Ever wanted to be on top of search engines for keywords in your market. Sounds exciting eh? Up until about a year ago, the best strategy I knew of was to go to websites that were already there, copy their content and meta data, then launch a site that contained more information than the top 5 sites already at the top. Ergo – you win. NOT SO FAST!  Aside from plagerism, and copywrite infringemnet, the real crime is what search engines call Content Spamming […]

The worst thing a broker has ever heard. “Can I get a floor agent to pick up the client holding on lines 2, 3 and 5, please.?” I had an interesting conversation with a broker in San Francisco this morning that first had us laughing, then had him crying. This broker floats between number 3,4, and 5 in San Francisco – which is a highly competitive market. We were doing a marketing piece for the brokerage to launch a new program for buyers and sellers and I asked him what phone number I we should use. “Phone?” he replied.  “We [...]

Brokers are beginning to use video more and more in offering content to consumers for real estate. With desktop video editing emerging as an easy to use application, brokers no longer need to pay a fortune for property video.  But if you want to, Inman will be happy to send a professional videographer to capture an increadible video story of your listing and the community. […]

In evaulating the web statistics at WAV Group.com, HomesMagazine.com and many significant broker websites, I recognized that for the first time more than 20% of users visiting the site are using MacIntosh Computers. MacIntosh is having a resurgance in popularity among consumers due to the ipod Helo effect and the introduction of the pentium processor and software like parallels. The Ipod helo effect is that people love their ipod so much, they are spending time in Apple Stores and on ITunes and other Apple websites.  Their brand and products are excellent. Business users have log avoided Apple computers becasue popular [...]

It should first be disclosed that WAV Group offers consulting services to Real Estate Blog Sites – we really like them and their product 🙂 which can be purchased from Real Estate Blog Sites or from Homes Magazine in Northern California and Lake Tahoe Markets. Why get a blog. In my view, blogs serve a variety of great benefits to brokers. […]

Last one here, please turn off the light! Technology may be eroding the culture of broker businesses today.  Each day I see fewer and fewer agents in real estate offices.  Most work from home and port into the office and the mls through web interface. I met with a successful agent who sells 2-3 homes a month in San Francisco.  He joined his current brokerage 4 months ago, and has only been to the office twice – both times to use the copy machine to duplicate some huge documents.  Each time, he had to reintroduce himself to the receptionist and [...]

Ruby on Rails may soon become the leader in development platforms for real estate applications. What is Ruby? Ruby is an object-oriented interpreted scripting language created by Yukihiro Matsumoto. Since the mid 1990s, it has grown in popularity in Japan and has gained recent attention as the language behind the Rails framework. You can use the language for a striking variety of functions—from basic scripting to creating Windows applications to developing Web applications. You can start using Rails without extensive knowledge of the language; the Rails framework generates the fundamental classes needed for the Web application and uses reflection to [...]

In a move to maximize its benefits to its REALTOR® members and encourage the adoption of transaction management subscribers to the RELAY™ product, the National Association of REALTORS has negotiated a reduction of up to $2500 in the deductible amount on Errors and Omissions insurance provided by Geo. F. Brown & Sons. […]

One of the latest issues facing brokers today is adopting strategies to successfully syndicate real estate listings to online portals. The good news is that it will be easier thanks to feeds using xml and web 2.0. The bad news is that very few service providers to agents and brokers offer this capability. The first company out of the box with this capability was Threewide.  The newest entry into this arena is vFlyer. […]

Web Stats- What are Web Statistics, Where do I see my web statistics?, and How to I interpret web statistics? Internet marketing affords the agent and broker the very best methodology for measuring advertising – all types including print, TV, radio and web. There are a few basic concepts that need to be understood in order to measure the effectiveness of your advertising and the effectiveness of your website at achieving the holy grail – lead conversion. Where do I go to see my web stats? The first thing that you need to know about your website is how to [...]

Want to have some fun? Ever have the experience where a customer registers to your website using foul or misleading information ie – Bill Clinton, etc. Well, as it turns out, if you view the details of the header of the e-mail that gets sent to you from your website, you will be able to see the IP address of the sender. […]