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Franchise-based real estate company Re/max is launching an ad business.
Re/max Media Network will use its first-party data from people buying and selling property—including residential, commercial, and luxury—to court advertisers across a wide swath of industries, said James Schwartz, svp of marketing at Re/max. Re/max is working with LiveRamp to sell ads and launch a data clean room for advertisers.
“When you are ready to buy or sell a home, it really ties to life stages,” Schwartz said. “Family formation, family separation, job transfer. So there’s a wealth of data and information.”
Re/max is the latest of hundreds of companies aiming to build a media business built upon its first-party data. And while Amazon and Walmart are making billions on their media networks, others are struggling to break through the noise to capture a piece of what’s expected to be a $62 billion pie in 2025, according to Emarketer.
Re/max is initially selling onsite programmatic ads on remax.com, a few of which are already visible. ADWEEK saw ads for insurance, software, and paint companies during the week of May 12.
Re/max currently has a monthly digital audience of 7.6 million users, the company said.
“Movers are a highly valuable segment,” Andrew Lipsman, independent retail media consultant, told ADWEEK. “The potential for understanding more granular stages of the moving process could be attractive.”
Still, Re/max is up against big players in the retail media space, Lipsman noted. Companies like Amazon and Home Depot have more mature ad businesses with data that can also give advertisers insight into which audiences are buying or selling a home.
That data will always be one step behind the first-party data directly from a real estate player like Re/max, though, because Re/max has exact data on where someone in the market to move lives, said LiveRamp chief revenue officer Vihan Sharma.
“Rather than going and trying to predict who is going to move—or who is purchasing what—having that signal deterministically gives you a lot more efficiency,” Sharma said. “The signal base that Re/max has is very powerful.”
Offsite plans and realtor-cum-influencers
As Re/max Media Network grows, advertisers will be able to target Re/max audiences offsite as well, with ads either across the open web or on social platforms like Meta, using LiveRamp’s clean room to overlay their own customer data when relevant.
LiveRamp and Re/max began serious conversations about the ad network in the second half of 2024, Schwartz said.
The companies are currently working together to build out an offsite audience targeting capacity, but that process can take 12 to 18 months, said Sharma.
Re/max also plans to incorporate its network of 52,000 U.S.-based real estate agents (145,000 agents globally) into the mix in some capacity, potentially offering brands the opportunity to sponsor social posts and tap into an agent’s localized following, Schwartz said.
