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Zillow Digs sees 236pc app growth, adds color search

Zillow Inc. has enhanced the iPad application for its home improvement business, Zillow Digs, by adding mobile color search and match.

Users can now search through images by color family, view paint chips for the most prevalent colors in the image and find real-world paint information for the colors in the image. The Zillow Digs app is available for iPad devices in Apple?s App Store.

?Couch surfing and shopping for home improvement is a very mobile experience, and color is a great way to freshen up a room or add a focal point,? said Jeremy Wacksman, vice president of consumer marketing and mobile at Zillow, Seattle.

?We?re marrying these two home improvement attributes with the addition of color match and search to the Zillow Digs app,? he said. ?The iPad?s visual, multi-touch capabilities also allow for consumers to have an interactive browsing experience as they look through more than 100,000 photos by color family, select virtual paint chips to find additional photos with those colors and use the app to find real paint colors in stores.

?We wanted to maximize the user experience to really be able to have fun with large, beautiful photos. And a tablet was the natural first place to go with such a visual, interactive product. With large photos and multi-touch capabilities, consumers can better visualize their dream home with the iPad by swiping through high-resolution pictures and zoom into their favorite aspects of a room.

?We envision people will use Digs much like they browse and dog-ear the glossy pages in design magazines.?

My digs
Zillow Digs launched five months ago and has already accumulated more than 49,000 photos from professionals and consumers, demonstrating a 236 percent growth since launch.

The Zillow Digs iPad app lets users browse more than 100,000 images and tap on a heart button when they like an image. The images then get saved to My Digs, and users can create boards for different styles and spaces.

The app also lets consumers share images and design ideas on Facebook.

Now, consumers can filter images and design ideas by color in addition to spaces, styles and cost.

For example, if a consumer chooses to filter the images by the color pink, only photos that contain pink features, such as furniture or wall color, will show up.

Additionally, when users click on an image, they can see exactly what color is being used and select virtual paint chips so that they can go out and actually find that color in stores.

According to the company, Zillow Digs is the first home improvement app that lets consumers filter images by color and budget as well as view related photos for color inspiration.

Home improvement
The company also provides photos from its own database of more than 110 million homes in the United States.

Zillow has launched a number of other mobile initiatives as well.

For example, the company launched the Zillow Rentals iPad app this past February (see story).

?Real estate is inherently mobile, so the integration of location-based and on-demand usage of Zillow was natural and a great complement for our core business and audience,? Mr. Wacksman said.

?Now, we have tipped toward mobile, meaning more homes are viewed on Zillow from a mobile device than on desktop, and truly see ourselves as a mobile company,? he said.

 ?Being able to look at the details of a home curb-side, solely using GPS, or instantly receive an alert on your phone when a new listing matches that match your saved search criteria hits the market, makes Zillow a better tool and a 24/7 tool for home shoppers.?

Final Take
Rebecca Borison is editorial assistant on Mobile Marketer, New York