As Keller Williams works to lead major brokerages in technological innovation, the firm is partnering with the fast-growing community social network Nextdoor.
Nextdoor will provide Keller Williams agents with data-driven insights about neighborhoods and communities, like popular topics of discussion and favorite local restaurants, and Keller Williams will allow its listings to appear on Nextdoor’s pages dedicated to real estate.
Nextdoor has dedicated real estate verticals in 40 of its markets, though it plans to expand those shortly and include Keller Williams’ listings when it does.
At the same time, both companies will encourage Keller Williams agents to pay to sponsor Nextdoor’s neighborhood real estate pages, although that opportunity is also available to agents at other brokerages.
Keller Williams can opt out of syndicating their listings to Nextdoor if they choose.
Nextdoor, which launched in October 2011 and draws a reported 12 million monthly unique visitors in the U.S., lets neighbors connect to talk about local issues, resell furniture, find babysitters and, of course, monitor local real estate.
“We at Keller Williams are creating data alliances in non-competitive spaces to allow our agents to be more competitive and take more market share in this new revolution of real estate,” Keller Williams Chief Innovation Officer Josh Team said in a statement.
To receive these data insights, Keller Williams is working through its tech project KW Labs and the Keller Cloud platform. The brokerage hopes that Nextdoor’s insights will help its agents become better local experts. The brokerage imagines agents using Nextdoor’s insights in conjunction with its new artificial intelligence assistant Kelle to find out everything they need to know about a new neighborhood.
Example of what an agent’s sponsorship looks like on Nextdoor’s app and website. Red boxes have been added by Inman for emphasis. Credit: Nextdoor
Nextdoor users tend to be engaged members of their communities. For agents, that means that leads they might find via the platform would likely be higher-quality than leads they’d pick up through other forms of online advertising. Agents from all brokerages first register their own business pages on Nextdoor before moving on to paid sponsorship or, in Keller Williams’ case, taking advantage of local insights.
The partnership between the two companies is in its early stages, but both see potential for more partnership opportunities moving forward.
“So much of real estate advertising today, especially online, is transactional,” Nextdoor Vice President of Development Ali Jafari said in an interview with Inman. “Agents are typically very good resources and they don’t get to give those resources to people who aren’t their customers.”
Correction: this article was originally published to include information about an exclusive sponsorship deal between KW and Nextdoor, which is not accurate. It has since been updated and corrected.
