First, a little background on some important changes to how the search engines work.Search engines like Google and Yahoo have made huge changes in the way they index content on the Internet over the last few years. Many old school web designers and IT professionals have not kept up on the changes in Internet marketing techniques and have been providing incorrect information to their customers and employers. I know this because I still regularly hear that adding meta-tag keywords to a web page are not only mandatory but the best way to get your website in the search engines. This is absolutely not correct.

In fact, I have a property for sale right now that I created a High-Def Virtual Tour for, and within a couple of days it was on the first page of search engine results. Here’s how I did it.

First, I opted in to Just Snooping.com’s Virtual Tour Export Options and made sure the tour was added to Realtor.com and my local MLS. I then took a few extra moments to submit my tour link to the three top search engines manually. Finally I added comments to each of the photos on my tour. The entire process took me less than 15 minutes.

I have to admit that I was a bit surprised that, in a down market like we are in today, my Virtual Tour soon showed up on the first page of the Search Engines. As of right now, my Virtual Tour is the third result on the first page search results for homes in my city. (View the Google results here.)

A large part of my success in the search engines is due to the fact that Just Snooping.com’s developers do an amazing job designing the code behind the Virtual Tours. The code is optimized to be friendly to search engines, unlike many other Virtual Tour product that search engines can’t index. Search engines love content, so by adding captions to my photos, I gave the engines more content to index. (And by the way, there are no keyword tags in the source code.).

If I can do it with my busy schedule, so can you. Just take a few extra moments to add comments to your photos, and submit to the search engines. Our system makes it easy to automate the export all your tours to a number of top real-estate search sites. And it only takes a few minute to submit to other search engines manually. Try to think of any other sites you could post a link to your virtual tour, such as Craigslist or personal websites and blogs. This is called Back Linking and it’s one of the most powerful mechanisms you can use to increase your online presence and search engine ranking. To help you get started I have included the free submission links for the largest search engines, below.

1. Google http://www.google.com/intl/en/submit_content.html
2. Yahoo http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html
3. MSN http://search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx

It honestly amazes me when I hear complaints from customers that they aren’t placed well in the search engines …Yet the first time I follow the suggestions and use the built-in tools in Just Snooping.com’s system (which we have been freely providing for years) I have success like this. I don’t have any advantage at all. If anything, that fact that I do not spend my days marketing myself or my services should have put me at a huge disadvantage. Nonetheless, my Virtual Tour is raked above many, many others within just a few short weeks of listing my property for sale.

Are you doing all that you can to market your personal website and Virtual Tours? If you are a Just Snooping.com customer and need assistance or advice, our Customer Service Technicians are very knowledgeable and willing to help. We have extended our hours of operation and provide multiple methods by which you can communicate with us, such as Live Online Chat, e-mail or by phone Monday through Friday 6:30a.m. – 6:00 p.m. PST.

You should also consider taking advantage of other resources and products provided by Just Snooping.com, such as our Agent Website Packages if you don’t already have a powerful online presence. Lastly, check out the Marketing Tips document we’ve published, which clearly defines Search Engine Optimization techniques to help you become more productive in your Internet marketing efforts.

The key, he says, is for agents to concentrate on one niche of their market that they care about and become THE expert in that niche.  Maybe it’s urban condos. Maybe it’s catering to clients looking to relocate into your area. Whatever it is, he urges real estate pros to really take ownership of their niche. Being a generalist leaves you being not very good at anything in particular and, he implies, not very memorable, either. I think this is a very interesting concept.

I happened to run into a very good friend the other day the grocery store who recently launched her own own group of real estate agents under the Keller Williams brand. She was changing the structure of her group so that some of her agents focussed on getting listing clients (home sellers), while others would focus on becoming buyer’s agents. She felt that the model they had been using of having all of her staff trying to gain clients who were both buyers and sellers wasn’t effective. Her agents didn’t get the in-depth experience in either side of the transaction to really becoming experts in it. Winning listing clients takes a certain set of skills and winning buyers takes a different skill set, she says. When I asked how her team reacted to the changes, she said most saw right away how well it could work, but that some were very resistant to their new, specialized role. Not a big surprise there…change will always meet with some resistance!

It will be interesting to see how the changes to her group work out. Perhaps these specialists will specialize even further, such as representing only buyers looking in Spokane Valley (one section of the city we live in). To me, it seems like the message in all of this is that it’s possible to be more successful not by taking every opportunity that presents itself, but by cultivating a niche and saying no to opportunities that lie outside of that specialization.

So what do you think? Is this model of specializing in a niche market something that could lead to success in a down market? Has anyone out there been doing this already? Care to share your story?

• Google - You might have heard of this one, considering they’re the something like largest search engine on the planet. (Distribution to Google as been available since spring 2007.)
• Trulia - A leading real estate search engine that provides lots of local information. (Distribution to Trulia as been available since spring 2007.)
• Zillow - A real estate service that provides home-for-sale listings and other information on properties, including neighborhood home estimates.
• Oodle - A classified listings search engine that allows users to post and search for homes, cars, and more in their local area.
• PropBot - Real estate search engine with over 1 million listings.
• ClickableCityDirectory - Provides links and information on all cities in the U.S., including homes for sale.
• Realtor.com - The real estate site of the National Association of Realtors. Distribution to Realtor.com is on a per-tour basis costs $25 per tour. (We wish this wasn’t the case, but Realtor.com charges us, so we must pass that cost on. Realtor.com does offer packages for offices and agent that will wave those fees.).

So why would you want to send your tours to these sites? I’m glad you asked. Here’s why: By distributing your tours to more websites, you’ll increase the chances that they’ll show up in general search engine results, which means more eyeballs on your tours. Of course, your tours will also appear on each of the specific sites mentioned above, so if someone is browsing those sites, tour tours will be there.

This additional exposure is a great benefit to clients listing their home with you because you’ll be marketing their property that many more places (be sure to mention this in your listing presentations!).

As always, using this feature doesn’t cost you a penny extra and it’s dead-simple to use. Just click the sites you want your tours sent to in the Virtual Tour Feeds section of the My Profile page. We’ll take care of the rest for you.

We’re always looking for more sites to make our Virtual Tour feeds available to, so if you have any that you’d like us to add, leave a comment and let us know.

The fall of the Dollar in 2007 has made real estate in the U.S. much more affordable for international home buyers. Severe dollar declines against the Euro (€) and the Pound (₤ ) have made U.S. homes much cheaper for Europeans, while problems with mortgage lending has kept many Americans out of the housing market. European currency advantages are benefiting further from the sharp drops in housing.

Housing in places such as Paris, London, and Southern France have jumped as much as 100 percent while U.S. prices have stayed put or dropped. Many are looking to second homes in the U.S. market for work or play and as investments. New York and Miami have long served as second home targets for affluent and accomplished foreigners, but now the list of target markets is growing.

Engel & Völkers Group a Hamburg real estate company is eager to take advantage of the opportunity created by the falling dollar by opening 300 residential sales offices across the U.S. in the next few years. The company has offices in Florida, Connecticut, and New York and is on track to open 30 more on the east coast.

The currency advantage is greatest for British citizens since each pound is worth well over $2. By contrast, the Euro is worth about $1.45. “The English are now actively looking more into Manhattan properties than Americans buyers,” says Ivan Hakimian of New York’s Itzhaki Properties. Where at one time British Executives traveling to the U.S. for extended periods would stay in corporate rentals, they are now buying properties outright.

The expansion of foreign real estate investment in the U.S. also means secondary areas are now receiving interest with international buyers. Properties in Durham, Raleigh, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina that are being sold to French and Scandinavian buyers are creating a new phenomenon.

South Koreans are buying condo towers and mid-level rise buildings in Los Angeles, which is helping to revitalize forlorn downtown neighborhoods. According to Johanna Gunther of the Ryness Co. in San Diego,” the demand for downtown Los Angeles has not been an attractive urban residential market until recently, but Korean demand has been a big factor in the change.” In recent years, the South Korean government has loosened restrictions on foreign exchange transactions, facilitating the large rise in Korean purchases of U.S. properties.

The National Association of Realtors found that 7.3 percent of the houses sold last year in Florida alone were sold to foreign buyers and Miami is a major magnet for Latin American and European buyers. The buy out is helping to mitigate the fallout from the area’s housing slump.
If the recent fall of the dollar against European currencies continues, the surge to buy up America will become more and more prevalent. The U.S. dollar is decreasing in value in large part because our Federal Reserve is printing money like a banana republic.

The countries we borrow money from are also buying up the U.S. Not too long ago, Citigroup made Abu Dhabi, ruled by President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, one of its largest shareholders. Many companies have welcomed such investments from foreign sources because the funds come from stable investors, but some U.S. officials have expressed concern that their acquisitions could target sensitive industries with links to national security. European companies at large have dipped into their wallets to spend more than $280 billion buying U.S. companies.

Abu Dhabi’s move recalls the early 1990s investment in Citi Bank made by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. After Citi Bank made some losing bets on U.S. and Latin American real estate, Alwaleed bought a stake in the bank for less than $600 million, which has since ballooned into several billions of dollars. In addition to real estate, the Citigroup/Abu Dhabi situation and other European buying binges are just punctuations in the ever changing real estate buyout of America.

Does the selling of U.S. Real Estate to multinationals impact the national good or community concerns?

We’ve just released a new upgrade to InStitches, our panoramic photo-stitching software, that features faster stitching speeds, quality improvements to the final stitched photo, and multilingual support (meaning you can now install/run it in English or Spanish). In our testing, high-resolution photos stitch up to 12x faster(!), and there’s now a slider control to let you adjust the speed vs. quality setting of the photo stitching to your liking.

Existing InStitches users will be prompted to upgrade the next time they start the application. Simply click Yes and the upgrade process will run automatically (assuming you’re connected to the Internet…an Internet connection is required for the version check and upgrade to work). If you’re not using InStitches and want to start, you can learn more and order it on our website.

These changes were made after we heard from several customers that the stitching process took too long, so here’s some proof that your requests are being heard! Your feedback means a lot as we look for ways to improve our products, so after you’ve had a chance to take the new InStitches for a spin (or should that be for a stitch?). Leave a comment and let us know what you think!

Personally, I spend the majority of my time every week out in various markets throughout the US talking with Realtors and brokers and, while many are having to retool or reposition, without fail the “movers and shakers” are still getting their share of the pie. So I’m curious…What are you seeing in your area? Is the sky falling on your market or are you wondering what all the fuss is about? Post a comment and share your thoughts.

Our live, one-on-one training has been a hallmark of Just Snooping.com and one of the key benefits of our Premier Online Marketing System. But as good as our Certified Trainers and Customer Service reps are, they have to actually sleep once in a while! That’s why we’ve created and recently launched our Online Video Trainer. The Online Video Trainer takes you through all aspects of our Virtual Tour system, including how to take photos (using any digital camera), how to stitch photos into panoramic using our InStitches software, and of course how to create, edit, and upload Virtual Tours. Customers can access it by logging in to your account and selecting the Video Trainer link.

We’re exploring ideas for new lessons and other topics, so if you have ideas or comments, post them below.

Having been a certified trainer for over 5 years, I have trained more than 600 real estate offices throughout the nation and been privileged to be in front of nearly 50,000 Realtors. With the opportunity to speak to so many real estate professionals, I’ve been able to see how the market has changed and where it is going. Clearly, technology is that end point. In my experience, those agents who have been able to accept and embrace new technology have, by far, had the most success.

One of the first and most important factors in successfully adopting new technology is getting comprehensive training on the tools you’re using. My trainings on our Premier Online Marketing System (which includes virtual home tours, agent and broker websites, email, printable fliers, statistics, and more) usually last three hours each. When most agents hear that, they freak out. Real estate agents are obviously very busy people, and every hour they spend with me is an hour they aren’t spending showing homes or working to gain new clients or listings. Still, by the end of my training just about every one of them comes up and tells me that it was the best training that they have been to. They feel more comfortable with our system, can see its benefits, and are excited about using it to help improve their business.

With that kind of response, it’s clear that proper training is key in having agents embrace and use any new technology. Our company does comprehensive training for every new customer and has added a number of ongoing training and support options including an Online Video Trainer, Live Online Training Sessions, and Online Chat Support.

I’m sure you have all been to training classes at some point, so I’d like to ask what you think works and what doesn’t. First, do you get adequate training on the new tools and technologies that you need or are expected to use? If so, what kind of training do you feel is the most successful? What do you want to see or hear when you have to sit and listen to someone for nearly three hours? Although I have done this for a long time, I am always up for suggestions or feedback on how to make things better. Post a comment and let me know what you think.

Technically, this release is an upgrade from version 3.0 to 3.8, but it encompasses more than a bump in the number to the right of the decimal point. We realized our software doeesn’t just create Virtual Tours and Websites. It includes high definition virtual tours (an industry first); distribution to major real estate sites like Google Base, Trulia, and Realtor.com; integration with existing MLS and IDX systems; printable fliers; tour and website statistics; support for multiple languages; online video training and seminars; and more. Given all that, we decided to christen it with a new name: the Premier Online Marketing System.

But enough about the new name. I’m sure what you really want to know is “What’s new?”. Some of the features and enhancements in this release are described in more detail below.

Multilingual Virtual Tours & Websites

With our business expanding into Spanish-speaking markets in the Caribbean, Mexico, and parts of the United States, we recognized many brokers and agents need to display their tours in multiple languages in order to reach all their customers. We’re proud to have built the industry’s first multilingual system for creating and displaying virtual tours & websites. Visitors to your tours and website can switch between languages by simply clicking a link, and our entire administration interface is available in both English and Spanish. We plan to extend the multilingual capabilities in the future, as well as as add other languages (”Parlez-vous le français?”, anyone?).

New, Easier-to-Use Interface

Once you sign in, the first thing you’ll notice is that the administration interface has a completely new look. We took this upgrade as an opportunity to put a fresher, more colorful face on our application. More importantly though, we made the application quicker and easier to use, so you could spend less time creating and editing tours and more time on your business. For example, you can now edit multiple virtual tours at the same time or switch between tour and website editing on the fly (neither of these things were possible before). Built using Adobe’s Flex technology, the new interface which cuts down our development time and allows us add new functionality more quickly.

Support for Multiple Currencies

Many of our customers—and their listings—are outside the United States, so we added the ability to show prices in other currencies such as the Euro, Peso, and Canadian dollar.

Improved Photo Uploading

You can now select and upload multiple photos at the same time. The system recognizes the filename of your photos, so if you give your photos logical names, there’s no need to type in a separate display name. This is a real time saver!

Quick Tour Searching & Filtering

Start typing in the Search box and your list of tours filters automatically. By default, tour searches are constrained to the last 6 months, but that range can be adjusted. This feature is great for agents or offices with lots of tours. (Remember, we believe every listing should have a virtual tour…you DO have a tour for every listing, don’t you??)

Improved Website Manager

Our improved Website Manager makes it easier to add and arrange content on your website.

Upgrade for FREE

As is our tradition, this upgrade comes to you for free. That’s right. Nada. Zip. Zero. Zilch.

Eventually, we’ll switch all of our customers to the new system, but right now we’re upgrading on an invitation-only basis. Hundreds of users have already made the switch. Don’t miss your opportunity to upgrade to the new release! Requesting an invite is simple:

1. Sign In to your account.
2. Click the Learn More button in the announcement at the top of the Welcome page.
3. From the popup window, verify your email address and click the Request Invite button.

When we have invites available, we’ll send you an email confirming your upgrade to the new system. The upgrade process is seamless, so all of your existing tours and website information will remain exactly as it was; you’ll just have access to the new interface and features. We’d love to hear what you think of the new system, so after you have a chance to give it a spin, post a comment and let us know what you think.

If you’re not already a customer, now is a great time to become one. We’ll be showing off our new product at the National Association of Realtors Conference, November 13-16 in Las Vegas. If you’re there, stop by booth #2249 and say hello! You can also visit our website to learn more and sign up.

So, Is there a similarity between how a homeowner picks their REALTOR and how a REALTOR picks their broker? After a while, brokerages all start to look the same as well. There are typically two options: pay a desk fee or pay a commission split to the brokerage. Either way, your job is the same: bring buyers and sellers together. Often, there is little difference in what one brand offers over another. I think it’s safe to say that when a REALTOR chooses a brokerage at which to hang their license, they look for a broker that they “click” with. They look for the person they feel safest with and know they can look to for solid advice. Sound familiar?

Now it’s time to evaluate. If you’re an agent, what kind of leadership does your broker exude? If you’re a broker, what kind of outfit do you run?

Every office falls into one of two categories when it comes to how it operates: it’s either a dictatorship or a democracy. Now, don’t mistake “dictatorship” with Adolf Hitler! That’s not what I’m talking about. What I mean is that you either have one ultimate decision MAKER, or many decision MAKERS. I understand that, in theory, if you have a desk-fee office, the agents are all responsible to and for themselves. And if you have a traditional brokerage, each agent pays the commission split, and thus should have a vote in operational decisions. Right? Well, you’d be surprised. As I talk to thousands of brokers and agents across the United States and Canada I always ask this question, and the response I hear that intrigues me most is this: “If the agent wanted to make their own decisions, they would have started their own brokerage. The fact that they didn’t, means they’ve asked me to lead them.”

What It Really Means to Lead

Leadership can be categorized two ways:

• Actual (actually doing) - giving guidance or direction, as in the phrase “the emperor has provided satisfactory leadership”.
• Potential (ability to do) - the capacity or ability to lead, as in the phrase “she could have exercised effective leadership”; or in the concept “born to lead”.

Leadership is defined as “the ability of an individual to influence, motivate, and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of the organizations of which they are members.” Leadership directly impacts costs, revenue generation, service, employee and customer satisfaction, earnings, market value, share price, social capital, motivation, engagement, and sustainability. Leadership is the ability of an individual to set rules for others and lead from the front, not the rear. It is an attitude that influences the environment around us.

Regardless of your political stance on the current war in Iraq (or any war in past history), I’d like to know what you think would happen if, before a platoon attacked their target, everyone stopped to take a vote on how to proceed. Honestly, what do you think would happen? I bet they’d all die because they had poor leadership. If someone is appointed as a group’s leader, they have a choice: They can embrace their role as as a leader and work to make everyone around them better; or, they can “poo-poo” the idea of leading and, consequently, everyone around them will eventually fall.

I found this article by Marc Davison on Inman News. It is a wonderful look at what Marc would do if he were leading a brokerage in this time of uncertainty and turmoil in the real estate industry. Please take the time to read it. (Note: Inman News is a subscription-based real estate news site . If you don’t have a subscription, there is a free version of the article on Marc’s 1000 Watt Consulting Blog.)

Every Broker I’ve sent this article to has said that they completely share Marc’s point of view. But simply saying you agree is the easy part. The challenge is being a strong enough leader to implement what you truly believe in. So…Are you the leader because people look up at your name on the sign in front of your office? Or are you a leader because those people truly look up to you?