So this is how Zillow gets all their data
by MattIn the business world, keeping a tight wrap on company secrets is key to success. Has Rich Barton of Zillow just given away one of Zillow's major business components?
The real estate community has been working for months to get at the data extraction Zillow uses to get all the information about your homes. With just a few clicks and insightful research, Realivent has uncovered a how Zillow does it.
And this whole time we thought they used computers…I guess the joke is on us.
In response to the newly found Zillow secret, we at Realivent are throwing away all our computers, all 3 of them, and acquiring a large army of children to do our research. So if a kid between the ages of 5-7 starts asking you about you home, just smile and know that the information is going to make online real estate better. We are hoping to get all the data by 2013, and unleash the next real estate monster.
Sorry Zillow, welcome to the business world 
Here are some of the kids you might meet:
Timmy's in charge of our Bird's Eye View of homes. Here he is practicing.
Jonathan is in charge of weekly price changes. Before the kids can go out and ask the general public real estate questions, we make them practice on zoo animals. We also tell them that no matter how busy the people look, they will always have time to talk real estate.
Little Ricky is in charge of recent real estate news
Lastly, Jenny is in charge of graphic design…not sure if we are going to keep her though. She does this to everyone in the office.
Tags:business world company secrets Fun Stuff Realivent Updates zillow
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ROFL - great post, Matt - that looks like a strong team.
April 6th, 2007 at 6:13 pmDavid, Glad you liked it…We will probably by acquiring you around 2014, so get ready.
April 6th, 2007 at 11:08 pmVery Nice. You forgot one major component to the team:
The Board of Directors and brain children:
http://lo.redjupiter.com/images/BetsyDevine/sunbathers.jpg
April 7th, 2007 at 5:28 amLoL, that is a great post. Personally, I’m thinking monkeys - maybe some chimps that know sign language? I think you’ll have less trouble with child-labor laws….
Glad to see those at Zillow can take some ribbing!
April 9th, 2007 at 10:06 amI was disappointed… I was hoping for the real “secret”. LOL
April 9th, 2007 at 1:47 pmThis is awesome! GREAT POST!
April 11th, 2007 at 10:40 amVery innovative…you have a great sense of humor. But seriously, I do wonder how authentic some of the info is especially since most sellers don’t have the correct info on their home to actually put in the zillow database. I realize this is based on wikipedia but the jury is still out.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:08 pm[…] Our Zillow Ideas are Catching on - But is it too late? by Matt Tags:army of child geniuses bots Fun Stuff Google mind reader superstars zillowNo less then 3 days after we announced our army of real estate data collectors, the competitions started announcing their plans for global real estate domination. Greg Swann at bloodhoundrealty built a zillow bot to compete with our new mega real estate monster…Well, all I have to say is bring it on. […]
April 11th, 2007 at 9:28 pm[…] Real estate bloggers are usually dry and boring authors. I am here to spice it up, can you tell? Anyways, I saw this blog post by Realivent and thought it was pretty funny. […]
April 12th, 2007 at 12:26 pm