Wednesday, December 12, 2001 – Newport Beach, CA.
The phenomenal growth of insurance and home mortgage Web sites has yielded an unusual after-market niche, and LeadExchange is defining this new industry by allowing brokers and agents to buy, trade, and sell sales leads online.
LeadExchange is a spin-off of iLeads.com, an Internet lead generation company that has used and tested the LeadExchange concept during its six years in business. iLeads.com is a privately held startup based in Southern California (Orange County).
Because of market fluctuations, legal limitations, and capacity restraints, there are often surplus sales leads gathered from the online marketing programs of financial services companies. Since the Internet is a worldwide medium, companies often receive thousands of inquiries from customers outside their geographic service area or product line.
LeadExchange offers a simple, electronic platform to moderate the allocation of these leads to qualifying companies that can fulfill the sales. Currently, the system supports trading and sales of home mortgage and life, health, disability, long-term care, annuities, auto, and homeowners insurance leads, and the system is being expanded to support additional products and industries.
“Customers are happy because they are being serviced,” said Drew Warmington, CEO of iLeads.com. “They want information about products and this way they are contacted within a short period of time without having to shop around.” Participating companies find that they are able to gain both in sales efficiencies and in achieving customer satisfaction.”
Here’s how it works: vendors of leads set a market price for these “spare leads”, and LeadExchange processes the leads for the vendor and offers them for sale in large blocks sorted by product type and geographic area. Interested buyers may purchase blocks online, to supplement marketing efforts or to fill downtime in sales periods. So far the response has been tremendous. “We don’t see leads going to waste,” said Warmington. “For every interested customer, there’s an interested provider.” Auctions are held daily, in real-time (as leads are posted after processing, they are automatically available for purchase). Purchased leads are delivered immediately via electronic file. LeadExchange keeps accounting for all activities and reconciles each account on a monthly basis.
About iLeads.com
iLeads.com has been the leading innovator of online financial lead generation since 1996. Through its network of 185 websites, iLeads.com has attracted, validated, and qualified more than five million leads for the mortgage and insurance industries. Thousands of industry professionals count on iLeads.com to deliver a steady stream of convertible leads every month. Since 2000, iLeads.com has been a partner of The First American Financial Corporation (NYSE: FAF). More information about iLeads.com can be found at www.ileads.com.
About First American
The First American Corporation (NYSE: FAF), a FORTUNE 500 company that traces its history to 1889, is America’s largest provider of business information. First American combines advanced analytics with its vast data resources to supply businesses and consumers with valuable information products to support the major economic events of people’s lives, such as getting a job, renting an apartment, buying a car or house, securing a mortgage, and opening or buying a business. The First American Family of Companies, many of which command leading market share positions in their respective industries, operate within five primary business segments, including Title Insurance and Services, Specialty Insurance, Mortgage Information, Property Information, and First Advantage. With revenues of $8.5 billion in 2006, First American has approximately 2,100 offices throughout the United States and abroad. More information about the company and an archive of its press releases can be found at www.firstam.com.
Media Inquiries
Media Contact: Drew Warmington
Title: Managing Partner
Phone: 1-877-245-3237 ext. 113
Email: dwarmingtoni@ileads.com
