Belinda T.

I've been with Zurple for about a month, so maybe they'll improve over the course of the contract. But right now, I'm very, very unimpressed. For a $900/month service, they're really quite useless. I've received 2 genuine leads over the course of August, which is terrible. I could've done a better job myself. It's no wonder why they lock agents into a contract. They wouldn't stay in business, otherwise. Too many agents would cancel after a month of non-results (who wouldn't?). The contract was a red flag to me at the time, but I thought, "oh, some agents are having decent success with this. Maybe I'll try it out for 6 months". Big mistake. Should've listened to my gut rather than the guy on the phone.

Plus, they tried to pressure me into choosing a 12-month service. Luckily, despite how slick and "friendly" the guy on the phone was (Pedro, I think is his name), I only signed up for 6 months. Thank goodness for small favors. These sales rep types have no interest in your success. They just want to get a commission, I'm afraid. Too bad I discovered that too late.

Because of this experience, I've chosen to write off every internet advertising/marketing agency out there, especially ones promising 20 leads a month to realtors. Maybe there are good ones out there, but I've convinced myself that they're all crap and just want thousands of dollars for little to no work, only lies that they'll help you grow your business.

It's also my fault, too. I didn't want to take the time to do digital marketing myself, and I screwed up. I take full responsibility for this. Good news is that I didn't sign up for the full, 12-month package.

Summary: AGENTS, STAY AWAY FROM ZURPLE AND EVRY OTHER LEAD GENERATION COMPANY! THEY'RE PARASITES PROMISING EASY MONEY!

Market your own business, and get your own leads. Nurture your own leads through consistent follow up.

If I could l, I'd give Zurple 0 stars, but 1/5 is the lowest, unfortunately.

UPDATE: I've received a complaint from a homebuyer about receiving canned email responses from my website. It's only one complaint, but still. Besides being overpriced, Zurple will hurt your customer service efforts, too.

If you still wish to sign up with them, all I can say is... you've been warned.

I like WebsiteBox. At a one-time fee of $99, it's very affordable, which is especially nice for new agents. Plus, it's easy to set up. I was able to set it up in a weekend. Also, the customer support is alright, although they sometimes take a while to answer back.

However, WebsiteBox has a serious security loophole that's stopped me from using it. This platform doesn't support SSL. In other words, your site will be flagged as "This Site Is Not Secure", and anyone who enters in their name, street address, etc will put their personal at a serious risk. Hackers will have a field day. Some clients won't care, but as buyers become savvier, they'll start to avoid sites without an SSL certificate.

If you're a realtor, you're trying to get prospects' contact info. That's important when you want to keep in touch with sellers and buyers who may not be in the housing market for a good 6 months or so. But, you can't do that (at least not responsibly) with a site platform that's missing basic security requirements. You could get away with this in 2002, but not 2018. Not with all the recent data breaches, internet protection laws, and whatnot. Besides this being unsafe, it also looks unprofessional, especially now that most realtor websites have an SSL certificate. Google will also push your site way down the list, too. Not having an SSL certificate is really bad for SEO, too. Don't expect to rank on the top 3 search results pages.

Also, if you're a realtor who does Facebook advertising, this platform doesn't support that. It supports Google Analytics at least, so Google AdWords should work with it. Still, to ignore one of the largest ad platforms out there is really disappointing to me.

These issues, combined with the Windows 95/XP layout of the control panel, make WebsiteBox very lacking compared to more expensive sites. I like what they're trying to do. They want to bring affordable website solutions to the real estate industry. But, it feels less like an "affordable solution" and more like a "you get what you pay for" sort of thing.

Summary: It seems if you want a decent, secure, and up-to-date realtor website, you'll need to shell out at least $300.

EDIT: The more I read the reviews, the more I suspect that a lot of them are fake.