RealBird.com- Viral Marketing Widget For Real Estate Agents
April 7, 2008 
When I came across RealBird Listing Widget on Wallingford Wired Blog, it immediately grabbed my attention. It is not a secrete that many real estate gents can be very protective of their listing. If you don’t believe me, read the blog post by Greg Swann about a listing that was not his own.
I can’t blame Realtors for being overprotective about their listings. You don’t want your inventory to be misrepresented. However, at the same time many real estate websites have their local Multiple Listing System integrated into their websites so when visitor searches for the property, he can browse through hundreds of listings without leaving the website. Of course this can result in a lead where you can work as a seller’s agent on a property that you did not list.
But what about offering an opportunity just to any webmaster to “advertise” for you for free? Going back to Wayne and Pat, below is an example of a listing served via Realird.com Listing Widget I was able to grab right from their blog:
Why would you consider RealBrid.com? Simple. Viral marketing. There are many bloggers like myself that are on the constant lookout for good content for their blog. This can create an exponential exposure for you listing.
Posted in Blogging, Marketing, Real Estate Websites
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Right on the mark ! Great post.
-- Zoltan
www.RealBird.com
Thanks, for stopping by. Don't hesitate to drop me an e-mail if you were to release new features! ;)
Sure will ! Thanks.
-- Zoltan
Zoltan,
There is room for improvement for your widget. I am not sure if you have ever had a chance to view the widget while browsing in Fire Fox.... Take a look at the snapshot below:
<img src="http://www.go-beyond-mls.com/realbird.png" />
It is the same on other blogs. But if you click "get & share" and then click "cancel" that whiteout goes away. I it's difficult to tell what is causing this. I am sure you have some good programmers to fix it. ;)
Oops,
I guess I can't embed the image in the comments with Disqus. Here is that snapshot:
http://www.go-beyond-mls.com/realbird.png
Vlad, Checking it out ! Thanks for the screenshot. That's helpful.
What FF version are you using on which OS platform ?
My primary browser is FireFox 2.0.0.13 on XP SP2 and do not see this problem myself. We support FF 1.5+, IE 6+ and Safari 2+ both on XP and Mac for most of our interfaces. We'll have to look into this.
I post some screen shots myself with the next comment. Could you see whether http://realbird.typepad.com has the same problem in your browser? The top post at the time of writing this has 2 samples of similar widgets.
Thanks a lot again for finding this !
-- Zoltan
Zoltan,
I am viewing the page on a Mac (OS 10.5.2) in Firefox. It looks fine now.
The snapshot I took on Linux (Unbuntu Gusty to be exact).
I just tried to view it in Windows but the browser froze.... Do you have an
issue viewing my website???
The widgets on typepad look fine, again I am on Mac right now. I will let
you know if I notice something strange Linux. I barely use Windows
Thanks for the browser details. I do not have any problem viewing your site. Nice and fast
-- Zoltan
I think the Googe search API is causing some problems. That or AJAX
associated with it might be at fault. Oh well, I guess I just will have to
use good old local search ....
I really like what you are doing with RealBird.com. Nice concept. Great that
you have a free account for those who might want to test drive your
services.
Thanks Vlad !
Vlad, thanks for stopping by my blog! BTW, I have tried to duplicate the error you found on the RealBird widget in my Firefox and could not. When I click on the Get & Share, there is no white-out at all, I can see the various sharing icons and click them with no problem. I am using FF 2.0.0.13 on Vista Home Premium. I also tried to duplicate it on IE 7.0.5730.11 on XP Home SP2 and it displayed fine there as well.
@Zoltan, I've been using both RealBird and Postlets widgets to post my listings to my blog and must say I like them both, but I've found RealBird's easier to format into the post. I have to adjust the code for Postlets a little to get it to display correctly in my somewhat narrow pages, but RealBird slips right in with no adjustment needed. Great job and great widget!
Wayne Harriman
Wayne,
I've had issues with the widget on Lunux, that is when I took that snapshot.
Mac and Windows seam to be running the script without a glitch.
I am not sure you need to be worried. Majority of users are probably using
Mac or Windows.
Wayne, Nice blog you got there !
Thanks, I really appreciate that! I just started it about 3 weeks ago and have been trying hard to keep it current and relevant. We don't Have a lot of readers yet, but hopefully with the help of other bloggers like Vlad, we'll see some steady improvement!
Wayne, Happy you like our service. Many of our members are using multiple overlapping providers because of different feature set. I suspect, in the near future, us, vendors will extend into different directions with even more specialized offerings now that the basics are covered. Stay tuned, more RB features and products are coming
E.g. http://activerain.com/blogsview/455028/ActiveRa...
Vlad, thanks for hosting this conversation.
My pleasure. This conversation is a breath of fresh air for a change. ;)
Great Vlad. I'll be reading your blog ongoing. Good stuff.
-- Zoltan
Just got back to my Linux. That whiteout is is still here, but I will be upgrading to a FF 3.0 tomorrow so maybe that will fix it. I would not worry about it too much. Unless of course you have many visitors using Linux.
I will have to try that widget in my real estate site, it seems very useful for me. Instead leaving the website the users now can search listing in my own page.
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Good luck. Let me know if you have any good properties so I can showcase them on my blog. ;)