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Navigating Real-Estate Technology

There are so many companies out there trying to sell agents all kinds of technology to improve our business.  That’s great, except it leaves the agent with trying to wade through it all and figure out how to make is all work and what really does work.  For the most part, people trying to sell us technology are NOT Realtors.  They don’t know or understand our business.

Most technology companies deal with one single aspect of our business, like websites.  But there are many technologies needed to make a website successful.  There is the website itself, the IDX technology, the web search strategy, the lead capture and follow up, and the list goes on.  Yes there are many companies that offer a so called “All in One” solution.  Usually this means we are getting a bunch of technologies that are thrown together and no one of them is that great.

So I want to try and start something new and offer to answer questions from readers about real-estate technology.  What works, what doesn’t?  Which technologies work best together?  Most importantly, what technologies actually can make your job easier and give your clients a better experience.

So while the technology developers will continue to throw new cool and neat technologies at us, I’ll be more concerned with how does that technology translate into our everyday business.  For instance, one new technology I will be writing about in a future article is live mobile broadcasting.  We heard about this over a year ago when companies like Bambuser began to offer live video broadcasting from your iPhone.  I have been busy testing this with a few ideas on how to use it in real estate.  Right now I am testing it as a live Open House broadcast.

So continue sending questions and comments and I will work them into answer in future articles.

Thanks,

Barrett

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Google Base for Real Estate

This is the start of a new series of articles for Realtors on leveraging free technologies.  If you have any questions or would like to suggest a subject for me to cover please contact me via my Google mail account at wbarrettpowell@gmail.com.

I spent a lot of time thinking about what to write first.  There are so many great applications that are provided to us, most for free.  The catch is always trying to wade through what works and how to use.  I will try and make this column answer both of these questions.  Now on to the first topic.

Many of us have heard about our National Association of Realtors and this new thing called RPR.  RPR is supposed to be a National MLS.  While NAR and the local MLS boards have gone back and forth over who is doing what, a little company named Google quietly began working on something as well.  Called Google Base, this is a Google product that allows products to be added to Google.  Why you might ask?  If a product is in Google, it can be searched for and found.  Hum, this sounds interesting.  I wonder if it works for houses?

You bet it does!  As I write this little article, just about every property in a MLS is now being uploaded to Google Base Real Estate.  But it is not only properties from the MLS.  Many property databases exist beyond our MLS.  How about the many foreclosure listing sites out there or the For Sale By Owner sites.  Well many of these are now being added to Google Base Real Estate.  This is game changing because while we as Realtors wait for our association to deliver on the National MLS, Google has already done so.  Well almost anyway.

True the Google Base Real Estate solution may not have all the information available in our MLS.  It may not have all the details about the property such as all the appliances listed.  But for the consumer who is starting their search, is all that data really important?  Maybe, maybe not.  What is important is to give the buyer what they want.  What they want is to be able to search for a property.  Then search for information about the area.  They want to search for school information.  They want to search for demographic information.  They want to search for photos of the area.  Guess where they can go today to find all these things, right now…Google.

So how do we harness this Google information?  One way is to add a Google Base Real-Estate search to your website.  There are a number of companies who have started offering an IDX type search using Google instead of your local MLS.  What I especially like about these new Google Base search vendors is that also offer a really nice mashup of information about the area the house is located.  For example, since you can search Google for just about anything, why not offer categories like schools, restaurants, shopping, etc. of things geographically located near the house you are interested in.  That is what a mashup can do.

One vendor I really like is Realbird (http://Realbird.com).  Realbird is a paid solution, similar to your other IDX vendors.  But instead of pulling the property data from your MLS, Realbird pulls it from Google Base.  This does a number of things.  It first means you have properties now available that are not in your MLS, including properties outside your MLS’s service area or properties like foreclosures that are not listed with a member of your MLS.  Another nice feature of Realbird is they offer a Wordpress plug-in.  This is a native Wordpress type application that makes the search work much better in a Wordpress environment than your typical IDX vendor can using what is called an I-Frame (don’t worry about this for now). 

Another vendor that just came on the scene is RealShout (http:RealShout.com).  RealShout just released their free Google Base Real-Estate Search.  Like RealBird, RealShout’s search is available as a Wordpress plug-in and also offers a “mashup” capability by providing additional location information on the property detail page.  RealShout does offer a paid version of $50 per which is the same as the free version but with support included.  Talk about a great deal.  I am currently beta testing RealShout on my real estate website.  So far I really like it.

Google Base Real Estate is for real, no pun intended.  It is here and here to stay and will only get better.  If you would like to learn more about Google Base Real Estate then…Google it.  You will get plenty of information and examples.

If you have questions about Wordpress, get in contact with me.  I will be covering Wordpress in future articles.

Barrett Powell

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Using Bing and Microsoft Photosynth in Real-Estate by Barrett Powell

Last year I wrote about beta testing a new Microsoft product called Photosynth.  Read the original article here.  In that blog I talked about how I felt Photosynth was another option for agents to use to showcase a property.  I talked about it being a new type of “Virtual Tour”.  The more I learn about Photosynth, the more I like it.

Now Bing and added an extra twist.  Within Photosynth you can do what is called “geo-code” the location of the content.  Geocoding actually places the content, a Photosynth photo tour at a location on a map, in this case the Bing map.  When you pull up Bing you will notice on the left side a “Map” option.  Selecting this brings up a map that looks very similar to Google Maps.  Once the map is loaded you will see another new feature in Bing on the left called “Explore the New Bing Maps” with a “try it now” hotspot.

Clicking on the “try it now” brings up a Bing with some new features turned on.  You will notice the left side now features the current weather for the area you have centered on the map along with some other interesting content, such as photos, AND any Photosynths in the area.  Clicking on the “Map Apps” button on the left brings up a window where you can turn on additional features.  One of those features is Photosynth.  Turning this feature on now places location pins on the map where a Photosynth is present.  By doing a Photosynth of your listed properties you now add another marketing tool to your arsenal and get more exposure for you and your listings.

Try Microsoft Photosynth on your next listing.  http://photosynth.net

Barrett Powell
wbarrettpowell@gmail.com

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The market is changing, and so should you (part 1)

·         The days of taking a listing, placing a sign in yard, entering the listing in the local MLS, and then waiting on a sale are over, at least in the current market.  Both buyers and sellers are looking for that “difference” that is going to help them buy or sell, or both.

The Internet is the new way.  Yes we have heard this for some time.  The problem is many heard “the internet is the ONLY way”.  That assumption would be incorrect.  Yes it is true that many buyers and sellers begin their research on the web.  But that’s not where it ends.  Studies have shown that these savvy buyers and sellers end up working with the first agent they make contact with.  But what are the factors that impact that first contact decision.

For the most part, these buyers and sellers and looking for signs (not the obvious yard signs), things that tells them you are successful, trustworthy, and will get the job done.  If they find your website, and see it as useful, but they don’t find other aspects of your real-estate career to backup your site, they will likely move on to the next agent.  If they don’t see your name in other places, other websites, yard signs, mailings, advertisings; they’ll assume you’re probably new, got a hot new website, but lack the experience they need to help them get the job done.

On the other hand, if they see blog sites and postings by you at various real-estate related sites like Trulia, on subjects they find useful and interesting, they may be willing to forgive the other shortcomings and give you a shot.  Likewise, if you’re not totally internet savvy, but you have a big ad in the local paper, or you have a lot of signs around town, they may be willing to forgive your tech shortcomings; feeling you will work harder to get the job done in the end.

So what does all this mean?  It means if you’re an experienced agent with many years of measurable production under your belt, you’re probably going to do well in any market.  Why?  Because you are already practicing the tried and true activities that lead to a higher than average rate of referrals, that's why.  These handed down activities are the bread and butter of being successful in real-estate.  They say not only am I successful, but I’m trustworthy enough to have your neighbor, friend, or relative recommend you use me.  I have earned my stripes, the old fashioned way, and I can probably survive, even if my website or web skills are not the best.  Does it mean I may be leaving something on the table by not having great internet skills?   Absolutely! But it is not as important as it would be if you were just starting out or you had not amassed your multi-million dollar database of existing clients.  Remember, it cost more to capture and sell to a new customer than it does to sell to an existing one.

What I’m hearing then is that the internet is really not all that important.  Not hardly.  What you are hearing is that the National average age of a realtor is the high 50s.  That means we have a bunch of these senior real-estate giants who still garner the lion’s share of the business.  This also means we are seeing more and more of these starting to retire.  This is leading to a very interesting and serious problem and opportunity.

That knowledgebase that has been handed down through the generations is being lost.  It’s walking right out the door with the retiree.  At the same time, new high tech agents are coming in, thinking the “old way” is dead and gone; long live the internet.  We are really missing a golden opportunity.  At least most of us are.  Some of the truly smart “new” agents have figured out that the Internet alone isn’t going to make them the new real-estate giant they want to be.  They know it’s going to take a mixture of the old with the new to make that happen.  Those smart agents have probably started out as a team member of one of those “old guard” agents, and spent a lot of time learning and understanding the way of the “Jedi”.  You know, the old guard protectors of the Universe in Star Wars.  Mix a little old school with new market tech and you just might have something there.

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GIS and Property Lines Downloaded To Your GPS

Whether your a Realtor, property owner, buyer, developer, or even a hunter...there were probably times you would like to have a handheld GPS with the property lines of the land you are walking on displayed.  This would allow you to know exactly where the property lines were, and more importantly where YOU were in relation to the property boundaries.

This short video demo will show you one solution I have come up with using Open Source (free) software.

Posted via web from wbarrettpowell's posterous

GIS and Property Lines Downloaded To Your GPS

Whether your a Realtor, property owner, buyer, developer, or even a hunter...there were probably times you would like to have a handheld GPS with the property lines of the land you are walking on displayed.  This would allow you to know exactly where the property lines were, and more importantly where YOU were in relation to the property boundaries.

This short video demo will show you one solution I have come up with using Open Source (free) software.

Posted via web from wbarrettpowell's posterous