Posts Tagged ‘google’

Cool Apps: Google+ Rolls Out Pages for Businesses

By John Thompson | November 11th, 2011 0 Comments

The long-awaited “business” version of Google+ is now here! Google launched “Pages” for Google+ this week to extend the connections we make on the company’s social network beyond people to now places and also things.

I know what you’re thinking: Gee, I already have a blog, a Twitter handle, a Facebook profile and a Facebook page for my business. Do I really need yet another page for my business to plug into yet another social network?

It’s a fair question.

It’s worth pursuing a new page on Google+ for your real estate business because:

  • This is Google we’re talking about, a 500-pound gorilla when it comes to the web. Google has shown this year that it’s pretty serious about social networking and seems to be determined to invest heavily in Google+ to keep it relevant, innovative and essential to the social web experience of the future.
  • Google also announced “Direct Connect” from Google search as part of the unveiling. That means that Pages in Google+ will now be found in Google search results, allowing people to connect directly to businesses.
  • Google is a beast when it comes to search. The majority of the world now searches on Google, which means you want to be there to be seen by folks seeking out the services you offer. Some say the business opportunity is far greater here than with Facebook because people searching on Google are in the frame of mind to research and buy things or services. People on Facebook, on the other hand, tend to be there to socialize with other people, which is a totally different motivation and much harder to connect to from a business perspective.

Convinced? Google has a page set up for creating Pages at https://plus.google.com/pages/create. If you don’t already have a Google account, you’ll have to set one up first. The page will then walk you through the process of locating your business and building its page.

For a little inspiration, check out these pages that are already up and running:

The Phoenix Suns
Burberry
Toyota

Google+ Pages presents a great opportunity to connect with consumers who are searching for real estate information in your neighborhood online.

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Intero Cool Apps: Why You Should Resist the Urge to Ignore Google Plus

By John Thompson | July 8th, 2011 0 Comments

By now, you’ve likely heard some buzz around Google’s latest big release called Google Plus. Maybe you’ve already gotten an invite and tested it out. If not, you should. I’m going to talk about why and how this new social network can be useful in your real estate business and go over a few basics of the road.

Why oh why do we need yet another social network?

This of course is the first question that comes to mind anytime someone invites you to a new “Facebook” of sorts. The short answer for why Google Plus is worth your time is this: It’s easy to use, takes seconds to set up and gives you the flexibility you’ve been longing for to segment your professional and personal social networking in a meaningful way.

OK, so how to get an invite if you don’t already have one?

The best way is to simply put the word out on Facebook and Twitter. Let your existing network know that you haven’t gotten an invite yet and are looking for one. Chances are high that someone in your circle has gotten in and can send you an invite.

What’s it all about?

The fundamental difference between Google Plus and the others before it is privacy. Google Plus is based on the Google Circles feature, which enables you to share and view content to and from specifically defined groups of people – and no one else. So if you want to share new listings or local housing news with your group of interested local buyers, then your cousins in Minnesota don’t have to be burdened with your irrelevant posts. Likewise, your professional contacts won’t have to see the pics from your summer family reunion.

How is this any different from Facebook’s list feature? Very very different. First, there’s ease of use. Google Circles is simple drag and drop. As soon as you get set up, you start creating your circles and simply sort your contacts into their respective groups. Second, there’s the segmentation of viewing content from these groups. So you’re not getting professional news and marketing tips alongside updates from your family members.

It’s easy to get fatigued by social media and resist the urge to jump on the next big thing that ends up being nothing at all (remember Google Wave?). But Google Plus really shows promise to be the best social web tool of all – especially for those of us who’ve found our personal and professional lives blending, finding it hard to keep up with all the content we want to keep up with due to this very blending.

Reach out and get your invite and start test-driving Google Plus today!

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Cool Apps: Rediscover GOOGLE Apps!

By John Thompson | March 19th, 2010 0 Comments

Yes, yes. I know. Google Apps, the search juggernaut’s super-smart, everything-rolled-into-one-for-a-nifty-little-price business solution, isn’t exactly new.

Not exactly, anyway.

For while Google Apps has been around for a few years, an announcement last week merits your attention – in fact, it merits a good long look!

Google has completely upped its game by expanding Google Apps’ capabilities exponentially. They’ve done this by launching the Google Apps Marketplace.

If you’re at all familiar with the iPhone App Store – the collection of some 200,000 small applications that run on your phone – this news will seem familiar to you.

What this new Marketplace has done is to offer products and services that integrate fully with Google Apps. From accounting and finance tools, like Freshbooks, to image editing, like Aviary, as well as payroll tools, CRM, expense reports, and analytics tools for your websites. For the most part, these tools include single sign-on (so you don’t have to log in again and again and again), as well as Google’s universal navigation.

And you can count on the number of apps in the Marketplace to continue growing as programmers vie to make their latest creations available to the millions of Google Apps users.

In effect, what Google has done is make it possible to run your entire office from any location. Where you are doesn’t really matter.

In order to use the Marketplace, of course, you have to be a Google Apps user. If you’re not, take it out for a spin; you won’t regret it. If you’re already using Google Apps, then good on ya’. Step into the Marketplace and give it a try.

“New” doesn’t always mean “best” … sometimes we just have to look at something seasoned in a new way to find something that’ll change everything.

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Intero Cool Apps: Are You Waving?

By John Thompson | January 22nd, 2010 0 Comments

For much of 2009, techno-geeks were all a-buzz with talk about Google WAVE, the search engine juggernaut’s collaborative tool that was supposed to shatter the Earth and change the way we all did everything.

And then … WAVE was released. Did you notice? Lots of people didn’t. The ones that did, met it with a collective, “Meh. That’s it?”

This sort of thing often happens when people set their expectations too high.

The thing about Google WAVE, though? It’s actually extremely cool. People have just been so busy dismissing it because time didn’t stand still upon its release that they failed to see that.

In many ways, it’s much like Twitter was when it was first introduced. Not many people “got” it. “Why on earth do I need people to tell me about how their cornflakes got soggy at breakfast?” people would ask. “I have real work to do,” they’d say. Now, Twitter is one of the most powerful business tools at our disposal and no longer being dismissed by anyone (well, not many, anyway). I believe that the same will hold true for Google WAVE.

So, how do I use it?

The answer is that there are lots of ways to use it. But here’s just a touch of what’s possible: Google WAVE is already being used by lots of small business groups because it has tremendous strength in combining platforms like email, document sharing, multimedia file-sharing, instant messaging, project wikis, video conferencing, and a host of others. It has the ability to eliminate all of the other disparate communications tools by combining them into one well-honed powerhouse.

For example, let’s say that you’re having a same-time, multi-location meeting between team members. Everyone invited to participate in the WAVE (the name for a particular project in the application) can contribute to the notes and see who is adding what — all in real time. At the end of the meeting, all of the notes are captured in a thread that can be viewed later on if someone wanted a recap, or if someone got invited to the WAVE late in the game. If there are team members who couldn’t participate because of differences in time zones (or other asynchronous difficulty), they can go into the WAVE, see all of the discussion, then add their own notes, as if they were present from the get-go. And anything that Google WAVE can’t do in its native state can likely be managed with any of the wide range of plug-ins that are available for it.

Right now, Google WAVE is only available by invitation. But before long, it’ll be available to everyone. It’s also important to remember that using WAVE to its potential will take time. It’ll take patience. But the power is there. Oh, yes. It’s there.

As for its ability to change the world? It hasn’t yet. But I’m betting that it will.

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Cool Apps: AARDVARK

By John Thompson | January 15th, 2010 0 Comments

There are times when, no matter how much we think we know, we’ve gotta have a question answered. We go online, we search. Google or Wikipedia or some other search engine might have a cavalcade of “answers”, but the odds of those answers being exactly what you were looking for…well, they often come close, but rarely do they hit it right on the head.

Sometimes, the answer we want is the sort that we’d get if we simply asked a friend. Someone who’d had actual experience with something. Well, now there’s a search engine for that.

Let’s take a look at Aardvark, or ‘Vark, as they like to be called.

Available on The Web or via its own iPhone application, Aardvark is a new kind of search engine. It lets you tap into the knowledge and experience of friends, or friends of friends. Using information from your social graph (the people you know), Aardvark searches contacts for people with related topics, people to whom you’re connected, people who’re in or near your location, or people who share your tastes. When you want someone who knows the answer — the answer YOU want — Aardvark will get it for you.

Now, let’s think about how this could apply to your business. There’s a great shift in our industry toward offering services on a hyperlocal level. If you’re a real estate professional in Awesometown, USA, you’re probably looking for as many ways as possible to set yourself as THE authority for information on your area. Aardvark works there. When people go to vark.com looking for information about Awesometown, you’ll be the one with the answers. People will say, “WOW! She (or he) really knows what she’s talking about!” and will, most likely, remember that you were helpful.

This opportunity has “WIN” written all over it.

As vark.com (Aardvark) was just launched in October, you could be among its early adopters and set yourself apart as one of its go-to contacts for your area. Just think of the possibilities.

Aardvark. It’s new. It’s cutting-edge. It’s cool. Check it out!

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