I love St Patty's Day! I take pride in celebrating my 1/8 bit of Irish heritage. :)

In the spirit of Saint Patrick's Day, here's a blessing for you -

May your pockets be heavy-
Your heart be light
And may good luck pursue you
Each morning and night

And some humor for ya-

Two Irishmen, Patrick Murphy and Shawn O'Brian grew up together and were lifelong friends. But alas, Patrick developed cancer, and was dying. While on his deathbed, Patrick called to his buddy, Shawn, "O'Brian, come 'ere. I 'ave a request for ye." Shawn walked to his friend's bedside and kneels.

"Shawny ole boy, we've been friends all our lives, and now I'm leaving 'ere. I 'ave one last request fir ye to do."

O'Brian burst into tears, "Anything Patrick, anything ye wish. It's done."

"Well, under me bed is a box containing a bottle of the finest whiskey in all of Ireland.  Bottled the year I was born it was. After I die, and they plant me in the ground, I want you to pour that fine whiskey over me grave so it might soak into me bones and I'll be able to enjoy it for all eternity."

O'Brian was overcome by the beauty and in the true Irish spirit of his friend's request, he asked, "Aye, tis a fine thing you ask of me, and I will pour the whiskey. But, might I strain it through me kidneys first?"

Have a fantastic Saint Patrick's Day!

Do you Poken? If you are not sure what I mean by that, I want to introduce you to my latest tech-gadget rave... the Poken. In this recent post on my other Real Estate Virtual Assistant blog, I raved about the Poken and how I think this is the coolest tech gadget of the moment. Now I want to be sure to share it with all of you cool Active Rain folks. (links on where to get one at the bottom of this post)

What is this cute little thing called the Poken? Quite simply, it is a digital business card. This digitial business card will not only carry and share all of your contact information, but also all of your social networks profiles as well. When you come upon someone else with a Poken, you simply touch the little hands together, (or "high 4" as the Poken people call it) and viola, contact information has been instanly exchanged. How cool is that?

Over on my blog, The BVAS Connection, I give a more in-depth review of the Pokens. Plus I made a little video showing them off which you can see here:

Some may call me a geek-girl, and proudly I agree. I get especially geeky when it comes to cool tech gadgets that I see they will simplify aspects of my business and that of my clients. These Pokens can do just that.

• No more reprinting business cards when you change one of your phone numbers or address. Just update your Poken and it updates all who connected with you. (very GREEN)
  
• No more jotting down your social network profile links on the back of a business card or napkin.You can put as many as you want on there.
  

Where do you get a Poken? Be sure to check out the following vendors that sell Pokens here in the states.

• Start Poken
• Poken Zoo
• Poken Girl
• findapoken

And if you ever run into me in person, be sure to Poken with me!

I've been having some fun over at my regular blog, The BVAS Connection. We've done some remodeling over there and I thought I would do a quick post over here on my AR blog that I've been neglecting so badly. (SORRY ActiveRain blog. Let's kiss and make up, OK?) 

Today I wanted to share my latest short video, introducing my little office partner. He brightens each and every day while I work in my home office, and he will hopefully become a good little assistant someday.

I promise to try not to be a stranger here on ActiveRain anymore!

Ever have a problem nailing down showing agents by phone trying to get showing feedback for your listings? Playing phone tag, or dealing with a fellow agent who is annoyed with the fact you called to bother them is never fun. (Been there, done that.) Then some of the online feedback systems either cost to much and offer too little.

Well today I wanted to share a great tool to help your showing feedback results. And best of all it is FREE! The program is www.ShowingFeedback.com, and my agent client and I had recently stumbled upon it when looking for cost effective showing feedback solutions.

ShowingFeedback.com allows you to create and send short surveys to agents that show your listings, and then give access to your sellers to review the reports and comments that have been left by the agents. To use you simply enter your listings and seller's information into the system, and when there is a new showing, add the agent's information and a showing feedback is sent back to the agent. So far in using it the past few weeks we have seen about a 90% response rate from the showing agents and we are very impressed. And of course, the sellers like getting direct notification of their showing activity and feedback.

And did I mention that this was free? Give it a try, you have nothing to lose!

Does anybody have any feedback on the company, ushud.com? (also known as allhud.com, hudworks.com, Heavy Hammer Inc.,etc.) I have an agent client that who has recently signed up to be an "exclusive agent" with ushud.com, and I want to see if this system will really be worth it for them for the price.

I know that AR has many sales people on here associated with the ushud.com/Heavy Hammer company, but I want to hear from the actual users. I don't want to hear from the sales people. What I am looking for some real honest feedback from real agents that have worked with them.

So ushud.com users, past and present:

• Are you receving the amount of leads promised from them?
  
• Are the leads you receive/received from ushud.com quality leads?
  
• Have you had additional closings directly related to the leads received from ushud.com?

Feel free to comment here, or email me privately at megan@barbervasolutions.com. I appreciate any comments or feedback you can provide me.

I always look out for the best interests of my clients, and want to make sure they get the best ROI on all of their marketing efforts. I am not always sold on these types of lead selling systems, but if it is worth it to them, then I am all for it.

Though internet marketing has taken up the forefront of many Realtor marketing plans, many agents still find success by regularly marketing to their prospects and sphere of influence via direct mail marketing. The ultimate goal is to continually stay in front of you past & present clients, prospects, and farm, so that they remember you when it’s time to talk real estate. So what are YOU doing to stay in front of your sphere?

The Fall is a great time for marketing, with many ideas or excuses for you to reach out and touch your prospects. And it is always helpful to send them something of value, that they would appreciate and hold on to. The following are a couple ideas to get you going on your fall marketing.

1. Fall Events Calendar - Send your sphere a postcard containing fun fall events going on in your neighborhood or town. Let them know about the hayrides, pumpkin displays, fall festivals, or costume contests going on in your area. And be sure to attend some of those events to meet your prospects and show them that you are not ALL about real estate ALL of the time.
2. Fall Time Change Reminder - The most popular fall time marketing opportunity is the fall time change reminder. It is a simple thing, but clients appreciate it, and it’s a great excuse to get in front of your contacts.
3. Winterizing Tips - Homeowners appreciate a good home improvement tip. Remind your clients to keep one of their biggest investments, in top shape. Before the sting of winter takes it’s hold, send your clients a few tips on how to winterize their homes and get ready for freezing temperatures.
4. Thanksgiving - Sending Thanksgiving wishes seems almost an obvious choice for fall marketing, but I recommend you do it with twist. Use it as a client appreciation opportunity and work out a discount coupon with a favorite local shop or restaurant (local business love cross promotion). To “give thanks” to your sphere, they can bring the postcard to said local business, and appreciate a discount on you. You may even get extra cards printed for that partnering business to display for you.

Do those get your creative juices flowing? Need to know how to implement something like this? Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions has your answer. Let us coordinate your fall postcard marketing with our custom designs and we arrange the printing and mailing for you too!

Announcing our “Pre-Vacation” Special - Order your Fall Time Change postcard from one of our exclusive designs before the deadline on October 6th, 2008*, and receive 10% off the design fees we normally charge. Contact Megan for more details on this and other postcard marketing opportunities.

*Orders received after October 6th for the fall time change are not guaranteed to be sent out in the proper time. Please act fast!

© Megan E. Barber, Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions, LLC

Megan Barber is a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, owner of Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions, LLC, and publisher of The REAL Advantage E-Zine. Megan has spent over 10 years doing the “behind-the-scenes” work in the real estate industry assisting agents with their real estate marketing and transaction needs.

To me this story is dispicable: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/laland/2008/05/report-californ.html Just another great example of the fiscally responsible politicians we have. 

I know that there are people that are truly vicitms in this whole foreclosure mess and I do feel bad for them. But then there are others that have either simply made bad decisions at the peak of the market, or have been blatently irresponsible.  The sad thing is we ALL will probably end up bailing them out.

My Craig's List issues won't seem to die. I awoke this morning to several new comments in my inbox on a subject that seems to have been revived from Part 1 and Part 2 of my venting on flag happy people on Craig's List.

Last night it looked like someone decided to to bring their anti-Realtor battle to my Active Rain blog (comments in part 1), via what I call "drive by" commenting. Apparently I am too dimwitted to understand that CL is apparently only for the little guy and non-commercial people. And then there was the usual excerpt from the TOS that was meant to back up their claim.

I left my own follow up comment there, but really, I can tell them the same thing over and over about how my agents ads have never violated the TOS, blah, blah, blah. They will never really listen or understand. For someone who calls me out as dimwitted, they fail to research and understand the facts and only look foolish themselves. Quoting that same TOS passage over and over again does not help them as there are so many holes in that argument, it's not funny.

So they want to bring their battle to Active Rain?  I haven't the time to waste on this, but if Smitty is brave enough to engage the AR community, good luck with that.

Unfortunately Craig's List was not worth the harassment and time spent to keep reposting for my clients in the Santa Fe market area, and have since moved on to using only Backpage.com. We still us CL for other market areas, but Santa Fe CL is hopeless.

I'm sure many of you that read the news or frequent the Drudge Report like I do, came across this little gem in the news: Unhappy home buyer, feeling misled on price, sues agent. The fact that this was on Drudge made me groan in disgust.

Now I must say in my whiniest of "Meredith Gray" voices (from TV show Gray's Anatomy)... Seriously? It has come to this? Seriously?

There are so many things wrong with this article, one of which being RE/MAX is written totally wrong (an annoying pet peeve of mine). And the whole slant of this article seems to paint picture that the "big bad Realtors" have found another way to scam the consumers through the use of buyer agency. This whole thing is preposterous.

Not being a Realtor myself, but an educated consumer, I do know how to do my due diligence when selecting a neighborhood and examining the sold prices in the area by viewing public records.  It does take a little bit of work, but that is the right way to do it. One's laziness or stupidity is no one's fault but their own.

Really, I am getting so sick of this litigious society in which we live, and how the solution is blaming anyone else you can for your own stupidity is beyond me.

Hello 2008! 

New Year, New Start. It's the time of year where people traditionally make resolutions and set personal and professional goals. I have occasionally done this year after year, but this time I'll add a little more accountability by putting it out there for people to see

2008 may be a little over a week old so some may think that I am a little late at making my goals, but goal #1 was to make my goals for 2008 so here goes.

Professional goals: 

1. Finish putting together my Operations Manual (thanks for the reminder Laura) documenting all the processes of what I do each and every day
2. Finish up my Policies and Procedures Manual for my Associate VA team members and possible future in-house assistants
3. Add 1-2 more Associate VA team members to assist with more clients and allowing my business to grow
4. Develop relationships with professional web designers and graphic designers and professional copywriters to be able to enhance the services my company offers
5. Blog on my BVAS Connection blog at least 3 times a week 
6. Blog on Active Rain at least 2 times a week
7. Start a new blog geared towards advising Virtual Assistants and individuals considering starting a VA business
8. Organize, make improvements & redesign my home office to make it more functional for my needs and encourage more productivity (looking for feng shui advice)
9. Stick to my office hours, and remove myself from "work" mode after 7pm every night (a tough one for me)
10. Create a monthly newsletter to send to my clients and interested parties

Personal Goals:

1. Cut out my diet soda intake and replace by drinking at least eight 8oz glasses of water a day
2. Eat more fruit and vegetables, and less junk
3. Get out of the house and get an at least 30 minute walk 3-4 times a week
4. Shine my sink every day, and get back into a firm daily routine (FlyLady is the best).
5. Keep my house in order, one baby step at a time
6. Kiss my husband goodnight every night and thank the Lord that I have such a wonderful man in my life

I could probably go on, but these will get me started for this year. Now that I've let the world know what they are, I better hold to them. Here's to a happy and prosperous new year for us all!