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Countrywide to roll out pilot hybrid offering

Digital fixed fee version of traditional service has been a success during five-month trail, says company.

Nigel Lewis

countrywide-hybrid
Countrywide has revealed this morning that its trial fixed-fee, boiled down hybrid sales service has been a success and that it is ‘delighted’ by the results and will now roll it out nationally.

Within its Q3 trading statement released today the company says the pilot hybrid branches recorded ‘consistent outperformance’ compared to a control group of traditional branches since the digital pilot, as it known internally, launched in June.

The agencies involved were Spencers in Leicestershire and Rutland; Austin & Wyatt in Dorset (pictured, right), Hampshire and Wiltshire; and Frank Innes in the East Midlands.

alison plattAt the time Countrywide CEO Alison Platt (pictured) said there was ‘no going back’ from digital, which the company has described as a “leap forward” for the industry.

Compared to the control group the hybrid branches gained 4% more leads, 15% more instructions and 8% more registered buyers.

“What we have learned over the past few months has informed the development of the proposition going forward,” the company says.

“The combination of our people, our high-street presence and online technology is clearly differentiating. It is evident that our full-service customers value the enhanced online tools that this proposition brings. We are now rolling out our digital proposition to the next wave of brands and branches as planned.”

The announcement is a clear sign that every large estate agency is now considering how to adapt their business to the potential challenges of online competitors such as Purplebricks. While the Countrywide digital play was being tried out, Savills announced that it had bought hybrid agency YOPA while Connells recently snapped up online-only outfit Hatched.

November 24, 2016

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