Last month, we highlighted an online real estate social network. One of our CyberExpert readers contacted us to make us aware of another agent network that he feels is similar to “MySpace.” This network is called ‘Wanna Network?’ and can be found at www.wannanetwork.com. Another site to check out is RealTown at www.realtown.com. Both sites offer a tremendous amount of information. Log on and check them out!

According to a recent article in eWeek (Microsoft Office Goes Online, by Peter Galli), Microsoft will be rolling out a new offering called Office Live Workspace. With Office Live Workspace, users will be able to access, share and collaborate on documents online. Users will need to have Microsoft Office loaded onto their computers in order to make edits to the shared documents. If you don’t have Office installed, you can view Office documents in a browser (Internet Explorer and Firefox will be supported). You can also “comment” on the document. If you do have Office (2003 or 2007) installed on your computer, the online document will automatically download to the Office version you have when you click to edit the document. Once saved, your changes will be automatically saved to the online version of the document. Microsoft is offering this service at no cost when it releases it later this year.

Want the “skinny” on a neighborhood? Check out ZIPskinny at www.zipskinny.com. Here you’ll find all kinds of useful (and maybe not so useful) information just by typing in a ZIP Code. When we typed in the ZIP Code of our headquarters (we’re located just outside of Boston), we were given general information about our town – such as longitude and latitude – along with population, housing units, land area and water area. ZIPskinny also provided us with ‘Social Indicator’ information, such as Educational Achievement and Marital Status and ‘Economic Indicators,’ such as Household Income and Occupation. It also provides neighborhood comparisons and demographics. Basically, it pulls data from Census information. It’s a neat tool, but pay attention to the disclaimer at the end of ZIPskinny’s search results. Here they inform you that the information provided is “sample” data and that ZIP code searches pull data from mail delivery areas, so it may not accurately represent uniform population units.

Matthew Ferrara & Company’s Disclaimer: We do not endorse any products, services or vendors. Nor are we paid in any way to promote certain products, services or vendors. We simply report on new technologies and services for informational purposes only. We strongly encourage our readers to research all products, services, technologies, vendors, etc. before joining a network or acquiring any product or service, whether it is free or not.

Our Real Estate TECH HOTLINE – that’s what’s hot! For just $24.95 per incident, our TECH HOTLINE Support on Demand service helps REALTORS® resolve their technical issues and answer their “how to” questions – FAST! We also offer a guarantee – if we don’t fix your technical issue, you don’t pay!

TECH HOTLINE Support on Demand provides technical support for:

• Desktop Computers
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• Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint)
• Outlook, Outlook Express and Web Email
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Call 866-95-FixPC (866-953-4972). We offer fast, friendly support when you need it. Click to find out more.

New Web Services Provide Voice Mail Options

You know the routine – you set up a personalized greeting on your cell phone, people leave messages after the beep and you retrieve your voice mail messages by dialing in to your cell phone’s message center. Not a big deal. Most of us can do that while driving 80 miles per hour, drinking hot coffee and reaching into the back seat for a bag of chips.

There are now a couple of free web-based voice mail services that will allow you to do more with your messages than just retrieve and listen to them. These services are “YouMail” and “GrandCentral.”   » Read the full article

Informative Tips from us to you!

Tech Tip #8:

Decrease That Daily Dose of SPAM in Outlook!

To decrease your daily dose of spam, select Tools > Options > Junk E-mail and click the “High” radio button.

To eliminate spam completely, select the “Safe Lists Only” radio button and you’ll receive e-mails only from the people you allow. If you are concerned about missing any e-mails, check your Junk E-mail box regularly.

Here is an overview of our some of our open events:

October 25:

The Greater Boston Real Estate Board will host the Ultimate Technology Certification Course with Matthew. Although our UTC program is not new to the Boston area, this is the first time we’re offering this outstanding program through the GBREB. We’re excited to be working with this wonderful group once again!

Please visit our Events & Seminars calendar for a complete list of dates, events and locations, and to register online for any of these programs.

No Photos, Please!!

Regular readers of this column may remember the installment, No Photos, No Buyers, No Kidding, where I exhorted real estate agents to make every effort to upload multiple photos to every listing on their website. Back then, the argument was that online listings without photos were about as useless as jargon-abbreviated classifieds in the back of the newspaper. Truth be told, the consumer vindicated my efforts, with the NAR’s annual buyer survey reporting that the consumer ranks multiple photos as the single most important data they seek from online portals. Some real estate companies have gone so far as to mandate multiple photos as a pre-condition before a new listing will appear online. And yet, while any search (try one now) of REALTOR.COM will still find plenty of listings without photos, tremendous effort has been made by most agents to saturate their listings with photos and virtual tours.

Now, however, I’m ready to admit that I was wrong. I concede defeat. Throw in the towel; anything you wish, if you’ll just stop putting more photos online. Please!

» Read the full article

Microsoft Windows Series | Tutorial #7

Outlook’s Calendar is a great tool for setting up appointments, meetings, etc. Essentially, it is an excellent time-management tool. The Calendar has some nice features that help you organize your time and tasks. One feature lets you “drag and drop” an email right into your calendar. You can then set up an auto-reminder to pop-up on your desktop so that you can take action. Since you’ve dropped the email message into the Calendar, it will be right there for your reference when the reminder appears.

» Click Here for complete Step-by-Step Instructions!

Check out the Latest Blog Entries: If you’re ever wondering what’s on Matthew’s mind, feel free to check out our Blog. You’ll be amazed at what goes through his head on a daily basis!

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