presences and make them successful. Typically using SEO is how I do it.

That having been said, I think HomeGain has been unfairly “lumped in” with some of the other folks that many REALTORS who call “Interlopers”. I think there ARE varying degrees of being a Third party lead provider / information provider. (I don’t beleive for a minute that folks like Trulia or Zillow will stay on an advertising monetization model–the temptation will be too great.

HomeGain has been unfairly labelled with the others when they do (at least) one thing differently than the others. They DON’T use MLS data from REALTORS to lure leads and then sell them back to REALTORS. That is a huge difference. They simply use advertising to find folks who are looking for REALTORS and they try to connect them to you as quickly as possible.

So in that sense, I guess I was saying that they are the lesser of evils. I do not like it when I see people get mis-characterized and I do think Trulia (ESPECIALLY right now)intends the industry harm. I do not feel that way about HomeGain. They are an interloper, but their goal seems to be to partner and make a buck or two.

I guess, the way I read what Louis wrote, I did not get the feel that he was touting me as an endorsement. I think he feels very misjudged by some REALTORS and was taking my post as an opportunity to say “See-we aren’t THEM”.

THEM (T! and Z!) have gotten a lot of positive press and exposure, while as Louis feels that their approaches are detrimental to the REALTOR. I see his point.

I hope that clarifies the fact that a) I do not ENDORSE them,but b) I do see some clear lines of demarcation that make them better than some of the others.

Did I misunderstand your posting or perhaps theirs?

My interpretation of their posting is that you endorse HomeGain. On the contrary I thought you were saying it is the lesser of some other evils but that you didn’t whole-heartedly support their model either.

Would you care to comment or clarify?

Thank you!