There are three new Happy New Year RES Flyer templates available in the Holiday Category.

There are lots of ways to use the RES Flyer Happy New Year templates.

Are you going to a New Year’s Eve party? Take your camera, snap some candid shots and send it to the host the following day. Here’s an example of what a New Year’s Eve Party Show might look like. Choose your favorite photos from 2007 and send a New Year’s retrospective show. Highlight some of the people you’ve worked with in 2007, or the properties you’ve sold. You’re limited only by your imagination.

We’ve seen lots of Holiday greetings being sent, and that makes us smile. This holiday greeting was sent in by Ann Brown, of Virtual Admins Plus for Linda Risden at Florida Five Star Realty, Inc. It was featured on the front page of Linda’s website. Feel free to include links to your holiday greeting shows in the comments!

Happy Holidays from all of us at Real Estate Shows!

Videoblogs, or vlogs, are relatively new to the real estate industry.

But there is a growing community of experienced videobloggers outside of the real estate industry. They make up the bulk of the users on the “by invitation only” Seesmic.com. After spending a few days on the site, my gut told me this community would be a good one to tap into to jump start a conversation around the theme of “Beyond The Written Word,” a panel I am moderating at Inman’s Bloggers Connect conference in NY.

The Bloggers Connect panel will consist of Douglas Heddings, Senior Vice President, Prudential Douglas Elliman; Rachel Natalie Klein, Founder, IntoTheBox.tv; Daniel Rothamel, Realtor, Strong Team REALTORS; Blogger, RealEstateZebra.com; and Mike Price, President, ML Broadcast.

We only have 45 minutes to discuss a very hot topic. So let’s start it early.

To help us, I asked the seasoned videobloggers on Seesmic what they might have to say about the potential upside and possible downside that video blogging and podcasting might have for real estate agents looking to use it to grow their business. This 14 minute video is an edited version of the discussion.

The goal of this video is to generate further discussion. The questions and comments you leave here will help move this discussion forward and may very well end up being part of the panel discussion in New York. So, comment away. If you’d like to add your video comment, you can upload a video anywhere you choose and include it as a link in the comments here, or you can add your video comments to the discussion the discussion video on Viddler.

Here are links to the full comments used for this video.

Jeff Turner | Real Estate Shows

• http://seesmic.com/VxW9jHhM95
• http://seesmic.com/YudjEHC5cP
• http://seesmic.com/COp2rZCILR

Deek Deekster | DeekDeekster.com

• http://seesmic.com/7iLwyHdB7u
• http://seesmic.com/ZyqkRZJnmB

Adam Jochum | Cafn8ed.tv

• http://seesmic.com/dqrVKHFMcG
• http://seesmic.com/6sirvwQqNX
• http://seesmic.com/uo7ayvUTPv

David Jacobs | TheConnectedWorld.net

• http://seesmic.com/AfUBDFSjdr
• http://seesmic.com/FuJnMVS4Ui

Nicole Spagnuolo | NicoleSpag.com

• http://seesmic.com/CvPvpZk5hu

Victor Cajiao | TypicalMacUser.com

• http://seesmic.com/zaKipGp6NV

Daniel Rothamel | RealEstateZebra.com

• http://seesmic.com/JQgRL9hmt9

Andy Kaufman | MyEastBayAgent.com

• http://seesmic.com/KliOhLXHoV

As further commentary, this video took a ridiculously long time to edit.

An extremely “social networked” REALTOR® friend of mine joined yet another network recently. This time though, she joined not as an agent, but as an artist. She’s enjoying her new environment and I think it will even give her a boost in her real estate career. (Not that she needs one.)

Think about this, when children learn to play musical instruments, they do better in math. In a way they’re related, even though math is thought of as one of the fundamental building blocks of education and music is sometimes cut out of our schools when budgets get tight. (Don’t get me started on music and art getting cut, OK?) Something about music relates to math in the brain, and learning to read and play musical notes helps numbers to make more sense.

I know that when I make a Real Estate Show first, I do a better job marketing a house on all the rest of my promotional materials.

The creative process at Real Estate Shows makes me focus on what’s really important about the house. First, I pick nine (or five) pictures to be the “scenes” in the Show itself. I generally like to start at the front of the house, then lead through somewhat and end up in the back yard. That’s just my way.

But I’m not done there. Then I choose a focal point in each of my photos. This is where the camera “moves” in each scene. What do I really like about this room? What’s something a buyer will want to learn about this house? It’s up to me to give this house its best chance at a quick sale.

Then it’s time to add titles, choose music and add a description. By this time, I know the house pretty well. I’ve not only been in it, measured it and photographed it, but now I’ve studied it. I’ve really thought about what makes this house special. And I have the tools to help someone else fall in love with it, even if they’ve never set foot in it before. Everything works together, in just the right way.

I know that if I start with the Real Estate Show, the creativity involved is going to “wake up” my brain and help me show that house to its best advantage in all the marketing I’ll do.

Make your Show first, and see if it helps you, too.

Our CEO, Bill Leider, has been awarded The Black Pearl award for his post, “What Is A Brand?“ The Black Pearl is awarded “for the best practical, technical or marketing idea of the week.” Everyone here at Real Estate Shows would like to congratulate Bill on yet another fine piece of writing.

Are things a little tighter in your real estate market lately? Wondering how you can set yourself apart from the competition?

Let me tell you a little secret. The things you are doing already are probably wonderful, fabulous things that would make any client proud to choose you. But unless you can show them what you’re doing and how that is a benefit to them, you might as well not even be doing them.

As an example let’s look at Bob Carney of Long & Foster Real Estate, Inc. Bob recently posted on his Focus On Frederick blog about caravan tours. His company still does the “old fashioned” caravan tour once or twice a month to view the new listings. A client might wonder how this is any better than just looking at the pictures of the house, as many offices do now that technology makes this so easy.

There is nothing like being in a house to see how it feels. Even our wonderful Real Estate Shows is not meant to take the place of actually walking around in a house, but hopefully it shows you the house in such a way that you want to see more. (And maybe are even pre-disposed to fall in love with the house.)

Bob explains that having a bunch of agents view your home in person is something you would very much want to happen. If you are a seller, you will gain a lot of useful information from the tour. These trained, experienced agents are going to let you know exactly what might get in the way of a sale. They are also actively working with buyers, and once they see your house they may realize they have a buyer who will LOVE it.

After listing your house with Bob Carney or one of his coworkers, you now have a whole team of agents who have seen your home, know it’s condition, are familiar with the neighborhood and will keep it in mind to see if it fits the needs of their clients.

In Bob’s post and Real Estate Show, he takes us along for the ride and lets us experience the tour for ourselves. We see the advantage because we feel like we’ve been there, done that for ourselves.

If you’re an agent looking for a way to set yourself apart, maybe you don’t have to do anything different. Maybe you just have to find a way to show what you’re already doing.

*Ahem*. I’ve heard Real Estate Shows are a great way to do that.