Facebook 3.0 (finally) arrives for iPhone!

For all you social-media-utilizing real estate agents and brokers who have been paying attention through all the real estate conferences, tweet-ups and bar camps over the past few years, Facebook 3.0 for the iPhone has arrived.

First off, I'll tell you it's cool. Really cool. While Facebook 2.5 was essentially a user-friendly-but-watered-down version of the world's most popular social networking website, Facebook 3.0 brings true utility to mobile social networking.

Facebook's programmers have realized that social networking is going mainly mobile, a trend that's not likely to slow down any time soon. And why not? You don't need to risk racking up hours on your company's firewall showing your boss your Facebook obsession when you can pop open a cell phone app a few times a day (and that's for the people who DON'T have Facebook blocked through their company's Net Nanny). And let's not even mention college students who utilize the mobile app while sitting through another lecture...

In addition to the more user-friendly design and interface, Facebook 3.0 provides benefits to the real estate community its predecessor did not. For one, you can actually create photo albums. Meaning, you can add an entire album of a networking event, open house, or new listing to Facebook while it's occurring, all from your phone. Take that, Twitter!

If you have an iPhone 3GS, you can upload videos straight from your phone to Facebook. Quick virtual tours, anyone?

Also, Facebook 3.0 gives you the ability to check your events and RSVP, update your Pages, write Notes, quickly call and text your Facebook friends, and more. I don't even have to go through all the potential real estate benefits there.

Mashable's Ben Parr has more details on the update, which, I'm told, is still listed as the 2.5 update, but loads the 3.0 version. You'll receive the 3.0 version if downloading from the iTunes store as well.

Trust me when I say you'll enjoy Facebook 3.0. If you see other cool ways you can utilize the update's features for real estate, let us know.

Google's Caffeine increasing real-time search emphasis

Yesterday, I reported Inman News' interest in the Google Caffeine search engine architecture story.

Inman followed it up with a more in-depth piece today, touching on the changes Caffeine's architecture brings and how those impact the real estate market.

The article notes Google's increased attention toward search speed. The new architecture helps Google crawl faster, thus leaning more heavily toward real-time search. This means those websites that are more frequently updated will benefit from Google's more frequent crawls, adding even more weight to the importance of real estate agents and brokerages utilizing Twitter accounts and blogs.

Check back to Sean Cutright's blog and Delta Media Group's News blog for more information on Caffeine and all relative real estate search engine optimization news.

Delta Media Group training Prudential Homesale on new real estate website

Delta Media Group recently sent live the real estate website of one of our largest new clients, Prudential Homesale Services Group.

Mike Minard, Delta Media Group's president, is in Lancaster, PA early this week to help train Prudential Homesale's more than 1,200 agents on how to use their new real estate website and lead management systems.

We'll keep updates of the training on Delta Media Group's News blog. Check back for further details.

Google Caffeine hitting the real estate news scene

Inman News has jumped into the Google 'Caffeine' discussion, with an article this morning on how the amped-up search engine architecture Google is testing may affect overseas property searches.

Though the article adds little to the Caffeine conversation, it's worth noting the Inman has taken an interest in the topic, albeit through a republished column.

While the column asks if Google's Caffeine will affect overseas property searches, it quickly also suggests that there is little evidence that it will. In addition, it notes what we've already discussed: that Caffeine is putting more weight on real-time search, though it has not yet developed a true real-time search algorithm.

The Google Caffeine conversation is sure to continue to gain ground. Check back to Sean Cutright's blog or Delta Media Group's News blog for more information on how it will impact the real estate market and real estate search engine optimization.

Caffeine back up, Bing gaining ground

'Caffeine,' Google's new search engine architecture, is back up in its test mode, for those of you eager to check it out.

After a short demo period last week, Google took Caffeine down Wednesday night for updates. It was not back up as of Friday morning.

To a regular observer, Caffeine may only show slight changes from Google's regular search results. It does, however, seem to work a good deal faster and produce several more search results than Google's current engine.

The debate is still out as to whether Microsoft's Bing will gain much ground on Google in the search engine wars. Reports show Bing did gain 3 percent market share In June, and another 1.24 percent in July. Some argue that Google's new algorithm is built with intention of keeping up with Bing, while Matt Cutts, Google's head of Webspam, has said it is not.

Check back to Sean Cutright's blog or Delta Media Group's News blog for further details.

Google downs 'Caffeine' for short period

If you're looking to test Google's new search architecture, codenamed 'Caffeine,' you'll have to wait another few hours to do so.

According to a Tweet (Twitter post) by Google Webspam head Matt Cutts, Caffeine was taken down until approximately "late Thursday for datacenter upgrades."

Check back to Sean Cutright's blog and Delta Media Group's News blog for further real estate search engine optimization news.

More 'Caffeine' updates per Matt Cutts' blog

Matt Cutts, the head of Google's Webspam team, posted some follow-up Q&As about Google's 'Caffeine' on his blog yesterday. Click here for more information.

On his blog, Matt reviews questions about Caffeine, its design, what it aims to do, Google's direction with it, search engine competition, giving feedback on Caffeine, and more.

Check out Matt Cutts' blog at www.mattcutts.com/blog.

More info on Caffeine to come at www.dripmarketingblog.com.

PC World's look at Google's 'Caffeine'

PC World's David Coursey took a look at Google's new search engine architecture, codenamed 'Caffeine,' in a blog entry this morning.

Coursey's article notes that Caffeine could affect search engine results, thereby increasing the importance of a well-positioned SEO company to help keep the search engine results of a business website high. Of course, many of Google's results might not change, and there's no guarentee with any SEO company as to how quick their methods will help improve the results on any search engine. At this point, Caffeine has not been announced publicly for 24 hours yet, so there will be quite a bit that we'll learn about it through time.

Check back to Delta Media Group's News blog and Sean Cutright's blog for more information and news updates on Caffeine, and how it will impact search engine optimization in the real estate industry.

Google announces new search engine architecture

Yesterday afternoon Google officially announced a secret project several months in the making: a new search engine. Or, in Google's terms, "a next-generation architecture for Google's web search."

Codenamed 'Caffeine,' Google is allowing consumers to test the new search architecture at http://www2.sandbox.google.com. The page appears the same as Google's current search engine because the only changes Caffeine currently brings are "'under the hood' of Google's search engine, which means that most users won't notice a difference in search results," as Google's blog entry notes.

As a company that helps improve the search engine optimization of real estate websites, Delta Media Group will be testing Caffeine and how we can help the SEO of the brokerages we work with. Check back to Sean Cutright's blog or Delta Media Group's News blog for more details.

More details on the real estate market up-turn

Steve Murray posted a good article to the Lore blog over the weekend about the recent real estate market up-turn.

Over the past few weeks the real estate market has received several positive stories, as documented on Delta Media Group's News blog. Among those are:

• Pending home sales up for the fifth straight month
  
• Home prices increased in May for the first time in three years
  
• New-home sales increased at the fastest rate in eight years
• Existing-home sales increased
• Housing inventory decreased

The news certainly paints an optimistic picture for the future of the real estate market. As Murray notes, we likely won't see the market return to the "glory days" of 2003-05, but we also shouldn't see 2007-09 numbers for too much longer.

Check out Murray's article on the current state of the real estate market here.

Looking to position your real estate company to better improve your online profits? Contact Delta Media Group for more information on its real estate website, real estate lead management and real estate search engine optimization services.

Google's Chrome and the Google/Microsoft war

By now, you may have heard Google's announcement of its own operating system, titled "Chrome."

Chrome was announced the first week of July, and is said to potentially be a "Microsoft killer." In essence, Chrome will be a Web-based operating system, accessible through any computer that connects to the Internet. Its target focus will be netbooks - small, inexpensive laptop-like computers that connect to the Internet, but don't offer much in way of storage. CNNMoney.com took a closer look at Chrome here.

News about any of Google's developments is worth taking a look at, particularly if you're in the real estate industry. While Google has targeted Microsoft's niche in operating systems, Microsoft is trying to step on Google's search engine turf with Bing.

The rivalry between the two companies is guaranteed to have a major impact on how we utilize everyday technology. Will laptops turn to netbooks, with consumers accessing all their files through a small device used solely to connect to the Internet? Will Bing be a major search engine in the real estate market?

I'll keep updates with the progression of both companies as developments come along.