The Diverse Solutions Blog

So, a few of you have expressed an interest in using the RSS feeds for content on your websites and blog sites.  While I think this is a good idea I want to pose a couple questions.  Is the goal of this to engage the customer in your self updating pages or is this for SEO reasons?  If it is just for your customers and the overall fantastic usefulness of your site then I agree.  There are countless creative ways to incorporate these RSS feeds into pages that would be very impressive.  However, (playing devils advocate here) if you are hoping that this will help your SEO efforts won’t this be considered duplicate content if this concept catches on?  And what about the content always changing?  Depending on how it is used do you really want some one else’s property description being shown as content you wrote?  What are your thoughts on this?

Justin LaJoie – CEO
Diverse Solutions

Wow have we been busy around here but that’s a good thing.  Over the past few months we’ve added several new MLS’s and helped hundreds of people with developing a new online presence with our AgentCast websites or improving what they already have with our dsSearchAgent mapping IDX solution.  Currently we’re putting together our new developments schedule to further improve dsSearchAgent and I’d like to get some feed back from the people who matter most, our customers.  We have quite the list as it is but I know there are some great ideas out there that we haven’t thought of.  If you’re in the trenches and are using dsSearchAgent we want to hear from you.  Examples:

• New types of reports for the clients or the agents
• New ways to search
• New types of modules/widgets
• Additional ways to view properties
• New options to customize the look of the solution
• Anything that would make it better for you or your clients

It is the time to speak up and be heard.  There are no bad ideas.  We want to hear them all from the big ones to small ones.

Yesterday was a big day for us. First, we finally released our new admin (yay!), and second, we saw an announcement that Google finally released API tie-ins to their Street View imagery (see my post on Geek Estate or the original announcement). Although we had been getting requests to integrate Street View into our IDX solution (demo) for quite some time now, the imagery was previously only available through Google Maps. However, with the new announcement and release, developers can now hook into the Street View imagery directly.

I / we have been incredibly busy lately, but when we saw the announcement, we knew we had to get this out to our customers ASAP. Well, I’m really happy to announce that it’s already been integrated! Check out this $2.7M Newport Beach beauty to see an example.

While I think it’s a really, really cool feature, there are limitations. First and foremost, it’s (obviously) only available in areas where Google has street view imagery. For example, just because we service the Charleston Trident MLS doesn’t mean that Google has street view there. Second, the placement and centering of the street view imagery is an inexact science at the moment. Our code currently tells Google’s servers where the house is, and they tell us if they have imagery there and then show it. Unfortunately, when Google does find a match, we don’t really know if the match they found actually represents the streets around the house. All that said though, it’s still an absolutely amazing technology that we are very grateful to Google for.

For now, it’s only enabled on our demo account, but if you drop a comment at the bottom with your name and a link to your dsSearchAgent IDX solution, I’ll be more than happy to enable it on your own account. We’ll should be able to add the option to enable / disable it on your own accounts to our new admin either today or Monday.

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Update: You can now easily enable Google Street View in our Control Panel.

We are wrapping up our beta of dsControlPanel today and going ahead with a soft release of dsControlPanel. To recap, our dsControlPanel is a combination of our dsAgentChat, dsSearchAgent, and dsAgentReach individual administration areas. Not only can you find all your tools in one place now, but we’ve also added a bunch of new features, and even mashed some of our features up. You can read my run-down here.

So, to get to the new admin, simply navigate your browser to http://controlpanel.diversesolutions.com and you will login with the same username and password you already use in our other admins. Additionally we’ve also put a big yellow notice on the dashboard of each of the affected admins, announcing the change and providing a link to auto-login.

Now, being this is a soft-release we’re allowing you to continue to use the old administration areas just in case, but only for a week. So on April 10th if you attempt to go to your old admin area, you will be forwarded to the new dsControlPanel. And the “Old Admin” link will be removed from the dsControlPanel navigation.

I’m sure many of you are going to say “how the heck do I use this thing?!”, so instead of calling, emailing, or quitting, we’ve provided you with demo videos. From anywhere in the admin you can click on the icon to get a popup of all our help videos. Additionally, each section that has a video will also have a icon directly to the left of the icon. We’re hoping these videos answer most of your questions. Let us know if you can’t find help for something.

We’re really proud of dsControlPanel and we hope you enjoy the new functionality and usability. Thanks everyone, and please, tell us what you think.

Overview

We have been hard at work improving the backend for both our mapping mls idx-solution, dsSearchAgent, and our contact & lead-management solution, dsAgentReach, for some time, and today we wanted to introduce to you some of the overall changes & additions to these programs, as well as announce our beta program.

Before we get started, for those of you who just want the bottom line, here is the short-list of what you’re going to see with in our new control panel:

• Streamlined Interface
• Improved integration & consolidation between dsAgentReach & dsSearchAgent
• New applications (Form-Creator and Lead-Pipelines)
• Complete re-tooling of incoming lead integration

Our main goal for this release was to fully integrate dsSearchAgent with our dsAgentReach & Lead Management products. This alone was the number one request from many of our customers, and by far one of the most useful.

Our second goal was to streamline the user interface of all our dsAgentReach applications. We decided to start from square one and take the user interface in a completely different direction. We think this new system will really help you to better organize and utilize your Leads & Contacts.

Third, we decided to change how we handle incoming-email leads, in addition to providing more avenues for lead aggregation. We feel that our new method and avenues will help streamline the lead-distribution process.

Beta Information

We also wanted to let you guys know that we’re starting a limited-beta program to help work the kinks out and ready the new control panel for wide release. If you would like to participate, you must already have our dsSearchAgent product. To request to be included in the beta, email your Customer Support Representative, or our general support line: support@diversesolutions.com. For those of you we’ve contacted to be in the beta, remember that you can post your thoughts and bugs in our forum.

That’s it for our overview. Again I’ll be detailing all this information in individual posts, describing our changes, and how each feature will work.

It’s been a looooong time coming, but it’s time for me to put on my new-feature-dude cap again and share with you a whole bunch of new features that we’ve been quietly adding to our dsSearchAgent IDX solution over the past two months or so. I’m only allowed to talk to the outside world everyone once in a while before I have to get back to coding, so I hope to make the most out of this time before I’m banished back to my closet office.

Search by communities and tracts
Website visitors can now search for properties with certain communities, tracts, and neighborhoods (everyone seems to have different names for them). For example, you can now search for that killer home in Boston’s Beacon Hill community or Seattle’s Queen Anne community. In many MLS’s, this means that you can also search for homes in 55+ communities, specific condo tracts, and neighborhoods that span multiple cities.

Ultimately, we decided that the best place to put the community / neighborhood / tract search is in with our city and zip search box. We kept the same auto-complete technology we were using before, so you’ll now see all the different names and types of locations when you start typing in the location box.

Search by year built
You can now search for properties by the year they were built. It’s possible to limit the search to new properties, historic properties, or anywhere in between with this sweet new tool. Looking for that old, dilapidated junker you’ve been just dying to snap up? Now you can find it that much easier!

If you’ve chosen to use sliders in your IDX, you can choose how far you want the low end of the spectrum to go; the high end is automatically updated for you every year.

City marker statistics
Even though our city markers were great before, they’re “el fantastico” now! (Like my Spanish? I’ve always been good at it.) When you hover over any city marker, you’ll now see some quick stats about the city based on the default property types that are checked for you when you or your clients visit the IDX. The great benefit of these quick stats is the ability for out-of-area visitors to quickly get an idea about the pricing in the different areas without having to spend the time exploring and researching each one.

Full size photos!
Based on popular demand, we’ve added complete support for the full-size photos that come from the MLS. To see these photos, just go to any property you wish and click on the “View full-size photos” link immediately beneath the mini-slideshow. You’ll see a slick new full-size slideshow open up, and in it you’ll see all of the photos for that listing in the original form that they were provided in by the MLS. Just think, you’re finally able to see all of the superfine details of this “investor dream” to “purcahse (sic) and re build”.

Better zoom support
Previously, dsSearchAgent would only zoom to your search area if you either entered a single city in the city search box or if the number of properties that matched your search was less than 250. With the enhanced zoom support, dsSearchAgent now zooms to the area that matches your search no matter what you in put the location search box and no matter what other search criteria you specify. Hopefully this will make it much easier for you and your visitors to always be able to relate each search with a visual representation of that search on the map.

Sold properties!
Although this feature is only for members of SoCal MLS at the moment, we’re very excited to tell you that we’re working to get sold property data from each MLS and integrate it into dsSearchAgent! Now, when the owner of each IDX solution has it enabled, sold properties will be displayed immediately beneath the map whenever active listings are also plotted on the map. To see what I mean, hop over to this demo account and zoom into an area that you find interesting. Once you’ve zoomed in far enough, you should see the sold properties display pop into view; using it should be pretty self-explanatory.

Virtual tours for all
We’ve gone through every single one of the MLSs that we service and added support for the virtual tours feed that they provide. Now, if the agent that lists a property has provided a virtual tour (or more than one), you’ll see a link that says “View virtual tour(s)” immediately beneath the “View full-size photos” link. Each virtual tour will open in it’s own window, so your visitor will never be taken away to someone else’s site.

dsAgentChat in contact module
Ever since we completely revamped our dsAgentChat instant messaging application, we’ve been striving to integrate it into all of our products. We’re happy to announce that it’s now part of each of our clients’ IDX solutions! You can easily customize dsAgentChat so that visitors can chat with you via your cell phone, via the dsAgentChat desktop application, or via the dsAgentChat administrative area. Remember that all of our products come bundled with dsAgentChat for free, so there’s no extra cost for you to kick the tires on this really fancy technology.

Alrighty, that’s all for now. I’m off to work on some more cool features that will bring you riche$ beyond your wilde$t dream$. If you have any ideas for features that you’d love to see added to dsSearchAgent (or any of our products for that matter), or if you otherwise have a snide remark to share with us, feel free to post it in the comments. Don’t worry, we probably won’t laugh at you.

Hey there blog readers. My name is Andrew, and I’m another one (the best of all) of the lead software developers who works around here. My responsibilities include maintaining our current suite of products, developing nifty new products and features, and dutifully getting here at 8:00 AM 8:15 AM every single day.

I’m really excited to announce that today is new feature Friday! It’s sort of like Taco Tuesday, but without the tacos and with more real estate technology. While you’ve been busy getting completely overwhelmed with feedback on how great your AgentCast website is or how incredibly easy and powerful your dsSearchAgent IDX solution is, we’ve been secretly working on a whole bunch of new features for you to have fun with. Best of all, all of these new features are completely free to all of our existing customers.

I’m definitely fired up about the first new feature I have to share with you, especially since there is literally no one else out there that offers anything at all like this. It’s our new map statistics panel that conveniently slides out as soon as you hover over the tab on the right-hand side of the map. Once it slides out, you’ll find some really cool pricing, home size, and lot size statistics for all of the properties that are within that very map view. Actually, to be more accurate, the statistics are only for the property types that you have checked under the “Advanced >>” portion of the search tab. If you don’t like this functionality, you’ll even be able to turn it off in your dsSearchAgent admin area. However, it’s both really fun and really easy to use, so I encourage you to try it out!

Another set of crazy new features that we are releasing are our blog and website modules. While you might already have modules on your site from Altos Research, Trulia, or any other company, now you can add our great new modules to your site. Our slideshow module allows you to display your listings, or any listings that match any criteria you set up as a link in your dsSearchAgent backend, in a nice slideshow fashion. Our map module allows you to take those same properties and display them nicely on a map. Finally, our map search module is essentially a mini-IDX search application that you can put on your page when you don’t want to instead link to the full-fledged version. Using it, your visitors can search for homes based on almost any criteria they’d like. Clicking on a property that is displayed in any of the modules will bring the visitor directly to that property in the full-featured IDX.

Next (not that we need to wow you anymore for today), you’ll very shortly be able to tie your IDX solution to a domain name of your choice. For example, say you specialize in real estate in Elbonia and you have the domain name elboniarealestate.com. Previously, you’d probably use that domain to either host a site where you advertise yourself and what you know about that area or to host a blog. Well now you’ll be able to hook that domain name up our dsSearchAgent solution so that visitors who go to that domain will be able to immediately search for real estate in Elbonia and contact you via email or a dsAgentChat instant message when they have questions. Yay!

We’re also releasing a number of features that aren’t as, um, take-your-breath-away-awesome. You’ll soon be able to turn on the option to embed your contact info into the results panel. We’re also now announcing that you can connect your rockin’ dsSearchAgent IDX solution to your Top Producer lead management system. Finally, we’re rolling out the ability to search for houses by community, year built, and tract in many of the MLS’s. If you don’t have it yet in yours, be patient as it will be there very soon.

Sooooooo, now that I’ve got you all worked up, I’m going to risk getting my car egged by a rogue gang of agents and brokers by telling you we’re not going to immediately release all of these features to everyone at the same time. Instead, we’re going to do a slow rollout over the next two weeks or so in order to monitor any issues that pop up because of these features. If you have dsSearchAgent, you want to be one of the first to have these features, and you enjoy having stuff break on you (just kidding), drop us a line at info-attt-diversesolutions-dottt-com and we’ll see what we can do to turn the features on for you. In the meantime, be on the lookout for the press releases relating to these great new things!

Well, until the next time I have something cool to share, hasta luego!

Before I get started, let me introduce myself. My name is Jonathan, I’m one of the Lead Software Developers at Diverse Solutions. My job mainly involves developing new products, as well as maintaining existing applications.

Today, I’m happy to announce a new set of features and upgrades to our dsAgentChat platform. In this iteration of dsAgentChat our main goals were centered around what our clients were telling us, and what we thought the Chat could benefit from the most. So we came up with 4 main points of development: Ease of use, Centralized management, Extensibility, Desktop application. With that, let me introduce the main improvements to dsAgentChat, and how they will affect you.

Dashboard

To begin, dsAgentChat was given it’s own admin-area. You can access it from either the AgentChat button in your current admin area, or at http://admin.dsagentchat.com. In your Chat admin you’ll see sections for Chatting, Site-Badge Configuration, Options, and AgentChat Desktop.

Admin Chat

The admin chat itself has retained most of it’s previous functionality, other than a face lift. The major addition to chat is a “chat-base” where you can see your current chats, go away, or logout.

The chat-base allows you to do two important things. First, if you have closed a chat with a visitor, and you want to re-initialize that conversation, you can click on the visitor in your chat-base and your conversation will be reinitialized. Secondly, if you are going to go away from your computer for an extended period of time, but don’t want to close down your chat window, you can click “go away”. Going away effectively pauses your chat session, and gives any current or new visitors a generic contact form.

Site-Badge Configuration

In your site-badge configurator, you have the ability to create the chat-button that you’ll then use on your website. You’re given options for “Target Agent” and “Icon Text”. Target Agent is populated with the users associated with your Diverse Solutions account. If you chose one of these individual Agents, that chat button will send chats exclusively to that Agent. Alternatively you can chose “Round Robin”, and chats will be sent round-robin to the Agents that are current logged in, or have SMS enabled and scheduled during that time. Icon Text allows you to customize the text on the button. Currently we include Agent, Me, Team, and Us for your Icon Text.

Options

This section allows you to setup two very important features, your Personal Information and SMS options. The data you fill out as your personal information is what the visitor will see when they’re chatting with you. As for the SMS options, we’ve built in a schedule allowing you to set the days of the week, and the time you’re going to be available to chat. You may not want your cell phone buzzing at 2am, or maybe you take weekends off from, this will allow you to prevent SMS messages at inconvenient times.

dsAgentChat Desktop

We’re very excited to announce our desktop implementation of dsAgentChat. Being an “instant-messaging” culture here at Diverse Solutions, we always had a problem with forcing our Agents to keep a browser window open to interact with the chats on their website. Until recently developing a desktop application (especially cross-operating-system) was a very large undertaking. However with the advent of a new platform by our friends at Adobe, “Adobe Integrated Runtime” AIR, we are able to make this dream come true.

To take advantage of dsAgentChat Desktop, simply just navigate to that section in your Chat Admin and you will be given the simple instructions for installation. Once installed not only does dsAgentChat Desktop launch and act like a normal windows/mac application, but it also looks and feels just like your in-browser chat.

IDX / dsSearchAgent Integration

The final major feature we have to announce is integration with our dsSearchAgent product. In your dsSearchAgent Options you will be given the ability to chose your Target Agent (just like in your configurator), and your IDX will automatically have chat enabled for your visitors.

That’s it for our dsAgentChat updates, we hope you like them. These features will launch very soon, so keep an eye out for the update in your admin area.

As always, if you have problems with the new features, please contact our customer support.