We are pleased to annouce the offical beta launch of Event-based Lead Capture!
With Lead Capture, your virtual tour and it’s content now can become a lead capture machine. Just turn on the feature in your profile and let the leads come!
Click here to read more on this great new tool and to watch a help video.
I recently read a post by a popular blogger named Andrew Spence regarding how important time on site is for your SEO rankings. Andrew states that the two biggest metrics Google looks at are “time” and “click throughs.” You can ready the full post here. http://www.andrewspenceonline.com/website-visitors/
This post touches on something I have been talking about for a long time now: Create a better user experience AND content than the other guy, and more and more visitors will come to your site.
Sure it might take some time and effort, but if you provide the same content as the other guys and you pull it from the same source (the MLS), then how in the world are you ever going to differentiate your website from anyone else. Last I heard, Zillow had $400 million in the bank…so you can’t compete there. Yet Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com, your company website, and all of your competitors pull the same content from the MLS and regurgitate it in slightly different ways.
Where is the secret sauce?
I may be biased, but I think the Interactive Floor Plan Tours and some of the advanced things you can do with them are the secret sauce of the online real estate marketing world. One place you can compete on is a better user experience and content. We know from research buyers want to see floor plans. They rank right behind photos as the top 2 content items desired for a listing. They can also generate 30% more interest and even more commissions for agents. Use the valiable content created for your tours to lure people to your site and keep them longer.
Easily add embedded content on your website or blog
To help with the time on site issue, we offer embedded tour content for your site. Think of how you can embed a YouTube video on a blog….it is basically the same thing. We offer “embed code” via our Embeddable Tour tool and our WordPress Plugin where all you have to do is copy and paste the code into a page or a post to add the whole tour, or just parts of it, right into your website. We offer a pop-over tour, or an embedded in-line tour option. With both of these options, the user is technically still on your site. No clicking a link and taking the user away to another tab (which means they leave your site…hopefully to come back). While it is technically content not hosted by your site, the fact the user does not leave your site and stays longer is very good for your SEO, regardless.
If you just put a link or button to virtual tour, two things happen. 1. The user is LEAVING YOUR SITE. Bad. 2. Each click means you are losing 50% of your audience. Bad.
Plus, with our new lead capture system coming soon, you will be able to capture leads in more places throughout the web. Something you can’t do with any other marketing medium. Click here to read more on our upcoming Lead Capture enhancements.
We recently made an update to our photo uploader tool to add a new Flash upload option. The default uploader is a Java-based program that requires Java to run and work on your computer. While 98% of computers have Java installed, there are some recent issues due to security concerns, and users of Apple computers are periodically experiencing issues where they can’t upload with this version, because Apple blocks Java from running on the Mac, at times. In addition if you are a Mac user and use Chrome as your browser of choice, the Java based uploader does not work because Chrome is a 32 bit application, and Java is a 64 bit application for the Mac.
So…we added a new Flash uploader that uses Adobe’s Flash tools to upload photos. It works pretty good, you just do not see your file structure initially. You need to click the button to +Add More Files, navigate to where you have the photos stored on your computer, and then you can use the SHIFT key (start at the first photo and then hold the key down, and click on the last photo to select all photos in that folder) or the CTRL key (hold the CTRL key and then just click photos you want to upload to highlight them) to select various photos. You will then see them added into the upload window. Then just upload.
You can also use the Web Uploader where you select one photo at a time, if all else fails. This option does support the uploading of zip files too, so you can compress your images and upload.
Now you can defer your FloorPlanOnline tour cost and pay it off AFTER you close that sale! Just pay with PayPal and select the Bill Me Later option (subject to your credit approval with their terms) and you can now defer payment for months. It is a cool, new free option offered by PayPal, the leader of ecommerce payments on the web.
We have made some updates to some of the tools you might use – the photo uploader and the WordPress plugin. Details are below.
1. Uploader. The photo uploader was updated with the most up to date functionality, powered by Aurigma, the company behind the upload functionality. There has been a lot of updates to Java recently which has caused some upload issues. So, because of the 
update, you will likely need to install the small program that the uploader users. Just give it a few seconds to install. Depending on your browser, the experience will be a little bit different.
Note, the Select all button is a little different. Now, just check the box next to the folder name to select all images in the folder. Then select the upload button.
2. WordPress Plugin. We made some updates to the WordPress plugin that allows you to embed the tour or a pop-over version of the tour on your website. The update was needed due to some code conflicts with some themes. For now, the way to update the plugin is download it from the Embeddable Content page, or just click this button.
Download WordPress Plugin
We just updated our support page on how to create floor plans yourself. We have some great options, and subscribers can upload plan images and use them for FREE, or use the drawing tool for just $10 a listing.
Click here to learn more.
