Many of you read my post last night regarding Real Estate Webmasters all of a sudden not ranking for our own name in Google (Well several pages down) - Naturally I assumed there must be something going on - a penalty perhaps? Well we are not sure as tonight everything appears to be back to normal so it could have just been a google glitch. However when it happened I immediately went into SEO detective mode and started a full audit on both our outbound and inbound linking activities (Always a good place to start looking if you suspect a Google penalty) - In doing so, I realized that there are a few areas that could really use some tightening up if we want to be able to claim that we are in complete compliance with Google's terms of service.

Where to start?…

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This evening a user posted in the forums that they were looking for Real Estate Webmasters by Googling our name, and it did not show up in the first few pages (for our own name) – huh? I received several PM's about it as well.

Now of course I go and check for myself, and sure enough – the forums and blogs seem to be coming up fine for queries, but for searches that would normally return the main page of our site, nothing seems to be showing up. Of course my first reaction is one of shock – this can't be right, must be a mistake (every webmaster thinks they are squeaky clean right? :))

But seriously – as someone who has been around SEO for as long as I have, I know that this warrants investigation – I mean sure it would be nice if there was some mistake –…

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As part of an ongoing effort to maximize the amount of exposure REW members receive from our combined forums, blogs, listings and directory - I have begun implementing a new phase of advancements for the REW Directory - as an equally important consideration, these upgrades will improve the overall user experience that our visitors (Your potential customers) receive while using the REW Directory.

Enhancement #1: Exposure for bloggers

The directory now shows the 3 most recent blog posts from a member in a given area. (I might change this to 5 not sure yet) - Now visitors to the directory can not only find agents, but get access to "current" information regarding an area, and read posts from local Real Estate Professionals.

If you are already listed in the…

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Recently a letter was sent from the MRIS MLS board to our IDX co-ordinator that MRIS was increasing their fees for "Master Licensees" and that if we were to take on even one more MRIS customer (We currently have 8 or so) that we would have to become a "Master Licensee" and pay this new fee. Their justification for this was increasing costs (I assume hardware and bodies to maintain this large MLS data center.)

Ok so what's the MRIS Data fee?

Normally MLS boards when they decide to charge vendors or members of the board a monthly fee it typically works out on the low end to around $10.00 a month and on the high end to $100 per month, something like that. But not MRIS - they want us to pay $24,000.00 USD PER YEAR!

 

What's wrong with this picture? Well…

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I first became aware of it in the forums when Eric Blackwell posted about a possible Point2 Implosion as Eric reported reading on Jay Thompson's blog something shaking at point 2 agent that Brendan King, C.O.O of Point2 Agent had resigned. I have been following the story a bit since then, and haven't really seen anything concrete from Point 2 themselves, however I was reading on Active Rain (Becky Troutt) reported that

"Ches Hagen 11 yrs - VP of Cat/Heavy Equipment
Jason Collins 10 yrs - Chief Technology Officer
Brendan King 9 yrs - Chief Operating Officer
John Fothergill 9 yrs - VP of Product Development
Jon Lesvesque 9 yrs - VP of Systems and IT
Jeff Tomlin 6 yrs - VP of Business Development
Allan Wolinski 10 yrs - support team manager
Greg… Read Full Post

Ever since I posted that we were waiving the setup fee for our REW Templates with our 12 days of Christmas promo, I have been getting a lot of questions about REW Templates - I will try to provide some answers here so that you can (The customer) can make an informed decision as to whether or not an REW template is right for you.

I will start with some basic line entry type lists of the basics of what is included in an REW Template, if at the end of this you still have questions, or require clarification, please post in the comments section at the end of the post.

Let's start with the front end:

• REW Templates are available in 5 unique styles
• Each style is available in both tradition 800x600 display and new wide version 1024 x 768.
• Each…

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Important Notice - Sales of the REW 12 Days of Christmas are now Closed - Happy Holidays and thank you to everyone that has participated.

It has been a great year here at Real Estate Webmasters thanks in large part to our great customers and members. I have been thinking about a way to give a little back as a Christmas promo and here is what I came up with.

No setup fee for REW Templates

Normally if you purchase an REW Template there is a $740 USD setup fee, and a yearly hosting fee $360 USD (Works out to $30 per month)

So here is the deal - Anyone who orders a new REW template between today - Monday, December 10th and Friday December 21st (I think that is 12 days) I am waiving the setup fee. So in essence all you are paying is $30 a month… Read Full Post

So I was looking at my Active Rain statistics today (To be honest not something I had ever really done before aside from the occasional glance. And of course, being the curious cat that I am, I decided to take the time to figure out how these things were calculated and what exactly I was looking at. Also I wanted to see how my stats stacked up in terms of traffic vs my REW Blog.

A quick overview of Active Rain the stats as I understand them (This is for blog entries)

The stats break down the following

• Date: This is when you submitted an article
• Title: This is the title of your article
• Comments: This is how many comments the article has received
• Views: This (I think) is impressions (One of the numbers I want to go into detail…

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