Consumers and builders both benefit from new site features
AUSTIN, Texas – May 20, 2003 – Builder Homesite, Inc. announced today that the 3.0 release of its consumer website NewHomeSource.com has resulted in a 50% increase in leads for its builders. The latest design enhancements have created a superior consumer experience that results in more and higher quality leads to builders.
“We’re delighted with the increased performance since the 3.0 release,” says John Rymer, vice president of sales and marketing for Morrison Homes. “NewHomeSource is now our primary source for Internet leads. And we’re seeing consumers walk into our sales offices with their Instant Brochures from NewHomeSource.com.”
“Before we began our site re-design,” explains Krishna Murthy, vice president and chief information officer for Builder Homesite, “we studied how thousands of new home shoppers navigated NewHomeSource — where they spent the most time, where they exited, where they generated leads. Using this knowledge, we were able to design a website that helps consumers get to home listings quickly and encourages them to generate a lead before they leave.”
Because Builder Homesite is owned by the nation’s leading homebuilders, NewHomeSource reflects the expertise of the best marketing minds in the industry. According to Sara Hellman, director of product marketing at Builder Homesite, “We spent many hours with our builder members learning how best to market new homes to consumers.”
New site feature highlights include more efficient searching — so users spend less time navigating and more time shopping — and incentives and reminders throughout the site, like Instant Brochures, that encourage the consumer to contact builders. And while the increased number of leads is important, even more critical is that other forms of builder contact are also on the rise — click-throughs to builder websites have doubled and requests for driving directions to builder sales offices have tripled.
The results of the latest version of NewHomeSource have surpassed all expectations. Users find homes, communities and builders faster, spend longer on the site and return more often. According to Martin Pedersen, director, Internet for KB Home, “The 3.0 version of NewHomeSource.com has increased the number of leads without sacrificing the quality. NewHomeSource.com is one of our most cost-effective marketing strategies.”
About Builder Homesite, Inc. and NewHomeSource.com
Founded in Austin, TX in 2000 by a consortium of thirty-two of the nation’s largest homebuilders, Builder Homesite, Inc. (BHI) represents over 200,000 new home sales annually. BHI’s mission is to offer improved technology and marketing solutions for the new home industry. The first product by Builder Homesite is NewHomeSource.com, a consumer website offering the most comprehensive information and selection of new homes available on the Internet. Because of their extensive distribution network, many additional builders are making BHI their entry point into the Internet. By providing data to a single source — New Home Source — builders can not only be listed on that website, but also participate in other BHI online partner channels including Microsoft’s MSN, Yahoo, eBay, CitySearch, newspaper websites, and realtor websites.
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- Eleanor Bowman
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