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Via Jeremy Blanton (ActiveRain Corp.): Today is an exciting day for ActiveRain as we release a great new feature. As of today, you now have the ability to add a signature line to all of your blog posts automatically! Many of our members have the same tagline or image that they like to use on each & every blog post. With this new feature, you are able to create your own custom signature line that will automatically appear on every post you write.
How It Works
You will write your signature/tagline/footer once & save it. Then whenever you post something new to your blog, it will appear at the bottom of that post. You can place all of your about me information as well as any other buttons, icons, or custom signature pictures that you may use into this block. It will save you lots of time.
Before, to add your custom signature, you would have to copy & paste the signature from an old post into the new one. And if you used something containing HTML, the process was even more laborious. All of that work has been simplified into one easy step now.
How to Set Up Your Signature
Start by logging into your account. Then, click on the Settings tab along the left side. You will then scroll down to the signature box that will look similar to this:
Fill in the signature box with whatever information you wish to have shown in your signature. Remember, whatever information you place in this box will be shown on ALL of your posts. So take that into consideration when placing the information in this box. You do not want to put something like "for more information on this listing, contact me" because all your blog posts are not listings. This box allows you to insert HTML codes, images, & links along with your content, so be sure to take full advantage of these.
On the other hand, DO NOT ABUSE THE SIGNATURE! If you place too many graphics & videos & paragraphs upon paragraphs of information with links, you will slow down the loading speed of your blog. Also, if your signature lines are 3 times the length of your posts, then consumers will be turned off. They visit your blog for information & quality content. If instead of finding bunches of content they only find small bits followed by giant signatures, they will lose interest in your blog & move onto someone else.
Once you have filled in the signature box with the information, be sure to click the update button below. If not, your new signature masterpiece will not be saved & will not show up when you visit your blog to preview.
The Final Result?
After clicking update, visit your blog & see your new work of art. I hope that our members are as excited about this new feature as I am! Please do me a favor, after setting up your own custom signature, stop back by this post & leave a comment witha link to yours so we can all view the new masterpieces.
Here is mine:
Via Brad Andersohn ~ Community Builder (ActiveRain): How To Backup and Export Your Blog Posts - ActiveRain NEW Feature
On August 18 @ noon CST, we launched the ability for members to export all of their blog entries to a single, compressed XML file. Its open nature will allow for the development of third-party import tools.
Exporting your posts from ActiveRain has been a long awaited feature that is now available to all members. The format is XML and can be manipulated in many different ways which I'll demonstrate in future posts. Special thanks to our tech team for making this possible. This new feature will allow you to backup and export your Blog posts with a single click.
The first thing you are probably asking yourself is what the heck is XML? Read more at XML.com
Here are the simple steps to download your ActiveRain Blog File
Step 1:
Log in to ActiveRain
Step 2:
Click on your "My Home" link in the upper right hand corner of your screen
Step 3:
Scroll to the bottom of the screen and click on the link "Export Blog Entries"
Note: Depending on what computer you are running (IE: Mac, PC) and what operating system, the next window that pops up may appear slightly different, but it will be the same principle. You are saving a file to a specified location on your computer.
Step 4:
The pop-up window below will appear. Select "Save File" to your desktop, and click OK.
Step 5:
You will have a zipped or compressed file on your desktop containing the XML file with all your Blog entries.
(if file is not on desktop, check the location you saved it to, often times it will default to your "Downloads" folder located in your "My Computer" folder.)
Step 6:
When you "Double Click" on the zipped file, it will extract the .XML file to your desktop
Step 7:
To open and view this file, or to use with any XML compatible formats and programs, right click your mouse on it and select the program you wish to open it in. For this example, I am going to use a simple text editor application on my computer called TEXT EDIT.
Step 8:
You can now see the XML format of your entire ActiveRain Blog.
Now don't go passing out on me (LOL~) understand that XML formats are a complex and more complicated format than most of us are used to working with or seeing, however, there will be a multitude of ways that this data can be used by other programs and sources. You cannot hurt your ActiveRain Blog by messing around and experimenting with this file. It is already exported from AR to your computer and will not affect your AR blog in any way. You have now successfully downloaded and backed up your entire ActiveRain Blog and every post in it.
I'll try and post some more advanced information on ways this can be used in the near future, but for now, at least you know how to access and download it to your computer. Baby steps, just baby steps before we show you how to run the 100 yard dash with it. I'm sure there will be many questions, and ideas generated by this post, so please feel free to leave your comments and thoughts. I'll do my best to get your questions answered in an accurate and timely manner.
Starting today at 12pm Pacific Time, every time you post a blog on ActiveRain and you also send it to your Raindexed Blog (outside blog), a link will be attached to the bottom of the blog post. The link will say 'Originally posted on (name of blog): (title of post)' ![]()
This is designed to show the Search engines the authority source of your content, that being the post on your custom domain Raindex Blog. This will help the search engines start to move from indexing the post on your ActiveRain blog and give a higher probability they will index it on your Raindex Blog (if you have one and you posted your post out there of course)
It's also just a great link out to your Raindexed (outside) blog for all posts on ActiveRain that have been syndicated there.
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After a few weeks of glitches in our points system, we have finally been able to repair most of the major glitches. Points should now be working close to 100%. There still is one minor issue that we are aware of and need your assistance in correcting. It appears that if you go back and edit posts that have previously been published that the system is deducting points from your total. We are working hard to correct this issue but need detailed examples to get this issue fully solved. If you have an exact example please post in the comment section below in detail to assist our developers in correcting this issue.
The major loophole that was allowing some people to post more than 10 posts in a week and receive points for all posts has been closed. It is now back to 10 posts per week, 10 comments per day with 200 points awarded for posts and an additional 25 points if you put it in a channel and 25 points per comment left.
One major change that has taken place is the schedule for posts. The posting week now starts at Monday at 12:00:00am and ends Sunday at 11:59:59pm.
If you are experiencing the glitch above please post in the comment section below. Also, please do not flood this post with amount of points you have lost over the past few weeks. Those comments will be deleted to keep this post as clean as possible for our developers to track the issue and resolve. If you did experience the loss of points, use the Contact ActiveRain at the bottom of this post. Please be patient if you submit a ticket regarding lost points and condense your list to one ticket. If multiple tickets are submitted it will slow down the response time for not only this issue but other crucial parts of the network.
Thanks to everyone for your patience during this time and continued great contributions to ActiveRain!
How many times did you end up here?
more than once I hope......hahaha!
 Earlier today we received the sobering news that one of our community members has recently died in a tragic auto accident.
Mohamed Mekhimar, an agent with RE/MAX Commonwealth in Richmond VA died early Monday, Jan. 19, in an automobile crash on Pole Green Road, near the Mechanicsville Turnpike.
According to sources at the Hanover County Sheriff’s Office, Mohamed Mekhimar was killed around 5:50am when his 2005 Honda CRV ran off the right shoulder and struck a utility pole. He was pronounced dead at the scene. No other vehicles were involved in the crash, speed was not a factor, and he was wearing his seat belt.
Mohamed joined ActiveRain in early August of 2006 and quickly achieved the Featured Agent status for Richmond VA.
Our deepest condolences and sympathies go out to his family and friends.
Today, Active Rain unveils the New and totally revamped Localism, "The World's Most Complete Neighborpedia," with new content, features and design!
The New Localism
ActiveRain, real estate's leading online community, has released a dramatically updated version of its Localism neighborhood portal, where local residents, potential residents, and area merchants connect. Billed as the "World's Most Complete Neighborpedia," Localism already contains over 200,000 articles and photos. The site opened up to contributions from ActiveRain members today and will be accepting contributions from other local merchants and consumers beginning in August.
 "No one has captured the essence and flavor of local communities online on a large scale," said Jonathan Washburn, CEO of Active Rain. "All the data points, pie charts, graphs and widgets in the world can't tell the complete story of a place. It takes content from the people who live and work there – which we have in abundance – to bring things to life. There are plenty of local review sites out there, but we're going beyond that to capture the full range of things that make communities unique."
The site, which covers the entire United States, allows users to go well beyond the typical city or ZIP code level to explore specific niche communities. Moreover, Localism manages to the avoid the proverbial "chicken and egg" dilemma that many who have attempted to enter this space have faced, due to its vast store of existing content and already impressive search engine performance, which helped deliver over 280,000 visits in June.
Key Attributes
Some of the key attributes to Localism include:
"Top Neighbors". The top content contributors for each neighborhood are ranked and displayed as the "Top Neighbors" for their community.
Unique photographs. Localism features over 100,000 photos of communities that cannot be found on any other site.
Human editorial involvement. ActiveRain editors will manually review every single article to ensure that they add value to their intended community and audience.
Community sponsorships. Real estate professionals and other business people may purchase sponsorships of one or more communities within Localism for a small monthly fee.
"Our growing Active Rain community of over 95,000 real estate professionals knows America's communities down to the last speed bump and corner store," said ActiveRain community evangelist Bob Stewart. "Their collective knowledge provides us with a tremendous jump start in providing relevant, useful information and will be built upon by the contributions of consumers and merchants nationwide."
"Localism converges art and function, consumer and professional, neighbor and seeker," concludes Washburn. "This space has seen its share of failures and we've taken those to heart in creating a destination that includes all the key elements needed for true online community."
About ActiveRain
Active Rain is a real estate technology company based in the Pacific Northwest founded in 2003. The company launched its online community for real estate professionals in June of 2006 and quickly established it as the leading real estate social network. The community currently has over 95,000 members. The company released Localism in beta in 2007. The company, which has just nine employees, secured $2.75 million in funding in December of 2007.
If you've just crawled out from underneath a rock, or spent the last 6 weeks living in a cave, then you probably aren't aware of the current ActiveRain Event of the Year - the Makeover2Takeover Team Competition!
Here's a quick refresher course if you haven't been following our Weekly Challenges:
Whether your Real Estate career has just begun, or is in dire needed a complete overhaul, here's your chance!
Think "Top Chef," less the cooking.
 Or "Extreme Home Make-Over," but without Ty and his annoying megaphone.
 The Biggest Loser, only you're a Winner!
From the same folks that brought you 'Project Blogger" comes the latest reality 'realty' event....
The Contest is simple: We selected 16 'Makeover' Teams, each comprised of one (1) seasoned real estate veteran (Mentor), and their chosen apprentice. Over the course of this 8 week adventure (leading up to the 2008 SF Inman Connect), the Mentor/Apprentices (M2T Teams) are facing a series of weekly challenges, aimed specifically at developing the apprentice's image/abilities as a top performing real estate agent.
The mentors and apprentices are chronicling their experiences on the official 'MakeoverToTakeover' blog.
Competition Began: Friday, May 16th
Competition Ends: The 3rd week of July. The Winning Team will be announced at Inman's SF Blogger's Connect 2008
Weekly Challenges: Each week the Teams have been facing difficult elimination challenges designed to develop and hone the Apprentice's professional skills, and to test the Mentor's ability to teach/guide the Apprentice.
ActiveRain Members can view the Weekly Challenge Results on the official 'Makerover2Takeover' blog.
Scoring: The last three teams standing will be invited to join us at Inman Connect in San Francisco where the winning team will be announced. In addition to the final challenge, the overall body of work will also be evaluated to determine the winning team.
Judging Criteria: Each week, when that weeks challenge is announced, judging criteria will be spelled out. Our panel of distinguished Judges will score each Team based on that criteria.
Prizes: Points and prizes are awarded to the first place team for each Weekly challenge. The grand prize will be a Web2.0 Marketing package worth many 1000's of dollars. You can look forward to prizes from the who's who of online real estate.
At the end of 5 weeks of competitive elimination challenges, only 8 Teams remain:
The Huntsville Duo - Kimberly Grant & Elizabeth Ramsey Cooper
Team Tex/LA - Liz Carter & Josh Lazaro
The KW Dynamic Divas - Darleen McCullen & Penny Robinson
The DREAMWEAVERS - Debra Brooks & Melissa Grant
Team Manna - Desiree Daniels & Brian Block
The SF Bay Area Duo - Hank Perry & Vickie Nagy
The Next Evolution - Midori Miller & Jeannete Neerpat
Caulk Wood, Bonding for Success - Missy Caulk & Kim Wood
Well, another week of heated competition has gone by, and the cream of our Teams is rising to the Top! We had 15 Teams remaining going into last week's Challenge. Today, one Team will be announced the Weekly Winner, and Two Teams will be sent home.
(To find out all the details on the Week Two Challenge, GO HERE)
In a nutshell, our M2T Teams were instructed to create a 'Pre-Listing' package that could be transmitted entirely in digital format by email. Their entries were judged on aesthetics, organization, general content, and creativity/resourcefulness.
Once again, though we find many of the Teams running neck-and-neck, only one can be crowned the Weekly winner.....
~ o ~ o ~ o ~ o ~ o ~
And so, without any further gilding of the Lily....
Let's get the Bad News over with first, shall we?
The Makeover2Takeover Teams to be eliminated from competition this week are the Teams of "MFour" - Maureen Francis & Karen Moorhead, and Dawn Workman & Chelsea Miller. Once again, Ladies, thank you for your participation and effort. We will be awarding each of you points for your involvement, as well as a token of our appreciation to follow later.
~ o ~ o ~ o ~ o ~ o ~
And now, for the winner of the Week One Challenge.....drumroll, please!
The Team to win the Week Two Challenge is the Team "Next Evolution" - Apprentice Jeanette Neerpat and Mentor Midori Miller!
 
Congratulations, Jeanette and Midori!
And to all the other Team Contestants, congratulations as well. you're onto the Week Three Challenge which will be announced later today!
For all the members of ActiveRain, make sure to voice your words of encouragement and appreciation to all the Makeover2Takeover Teams!
Tomorrow morning when you wake up, our site will probably have a bunch of bugs.
Now that we have the bad news out of the way.............how about some great news! The site should be twice as fast because we are going to have twice as much computing power behind it. Tonight, we will be transitioning the site to all new, state-of-the-art servers. This will be the final step of a six month process where we have invested time and resources to bring stability and speed to ActiveRain.
This doesn't mean we are going to stop here because ActiveRain is quickly growing. We will no doubt start our next round of performance enhancements soon as it's a never ending cycle for a rapidly growing site.
The Details:
ActiveRain will be taken offline tonight at Midnight Pacific Standard Time and will be down for at least five hours. This is a MAJOR undertaking and some components are very difficult to test in a staging environment so we do expect a fair amount of bugs.
As you encounter bugs tomorrow, please use the 'Contact ActiveRain' link at the bottom of any page to report the issue. The more thorough you are in reporting the bug, the more quickly we can remedy the situation. In reporting your issue, please include what browser type and version you are using.
We want to apologize in advance for the inconvenience this may cause you.
Godspeed,
SS ActiveRain
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