A group of 11 major U.S. newspaper companies representing 282 newspapers have formed an alliance with Zillow.com to extend their classified ads to the popular real estate site.
Under the agreement, local advertisers who run print and online “for sale” and open-house ads with the newspapers will also have the option to share listings on Zillow, which has 1.5 million registered users. Newspapers will also be able to incorporate Zillow features into their own sites, including the company’s “Zestimates,” or estimated valuations of homes nationwide.
Participating newspaper publishers so far include Hearst Newspapers, Journal Register Company, Lee Enterprises and MediaNews Group. Large market newspapers owned among the 11 newspaper companies include the San Francisco Chronicle, the Houston Chronicle and the San Jose Mercury News. More newspaper publishers are expected to join the group before it launches in the first half of 2008.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but it’s expected to include an ad revenue-sharing arrangement between Zillow and its newspaper partners.
The Zillow partnership comes a year after many of the same publishers forged an alliance with Yahoo–focused on giving newspapers the ability to place local help-wanted ads on the Internet portal’s HotJobs career site. The Yahoo group is now up to 21 newspaper companies and nearly 400 newspapers, most recently adding The New York Daily News.
