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Press Release: ActiveRain Launches Nationwide Referral Exchange

For Immediate Release

ActiveRain Launches Nationwide Referral Exchange

Largest Social Networking Site For Real Estate Professionals

Creates Clearing House For National and Local Referrals

SEATTLE, July 24, 2007 - ActiveRain, the world's largest social networking site for real estate professionals, today unveiled the ActiveRain Referral Exchange, a national referral hub for ActiveRain members seeking to connect buyers and sellers to other real estate professionals outside their area.

The ActiveRain Referral Exchange, a part of the ActiveRain Real Estate Network, is a central online exchange designed to become the standard repository for referral exchanges for the real estate industry. The platform enables referring agents to communicate with other agents and review previous ActiveRain blogs to determine whether there is a good match. Any referral fees or compensation is arranged directly and confidentially between parties and is not reported to ActiveRain.

The ActiveRain Referral Exchange was designed as a stand-alone platform to enable registered ActiveRain members to connect and create profitable new business relationships. ActiveRain members include more than 35,000 real estate agents, mortgage lenders, appraisers, title company officers and other real estate professionals.

"The ActiveRain Referral Exchange is another great reason to start blogging at ActiveRain today and participate in a dynamic community helping real estate professionals generate more business, improve their business knowledge and get closer to clients," said ActiveRain CEO Matt Heaton. "With the launch of the ActiveRain Referral Exchange, frequent and articulate ActiveRain bloggers are further rewarded because referring agents can review that agent's style and local market expertise to find a referral partner."

At launch, participation in the AR Referral Exchange is free of charge. ActiveRain plans on charging a $20 monthly fee to participate in the Referral Exchange as adoption reached critical mass in certain metropolitan markets. For the remainder of 2007, that fee is being waived.

To visit the ActiveRain Referral Exchange, visit http://www.activerain.com

"The ActiveRain Referral Exchange is the next logical step in the evolution of ActiveRain and is an extension of the trust that exists among members of this community," Heaton said. "The ActiveRain Referral Exchange demonstrates the true power of Web 2.0 by making available a powerful platform that allows individuals to pursue their mutual interest on their own terms."

About ActiveRain

ActiveRain is the nation's largest social networking site for real estate professionals. More than 35,000 real estate agents, mortgage lenders, appraisers, title company officers and others in the real estate industry participate in the network to exchange ideas and generate leads. For more information, visit http://www.activerain.com/.

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Media Contacts:

Greg Berardi, 415.239.7826, greg@bluemarlinpartners.com

Posted by ActiveRain Real Estate Network on 07/24/2007 08:16 AM

Comments (83)

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83 Comments on Press Release: ActiveRain Launches Nationwide Referral Exchange

JUL

2007

Hot dog. I'm ready. I've been waiting for this. Excellent.

Thanks ActiveRain.

A great addition to the community! Thanks and keep up the great work you do with the development of this great online resource!

FYI: Just about to put up a post with more information for ActiveRain members.

I'm all in. This is exciting. Thanks AR.

This is great! I'll be anxious to watch the posting activity at the exchange and hear reports of how it's working.

Alright AR, if you've got anyone headed to or out of Idaho, including Boise, Meridian, Eagle Start, Middleton, Nampa or Caldwell get hold of me.

good job... I already caught in on the home page - great idea

Thanks for the continued improvements.

Jeff

I hadn't seen or heard of this until now, nice addition!

It looks very interesting. Looks like a great resource center.

It just keeps getting better and better!

Hoooooo Weeeeeeeee. Can't wait to hear the rest of the details.

I love referrals.

Fix the missing .com

"To visit the ActiveRain Referral Exchange, visit http://www.activerain/."

May I point out that in fact it will be an International Referral Exchange.
Canada, eh!
"The true north, strong and free"

I seldom make 1 word comments but here goes: AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Interesting idea, just how it will work will be interesting to see. I usually know where I am going to refer people when I need to do that. If you spend hours on Active Rain every day it may hurt you with referrals.

"Lets get ready to rumble!"

Referrals drive my business 80% of the time. Let's go...

Active Rain has done it again - great job! Three quick suggestions:

Enable the search settings to be saved as a default so that we don't have to select State and County each time
Enable a feature that allows us to specify what State, County and Cities we service so that the system can match a posted referral with members who service that location
Have the system send an automatic notification for any matches a matching referral is posted that there is a referral up for grabs

hmmm interesting. I have never paid to get referrals.

Matt,Caleb et,al,

With localism.com, this goes hand and hand.Where are the forms to view?

Tony,

1. Will have that done tomorrow.

2. Will put on the list of things to do.

3. Being worked on right now.

I tried to log on but got error on page --keep us posted. Want to sign up.

Looks like you guys are formalizing what has been going on for a while now. Makes all the sense in the world.

Bob Mitchell

ValueList Real Estate Services, Inc.

Interesting - how many members' already belong to a network? How will this fit in with Leading RE, Cendant and the national networks of other franchises? It would be a pretty rude awakening to find you have paid $20 a month more to put less in your pocket for going out of network.

This is great how exciting.

Very nice guys.....I'm happy to hear this is moving along!

Interesting... waiting for more info. Great idea to let agents try it out for a couple of months for free prior to making a decision to commit.

Hi Matt - Very interesting. It's fun watching from the sidelines to see what you and Jonathan are up to next.

I'm all in too!! I can't wait to get started!!

It looks like some people are posting their listings, offering to pay a referral fee if you send a buyer. Is this what the referral exchange section is intended to be??? Perhaps I am misunderstanding their post.

Refer Away....YAhoooooooooooooo!

Bring it on!!!!

I'm ready for all of your North Dallas refererrals!!!!

I think this is a great idea ! I would happily refer any clients I have to Active Rain members who I see devoting a lot of time and care to their blogs and networks. It shows dedication and conscientiousness as well as drive and ambition. Right now there does not seem to be a lot of Canadian AR members who are very active on AR, unfortunately and hence I know I will have a hard time referring through here (due to lack of active members), however hopefully that will change in time.

Right now I have a difficult time finding decent REALTORs to refer to in other areas . Sending another one out today, this time to the Downsview area of Toronto, Ontario.

I have already received referrals through ActiveRain...I'm sure this will make it even better. (Too bad there has to be a monthly fee.)

Yes it was noticed this morning and I was playing with it..thanks for the update and adding it to the features of AR.

Diana, got to make some money somehow :) We're basically charging for providing a service to help make the process easier. Sure, lots of referrals happen behind the scenes already on ActiveRain and that's just fine.

I know a lot of small real estate brokerages that have lots of referrals out of area, but have no way of placing them, hopefully this will help solve the problem.

I was thinking about recommending this. You beat me to it. Thanks this could be great!

This is wonderful news. It makes AR even more awesome! :) But the fees may deter people from signing up? But I agree you gotta make money somehow to support the expenses. I am a member on tribe and they were toying with ads, then bigger ads, people really backlashed. When I was a realtor, I was using housevalues, NEVER AGAIN! But they had a free referral services. However, the amount of money they charge for, anything should be free!

Cheers

Cindy

Ok, so tell me - with all of this great free stuff going on for us real estate people - how does active rain make it's money?

If anyone needs agents in the East Phoenix Valley and Gold Canyon Arizona area, please get ahold of us. We would love to be of service.

Cindy, we don't plan to charge for a while until we get some traction with the referral network and members can see a clear value to being involved. We also plan to keep the monthly fee fairly low to get as many people involved as possible and to keep adding tools to the referral network that will make members want to use it.

Gosh. I just had a horrible thought. How do we make sure that the referral companies/web sites don't start dumping their leads into this system.

I'm thinking there should be something like the Copyright notice that listers with a referral should verify that they are not a referral service, i.e. housevalues, etc.

Good job Matt. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. It's a very good idea BUT I already see folks just offering a referral to sale their listing. Shouldn't a referral be a buyer or a seller? Heck I already know I can find listings.

it would be nice to have an international option...it could be as simple as an "international" category.

some of us get contacted almost every day about availability of property in foreign lands.

Tony

Ditto, Lenn - Good point.

Referrals are alive and well on ActiveRain. 'Got a new one today, in fact, and expecting settlement on another this month!

On the right track, sure there will be wrinkles to iron out such as Lenns thought....will watch- so far the guys have dont fantastic work!

This is great, but are we not all kinda doing it now anyway? paper trail?

Dick Beals

This is the reason I originally joined AR. I've been using the Associates feature as a way of tracking which agents I like, for different parts of the country.

This is a great idea. I have learned a lot from AR and have read about agents who have recd referrals from AR. This will make it easier to ggive and receive referrals.

Awesome - thanks!

The abuse has started.

There's a guy in MD advertising insurance. This jewel of a web site will be worthless if it turns into an advertising rag.

Date:Status:Location:Side:Property Type:Price Range:Time Frame:Referral Quality:Referral Fee:Extra Details:

July 24, 2007

Available

Any residential neighborhood in Maryland

Buyer

Single Family

$400k to $500k

Immediate

Qualified Lead

I am looking for referrals from my local real estate community for buyers looking to partner up with the largest insurance agency in the area to take care of their homeowners insurance needs. I do not have a specific type of referral in mind, however a great start would be any of your valued real estate clients who need top-industry professionals to guide them through the insurance process. Please contact me so I can treat your clients the way you have been treating them, as family.

Matt...

Lenn is right. The abuse has already started over there.

Is there not a way to nip it in the bud?

Should we report the adverts and "call me about my listing" as spam?

By the way we will never need this feature but we will be more than happy to give you guys the 20 bucks a month :)

TLW...ROAR!

Dear Active Rain,

THANK YOU!!!!!

ActiveRain moving onward and upward!!!

Matt Pellerin
PhoenixHomes.com

AR just keeps moving forward. Great feature and great to see. Great just one more thing to check when I get online. Email, blog, blog responses, weather, Squidoo, Active Rain Referral Exchange.

Here's a thought: Maybe add an item under "My Referrals" for "My Referral Partners" or "My Frequent Referrals" where we could add other agents the same way we add "Associates"

That way we could find our favorite people quickly if we want to send them a referral directly before putting it out "to bid".

Thanks so much for all you are doing for us in the real estate industry

I know that Active Rain agents are smarter than this. The idea, as I understand it is to list REFERRALS. We have agents listing themselves. Is that appropriate????

The system, once it get's going, will be clogged with agents looking for referrals.

Referral Information Date:Status:Location:Side:Property Type:Price Range:Time Frame:Referral Quality:Referral Fee:Extra Details:

July 24, 2007

Available

Santa Clara County, CA

Both

Single Family

$700k to $1.0m

Immediate

Raw Lead

25%

Hi Active Rain Networkers,

I am a Realtor with Coldwell Banker, and I will work with any sellers and buyer's in the Santa Clara County area.

Your referral is truely appreciated, feel free to contact me if you have a client that would like to work with a fluent Cantonese or Japanese agent.

Regards,

Jack

Lenn...

I saw that and would also like to find out what's up with all of this.

Hello? Anyone manning this post? :)

TLW...ROAR!

Very cool... it's nice to see innovations like this.

http://hismove.com/blog/activeraincom-launches-referral-exchange/

On the surface this seems like a great idea, and certainly a cash cow for the site. Members and other visitors have already been using the site as a resource for referrals - without the sales pitches that are popping up.

Beneath the surface, the relocation world can get rocky. Corporations, financial institutions and third party companies will demand, and get, their referral fee regardless of other agreements that may have been made. Agents sending the same lead to multiple agents in the same location creates additional issues.

There is an abundance of real estate knowledge on this site. Tapping into that stream of ideas will hopefully result in some guidelines that benefit most everyone.

Mary "B" - Austin, Texas

Anyway to get referrals, is a good way, at least I think so..

Nice touch, can't wait,

Tom Weiss

I saw this new feature when I logged on tonight before I read the post. I already go to my associates to send out referrals, before RE/MAX now. Why ? I feel like I know them and you do through their words. But, it sounds good to me, I'm sure there will be abuse, so I guess the moderators just got a new job description.

I saw the feature on Inman News before even logging in to Active Rain. Now that's publicity! Glad Matt is doing some of the tweaking Tony suggested. Glad especially that you're working on an e-mail notification system. Would be even nicer if we could give you a separate e-mail to send those to that's more actively read.

I just checked out some of the "referrals" some people are starting to post. I don't think that they get the concept yet. There are several agents saying that they are willing to receive referrals. I think it's supposed to be a place where you give out a referral and agents apply for the specific job on a case by case basis.

I noticed this today and was so excited... thanks for the improved feature - life is good

Matt,

Thanks for the post. A formal platform will certainly help to facilitate referrals.

Call my cynical but this is a big mistake. It's already "cheapening" this site... It's unfortunate.

This is alot to digest. I am going to park for awhile and let the dust settle to see the correct way of using the referral program.

Thanks for the enhancement.

JUL

2007

I agree... I'm confused.... is it already being abused or is it intended for us to post a referral to or from a particular area?

Great! I'll have to check it out later. Right now, I've got a list of associates in various states that I would refer to.

Woo Hoo, I'm ready for this. You continue to do a wonderful job and it is very much appreciated.

Thanks,

Fran

I don't like this concept because I would never post for a referral and then depend on someone to check a message board in hopes that someone would respond. I'm one that will go out and locate the agent I have a fit with and would fit my referral client... posting a referral and waiting for a response is so passive. I, personally, don't see it working well if you're looking for a prompt response from another agent who doesn't even know you're waiting to hear from them... we'll see.

I invite you to read my blog about the new program at activerain "marc mcgee" - I think it's a positive innovation. People who try to abuse systems are everywhere, but it's easy enough to filter them out as we move forward more efficiently.taruma

JUL

2007

Great addition to an already great site. ActiveRain continues to improve everyday and its great being a part of it. Thanks to everyone at AR for their great work and great ideas to make the site better