Case Study - Microsoft Advertising

Case Study
ForSaleByOwner.com Achieves 283% ROI
from Microsoft adCenter
ForSaleByOwner.com achieved nearly twice the ROI
using adCenter vs.Yahoo! search marketing. The early
pioneer and market leader in the online For-Sale-ByOwner real estate market is revolutionizing how real
estate transactions are conducted in the $1.5 trillion
annual U.S. real estate industry.
The Company has built a leading position in the ForSale-By-Owner market by combining a full-spectrum
of services—both Internet-based and traditional—designed to help owners complete home sale transactions efficiently. At this “one-stop shop,” owners may:
• List, display and highlight properties on the Internet
• Present properties to thousands of potential buyers browsing the website
• Acquire sales tools to accelerate the sale
• Gain exposure to traditional listing services
• Get free access to advice and access a multitude of research tools
ForSaleByOwner.com also offers a wide range of complementary products and services, including mortgage
services, automobile content and services, and home
selling systems purchased at retail outlets.
“Because MSN.com is one of the
largest search engines in the world,
adCenter is a logical choice for
ForSaleByOwner.com. It has been
ForSaleByOwner.com’s experience
that adCenter produces the highest
ROI.”
- Colby N. Sambrotto
Chief Operating Officer
ForSaleByOwner.com
Campaign Objectives
ForSaleByOwner.com’s marketing efforts have been
focused primarily on Pay Per Click (PPC) search engines,
search engine optimization, free distribution magazines,
affiliate marketing, and, to a much lesser extent, 30 second
television ads. In addition, the tens of thousands of
ForSaleByOwner.com yard signs distributed around the
country for the past four years have also had a significant
marketing impact.
ForSaleByOwner.com’s primary focus and source of its revenue is from home sellers, but like most real estate
websites the vast majority of its traffic and secondary
source of revenue is made up of home buyers.
The company’s primary marketing objective is to maximize
revenue by driving home buyers and home sellers to
ForSaleByOwner.com.
Campaign Results
For the month of October 2006, ForSaleByOwner.com
achieved strong results:
•
•
•
•
9.8% overall click-through rate (CTR)
1% conversion rate- A highly competitive rate compared to industry average
30% CTR on main search terms
283% ROI- An strong result given that October is a poor month for real estate nationally
- Nearly twice the ROI generated by Overture
Evolution of Strategy
Microsoft adCenter figures prominently into
ForSaleByOwner.com’s online marketing efforts.
ForSaleByOwner.com currently spends roughly $10,000
per month with adCenter, which has been fairly constant.
Going forward the company expects its marketing budget,
earmarked for adCenter, to grow along with the size, scale
and reach of MSN.com.
“When ForSaleByOwner.com began
working with adCenter, ROI was incredibly and unsustainably high (700-800%)
due to the fact that there wasn’t any real
competition on choice keywords. As
that competition has materialized along
with the growth of Live Search, ROI has
stabilized toward a sustainable but still
impressive rate.”
- Colby N. Sambrotto
Chief Operating Officer
ForSaleByOwner.com.
For more information, please visit Microsoft adCenter: http://advertising.microsoft.com/Microsoft-adcenter