Ubertor Real Estate Blog

A bit over a month ago, we posted a blog post that unveiled the new Ubertor Refer tab in the control panel.

After many referrals by both Ubertor fans and clients, here are the 3 lucky winners:

The winner of the 1 month free on Ubertor:

The winner of a signed copy of Ubertor co-founder Stephen Jagger’s book Sociable!

The winner of a $20 Amazon gift card:

Your prizes will arrive in the mail shortly.

To enter for next month, all you need is an Ubertor website, click “Refer Ubertor” right in your control panel, and refer Ubertor using Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn.

Good luck to all next month!

This week’s post is to recognize Ubertor’s CSR of the Month (for April 2011), Marie “Tin” Sanchez, better known to many as Uber Tin. Becoming Ubertor’s CSR of the Month is no easy feat. The CSR must show exemplary work ethic, produce “world class” type of work, and demonstrate mastery in Kaizen.

Uber Tin has proven all of the above and has gone beyond what we ask from her.

Just to show some of Tin’s accomplishments for the month she was able to accomplish the following:

• Average response time in Live Help: 15.94 seconds
• On the spot solutions in Live Help: 149
• Number of accolades by potential and current Ubertor clients in Live Help: 24
• Implemented Kaizens: 2

If you catch Uber Tin on Live Help, be sure to send a congratulations her way, as it is well deserved.

Congratulations Tin!

I received an email today from Davis & Co. today about Canada’s new anti-spam law that is coming soon and I wanted to share it here. Will this new law change how you market your listings? open houses? Here is what Chris Bennett at Davis sent:

Canada has a new anti-spam law that is expected to take effect later this year.

The law is broad and the penalties for non-compliance are very steep. Virtually every person and business in Canada will be affected by the law and will need to rethink how they send emails, voicemails and other telecommunications.

Here are some highlights:

- The law prohibits any person from sending (or causing or permitting to be sent) a commercial electronic message unless the recipient expressly or implicitly consents to receiving the message.

- The definition of “commercial electronic message” is very broad and includes any message sent by telecommunications (including e-mail, text messages, voicemail, social media communications, etc.) if the purpose of that message is to encourage participation in a commercial activity.

- Commercial electronic messages cannot be sent without the recipients’ consent. Consent can be express or implied, and there are specific rules for how to obtain consent. There are some limited exceptions to the consent requirement.

- All commercial electronic messages must identify the person who sent the message (and if different, the person on whose behalf it was sent); provide accurate contact information for these parties; and be sent out by a mechanism through which the recipient may unsubscribe.

- The recipient must be able to unsubscribe using the same means by which the message was sent. There are specific rules and time limits for complying with unsubscribe requests.

- The maximum penalty for a violation of the legislation is $1,000,000 for an individual and $10,000,000 for a corporation or other business entity. These fines are imposed per violation, and a violation is defined as being separate for each day that it continues.

- Violations under the Act create both direct and vicarious liability, and directors or officers of corporations may be personally liable for the corporation’s violations. Employers are also liable for violations committed by their employees acting within the scope of their employment.

Davis LLP’s Technology Law Group would be pleased to help you comply with the new legislation. For more information, please contact Chris Bennett or Dave Spratley.

What do you think? Will you need to make changes to how you market?

We rolled out a change to the Ubertor login system today enabling all Ubertor users to use the OpenID system to log into their Ubertor websites. “Can’t remember your passwords? Tired of filling out registration forms? OpenID is a safe, faster, and easier way to log in to web sites.” Want more information about OpenID, check out their website. Facebook, Google, Flickr, Yahoo and many more use OpenID on their platforms and we are happy to add Ubertor to that list.

The Art of Marketing conference is coming to Vancouver and the organizers has given us a promo code to pass on to our clients and blog readers. If you want to attend the conference, you can use promo code SJ23 – this will offer you a savings of $50.00 per ticket, or $100.00 per ticket when registering 3 or more people at the same time. Here is the link to the registration page with the promo code. Want to know more about the conference, check out the video below:

Get expert advice from an Ubertor specialist on how to use the basics of the system. This is a great start for all new Ubertor users eager to learn how to begin maximizing their website for the most return. This is a live guided tour of Ubertor’s control panel – so if you’re on the fences about Ubertor’s software, click in and join the tour. See how easy it is to get a website up and running.

Join in 2 easy steps (Live Tour is FREE):

1. Register for the Live Tour on May 12th @ 2:00 PM PST.

Simply click on this LINK at the time of the LIVE TOUR and JOIN!

2. Use your microphone and speakers (VoIP) – a headset is recommended.

The live tour will go over the following topics:

1. Logging into your control panel (1 minute)

2. The Dashboard – Overview of cool tools to get your site running (9 minutes)

* Google Maps – Map your listings with 3 different views
* Google XML SiteMaps – Get found on Google faster than others
* Feedburner – Get your blog going with Feedburner
* Google Analytics – Start tracking the number of people coming to your site
* Favicon – Change your favorites icon

3. Crafting your own page (15 minutes)

* Adding content
* Adding photos
* Adding videos

4. Power marketing your listings (15 minutes)

* Display your photos
* Adding files, like floor plans and strata docs to your listings
* Mapping your listing on Google
* Giving your listing its own domain (URL)
* Adding music to your listing
* Have an open house? Advertise the listing as an open house
* Virtual Tours
* Get your listing on Craigslist – and looking good!
* Adding your own filmed video to the listing

5. Unveil the power of CSS and how it can help you mastercraft your website (5 minutes)

6. What is Twitter? How to use it with your website (5 minutes)

7. Q & A (10 minutes)

**1 LUCKY attendee will win $57.00, just for taking the tour!**

We ran a contest a few days ago for a copy of Cameron Herold’s new book “Double Double” on this blog. We had quite a few entries – a big thank you to all that participated! We choose the winner today and I am happy to announce that Robin Lear, a RE/MAX agent in Calgary, AB was the big winner. CONGRATS Robin!! I will be in touch to get your details and send off the book. (who knows, if Cameron is in town, maybe I can get him to sign it for you) For those that did not win, be sure to support Cameron and pick up a copy of his book.

I did an interview with Tony Wanless a little while ago about the deal that we did with the Calgary Real Estate Board, now known at CREB. Tony’s work came out this month in the print edition of BC Business Magazine. (Be sure to support them and pick up a print copy) In it, Tony talks about the changes we made to our system and how we can deal with large bulk website deals with real estate boards and brokerages around the world. You can see the article below: