CPD given facelift as user-base tops 1500
The MJB Data website www.cambridgepropertydatabase.co.uk has been restyled and largely rebuilt following continued rapid increases in demand. With over 1500 regular users in March 2005 MJB's proprietor Mat Barnett thought it needed improving to better reflect MJB Data's house style.
Too good to look bad
In February the number of new visits rose to around 5,000 and page views to over 50,000. The thought of missing 50,000 chances to make a good impression became too strong an incentive to resist and we began a thorough overhaul in mid March, and it was a good job we did as we found that several estate agents had completely changed their online property publishing systems which meant the data we were gathering was becoming less useful.
New synchronisation
In all of the feedback we've had about the CPD website the most common request has been for a way to view properties that are new or recently altered. Until now the entire online property database has been cleaned out and rebuilt server times a day. This system has now been replaced with a simple synchronisation method that uses half a dozen database tables to collect and compare property details. As well as presumably making a load of CPD users a bit happier, the new sync system also means properties no longer disappear and reappear at regular intervals.
Hot property
(Well, you can't have a news story without a cheesy pun or two.) Despite Cambridge Property Database being a bit of an experiment and a showcase for MJB's web-development work, it has evolved into the largest Cambridge property website bar none with consistently more than twice as many property details than the next biggest.
With plans in the pipeline to add a New Homes section, publish statistics on popular search terms and prices and to revamp the Cambridgeshire-wide database who knows? It could easily become the regions best used property portal.