Two points that are often misunderstood or overlooked:

A) eEdge is not a company, it is a system which facilitates the unprecedented sharing of proprietary information & engineering between multiple independent third-party companies, and provides those combined services to you as a Keller Williams agent at an INCREDIBLE value.

–and–

2) The user experience is very dynamic, based on what WE, as agents, want to see. Ever thought, “It would be nice if eEdge had / did / could…” and a month later log in to find that eEdge has / does / can…? It’s because every Keller Williams agent has the ability to suggest features and vote on features suggested by others.

eEdge started with one primary focus: Putting the agent’s 20%…

up front

above-the-fold

in your face

…to reduce distractions – all while saving you money. That’s why there isn’t a “Financials” section like there is in another “Top” database program; using your customer relations management system to assign costs to every part of a transaction isn’t in your 20% — it’s a distraction.

Your Agent Technology Council provided KWRI Tech staff (who are highly skilled, extremely devoted, and seriously undervalued) with a real-world understanding of how an agent’s top 20% plays out in today’s technological environment, then folks like myself came in as pre-Beta testers to give it a second look and report bugs or request changes on things we thought would give you a better product. The culmination of that collective expertise was launched at last year’s Family Reunion. Since then, you have as much input into the direction of eEdge as anyone else.

I’ve been working on computers for more than a quarter of a century and the one thing I know better than technology is human behavior. The success or failure of any new product / service rests mostly on the shoulders of the end user. If the end user likes it, she gets excited about it, and becomes an evangelist for it, the people she convinces to get on board will overlook a HUGE amount of errors & deficiencies. If, on the other hand, the end user digs his heels into the ground, convincing himself that he doesn’t like it & it doesn’t work, his negativity will taint the perceptions of everyone around him.

So if you’re not absolutely thrilled with everything about eEdge, stop cursing the darkness and light a flippin’ candle already!!!

Go to the eEdge collaboration page and look at the items suggested, then determine what’s important to your business. Unlike Facebook, you can give items a Thumbs Up OR a Thumbs Down. If you think someone’s feature suggestion is just a cheesy waste of resources, give it a thumbs down. If you see an item you like and are constantly hearing agents say they want the same thing, then give that item a thumbs up and send the link for it to all the other people who have ‘wished for’ (read: griped and/or complained about) that feature.

Why am I so fired up about this? Because there are over 75,000 agents using eEdge and the item which as received THE MOST votes has a total of 1,059. That’s just over 1% of users contributing their thoughts.

Folks, it’s like voting – If you don’t go to the poll, don’t complain about what you get.

Now for the not-so-great news. When you added GaMLS, all you had to do was select it from the MLS list and add your username. Adding FMLS is a bit more involved, so the instructions below may seem klunky and disorganized. What you see in GREEN will be actions you take on the FMLS site. You’ll be doing everything you read in RED on the myKW / eEdge site.

Step #1. Log into MyKW and go to the eEdge Dashboard (by clicking New Lead or by clicking Show Options under myMarketing, then clicking Manage eEdge Website – which is supposed to be the ‘easy’ way). Navigate to the Profile Info tab under Website Admin. Write down the URL which appears beside “Website.” (Figure 1)

Step #2. Log into FMLS. In the left navigation, hover My FMLS and click Edit My Roster.  Be sure the website shown under Website URL is the same noted in Step #1. If it isn’t and you need to change it,  the servers may take several hours for the corrected info to change across the board. (Figure 2)

Step #3. If your roster entry had the same Website URL as your eEdge profile, go to Step #4. If not, check back every few hours until you see that the info in your FMLS Roster matches the info in your eEdge profile.

Step #4. When (and only when) your FMLS Roster Entry, go back to the FMLS homepage, hover Tools for Success, and choose FMLSweb at the top of the far right column. Click “FMLSWeb Agent Elections,” and be sure the radio button beside I elect to use an ‘FMLSweb Approved Data Vendor’ is selected, then click Submit Elections. If you agree to the T&C’s, click I accept the… and you will be taken to a list of Approved Data Vendors. Scroll down until you see “Market Leader,” click the radio button beside it, and then click Choose Election. You will be CC’d on an email from FMLS to Market Leader indicating your election to provide Market Leader with the FMLS IDX feed. (Figure 3)

Step #5. It may take 1-2 business days before Market Leader activates your FMLS feed. In the meantime, go to the MLS Administration tab of your eEdge website and click Start MLS Application. Select ‘First MLS’ from the drop-down list and click Save. (Figure 4)

Step #6. When Market Leader provisions your IDX feed, the status beside First MLS in your MLS Administration tab will change to ‘Approved.’ Once this status is updated, navigate back to your Profile Info tab. At the bottom of the page, click Edit. Now click Add Agent MLS ID. From the drop down box, select the new option of ‘First MLS’ and enter your FMLS username in the Agent MLS ID field. Click Save in this box and again at the bottom of the page. (Figure 5)

Congratulations! Within a few minutes, you should see listings from both services displayed on your eEdge website.

(Note: If you didn’t already have Georgia MLS provisioned, repeat Step #5, adding Georgia Area MLS this time. Since GaMLS is pre-authorized, you can immediately proceed to adding your Agent MLS ID as shown in Step #6.)

One of the biggest scams going on right now is people stealing the pictures & addresses of homesPosting ads on Craigslist for sale and then posting a fake “For Rent” post with that info. They’ll usually seem very legitimate to the consumer at first, and then they ask for the first month’s rent and deposit to be mailed to a PO Box somewhere different – often out of state. One way to combat this is to add your phone number or email address to the picture by overlaying it in a way that the scammer couldn’t easily remove it. This can be done with very little skill required if you can use a program like PowerPoint. Simply insert the image to a blank slide and add a text box where you’ll put your information. Place the text so that it doesn’t obstruct the view of the home, and is still in a position that removing it would render the photo useless. I’m attaching a photo of some options I recommend (using stock photos).

Embed the text using PowerPoint

No, you can’t. Because the agent hasn’t changed anything. Since search engines see this EXACT same content on 60,000-70,000 websites, it’s similar to you receiving 60,000-70,000 emails with the same content. What do we call that? SPAM! Do you want your website to be considered SPAM?

This is what your website looks like if you haven't changed anything.

There is a 5-step process Jason lays out which I think is brilliant. Another option I would suggest to the “Do not use one repeated password…” tip is to have a ‘generic’ password you use on sites that wouldn’t ruin your life if someone logged in as you. The generic password I use (and yes, I’m about to violate Jason’s rule about talking publicly about passwords) is based on the website. I use the first 4 letters of the site and a consistent set of 4 numbers. It’s very easy to remember and using ‘targ2532′ on Target.com, ‘ajco2532′ on AJC Online, and ‘yout2532′ for YouTube adds an extra layer to your security. So that’s a Business password created from a word that relates to your business, a Personal password created from a word representing your personal life, and a generic password that is specific to the site.

If you’re familiar with Top Producer, the eEdge ‘Group‘ field is basically the same as TP’s ‘Contact Type.’ You need a “33–Touch” group for contacts you want on your (brace yourself) 33-Touch program. Once you have that group set up and running, there may be subset groups you want to identify. For example, you may be a Starfleet Academy Devotee and alum, as are most of your ‘Advocates’ and many ‘Tier 1′ contacts. You may consider creating a “S.A.D.” group to make it easier when you get ready to send out the annual Starfleet Ensign’s game schedule. Lets face it, that would be a heck of a lot easier than trying to cross-reference for contacts whose address contains ”Mothers Basement” and whose company contains ”Radio Shack.” Maybe you’re farming an area with a vibrant community core, replete with spring flings and fall festivals. Perhaps they’re tight-knit enough to actually know the name of more than 4 people in the community. Create a group named “Kirkenwoodville” and add all of the residents of Kirkenwoodville. If you really get inspired, you might create a 12×12 to send out or to post on a domain you buy just for this purpose.

One thing I would highly recommend – in the way I recommend you be driving south if you’re on the southbound side of an interstate – is that you create your groups in advance of uploading your contacts. If, however, you already have your contacts in eEdge, its no big deal to create the group and add people to it. Its just easier to sort out your database into smaller groups and upload in chunks / groups. That method also makes it easier to clean up your database as you go and break the elephant into smaller bites (Q: How do you eat an elephant? A: One bite at a time.).

Resolution: Each database entry has three email address spaces. Since you’re already in your database (you are, right?) Open your contact record and add ‘imprevsupport@marketleader.com’ as your own secondary address and ‘info@info.marketleader.com’ as your third address. Now, when Imprev sends a notice that your touch is about to go out, it’ll come to you as an email alert just like an email from a client – and it’ll show up right there in the middle of your dashboard when you log in. The same goes for those Market Leader updates. Imagine! Now the product that was built to put you in control of your business & keep you informed ACTUALLY WILL!

If you like to pull back the curtain and know the “How” behind the “What,” this entry is for you. Secrets behind the ubiquitous “SEO” (Search Engine Optimization) are about to be broken down for anyone who can use Google. And if you can’t use Google, how the heck did you find my blog???

First, some ground rules:

1. There is a fundamental difference between zebras and horses. Just because it has black and white on it does NOT make it a zebra. If it’s a horse, you can ride it. If it’s a zebra, leave it to the professionals because you’re (probably) in real estate and not in web design / content management.

2. As Oscar Wilde said, “Everything in moderation…including moderation.” Don’t go overboard with your keywords and make your content read like an instruction manual for an Asian product so cheap they couldn’t afford to hire a real translator.

3. Blog. Period. Just do it. And when you do, the conventional wisdom (of this second, but hang on and it’ll change) is to keep your post between 300 & 500 words, with your keywords making up 2-5% of your text. In other words, a post of 500 words should repeat your keywords 10-25 times.

4. Keep your content fresh. You can write the perfect blog entries for a month, but if you don’t keep it up and those dozen blog posts are all that you have for the next year, you wasted your time.

5. Don’t get cute. Plastering your keywords all over your website in 4 pt type and in white letters on a white background will not help your site – it will get you blacklisted and banned from the search engines. I’m sorry, did you say you wanted to be on the FIRST page of Google or NO page of Google?

Now, with our ground rules in place, here is MY formula for finding the right keywords:

1. While logged in to your Google account (you DO have one, don’t you???), go to https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordTool.

2. To establish a baseline for how well your current website targets your pool, enter your website name in the “Website” box and click ‘Search.’ Are these the phrases used by people you WANT to attract?

3. You know who you want to attract, and you know what they would probably put into Google to find someone like you. Type those words / phrases in the ‘Word or phrase’ box, one word or phrase per line. For example, “find a home | homes in Chicago | real estate,” then click ‘Search.’

4. When the results come back, there will hundreds of them. Look at the first page and make sure you haven’t made a huge error in the keywords you used. If you are trying to market your Dallas real estate business and “morticians in Cheyenne” comes up, you might want to try again. Just sayin…

5. On the bar right above the results, click “Download,” then “All (###)” and save this file in the CSV for Excel format. Open the file in Excel, then save it as an XLS file (not CSV) in a directory that makes sense with a name that makes sense. In Excel, do the following:

a. Change “Global Monthly Searches” and “Local Monthly Searches” to GMS & LMS, respectively.
b. Move the LMS column before the GMS column.
c. Insert a column after LMS and another after GMS. Label these two columns “Local Rating” and “Global Rating,” respectively. Highlight these columns and click Format > Cells. Format these as Number with 2 decimal places (the default). Select all the columns after these columns and hide them.
d. Assuming that you still have a header row, Competition is column B, LMS is column C, and GMS is column E, paste the following formula into the first open “Local Rating” cell: =((1-B2)*(SQRT(SQRT(C2)))*3). Now paste this formula in the first “Global Rating” cell: =((1-B2)*(SQRT(SQRT(E2)))*3). Not to bore you to tears, but this is a formula I created inverts the amount of competition into the marketing opportunity, boils down the number of searches to a number to eliminates wild swings, and multiplies it into a number between 1 & 100 (ish).
e. Highlight the entire worksheet and click Data > Sort, sorting by Local Rating first and Global Rating second – both in DESCENDING order.
f. Pay attention to the top 20-25 results. These are the keywords / phrases that are being searched at a high volume and the competition for the user’s eye is very low in proportion.
When you create this spreadsheet, you’ll probably be amazed at some of the things you didn’t think about. For example, in my area, the phrase “property tax” is searched 823,000 times PER MONTH on average. In other words, every 2 minutes there are 3 people near me who type it into Google. For some reason, only 20% of websites comparable to mine have the words “property tax” in them. How fast do you think I put “property tax” in my META tags and wrote a page for homeowners wanting to appeal their “property tax” assessment???

What works for you?

When the announcement came through that eEdge had been approved, I began looking at the service partners and realized that an individual agent would pay $20/month to sign up for DotLoop. Obviously a full office would get it for a bulk price that would break down to a significantly lower per-agent cost, but that didn’t help my cause – so I didn’t bring it up. Seeing the DotLoop price and knowing how ‘green’ the agents in my office are (plastic & aluminum recycling bins, paper recycling, etc.), I met with our leadership and informed them that we were going to position eEdge in this way:

“You, as agents, wanted to go paperless. It’s good for the earth, it’ll save you on printing, copying, & faxing, and it will save you time scanning and emailing documents. No more running around at the last minute because the lender needs an amendment. The cost for this service is $20 per agent per month. HOWEVER, KWRI has leveraged our agent count with DotLoop and gotten them to reduce it to $15 for you. You’ll save more than that not having to deal with the paper issues, and we can save money on our E&O insurance. Now, *if* you are interested in a customer relationship manager (CRM) that handles your touch programs with very little effort, KWRI has gotten that for you for free from Market Leader. *If* you are interested in some professionally-designed marketing pieces, they’ve also secured a relationship with Imprev at no cost to you. You can choose to take advantage of the services Market Leader and Imprev provide if you choose, or ignore them if you want, even though we believe you’ll definitely like what you see. The only thing that will be required to keep the office on the same platform is the $15/month for DotLoop.”

You’d be surprised how attitudes changed with this new positioning. It’s all about finding what is important to our ‘clients,’ in this case internal clients. If you’ve met any resistance due to lack of technical skills or any other reason, how did you overcome it?

Well, it depends on your needs and your web presence.

If you are ‘old-school’ and don’t really use a lot of technology in your touch programs, and you don’t necessarily want to drive traffic to an impressive, informational website, you should probably save the money and use it for stamps and stationery.

However, if you want to leverage technology in your touch programs, and you want your leads and clients to see your website as the only source they need for the information they need to find the right house, you should definitely consider the professional edition.

(Full disclosure: I’m a geek. I do not get any type of benefit from you choosing one option over the other. I simply want to convey why I chose to go with the Professional Edition.)

Differences visible to the public

When I first activated my eEdge account, I went with the basic account. While I was assisting another agent who had gone pro, I quickly noticed the visible difference. There are many things that aren’t visible from the public’s perspective, but the things that are visible definitely stand out. As for the visible difference on the website, consider these two property listings, with the changes that I can see bordered in gold:

Items not visible to your leads/clients

Allow me to translate “marketing-speak” to “agent speak.” I’m using Market Leader’s information, and interpreting the best I can, so please forgive me if I’ve misread something. The changes they highlight are as follows:

• “Deluxe” listing packages, which have brochures, flyers, and postcards that have been coordinated to produce a consistent brand.
• Unlimited virtual tours with text, photos and music. This is available ala carte for $49 (or maybe $99 – I can’t fully recall) each.
• Extended library of eNewsletters and eCards.
• The ability to create custom campaigns, in addition to the stock 33-Touch, 12-Touch, and 8×8′s available. This allows you to change the dates when your items deploy as well as what gets deployed.
• Craigslist posting service.
• The ability to embed a search widget into your other sites, such as your blog, email signature, etc.
• Expanded list of available website themes.
• Additional search fields and “search by map” options on your website.
• A selection of vanity URL’s already secured by Market Leader. (personal note: I got “SearchAtlantaProperties.com” – HOW COOL IS THAT?)
• The option to add “Featured Partners” to your website (translation: sponsorship opportunities!)
• Customizable email templates.
• The addition of an RSS feed alert for new leads,
• The ability to access your database, schedules, tasks, etc. from your smart phone. (To me this is a HUGE advantage!)
• Detailed customer information, including the number of times they’ve seen specific properties, when they last accessed the site, which ones they’ve saved, etc. (Personally, if I can see that a lead or client has viewed the same home 5 different times, I know that I need to be picking up the phone ASAP!)
• Performance management allows you insight on your close rate, unsubscribe rate, etc.
• Site activity monitoring, allowing you to see where your leads are finding you so you can better play “red-light, green-light” with your marketing dollars.

Have you discovered any other differences that I’ve missed? Let me know.