As part of our ongoing efforts to enhance and improve the Digital Home Info Real Estate Marketing Platform we have recently released a few new features.  A new small sized virtual tour that is ideal for displaying small images and auto-trim and correct photo processing.

The new small virtual tour has all of the same features as our larger animated virtual tour (Home Information, Google Maps, Mortgage Calculator, Appointment Scheduler, Auto-generated PDF Flyer, and photo browser) it is just optimized for smaller files sizes.  We have noticed that many of our agents use photos from their local IDX system and that these photos tend to be around 640px by 480px.  Although these looked good in the larger virtual tour, sometimes you could tell that a photo had been stretched to make it fit right.  So we created this version to match the need.  If you upload your own photos or your photos are large you can still use the larger virtual tour. We just wanted to provide another option so that you can get the most out of our service.

Something else we noticed with the IDX photos was that they sometimes contained whitespace (borders) around the edges.  So we set out to find a way to remove the whitespace without altering the photo.  This is where Auto Trim comes into the picture. Now you can simply click on the “Trim” link under each photo in your gallery and Digital Home Info will automatically remove the whitespace. This greatly improves the presentation of the virtual tour since the white is no longer there to detract from the overall presentation.

We will be blogging how to’s on both of these new features in the coming days so look for those soon.  If you have any suggestions or comments please let us know.

What do all of those terms in my email marketing reports mean?

Opened – The number of unique people that opened an email at least once.  Even though they may have opened the email more than once they are still only counted once.
Unopened – The number of emails that were not opened.

Bounce – An email that was unable to be delivered because of an issue with the email address. i.e. bad email address, miss- spelled name, domain is expired etc…

Delivered – The number of emails that were delivered.

Total Opens – The total number of times the email has been viewed.  Each time the subscriber opens the email is counted.

Clicks – The total number of times a link in the email has been clicked.

Unique Clicks – The number of times links in the email have been clicked.  If a subscriber clicked on a link more than once it is only counted once.

Forwards – The total number of times that the email was forwarded using the “Forward” feature link in the email.

Opt Outs – The number of people that opted out/unsubscribed from your list using a the link in this campaign.

Feel free to contact us if we missed any terms.

We just updated the way that Digital Home Info integrates with Facebook. The changes include:

• Easier set up of “Listing of the Day” status updates
• Publish “Listing of the Day” to multiple Facebook Pages
• Install “My Listings” tab on multiple Facebook Pages

 Here’s how to setup the “Listing of the Day” feature.  (You must do this to before you setup a “My Listings” tab.)

1. Click on the “Account Info” tab in the Dashboard.
2. Select the “Social Media Settings” tab on the Account Info page.
3. Click on the “Click here to authorize Digital Home Info access to your Facebook account” link.
4. Click on the “Login to Facebook” link.
5. Click on the “Allow” button on the “Request for Permission” page.
6. Check the box next to each Facebook page that you want to push the “Listing of the Day” to and press the “Save” button at the bottom of the screen.
7. When the page refreshes the Facebook pages you selected will be listed with checkboxes for each day of the week next to them.  Select the desired days and press the “Save” button next to the Facebook page.

To setup the “My Listings” tab:

1. Goto http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=258943535455
2. In the bottom left section of the page you will find an “Add to My Page” link. Click on it.
3. Select the page that you want to add this application to and press the “Add to Page”.
4. At this point the application has been added to your page. You may add it to as many pages as you like as long as the page is authorized above.

Email Marketing is an important part of any Real Estate Marketing Plan and one of the features included in the Digital Home Info Real Estate Marketing Platform.  Many of our customers are eager to get started using this great feature but aren’t quite sure where to get started.  So we created this tutorial to show you how to create an Email Marketing Campaign using the Digital Home Info system.

1) Once Logged in to the Digital Home Info Portal hover over the “Email Marketing” tab in the top navigation bar.

2) Click on the “New Campaign” link in the drop down menu.

3) Select an Email Subscriber List from the available lists.  Press the “Next” button at the bottom of the screen. (Don’t have a list created yet? Click here to create an email marketing list)

4) Enter a Campaign Name, Subject Line and Select a Date and Time to deliver the email.  Press the “Next” button to go to the template selection screen.

5) Select an Email Template to use.  You can select from the provided templates or add a custom template and use it.  Press the “Next” button to go to the Email Editor.

6) Edit the default content in the email template by typing over it or using the photo gallery to add your images.  Click on the “Next” button to go to the “Text Only” version of your email.

7) This is a “Text Only” version of your email.  It is for email clients that do not show html email.  The text only version includes all of the content in the html email and tries to format it in an easy to read format. When you are done editing this press the “Next” button to go to the Campaign Review page.

8) On the Campaign Review Page you can review the settings for this campaign.  Click on the “Edit” button next to each section in order to change the information.  You can also preview the HTML and Text versions of the email by pressing the “Preview” button.  Enter an email address to send a test/preview of the email. You must send a test/preview email before being allowed to actually schedule the email.

9) Once you have reviewed the test/preview email you press the “Schedule Email” button to send your email. Once an email is scheduled it may be modified from the “Pending” section at any time up until it is actually delivered.

Feel free to let us know if you have any questions.

Digital Home Info has integrated QR Codes into its Real Estate Marketing platform.  In addition to being available for immediate download and use in other marketing media we have integrated QR Codes into the new Virtual Tour flyers and will be adding them to signs and riders.

• QR Code for every Listing - Every listing has a QR Code ready for download in the dashboard.  The QR Code links directly to the Mobile Virtual Tour for the Listing.
• QR Code for Mobile Real Estate Agent Website - Every Digital Home Info customer gets a Mobile Real Estate Agent Website.  We provide a QR Code that links directly to to this mobile optimized site.
• Downloadable - Every QR Code is downloadable in a large format.

We are excited and pleased about this latest release.  Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.

Lately we’ve noticed many of our agents using various services to publish their content in a mobile friendly format.  We think this is a great trend but were concerned that once again agents were having to duplicate entry of information in order to get listings and blog posts in a mobile friendly format.  So in an effort to continue making the lives of our customers easier Digital Home Info has released a new feature, Mobile Real Estate Agent Websites.  Every Agent can now set up a mobile website to show off their listings and blog feeds in a mobile optimized format.  The best part is that the Mobile Real Estate Agent Website is included as part of the service at no extra cost.  Below is a quick video tutorial that shows how to implement your web site.

Photo Courtesy of Gregg O'Connell

Did you know that you can record your own voice message to be played on the toll free real estate call capture system? This is a great way to personalize the marketing of your listing. While we offer the latest and greatest marketing technologies we still get a substantial amount of traffic on the real estate toll free marketing system.

Follow the steps below to record your own message.

Login to your DHI account.

Click on the “Listings” tab in the top menu.

Click on the “Edit” link for your selected listing.

This brings you to the “Edit Property Code” page.  The third tab from the left is “Voice Message”  click on it.

Select the radio button for the number you want the system to call you at (or enter your own in the text box).

Press the “Call Me” button.

A temporary screen will display informing you that the system will be calling you shortly at the number selected.  This page will redirect after 5 seconds to the edit page.

Answer your phone when it rings.  The system will prompt you to begin your message.  To end recording your message just be silent for 5 seconds or press the pound button.

After you have recorded your message the system will play it back for your approval.  Press one to approve the message.

A couple of tips:

Although your message can be as long as you like we recommend you keep it under 90 seconds.  This will help you get the most pertinent information to the caller and keep their attention.

Write out a short script and practice it a few times before you actually record the message.

Call the system and listen to it after you have recorded your message.  This is a quality check just to verify that it sounds like you want it to.

Include “Press 1 for more information” or “Press one to talk to an agent” at the end of the message.  This will connect the caller to your mobile number.

Include the Virtual Tour URL in your message.

One of goals here at Digital Home Info is to continuously improve our Real Estate Marketing system.  In the last few months we have released an upgraded interface, real estate email marketing, and a contact manager.  This week we have made some enhancements to the Virtual Tour Videos that we create and push to YouTube.

We are now including the agent contact information and a link to the agent’s web site as well as the virtual tour in the description of the Virtual Tour Videos.  Our goal is to make as easy as possible for the agent to be contacted if someone is interested in a particular listing.

We have a number of enhancements on the board to be released in the next few months.

• Mobile web site for agents
• QR Code integration
• Agent Web sites
• Real Estate CRM
• Listing Check Lists
• Agent Presentation Sheets
• Real Estate Email Marketing Templates

Below is an instructional video on how to integrate Twitter and Digital Home Info.  This video will show you how to authorize Digital Home Info to access your Twitter account and select days of the week to automatically post a real estate listing of the day.

If you can’t see the video above you can view it here:

Twitter Real Estate Marketing

This quick tutorial explains how to use One Click Sharing to share your Virtual Tour links to your Facebook Fanpage instead of your personal profile.  You can watch the video above or follow the instructions below.

1. Make sure that you are logged in to both Facebook and Digital Home Info.
2. Starting with Facebook, click on the “Account” link in the upper right corner of the browser.
3. Click on the “Use Facebook as Page” link.
4. A window will pop up.  Select the Fanpage that you want to post the Virtual Tour or article to and click on the “Switch” button.
5. This will make the Fanpage the active Facebook user.
6. Go back to your Digital Home Info account.
7. Click on “Listings” tab.
8. Scroll down to the listing that you want to share.
9. Click on Facebook share icon.
10. This opens a new Facebook Sharing window with the Virtual Tour information and a space for you to add any additional information.
11. Across the top left you should see your Fanpage name and in the top right you should see “Posting as this page.”
12. Once you have added any additional information click on the “Share Link” in the lower right corner of the page.
13. At this point the Virtual Tour has been posted to your Fanpage instead of your personal page.  If you refresh your Fanpage you should see the Virtual Tour as your latest post.