Technology Tools for Real Estate

Wi-Fi Hotspots are a great boon to real estate professionals and anyone else who works on the road instead of in the office behind a desk. But while hotspots are convenient they also creates computer security risks.

Hotspots that are easy to log on to offer no data security and no encryption. That means others can intercept your data as it travels to and from your computer. When you type something and hit enter and the wireless signal you’re using has no encryption, the information you type is available for others to see and use. The guy sitting with a computer out in the parking lot or the hacker who lives upstairs over the Starbucks could easily intercept your data and grab passwords or other sensitive information you’re sending.

So when using your computer—or your smartphone—on a public wi-fi signal, it’s a good idea to use SSL. The SSL (Secure Socket Layer) protocol encrypts your data so that anyone intercepting it will only get gibberish. To use SSL, enter an “s” after “http” in the URL. So for example, if you’re visiting Google and you want to do an encrypted search, start by typing https://www.google.com. That s at the end of http, ensure that your data is scrambled as it travels over the Internet.

It’s possible to engage SSL when you log onto Facebook, Twitter, and Foursquare and many other sites. Foursquare does it for you automatically (Try logging on to Foursquare right now without using https and you’ll see that Foursquare changes it for you automatically.) In Facebook, you can put it in manually when you need it, or you can change your account settings so that SSL is automatically engaged each time you log in.

Also, if you use Firefox as your browser, you might want to install HTTPS Everywhere, an add-on that engages SSL whenever the website you’re visiting offers it.

All of us use Google Search all the time, but Search is only one of dozens of tools in Google’s online arsenal. Here’s a rundown of 9 Google tools—many available to real estate professionals at no charge—that can help you market homes and build business.

YouTube. Yes, we’re starting with the one you probably know best. There are real estate professionals who use YouTube to show off properties, but it can be used in many creative ways—market information reports, homeowner how-to videos, behind-the-scenes portraits of your brokerage. There are so many possibilities.
Google Voice. With Google Voice you never have to miss another call and you don’t have to widely distribute your cell phone number. That’s because this service lets you choose a phone number that will ring on your cell phone, your home phone, your office phone, or all three simultaneously, depending on the settings you choose. It can screen your calls, transcribe your voicemail messages and even allow you to set up different outgoing voicemail messages, depending on who’s calling. You can port your existing cell number and use it as your Google Voice number or your can choose a new, separate number to keep from having to publicize your cell number indiscriminately.
Google Apps for Business. What if your brokerage didn’t have to buy software or servers? What if you didn’t have to hire an IT consultant or fiddle around with upgrades, yet you and your team could have up-to-date software, customized e-mail, shared calendars, and cool collaboration tools? That’s what Google Apps for Business is all about. For a modest monthly fee, you access the software and the business tools you need online. Spend your time working rather than worrying about technology.
Google Calendar. Google Calendar helps you stay organized by offering you a desktop calendar that syncs automatically with the calendar on your smartphone. You can make your calendar available to business partners and family members, and you can receive event reminders as e-mail or text messages. It syncs with Outlook on Windows and iCal on the Mac so everyone can use it.
Google Places. When someone searches on Google for you—or another real estate company—Google pulls whatever it can find on the web and presents it to the searcher. But you can take control of what Google displays by registering for Google Places. Google Places lets you personalize what the searcher sees. It’s like a Yellow Pages ad but better because you can include photos, information about how you market homes, or whatever else might be relevant to your customers. It’s got great backend tools too, that let you analyze who’s searching for you. And like so many of Google’s products, it’s free.
Google Alerts. With Google Alerts, you can know what bloggers, the press, or the general public is saying about you or your brokerage. Enter a search term in Google Alerts. Whenever a news story, blog post, or video is added to the Internet that would appear among the top ten search results, Google alerts you. Use it to find out what people are saying about you, to find out what your competitors are doing, or to keep abreast of changes in the industry.
Adwords. Write an ad. Choose the Google search terms (also know as “keywords”) that best suit your brokerage. Have your ad appear alongside Google search results when someone searches for your chosen keywords. Pay only when someone clicks on your ad up to your budgeted amount. It’s simple to use and has the potential to drive lots of new visitors to your site.
Gmail Canned Responses. If you frequently send the same information to people who e-mail you, you might want to try Gmail Canned Responses. Canned Responses lets you compose a message, save it, and send it over and over again as needed. For example, if you frequently send the same e-mail response to prospects asking about a home you’re marketing, you could put that information in a Canned Response and send it out as needed with just a few keystrokes. It’s even possible to set up Gmail filters so that a Canned Response goes out automatically in response to certain e-mail messages. What could be easier?
Google Docs. Google Docs lets you store documents in the cloud and access them wherever you happen to be from any computer. No need to carry files around on a flash drive or move them around from one computer to another. Instead, upload your PDFs, Word documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings, or forms to Google Docs and access them whenever you need them. Google Docs also lets you give share your stored files with others and work on them together in real time.

So, what’s your favorite Google tool?

If you’re ever had your e-mail hacked into, you know how frustrating the situation can be. Friends, family members, and clients are getting rogue messages from you that you didn’t send and it can be a headache to get things back to normal.

Your e-mail system has a number of safeguards in place to make harder for someone to hack your e-mail and easier for your to regain control of it—but the safeguards can only work if you’re taken the time in advance to set them up well.

So right now, run this check to be sure your e-mail is secure.

Change your password. When’s the last time you changed the password you’re currently using. The longer the use the same password, the longer a potential hacker has to figure it out.
Choose a strong password. Select a password that’s at least 8 characters long and has a mix of upper and lowercase letters, numbers and special characters. Make sure it’s not a give-away like “password” or “123456.” Also, it should not be a name, a birthdate, or a word found in the dictionary. Check out our earlier post on how to create and remember a strong password.
Review your security questions. If you can’t remember the answers, they won’t be able to help you if you need to reset your password. Choose new questions and answers now if you need to.
Check your backup email. Make sure you still have access to your secondary email account, the one they’ll send a message to if you get locked out of your primary account. If necessary, set up a new secondary account or arrange for reset information to be sent to your cellphone.

If someone does manage to hack into your email, follow the three steps on our sister blog to get things back to normal.

As a real estate professional, one of your on-going tasks is self-promotion. You always want to make sure people know what you do and how to contact you if they ever want to buy or sell real estate. On the one hand, you’re always looking for ways to circulate your business cards and keep your name and contact information in front of lots of people. On the other hand, you—like all of us—want to discourage junk e-mail. These two goals, it seems, are mutually exclusive.

Most Internet security experts will tell you that the best way to minimize spam is to avoid the wide distribution of your e-mail address. They say things like don’t post your business card in public places and don’t drop it in that fishbowl when you’re visiting a restaurant. To avoid getting unsolicited e-mail, they say, you’ve got to keep your e-mail address as private as possible and only share it with your closest friends and associates. But people who are in business for themselves can’t really survive that way.

It’s a delicate balance, but there are things you can do:

Have a separate e-mail address for business. Never use your business e-mail to make Internet purchases or to participate in online forums or discussions.
Consider having some business cards printed that don’t include your e-mail address. These will be the ones you post in public places and distribute widely. If someone in possession of one of these cards needs to reach you, he or she can always call you.
If you have control over your website, make sure your e-mail address does not appear there for web bots to harvest. Instead have your webmaster create a form that prospects can complete and send if they need to contact you.
Also, find out from your webmaster what kind of spam filter you have and how to configure it so doesn’t inadvertently block e-mails you want to receive.
Never reply to suspicious e-mails. Instead, mark them as spam or delete them.

Discount marketing is all the rage and companies like Groupon and Living Social are growing fast by offering consumers discount deals on goods and services in all kinds of industries. This week, Groupon and Chicago-based Dream Town Realty have teamed up to offer a real estate discount. According to Dream Town, they’re the first residential real estate company to offer a deal like this on Groupon.

Here’s how it works: Consumers pay $25 for the Groupon. If 50 people purchase the $25 Groupon, each of them will receive $1000 back at closing. (If fewer than 50 people participate, the deal is off. But if more than 50 people participate, all will get the cash back as there is no limit to the number of Groupons available in this deal.) Buyers must close prior to 4/9/12 and sellers must list their home with Dream Town prior to that date. The minimum transaction price is $150,000.

As of this writing, with some 4½ days left before the deal expires, only 7 more people need to sign up in order for it to fly. Odds are, the deal will be on. The question is whether Groupon can give this brokerage a significant business boost in the midst of the current real estate downturn. We’ll all be watching to see how it works.