Spencer Rascoff

And so a lot of advertising models monetize very badly on mobile. Well, Zillow monetizes much better on mobile because of click to call. So when I'm looking at a home on my iPhone or Android, I can now click and call or click to text. And so it generates more leads and more highly qualified leads than desktop where you can't click to call.

And so a lot of advertising models monetize very badly on mobile. Well, Zillow monetizes much better on mobile because of click to call. So when I'm looking at a home on my iPhone or Android, I can now click and call or click to text. And so it generates more leads and more highly qualified leads than desktop where you can't click to call.

So not only do we have a better product that consumers like that had a less competitive landscape, we made more money from mobile usage than desktop usage. And that was a really rare thing for a startup or for any tech company to have at that time.

So not only do we have a better product that consumers like that had a less competitive landscape, we made more money from mobile usage than desktop usage. And that was a really rare thing for a startup or for any tech company to have at that time.

Absolutely. So at Zillow, we use the word persona. Beth the buyer, Susan the seller, Harriet the homeowner, Alan the agent, those are the most important personas at Zillow. And if you walk the halls of Zillow, well, I guess you can't do that anymore because it's a remote company now. But when I was CEO, it was in an office company.

Absolutely. So at Zillow, we use the word persona. Beth the buyer, Susan the seller, Harriet the homeowner, Alan the agent, those are the most important personas at Zillow. And if you walk the halls of Zillow, well, I guess you can't do that anymore because it's a remote company now. But when I was CEO, it was in an office company.

If you walked the halls back then, you would see posters of these personas And you'd hear employees talking about, oh, Beth wants this feature, or Rachel the renter wants that feature, or we should build this for Susan. So yes, understanding your consumer and your professional personas and building for them is critically important. And that's exactly how we ran Zillow.

If you walked the halls back then, you would see posters of these personas And you'd hear employees talking about, oh, Beth wants this feature, or Rachel the renter wants that feature, or we should build this for Susan. So yes, understanding your consumer and your professional personas and building for them is critically important. And that's exactly how we ran Zillow.

It was hard, not easily. I wrote a blog post in 2007 that's probably out there on the web still somewhere on Zillow's blog. The headline was, The Tidal Wave is Coming. And it was quite easy for us to see in our data that we were going to have a foreclosure crisis. You could see the increasing number of late payments and mortgage delinquencies happening

It was hard, not easily. I wrote a blog post in 2007 that's probably out there on the web still somewhere on Zillow's blog. The headline was, The Tidal Wave is Coming. And it was quite easy for us to see in our data that we were going to have a foreclosure crisis. You could see the increasing number of late payments and mortgage delinquencies happening

and the increasing number of short sales and the reduction in homeowner's equity. So you could sort of see it in 2007. I wish I had had the foresight to place some giant short trade on mortgage-backed securities, you know, and then maybe I would have been in the movie, The Big Short, but I did not. But anyway, so we saw that in 2007. When 2008 happened and the mortgage meltdown happened,

and the increasing number of short sales and the reduction in homeowner's equity. So you could sort of see it in 2007. I wish I had had the foresight to place some giant short trade on mortgage-backed securities, you know, and then maybe I would have been in the movie, The Big Short, but I did not. But anyway, so we saw that in 2007. When 2008 happened and the mortgage meltdown happened,

We right-sized the company. Unfortunately, we did layoffs. We went from about 200 people to about 150. We refocused the company. We closed down some initiatives. We tightened the belt. We worked harder and smarter. We increased the level of communication with our employees to make sure they stayed motivated and focused. We became more metrics focused.

We right-sized the company. Unfortunately, we did layoffs. We went from about 200 people to about 150. We refocused the company. We closed down some initiatives. We tightened the belt. We worked harder and smarter. We increased the level of communication with our employees to make sure they stayed motivated and focused. We became more metrics focused.

We just became a better run company in order to make it through that recession. What I learned from it all was to increase the level of communication with employees and to see the silver lining, because there definitely was a silver lining for us at Zillow.

We just became a better run company in order to make it through that recession. What I learned from it all was to increase the level of communication with employees and to see the silver lining, because there definitely was a silver lining for us at Zillow.

The silver linings were that the industry, the real estate agents, brokerages, and MLSs were willing to experiment with new things more during that downturn. They cut back advertising on newspapers so that they could lower their spend.

The silver linings were that the industry, the real estate agents, brokerages, and MLSs were willing to experiment with new things more during that downturn. They cut back advertising on newspapers so that they could lower their spend.

And when the coast started to become more clear and the dust settled and the clouds lifted, they were more willing to spend more on online advertising like Zillow, online lead generation, than they were before. So it accelerated the pace of the migration from offline real estate advertising to online real estate advertising, which Zillow benefited from.

And when the coast started to become more clear and the dust settled and the clouds lifted, they were more willing to spend more on online advertising like Zillow, online lead generation, than they were before. So it accelerated the pace of the migration from offline real estate advertising to online real estate advertising, which Zillow benefited from.