Herman Chan at 2011 Inman Connect, San Francisco, CA = Conference Highlight - 07/29/11 02:20 PM
By far, the highlight of the conference for me was Herman Chan's presentation on vlogging and video.  
I took some videos with my iPhone.  Hopefully they came out well.  He is ABSOLUTELY hilarious!

… (3 comments)

Update from the 2011 Inman News Conference - July 2011 - 07/29/11 02:15 PM
I am here in San Francisco at Inman Connect which is the "trade" conference for real estate. There are very few agents here, a number of brokers and franchises, and a lot of real estate technology companies. This is probably the 6th or 7th Inman news conference I have been to. It's great to connect with old friends and colleagues and to meet new people and potential partners as well. Can anyone guess the focus of the conference? Yup, social media. Mobile was also big.
The conference had some great and compelling speakers:
Emily White, Sr Director of Local at FaceBook … (4 comments)

Has ActiveRain Gotten You on Television? - 07/29/11 11:08 AM
The power of ActiveRain!  This is the second or third member story I have seen where blogging on ActiveRain has actually gotten a member on television.  Way to go Debbie!
Any other stories where blogging has gotten you increased exposure like television or the newspaper?
 
Via Debbie Gartner - Westchester Flooring -Hardwood Floors Carpet Tile Refinish - (Floor Coverings International Westchester NY & Fairfield CT):
Now, this was lucky.  One of my customers found my blog, and she is selling her home in Yonkers.  It had been on the market for a year and they decided to take a break, … (4 comments)

How Different is Social Networking from Real World Professional Networking? - 07/28/11 06:28 PM
Interesting post from one of the gurus of real estate coaching Mike Ferry.
I am currently at the Inman News conference and the core topic is ...  yes you guessed it ... social networking.
One of the speakers said that social networking is actually the same as personal and professional networking in the real world.  As Mike mentions below, if he were to use a bullhorn to yell out to 100,000 agents, he probably won't have a great conversion from prospects to customers.  But when he actually uses personal communication, he has a much higher conversion rate.
 What do you think?
… (4 comments)

Key Steps to Success with ActiveRain - 07/25/11 06:15 PM
This is a great post from Abe and others at ActiveRain on some of the core activities on how to be successful with ActiveRain and your RainMaker account.  Take a couple of minutes and flip through.  
I believe this is very valuable information and worthy of a re-blog to get the word out to help others be successful!
Via Abe Schmidt - ActiveRain Real Estate Social Media Trainer (ActiveRain):
Use the below Guide to jumpstart your page, your profile, and your personal website using ActiveRain. This is a collection put together by a previous co-worker and I truly believe you all … (10 comments)

Inman Real Estate Connect in San Francisco - 07/25/11 01:06 AM
Anyone planning on attending Inman News Real Estate Connect this week in San Francisco?  If so, let's plan on meeting on Wednesday July 27 at 5:15pm at Cocktails@Connect.
Leave a comment here so I can know to look out for you.
Niki
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Celebrate the Life of Fearless Blogger Jen Goodman Linn, the Founder of Cycle For Survival - 07/22/11 12:29 AM
It is with very heavy heart that I write to inform you that Jen Goodman Linn, the wife of David Linn, passed away yesterday at the age of 40 after a long battle with a rare form of cancer (abdominal sarcoma). Jen and Dave met in business school and have been together for the past twelve years or so at this point.  Both Dave and Jen are dear friends of my entire family and most of my friends from business school. 
One of the first blog posts I wrote when I started at ActiveRain in April was on "Loved Ones Battling Cancer"  Jen was diagnosed with a … (5 comments)

Stop Duplicate Titles! - 07/21/11 11:53 PM
In our efforts to keep ActiveRain highly SEO friendly and to get our member blogs to the top of the search engines, we are working with a well-known SEO consultant here in Seattle.  As I had mentioned previously, Google is frequently running its user experience and content optimization algorithm called Panda.  Panda targets content farms and duplicate content and then ranks those site lower in the search results as Google believes that those sites have search spam.
Our consultant Susan found a number of interesting things within the 3 million pages of content indexed by the search engines.   
MANY of our members will publish … (135 comments)

ARU Webinar: How to Win Friends and Influence Others - ActiveRain Style! - 07/18/11 07:07 PM
Everyone!  This is the single most important webinar on ActiveRain in terms of being successful.   Getting exposure for yourself and your blog on ActiveRain and in social media will accelerate your business.  Make a priority to attend!!!
Via Rich Jacobson Your Kitsap County WA Real Estate Broker (WindermereRE/West Sound, Inc.):
Back by popular demand, the highly acclaimed Live ActiveRain University webinar:
"How to Win Friends and Influence People - ActiveRain Style!"
(okay, so maybe 'highly acclaimed' is a bit of a stretch. But my Mom liked it!)
Join me, Rich Jacobson, this coming Wednesday at 9AM (PST) when together we will discover the … (3 comments)

ActiveRain Lunch MeetUp at Dos Caminos at the Palazzo in Las Vegas, NV - 07/15/11 07:23 PM
I am here in Las Vegas celebrating a friend decision to move from San Francisco to Singapore later in the summer.  I posted on Tuesday that I would be coming into town and six Rainers rallied to meet me for lunch at the Palazzo on short notice.
Just finished up a fantastic lunch at Dos Caminos.  Attendess included Shack Diva Renee Burrows, her husband Mike, Vegas Bob Swetz, Nicole and Starr Needham, Tara Phelps, and John Brassner.  We had a great time talking about best practices on ActiveRain, what ActiveRain can do / should do better (John felt like we need a … (6 comments)

Cast Your Vote...Pretty Please - 07/13/11 02:47 PM
Rainers,
If you love ActiveRain, take a minute and vote for ActiveRain for the Inman News 2011 People's Choice Innovator Award.   Voting ends on July 22, but don't wait until the last minute.
Niki
Via Kerrie Greenhalgh (ActiveRain, Community Builder):
Inman News is holding their annual voting poll for the 2011 People's Choice Innovator Award.  "The People's Choice award is intended to recognize a standout real estate-related technology".  
Hmmmm.....which Community do I know that standouts from the rest?  Ok, so it has to be real-estate related.....ok...um...geez....this is a toughie.....NOT!!!!!!  ActiveRain baby!!!
Voting ends Friday, July 22nd so cast your vote for ActiveRain your … (4 comments)

Real Estate Nightmares? - 07/13/11 02:36 PM
As many of you know, I am a reality TV junkie  (I am the moderator of the Real Housewives Group on ActiveRain if anyone is interested.)  I love Kitchen Nightmares on FOX with Gordon Ramsey.
A friend of mine posted the below on FaceBook.  Seems like ActiveRain would be a great place to launch a Real Estate Nightmares reality TV show :)
Niki

… (5 comments)

Mini-Meet Me: Lunching in Las Vegas on July 15th - 07/13/11 01:20 AM
Everyone,
I will be in Las Vegas this Friday July 15th and I would LOVE to meet any Rainers in Las Vegas for lunch. 
I would love an opportunity to meet and talk about ActiveRain and real estate - what works, what doesn't work, what can ActiveRain do better, and what can I do better to serve the community.
We'll be meeting at the Palazzo near registration at 12:30pm this Friday July 15th. 
Please comment below if you can make it.  Leave your cell in the comments so we can text you in the event that we head to lunch before … (40 comments)

Meet Our New VP of Sales Kate Yackley - 07/11/11 07:56 PM
Hi Everyone,
Big news here at ActiveRain.  Last week, we welcomed 6 new people to ActiveRain (more to follow), one of whom is Kate Yackley who is our VP of Sales.  Kate comes from an incredible background leading sales at Dreambox Learning, Onvia and Dun & Bradstreet.  Kate is a real sparkplug and we are loving her energy.  Kate will be leading up both sales and member services.
Click here to see Kate's Blog.
Welcome Kate to the neighborhood!
Niki
… (6 comments)

Issues with Images Should Be Resolved Now - 07/11/11 05:57 PM
Everyone,
The issues with the images on ActiveRain should be resolved now.
For those of you who want a more detailed explanation, here is a recap:
On Saturday, one of the seven ActiveRain servers named app4 started acting funny. When we were notified, app4 was restarted at approximately 7pm PST. When app4 was restarted, a directory on app4 that stored the location of certain images was disturbed. On Sunday and early Monday morning, members who were connecting to app4 were unable to see images recently uploaded to ActiveRain.  The load balancer which is managed RackSpace controls to which server a member … (7 comments)

Google Wonder Wheel is No Longer Available - 07/05/11 08:43 PM
A friend of mine just forwarded me this article.  Google has taken down the Google Wonder Wheel with no plans or definitive timing to bring it back. 
http://searchengineland.com/official-the-google-wonder-wheel-is-gone-84105
For those of you who enjoyed using the Google Wonder Wheel, the next best thing will be to go to Google Adwords, open up an account, and use the keyword tool. 
Any other ideas for visual tools for finding the right keywords to target?
Niki
 
… (17 comments)

How to Receive Professional Referrals from ActiveRain - 07/03/11 12:22 PM
Great example of How to Receive Professional Referrals from ActiveRain by Nevin Williams of San Diego, CA and Carla Muss Jacobs of Portland, OR.
Members of ActiveRain that blog and comment consistently and give back to the community WILL receive professional referrals from the community. 
Give and ye shall receive!
If you have referral partners in the "real world", go the extra step and GET THEM ON ACTIVERAIN!  It will help your business and theirs as well.
Niki
Via Nevin Williams, America's best mortgage pro! (First Priority Financial, San Diego jumbo & conventional ):
I got a call from this Active Rain member who referred me to … (8 comments)

New Compact Scanner from Kodak - The Kodak Scanmate i920 - 07/02/11 10:04 AM
I am trying to go paperless in my own life.  My work desk is getting cleaner, but home office is still a disaster - ask my wife. I love scanning my receipts for tax purposes and so my wife can keep track of me (she sees the credit card bills anyways). I have started scanning everything that I can to file it.  Anyways, this new scanner from Kodak seems cool. 
 I will have to check it out when it comes out.
Via Kodak Real Estate Solutions ~ Mark Walser (Eastman Kodak Company):
Hello Activerain,
Well over the past year many of you have requested to be notified when Kodak … (7 comments)

Technology Update: July 1st - 07/02/11 01:13 AM
Happy Fourth of July Everyone!
Quiet week at ActiveRain this week.  Due to the upcoming long weekend, we have not made any major changes or pushes.  We have a couple of internal system changes queued up for next week. 
We have experienced some slowness in the past on ActiveRain.  This has required us restarting several of the servers, which quickly addressed the situation.
Otherwise, enjoy the weekend and your barbeques.  But remember to get those blogs out there!   
Niki
… (9 comments)

Zip Realty and Redfin: Did Zip Realty Fail? Why Did We All Worry About "Rebate Companies"? - 07/02/11 12:55 AM
I don't if others saw the news today, but ZipRealty announed the end of buyer rebates.  I wonder if Redfin will follow suit.  It has been an incredibly hard real estate market.  As both companies strive to increase revenue and reduce costs, it seems like the employee agent and the homebuyer rebate are becoming things of the past.
Via Karen Fiddler, Broker/Realtor, Mission Viejo ((949)510-2395,The Fiddler Realty Team/eVantage Real Estate):
Zip Realty and Redfin: Did Zip Realty Fail? Why Did We All Worry About "Rebate Companies"?

Zip Realty recently announced that they are going through significant restructuring. They are no longer using … (8 comments)

 
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Nikesh Parekh

Nikesh Parekh (CEO of ActiveRain)

Bellevue, WA

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