When Deven and I started BrightDoor in 2005, we believed that an integrated approach to real estate sales and marketing was a natural evolution from the analog, fragmented communications that ruled the day. In the early days, developers categorized us as “nice to have” technology that provided a “wow” factor in sales centers. Today, customers view us as an essential solution, enabling lead generation and daily business management. Developers all over the globe are now digesting the reality that CRM is important but only if it’s integrated with all key sales and marketing efforts.

As I write this, I am on the final leg of a return trip from Dubai. I’ve just spent a week with developers of some of the most grand scale commercial and residential projects in the world. Guess what? They are dealing with many of the same challenges as our U.S. customers. At the heart of it all is providing sales efficiency at all levels - from moving web leads into the sale process more quickly to giving agents better tools for matching buyers with ideal products to improving the ability to track and measure sales progress.

Regardless of where I’ve traveled recently, one theme has been clear - the adoption of a fully integrated CRM solution is the most urgent need in optimizing sales efficiency and improving sales velocity.

At BrightDoor, we look forward to servicing the industry during this important transition.

This is my third year at Connect and it’s impressive how much the event has grown and how the audience is evolving. The Inman News crowd is mainly rooted in general brokerage real estate but they continue to tap into high tech solutions applicable for any type of property seller.

These folks aren’t the technology laggards most high tech main streamers assume - at least not today. The leaders have moved beyond open houses and direct mailings and are leveraging technologies in new, innovative ways.

With a backdrop of 1.4M foreclosures YTD and 11 months of inventory in the US, here’s my top eight (8) list from SF Connect ‘08:

1. Mobility is becoming mainstream - iPhones and smart phones are adding numerous “network based features” that empower buyers and seller alike. Get one.
2. Privacy is gone forever - Profiling the prospect , real time website monitoring, tracking every online action is the new norm. How is your marketing Personalized?
3. Social Web is The Web - For millions of web users (and Realtors) Blogging, Facebook and Twitter are must have tools to be considered a legitimate player. I personally have a hard time reading it all, not to mention contributing!
4. Visual Media Rules - The importance of reading text is on the decline. Most Gen Xers and Millennials digest content through visual media (pictures and video)
5. Buy now! - Several thought leaders believe now is the time to buy real estate. Prices will be heading  up after the election.
6. Financial challenges still ahead- quote from Carter Murdoch (SVP from Bank of America) “there are capital market gyrations not seen since the great depression”. The Connect panel of Bears agreed.
7. Compare and Contrast - Buyers are becoming experts; 20% of real estate shoppers visit seven (7) different sites on average.
8. Not leads - Conversion! - There is a shift happening. Many sellers are looking for less leads and more assistance with Conversion into serious prospects.

Lots of interesting things to follow. The next Real Estate Connect conference will be in New York City early 2009. See you there!

Recently, I spent a few nights at the InterContinental in San Francisco (great architecture, superior service and affordable price!). When I connected to the hotel Wi-Fi, I noticed it was faster than usual. It turns out this hotel delivers more than 12Mbps of actual Internet bandwidth to each user. Michael (BrightDoor co-founder) found even more speed from his recent stay at the Wynn Las Vegas - 56Mbps!

I can clearly remember only nine years ago, when that the fastest Internet access in my upscale Cary neighborhood was ISDN. All my neighbors settled for a 56K Modem and I had 128K of digital connectivity! I was on the bleeding edge:)

For any non-tech packet geeks, your probably saying big deal – who cares. I guess it may seem trivial when you’re just checking email or craigslist postings …. but the future of the web is video. Someday really soon your favorite portal will have more HiDef content than pictures and you’ll appreciate the speed. Trust me.

For real estate developers this is also a big deal. Today there are about 3M homes with FTTH (Fiber to the Home) in the US and the projected growth is impressive. High speeds are just part of the FTTH offering. BrightDoor even partners with one of the leaders in this space - Connexion Technologies.

So if you’re planning the “must have” amenities of you new community, don’t stop with a signature golf course, spa and fitness center or equestrian complex – make sure the buyers who are partial to high bandwidth hotels aren’t forgotten. They will beat a (digital) path to your door!

I’ll jump right into the good stuff. By now, many of you may have heard about the Microsoft Surface technology - an interactive multi-touch table designed for retail and hospitality applications. We were able to demo the technology that inspired Microsoft - the GestureTek Multi-touch Illuminate Table. This engaging touch table allows for multiple points of simultaneous interaction with iPhone-like gesturing such as finger pinch to zoom and swiping to organize content elements on the screen. The GestureTek representative we spoke to acknowledged that they are still trying to determine the best applications for this intriguing device. Imagine your BrightShow presentation software running on this!

Another very high-touch display option was discovered at the Stewart Filmscreens booth. There, we witnessed a large scale StarGlas touch wall that provided a huge wow factor. Imagine interacting with media on a screen as large as a traditional video wall! Based on IR (infrared) beam technology, I found it to have better precision than many other displays based on the same touch technology. In the past, Deven and I have developed concepts for experiential spaces that included a large touch wall component, but the AV technology wasn’t mature enough to match the vision. Based on the overwhelming number of suppliers addressing large scale touch displays, I’d say the technology is no longer a limitation.

Within the touch technology realm, another trend of note is how suppliers are responding to the way people want to interact. The Steven Spielberg film “Minority Report” provided a vision of how we might one day interact with and control digital media. That vision is being carried forward by both user interface designers and AV suppliers. At the Kortek booth, we were able to intuitively interact with a large touch display to navigate a cityscape in real time, zoom into a building and watch live webcams from inside the structure. As BrightDoor develops Z-axis support required for multi-tenant and commercial clients, technology such as Kortek’s Interactive Digital Board will provide an impressive way to display our solution.

Finally, I couldn’t resist including our very own David Johnston providing scale to the world’s largest plasma display - Panasonic’s 103″ TH-103PF9UK. At $69,990 per unit, I’d say the list of potential buyers for this beast is fairly limited. In all, our journey through the technology wonderland that was Infocomm 08 has been meaningful on multiple levels - providing both inspiration for new BrightDoor product features and helping us gain a deeper knowledge of new AV products that could give our clients a competitive advantage.

This update includes a description of the BrightBase Web Services API changes that we plan in our upcoming release, planned for Wednesday, May 7, 2008, at 11:59pm ET pending certification by our Quality Assurance group. This update summarizes enhancements to that release only. If you are not the implementer of the BrightBase Web Services API, please forward this to the appropriate person.

FindObjects Update
We have enhanced the FindObjects (and, as a result, the FindObject) Web method to return partial objects. Many of you commented on how you often just need bits of data and not the entire object, which can be a heavy payload. Full object retrieval is still fully supported and no code changes are needed. But now, the BrightDoor Query Language supports a syntax that looks like the following:

Please note, that in the above example a entity object is still returned. So for values that you do not explicitly select they are defaulted to their natural state. This may mean you have an object with seemingly invalid data, especially with dates and Booleans. So keep this in mind. However, the advantage is a much smaller XML payload and this should be a big benefit to those who just needs slices of data for your other business needs.

Notification Technology
Our last update mentioned the concept of notifications when objects are created and/or updated. We have selected the Amazon Simple Queue Service (SQS) which will allow developers to subscribe to messages based on a set of business rules defined within BrightBase. This enhancement will roll out later this year and we welcome your input on how to best make use of this technology and this concept. If you are unfamiliar with SQS, please check out http://www.amazon.com/Simple-Queue-Service-home-page/b?ie=UTF8&node=13584001.

Search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN utilize a variety of methods in determining rankings. Keywords are a major factor in determining these rankings. The right keywords should be relevant to your community (location, amenities, etc) and are popular with searchers. So, how do you know what keywords people are searching with? For one, try to place yourself in your ideal customer’s shoes. What keywords would you use to try to discover your community? Try it out and see what results you get. Observe the characteristics of your search results and see if you can uncover some hidden gems that you can use for your keywords.

When it comes to looking for help online, we recommend you take advantage of online sites such as KeywordDiscovery.com and WordTracker.com. These tools contain historical archives of past searches and their data is from a large sample of internet searches. Both are paid services, but can be invaluable in helping uncover the right mix of keywords and keyword phrases. Keyword selection isn’t an exact science but these sites can increase your odds of making the right choices. Once you’ve created the best set of keywords, those are delivered to your web development partner for implementing in your web site’s “title headers” and “meta-tags”.

At our INSIGHT event, we’ll cover more on keywords during our “The Seven Steps to Higher Rankings” discussion. If you’re in the Charlotte area and you haven’t signed up for the event, I highly encourage you to Register Today. The information will be invaluable and, hey, the price is right (as in FREE)!

Most of us will never get a chance to set foot on the hallowed grounds of Augusta National Golf Club. We have to rely on CBS and their broadcast coverage (starting in 1956). The Masters was one of the first golf tournaments to ever be broadcast in High Definition and this year, the tournament committee added more new media than ever before!

To compete with the CBS blanket coverage of 60 HD cameras, Direct TV offered the “Masters Mix Channel” – three separate views with interactive controls. AT&T had the “Blue Room” for web and mobile users. But for me, the Official Masters website powered by IBM was the most impressive (despite it’s excessive use of green). Maybe it’s obvious that the Augusta National team is desperately trying to appeal to a younger audience with a focus on the web and interactivity.

Masters chairman Billy Payne; “This current initiative is more accurately described as a continuing effort to reach more and more potential golfers, especially kids, by communicating with them and delivering content to them in the manner in which they want it delivered in this 21st century technological era. “Our Web site, Masters.org, has been significantly enhanced to deliver information and offer participation to a more youthful audience by the addition of full-screen streaming video, photo sharing and blogs, among others”.

For me, the killer app of the website wasn’t only the new and improved “Interactive Leader Board” but the incredibly awesome full screen video application – “Augusta Live!” The quality was extremely impressive but the controls and dynamic data all layered on a 960 pixel wide streaming video image, simply blew me away!

So, what does all this broadcast technology have to do with real estate? Well… EVERYTHING!

Here’s my realization tonight - if an institution as historic and respected as The Masters Tournament can truly be an innovator in interactive and experiential new media, then why can’t every real estate developer in the United States? Even consider the fact these guys have been playing golf on the same 18 holes since 1934. Icons like Jones, Hogan, Palmer and Nicklaus are all associated with the rich history of Augusta National. The Masters is proving you can really merge High Tradition and High Tech.

It also strikes me that both The Masters and a typical new home community share a similar physical layout of “place” (fairways and greens; streets and lots) in addition to the same core “product” (emotion and experiences). In one sense, selling golf is just like selling homes.

The next time someone tells your marketing or sales VP that “…we don’t need high tech stuff to sell our community here”, simply remind them that times are a changing and the good old boys in Augusta, Georgia have a head start on you!

“Once again, we must be at the leading edge, delivering sports and entertainment to our fans as they want it delivered”, said Billy Payne.

How do your home buyers want it delivered?

The same rules apply for our real estate customers today. Most everyone sees the value in churning their text copy on a frequent cycle - just look at this Blog. But in the world of club house renderings or model home interiors, sales executives need visual media that accurately reflects the current state of the project. This applies to the analog outlets (that’s brochures and collateral) but even more critically are the real time digital media devices (that’s the stuff of BrightDoor).

The visual content of a community’s website or interactive presentation tools has to be relevant ALL the time. If its outdated everyone loses – especially the sales team because they will abandon the medium all together. I’ve seen this happen every time. Consider a community I toured this week; the images on their website displayed nice colored renderings but the view outside of the sales center showed a finished product. Wouldn’t the buyers be more impressed with the real thing? Some marketers remain favorable to virtual views because they look “nicer” but lets save that topic for another post.

I believe the solution to this problem is more about process and commitment than anything creative or technical. Here’s some tips we share with our customers:

1. First you must commit to refreshing visual media on regular calendar intervals
2. Get the right tools (i.e. good digital camera) and relationships with your content partners (i.e. architect)
3. Establish a documented workflow
4. Assign a dedicated person who owns this task
5. Communicate updates to the sales team and your audience immediately

With a little more effort and commitment, you’ll be amazed at the results!

- Deven Spear

I am the basis for all wealth.
I am the heritage of the wise,
the thrifty and the prudent.
I’m the poor man’s joy and comfort.
I’m the only true wealth of the rich.
I’m the happiness in old age,
Security against poverty and want.
I stand and brace people to embrace me
at an opportune time but, unfortunately,
many wait until they can’t afford me.
I’m the answer to the law of inflation.
Supply and demand work in my favor.
I’m the product that has been least affected
by the eight major depressions since 1840.
Come into my royal kingdom.
I’ll give you security, happiness and contentment.
Why? I’ll tell you why…
Because under all is the land.
Who am I?
I am Real Estate.

- Author unknown (shared by Jami Mullikin)

Despite the inevitable cycles, we should never loose faith in the simple truth that real property is basis of weath in America!

- Deven Spear