Real Estate Blog Pro

Google Notebook Adds Search and Real Estate agents Catch On

Today Lifehacker  tipped us off to a helpful new feature on Google Notebooks- you can now search the content of public notebooks.  Check out the content that comes up when you search for "Real Estate."  Google Notebooks are the perfect tool for compiling researched content or publishing content for the public.  Real Estate agents are becoming quite saavy in the podcasting arena and tools such as this have become a powerful way to broadcast. 

If you are using Firefox, the Google Notebooks extension makes adding content to your personal notebook a breeze!  Your notebook can be accessed through your gmail account and you have a choice of keeping your content private or sharing it with the world.  Go gettem Pros!

powered by performancing firefox

Viewr Goes Live! Get your Video Egg On, Real Estate Pros

Could it be true? Viewr is live! The next highly anticipated real estate tool is finally available for your blogging and listing pleasure, dear real estate blog pros. We heard about Viewr back in July, with an update a month or so back and let's just say that the suspense has killed at least one of us.   With Viewr, agents will have a place to blog about their properties (or whatever else) and upload video content via  Video Egg software.  So far, the Pro likes it!

Viewr has a "global view on real estate" and the maps to prove it.  The (oh so very Web 2.0)interface is smooth and easy to use (so far). You can save your searched and your favorite listings.  It could be a good friend to a lot of you aspiring Pros out there.  Give it a whirl- set up a blog...see whats out there.  For god's sake, have fun for once!  Maybe real estate isn't such a drag afterall...just maybe.

Viewr


Technorati Tags: Viewr, Web 2.0, tool, real estate, New

Outside.in Is a Great Tool for Collecting and Sharing Local Info

The Pro has spent the last hour or so playing around with this cool new tool called Outside.in, which collects information pertaining to local community news, blogs and goings on....uh, and there's a lot of real estate stuff too.  You can use it (and contribute as well) to stay up to date on changes in the hood or inform your neighbors of your next open house. 

Good ole Curbed mentioned it today and got us going.  Its pretty decent so far!  Outside.in is putting the "i" in realty, if you ask me.  If you ask them...

outside.in is designed as a bridge between information space and real-world space -- a place to see in a single glance all the interesting things that are happening around you.

I know, I know...sites with forums and bookmarking and maps and such are all over the place these days.  So what's one more gonna hurt- right?  Well, so far it looks like there could be something a little different that may prove to be useful to some of you real estate blog Pros out there.  Give it a whirl and let this Pro know what you think.
I took the liberty of trying out a new polling tool from Polldaddy (which is pretty cool and terrifically easy to use).  Try it yourself on your blog if you like.  It's easy as 1..2..3



Outside.in
Polldaddy

Technorati Tags: Outside.in, local, tool, real estate, community

Edit your Flickr Photos Online with Preloadr and a Hack using Picasa

Now this is bound to be useful to all of you real estate Pro bloggers- edit your Flickr photos online with Preloadr!  This will be extremely useful when on the run or using your office computer or a public one.  I've been waiting for Pixoh to integrate this sort of function and lately they added a Flickr Export feature.  Nevertheless, if you are near your home computer (provided you use a PC), I recommend a quick hack i learned somewhere along the way. All you need is to have Picasa (Google's Image software) installed.  You can get it here:


Pro has talked about using Flickr before.  Here's another hack:  First, go to your Flickr account and look in your account setting for the option to email from mobile.  Flickr will give you an email address to use for mailing photos strait from your desktop to your photostream.  Now using picasa, you can edit your photos and email photos to anyone using the email function at the bottom- including your Flickr account. 

Find the photo that you want to add to Flickr, edit it and send it via email.  Use the subject line of the email to title your photo and the body of the email to describe the image.  Hint:  you can do the same thing when emailing strait to a blog post.
Good Luck Pros!


[Preloadr tip via Lifehacker]


Technorati Tags: images, Flickr, hack, Picasa

Picasa Web Albums released, A Yamanner Worm warning and a bit on Blogging for business

Google's Picasa finally release their online Web Albums thingy.  However, you must be invited, so sign up now with your Gmail account because it's first come first serve. This should be great for real estate agents who want to host property pics with links and such.  And it's still free [but there is an optionalstorage upgrade option ]! This has been a long time in the making.  Here's the blog link about it.  [and Lifehacker and an tester example]


QuickOnlineTips Blog may have helped the blogosphere out today tremendously by posting a warning about a javascript worm virus that travels via Yahoo! email.  Its called Yamanner Worm (or JS.Yamanner@m )and it can get onto your computer when a particular type of loaded email is opened.  Cases of the worm exploiting users have reportedly involved emails with a  subject line such as "New Graphic Site," according to QuickOnlineTips. Apparently those who use the new Yahoo! Beta email are safe. More on this read the Symantec Virus Threat Advisory.

Problogger had a great post regarding Blogging Business 101.  As usual, he answers many of the questions that we ask ourselves regarding how this whole blogging thing is supposed to help our business.  And because he isn't exactly a Pro business blogger (read his disclaimer), his advise is so much easier to digest. If you haven't check this Pro out yet, you're missing out!

Use these tips real estate agents and go forward in your blogging quest.  Remember that the Pro is always in your corner.  May the force be with you!


Technorati Tags: yamanner worm, yahoo mail, picasa web albums, business blogging, tips, warning

Wikipedia + Google Maps = Wikimapia and one hell of a real estate resource

So.....soon to be Pros, here's a new tool for you to add to your belt:  WikiMapia
Wikipedia (one of the most useful reference pages on the net) mashed up with Google Maps this week. The site is intended to be a Wikipedia-like reference for the planet earth (we all know where that is) .Wikimapia uses a feature similar to the 'notes' feature on Flickr, called "call-outs" which you can add on top of the area of the map you are referencing. You can search for information about an area without even leaving the crib!

LifeHacker WikiMapia - The geographical wikipedia
Digg Wikimapia = Wiki + Google maps

ALSO...Last week, Microsoft (we all know who that is) released a similar map program called Map Cruncher

Have fun with these...and, map something!


Technorati Tags: maps, mapping, wikipedia, wikimapia, google maps, tools, web2.0

Alphabetical List of 101 Software Freebies

Pro thinks that it may be time to devote a few posts to useful links with links.  As a real estate agent, you can never have too much information- you just have to gradually learn how to filter the good stuff out.  This tip should help you out in a tight pinch.  Check out this list of 101 Fabulous Freebies from PCWORLD because you never know what you might need. [link Digg]  Now get out there and sell!



Technorati Tags: tips, software, free, linkswithlinks, links

You can collect and save anything from the web with the NEW Google Notebook and other Gthings

There are some exciting things happing in world of Web 2.0  this week.  Flickr left beta stage and arrived in Gamma mode, Paul Stamatiou helps the non-pros out with a guide to Starting a Blog.  But, most exciting is the release of the new Gnotebook by Google.  Its a lot like the  scrapbook extension for Firefox that I discussed a week or two back.  Now you can clip and save images and text that you never want to lose into a notebook. Just think of how impressive your leads and listings will look, splashed like a scrapbook behind your username...ahhh


Note This [official Notebook Blog]

AND...  if you find that impressive, take a look at the Gmail filesystem


[ZDNet] Google GDrive not a rumor
Google GDrive is for Real[Paul Stamatiou]

hey...just tryin to help.  That's how we  become Pros!

Oh and...  here's a really nice map of Web 2.0 from Blogosquare


Technorati Tags: web2.0, blogging, agents, google, flickr, tools, notebook, recent

Technorati Tags: web2.0, blogging, agents, google, flickr, tools, notebook, recent

Technorati Tags: web2.0, blogging, agents, google, flickr, tools, notebook, recent

Technorati Tags: web2.0, blogging, agents, google, flickr, tools, notebook, recent

Technorati Tags: web2.0, blogging, agents, google, flickr, tools, notebook, recent

Use your Gmail account as an FTP server

gDisk is a software that turns your GMail account into a portable hard
drive so you can always have your important files accessible accross
the Internet.




Technorati Tags: gmail, harddisk, files

Get more info from your readers and make that sale with this easy form builder

Would you like to put a form on your site for your readers to fill out and submit?  Its a terrific way to find out who your readers are and put you in contact with them directly.  Well, let me introduce you to Sidewalk.  [link via DownloadSquad] Its an AJAX enabled form builder that's easy to create and simple to integrate onto your blog.  For a real estate agent, this is a powerful tool, as there is a good chance that the info that you gather from your readers will tell you a lot about the types of clients that your content appeals to. You'll have information to work with in minutes!

 Sidewalk forms can be embedded in any web page
just by copying and pasting a bit of JavaScript, which I think is one of its greatest selling points. When someone
fills out your form their answers are e-mailed to you as well as added to a web-based database where you can search the
responses and export them to CSV.

[link via DownloadSquad]

Some say this is the Most Powerful Windows Application available

Its the Total Commander PowerPack and its BAD!!! [that means good] The best part about it-its free! 

* file-manager inspired by Norton Commander, but with a modern Windows interface
* has two panes for easy file management
* every pane can have as many tabs as you want
* advanced file search with regular expressions
* rename multiple files
* split files (useful if you want to send a large file by email)
* pack/unpack files in ZIP format
* compare directories
* synchronize directories
* FTP client with support for SFTP
*
document viewer that supports: text files, source code files
(Assembler, C++, CSS, Delphi, FoxPro, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, SQL, XML),
HTML, RTF, Word documents, Excel sheets, OpenOffice documents,
executable files, DLL, INI files, registry files, image files (PNG,
JPG, GIF, Paint Shop Pro, BMP, PSD, ICO, CUR, ANI, MAC, WMF, EMF, PIC),
Flash, media files (MP3, WMA, OGG, AVI), database files (FoxPro, dBase,
Paradox, Access, MySQL, CSV), archives (RAR, ZIP, TAR, GZ, 7zip,
bzip2), disk image files (ISO, BIN, IMG, NRG)
* AES encryptor (encrypt/decrypt files with 128bit key using password or keyfile)
* decompilation of 32-bit PE executables (EXE SCR) and libraries (DLL OCX CPL BPL), resource files (RES DCR)
* create a list file with all selected files and directories
* count the size of all files in a directory
* shows informations about solar and moon dates, celebrations and calendars
* synchronize your local computer with atomic time via Internet
* browse NT events and services faster
* view/edit/kill processes that are running currently on the system
* RSS Reader
* CD/DVD burning
* view and edit files on ext2 partitions (useful to manage files on Linux partitions from Windows)
* mount disk images as additional virtual drives in system
* much more...

Pro found this helpful tip (and many others) from the Google System blog.


Technorati Tags: windows, tools, applications

Do you keep your listings on Excel spreadsheets? Now you can work with them online

If so, you can now view them and share them with other agents online with ajaxXLS. A little while back, Pro began explaining the powers of AJAX with homepages.  Imagine the same capabilities that you have with movable, interactive homepages spread to Excel sheets.  If you are a real estate agent or broker who likes to keep listings logged on excel sheets, you will quickly understand why this tool is so incredibly useful.   Pro just began playing around with it tonight, but it seems to do all that it promises. You can expect to open spreadsheet files with all of your common cell formatting
categories such as text style, decimals, currencies, date, and time.
ajaxXLS will preserve your formulas, backgrounds and borders from the
files created in Microsoft Excel or OpenOffice. ajaxXLS is platform
independent and can be used with any operating system.

These are a few of the benefits of this tool:

• Global access, all you need is an internet connection
• Platform independent, you can use it with any operating system
• Automatic updates and upgrades, no more computer restarts or missed patches/updates
• Server side management — all the busywork is done for you

[link via LifeHacker]

technorati tags: excel, spreadsheets, share, realestate, online, AJAX

Create spreadsheets online and share them with your associates

The Pro suggests NumSum, if you care to create easily created and sharable web spreadsheets online.

A real estate agent- blogger could find a lot of use for this handy tool.  Keep track of listings, log your commissions, never lose track of your expenses again.  If you're an agent that works for a small company, like me, you'll appreciate being able to share information with your co-workers regarding hot properties, inside information and data relating to the current market. Enjoy!
[link tip passed on by a Flickr buddy, runswithscissors]