Goofing around with setting up a WordPress "blogsite" that is for nothing but search.

Much work remains, but the gist of it is there.

Would appreciate any feedback. Curious as to what others think of the idea as much as the site itself. No need to be gentle, I have thick skin.

Phoenix Real Estate Search Site

Thanks!

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Jay Thompson
web: ThompsonsRealty.com
blog: PhoenixRealEstateGuy.com

Jay,

My poor "Boomer" eyes just can't handle the tiny fonts at higher resolutions, especially the serif fonts. Same with your main site, though you didn't ask for feedback on that. I just wanted to see how they compared in that area.

IMO, a separate search only site may work for your situation, since you have a "plug-in" IDX, and are not concerned about how IDX contributes to SEO, but is not necessary when you have an integrated IDX.

Do you (and/or REW) still have issues with uncooperative ARMLS and IDX out there?

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Ron Goodman, GRI, REALTOR®
Prudential Colorado Real Estate
Denver Colorado Real Estate and Homes for Sale,
AdWords PPC Consulting and Support for REALTORS®

REW doesn't have any problems with ARMLS, we can offer it to any broker of record -

As for the site itself - the theme (And your site I know you didn't ask) are a bit monotone for me, however I disagree with Ron on the fonts, I actually think it's quite readable.

I would prefer that the BG of your dropdowns were not semi-transparent, but rather solid.

What is the content strategy for the site? I understand the premise of a pure listings site and there can be significant benefits to one, but the site in of itself does not actually contain any listings or data of any kind and is just linking out to a third party - so I have to assume that you are just getting feedback on the idea, and goign to add significant content later? (We certainly know you are capable of it) but one might think you would be better served adding that content time on your main site?

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Webmasters who spend their energies upholding the spirit of the basic principles [Of Google] will provide a much better user experience and subsequently enjoy better ranking than those who spend their time looking for loopholes they can exploit. Google.com

At 1680x1050, which I use on my 20" wide screen monitor, the serif fonts are quite difficult to read, some letters just a blur, even with my glasses on. At lower resolutions, they are OK. But a sans-serif would still be easier on the eyes. The default sans-serif font on my REW template site is a comfortable read at any resolution.

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Ron Goodman, GRI, REALTOR®
Prudential Colorado Real Estate
Denver Colorado Real Estate and Homes for Sale,
AdWords PPC Consulting and Support for REALTORS®

Jay,

I don't see anyway to search for homes from the homepage. The sliders are cool on the map search, but, my feedback from buyers to me (your mileage may vary) is that the map, while cool, is not the best way to search for the majority of people, except for locals. Even as an agent, I only use a map search when I am looking for something very specific and I don't think that's the way consumers start their search. You may get very different opinions on this, but, that's mine.

Also, the "Keep zooming in" covers one of the most important things on the map - the number of properties the search is returning.

It just seems to hard to use as the point of entry to a new user and that could hurt in getting return users who might like the map later.

JMO

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Ryan Ward, REALTOR® - Keller Williams Realty Consultants. (404) 630-3187
Atlanta Real Estate - My featured area is Alpharetta Real Estate and it is where I call home. Read my Atlanta Real Estate blog.

Thanks folks. Exactly what I was looking for.

To be honest, I have no idea what, if anything, I'll do with this or where I'll take it. I often fly off on a whim and play around with half-baked ideas. Some work, others, not-so-much.

Hey Ron! Actually ARMLS has just recently opened up to several third party IDX providers. In the past they allowed ONE, unless as Morgan mentioned the broker provided their one and only feed.

New leadership has recently moved in that "gets it". Finally. They are even in the process of dumping Tempo MLS and going with FlexMLS. And they are **gasp** actually letting USERS beta test it.

It's quite refreshing.

Morgan, I don't know if you guys provide "packaged solutions" to the masses or just custom work, but ARMLS is **much** more open to working with various vendors than they were even just a couple of months ago. May be something to ponder...

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Jay Thompson
web: ThompsonsRealty.com
blog: PhoenixRealEstateGuy.com

That's great! We had FlexMLS when I first started in North Florida, and the Denver MetroList MLS was a real let-down, and still is, when I saw its limitations compared to Flex. Give me a holler sometime for a chat!

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Ron Goodman, GRI, REALTOR®
Prudential Colorado Real Estate
Denver Colorado Real Estate and Homes for Sale,
AdWords PPC Consulting and Support for REALTORS®

Thanks for the heads up Jay, they have actually always been receptive to third party vendors, however the yearly feed costs were prohibitive (Like 25k per year or something) so we did not pursue it - if they are more flexible, then I would love to revisit it.

And normally you are correct we do pretty much do custom stuff, but I am open to creating some less expensive canned solutions - Actually Ronnie in this thread is using the very first Canned REW product for IDX that we have produced (Out of necessity, Metrolist requires that all associate brokers use the same IDX) - It's been interesting, and we certainly have some revisions planned, but I do see with enough volume there could be quite an opportunity in both Metrolist and ARMLS

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Webmasters who spend their energies upholding the spirit of the basic principles [Of Google] will provide a much better user experience and subsequently enjoy better ranking than those who spend their time looking for loopholes they can exploit. Google.com

Jay,

We have a site that currently has no content on it and I was thinking of doing the same idea, just never got around to doing it.

We have a plug-and-play mls that we can place in the blog and think this would be a good way of getting leads. We'll be starting this project next week. Let me know how your site does!

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Troy Steuwer
Office Manager / Webmaster
Miller & Associates Realty
Panama City Beach, FL
(850) 249-6655 Office


Please visit our Panama City Beach, FL Real Estate website where you can find all of the Panama City Beach Condos For Sale and Panama City Beach Homes For Sale!

That does sound interesting. I have a site with no content right now and I am seriously considering doing this too.

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