I am Jeff

The act of using Photoshop for “touching up” photos of your listings is nothing new to most people that have been around for a while.  Ethical? Unethical? Maybe both, depending on the person.  Personally, I don’t have a problem with adjusting the lighting, but anything beyond that I believe is questionable.  If there’s something you don’t want to be in the picture, move it.  If you can’t, and it’s pertinent to the condition of the house (think holes in sheetrock) then it probably needs to stay in the picture to show a fair representation of the property.

So, with that being said, check out this new feature of Photoshop CS5 called “Content Aware Fill”:

I was an intern at a photo restoration company back in 1995, when Photoshop came on like 20 floppy disks, and the computers could barely run it with their 12mb of RAM. I would have KILLED for a tool like this. The hours upon hours it would have saved me…

Fast forward 15 years to today. It’s now easier than ever to alter photos. In fact, it’s so easy a REALTOR can do it! If they have access to Photoshop CS5. That doesn’t mean that they SHOULD do it, but I have a feeling there may be some people that abuse this feature.

Your thoughts?

And apparently it is… Quickly in this case.

I wrote yesterday about the Nestle/Greenpeace Facebook debacle and how it was quickly spinning out of control for Nestle.  I didn’t know much of the background on the story, so this presentation really shed some light on things for me.  Check it out:

Still no official response from Nestle on this.  I have a feeling whoever was running the fan page is no longer calling the shots on this one.  PR crisis anyone?

Or in this case, 93,000+ fans.

There’s been an awful lot of discussion lately surrounding using Facebook as a marketing platform.  Right, wrong, 10 fans, or several thousand fans, it just seems to be a hot topic no matter how you look at it.

So, here’s my thought: “What happens when a good thing goes bad?”

Let’s say you’re Nestle.  You’ve got a good thing going, or so it seems.  You’ve got a Facebook fan page with thousands of “fans”. Then one day all hell breaks loose!  Someone finds out you’re using a product that has a negative impact on the environment, and is responsible for destroying the rain forests. I’m sure there are other issues here, but this seems to be the underlying one. Problem #1.

Next thing you know, your fans turn on you.  We all know the viral effect Facebook can have.  Someone leaves a comment, their friends see it, they “like it”, their friends see that, and so on and so forth.  Within hours you have a blood bath on your hands, and your brand is quickly bleeding out!

What do you do?

Well, you certainly don’t make things worse by lashing out at your fans. Problem #2.

Stop the bleeding!

This thing is so out of control, there’s no hope for saving it.  If I were Nestle, I would kill the page.  Damage control time!  A press release saying this online marketing campaign no longer fits into our current marketing plan might be a good way to go about it.

With all the apparent successes of Facebook marketing lately, this is bound to happen again, possibly to someone in the Real Estate space. What would YOU do? Do you have a plan?

While I was up in Seattle for Real Estate BarCamp this last week, I was asked to facilitate a couple WordPress sessions.  I thoroughly enjoyed helping everyone in the beginner session figure out what the difference between .com and .org is, along with some of the other basics of WordPress. But what really got me going was the advanced session where we got into the real good stuff like URL structures, hosting issues, and my favorite topic du jour “WordPress plugins for Real Estate blogs”.

So, here are my personal favorite plugins, and the ones that were mentioned in my session:

TubePress Pro – Pulls video in from YouTube. Settings allow you to choose to pull videos by username, tags, playlists, etc.  Many options to configure the look and layout of the videos. An example can be seen right here on my blog’s video page and sidebar.

NextGen Gallery – Basic image gallery plugin using images you upload. Plenty of display options including slideshow, and sidebar widgets.  An example, with some really cool pictures, can be seen on the NW Portland Blog.

Tabs Slides – This plugin rocks, especially if you take the time to set it up properly.  It basically allows you to create tabbed content in the middle of your posts or pages.  Great for taking a ton of content and breaking it up into manageable chunks.  Here’s an example on one of our community neighborhood sites, the Portland Octopus (tabs are under the colorful image).

HomeQuest’s IDX Plugin –  What’s the point of having a blog, if you don’t have a home search with lead capture and client manager built into the back end?  HomeQuest’s IDX plugin gives it to you. Plus, the ability to geocode your blog posts directly onto a map alongside listings from your MLS.  Yeah, it’s pretty cool. Full disclosure – I work for HomeQuest and I very briefly mentioned this in the session.  I didn’t want to be accused of pitching my own product!

Using these four plugins, you can build a pretty killer WordPress Real Estate site.

Some other plugins that were mentioned that are worth looking into: ScribeSEO, WordPress Database Backup, and BuddyPress.

If you have any plugins that you’ve used that you think are worth mentioning, feel free to leave a comment below.  I’d love to hear what others have found.

Oh, and if you want to learn a bunch more WordPress stuff like this?  Attend Real Estate WordCamp, coming to Denver April 12th. If you see me roaming the halls looking for a Coke machine, say hello!

I joked the other day about my definition of a successful REBarCamp being one that is in close proximity to a Coke vending machine. Mostly because I was on the prowl for my early morning Coke, which is what gives me the kick start I need in the mornings. Yeah, some people drink coffee, I drink a 32 oz coke.

Anyway, on my way home from Seattle, I realized something. I actually had a really good time at #REBCSEA.  This was like my 9th Real Estate BarCamp.  The last couple I have been to have been pretty “meh” as far as I was concerned.

So, what made this one so different for me?

After thinking about it for a good long while, I came to the conclusion that it was because I was able to lead a couple discussions. I thought back to the RE BarCamps that I had enjoyed the most, and they all had one thing in common. I participated in the discussion in one way or another.  Whether it was me out in the crowd asking questions, or me up in front leading the discussion, I realized that sharing knowledge or insight was what gave ME the most value.  Not sure anyone else got value, but then again this blog is all about me.

So, one final thought for you to chew on.  Next time you’re attending an event, no matter how many you’ve been to in the past, try participating a little more in the discussions.  You’d be amazed at what might come out of it.

Until I have my next thought… I’m out.