When you’re a real estate agent, you probably already understand the importance of having a presence on Zillow. Zillow’s lead service is called Premier Agent, and you may be wondering if that’s worth the investment as part of your lead generation strategy.
There’s also the Flex program that’s a subcategory of Zillow Premier Agent.
Below, we’ll detail more about Zillow Premier Agent and Flex to help you decide if it’s a potentially viable part of your business.
What is Zillow Premier Agent?
The Zillow Premier Agent’s ROI is around 260% for those agents who use it effectively. However, there are caveats. Zillow Premier Agents will only get that level of ROI if they have a competitive budget, their profile is complete, and their follow-up skills are impeccable.
Each month, hundreds of millions of unique visitors use Zillow to look at homes and find real estate agents to work with. Since there are so many visitors, advertising can be a natural fit for agents who want to grow their business.
Zillow Premier Agent is positioned as the solution for agents who want to grow. An agent pays for branding and exposure across the entire Zillow network of sites.
Then, the Zillow Premier Agents are put front and center to be contacted.
If you have an active Zillow Profile, you’re displayed as a listing agent for the listings you claim. Premier status doesn’t affect this. You're not shown if you don’t claim a listing or are not active on Zillow.
Premier agents appear next to every listing they share in their defined ZIP code and anything outside of their ZIP code when they have the listing.
The Zillow Premier Agent cost is based on the average home price in the ZIP code you select and the number of other agents competing for their own space.
Zillow will charge more if you work in an area with a high average home price.
What About Zillow Flex?
Agents who don’t necessarily want to pay Zillow upfront have another option: Flex.
Zillow Flex is an alternative payment option. You can get leads upfront as an agent without paying. Then, when a transaction closes, you pay a referral fee.
Lead generation is undoubtedly expensive, and not every agent has the budget to invest upfront.
So you might be wondering why everyone wouldn’t choose Flex over traditional Zillow Premier Agent. The catch is that you pay a percentage of your commission which can be 35% or more. The range for participating agents is usually anywhere from 25-40% of the gross commission.
HomeLight, OpCity, and Agent Promo have similar programs.
Zillow’s big advantage over these competitors is the brand name and sense of trust that people have when they hear the name.
Zillow Flex isn’t available in that many markets yet, but they do appear to be rolling out the program pretty quickly to new locations.
You have to be a Zillow Premier Agent in a participating market and have written permission from your managing broker stipulating that you can participate in an ongoing referral-based lead generation program.
There aren’t performance-based qualifications to join Flex, but you have to meet the requirements to keep your place in the program.
For example, you have to work each connection. Zillow has an interest in agents closing sales when they send leads. You’ll have to use the Zillow Premier Agent CRM, which the company monitors. You’re expected to update lead profiles weekly and maintain positive ratings.
You also have to confirm each closing and pay the fee on the day of.
There are certain situations where Flex makes more sense than others.
For example, if you’re a broker and want to add value to the agents in your brokerage, it can be a good option. You could take on half the referral cost and then have the agent cover the rest.
This helps with scaling the brokerage.
There are also plenty of downsides, with the biggest being that Flex is one of the most expensive paid lead generation options out there.
Compared to Zillow Premier Agent, Flex is significantly more expensive, although the risk is lower.
