Dear CyberAgent user,

“It was a tough year for real estate agents but we are told that this year will be better.” This said by Derek Watts presenter Carte Blanch last night on national television. “Time ran out for Wendy Machanik and as her empire crashes around her, it can only serve as a warning to the real estate industry as a whole.”

“Unfortunately, the real estate calendar has started off on a terribly sad note for the industry as a whole. Just as we were receiving all this wonderful publicity about how we were lifting ourselves up and turning our ‘industry’ into a ‘profession’, the entire real estate world has been turned upside down as it is going to be checked up on to see if everything is in order.” Jill Corfield

On numerous occasions we at CyberAgent have highlighted the fact of how important the Internet is for marketing of property listings for the real estate agent. Nowadays, in a technology driven world, more and more buyers are turning to the Internet to look for a home. But have you ever wondered about the age, race and gender breakdown of local Internet users? Internet demographics in South Africa an article not to be missed this month.

Important news for all our KZN real estate agencies and real estate agent that are using CyberAgent; as from next month we will be offering free training sessions in KZN. Should you have any questions please contact our support desk.

Lynch argues that one to three photos per listing isn’t nearly enough, and says that agents should remember that selling a home also involves selling a lifestyle. Agent Strategies: Property Photos Still an Issue

Until next month!
The editor

SA’s hottest Province and top 10 cities as well as top 5 cities per Province for the second quarter 2010! These statistics were obtained from over 1000 websites hosted and maintained by CyberAgent...

South Africa is an interesting country with a great deal of cultural diversity and a growing divide between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots.'

When it comes to the demographics of Internet users in SA, many interesting patterns start to emerge, including an unbalanced race and gender breakdown.

There are obviously many cultural and economic reasons for the ‘non-representative’ Internet demographics related to categories such as race and age - an issue which the Department of Communications (DoC) is trying to address through its broadband policy...

Program Enhancements:

We have added in the automatic logging of SMS messages sent into the clients “Customer Notes”. That way you will have record of all SMS correspondence sent to each client for easy review at a later stage should it become necessary.

CyberAgent Anywhere problems:

Last week we had an issue with CAA not working. We apologise for the inconvenience this may have caused – however, this was beyond our control. As you should be aware of we have partnered with SAPTG to give you a canvass system with real time data from them. They had moved their server, so our system was unable to connect to it, and this is what caused the problems experienced. We have put measures into place whereby this kind of “uninformed” disconnection will no longer interrupt the entire system, but only where the data is retrieved (i.e. the Canvass System).

Build 3.100.1498 is now available. Please make sure that you are running on this version.

Q&A Section:

I cannot find my central developments properties on the IOL website. Why not?

Verified, it’s for developments which we have never added to Gravity or IOL Property because, like holiday rentals, they need to be handled differently to individual listings (e.g. like P24 and Genie handle them). A flood of near identical listings in an existing suburb kills the user experience, a single listing doesn't give the development enough exposure and doesn't convey the range of properties available and creating a new suburb for the development results again in little exposure for the development's listings because users almost always search by suburb and not development name.

Grant, IOL

We have 62 properties listed on our website but on investigating with IOL, which is perhaps the busiest property portal, only 27 are listed there.

Please can you advise why this is so?

IOL does not have all locations available as on www.cyberprop.com. Should you list a property in a location that does not exist on IOL the property updates/directs to the closest matched location. Best is to register on IOL Property and see the listing for youself.

We had power failure last night, this has reset the network and the computers are not able to see the server machine. What must we do?

The network should not be rooted to a number, but rather to a computer name which will prevent it from changing with a power failure.

Should you experience any problems or have any questions, please contact our support desk on 011 955 9100 or email Support@cyberprop.com

Strong password reminder by Hetzner

Our abuse team have noted a significant increase in the number of instances over the last few months where mailboxes have been compromised and abused due to weak mailbox passwords. You are receiving this email as one or more of your mailboxes does not make use of a strong password, which poses a security risk. Please update your password as soon as possible. For ease of reference, we have attached a list of mailboxes that will need to have their passwords updated.

What do I need to do?

We strongly recommend that you update your mailbox password(s) as soon as possible using your konsoleH Control Panel or Webmail. If you make use of an email program to access your email such as Outlook, Thunderbird or Entourage, you will also need to update the password on the email program.

To ensure your password is strong, please use the following guidelines:

• Use both upper and lower case letters.
  
• Incorporate numbers or punctuation marks.
  
• Ensure it is at least 8 characters long.
  
• Do not use your username, email address or domain names associated with your profile.
  
• Use different passwords for you various hosting services.
• Use a word or phrase you can remember easily, but would be very difficult for anyone else to guess

Why should I make use of strong passwords?

A weak password makes you vulnerable to spammers who could gain access to your email account and send unsolicited email from this account, resulting in your IP address being blacklisted. Using strong passwords helps to prevent this from happening

We’ve been blogging about how to take great real estate photos for some time now, but as realestate.co.nz CEO Alistair Helm recently pointed out, quality listing photos remain something of a rare commodity.

Another real estate professional who thinks property photography could be improved is John Lynch, CEO of real estate software company DwellAgent, who has previously worked as an agent in the US. Lynch says he continues to be surprised by how many listings he sees represented by poor photos...

Click Here for printable .pdf file

Website Stats as at end November 2010

Website Stats as at end December 2010

We provide you with FREE training session in the following areas;

• Gauteng
• Kwazulu Natal
• Western Cape
• and the Garden Route

During these training sessions more information will also be provided on:

• CyberAgent Anywhere
  
• Keep me Informed Function
  
• New developments in CyberAgent
  
• New Update Manager
  
• REEP (Real Estate Evaluation Portal)

Gauteng

A warm welcome to all new Agencies November/December 2010:

We trust that by now you are well aware of what CyberAgent can do for you. If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to contact us at support@cyberprop.com or phone us at: +27 (0)11 955-9100 or 086 112- 9237

In a short space of time you have reconstructed my old website and improved on it.

Your service was fantastic. You attended to all me requests promptly and warmly.

Uploading the information is really a pleasure.

I would like to commend your excellent product and service.

Colin Silverstone
Silkon Properties
Website: www.silkonproperties.co.za

Since joining CyberProp I’ve ‘bombarded’ your office and yourself with countless calls/cries on support and guidance, every time receiving positive, helpful and correct steps forward (not forgetting you all being so polite and never saying ‘I told you so’ or FedEXing a summa wrestler my way).

We are able to consistently and easily capture our listings, upload in seconds to multiple websites, and now, at a click of button, print our window cards – this is going to save me so much time! No more duplications (or human error when creating it) or designing in other programs. Your software is incredible! Big ups to your developers, support team and yourself.

You personally have put in a lot of time re-creating code and guidance tips on this window cards and many other reports, in order to suit our requirements. Thank you so very much! We appreciate it greatly!

I know it hasn’t ended, we have you presently redoing and adding it to cyber anywhere to ensure we can run reports.

Please know that we are very thankful and appreciate all the help you have given us so far.

Kindest regards
Sian
Chas Everitt

Send your viewpoints to news@cyberprop.com

Please be advised that:

In August 2008, the FICA was amended to provide that accountable institutions must register with the FIC "within the prescribed period and in the prescribed manner".

The period and manner have now been prescribed i.t.o. an amendment to the Money Laundering & Terrorist Financing Control Regulations (copy herewith).

All existing accountable institutions, which include estate agents, must register between 1 December 2010 and 1 March 2011. Anyone who opens a new business which is an accountable institution must register within 90 days of opening the business.

Registration must be done electronically through the FIC website (www.fic.gov.za). There is no registration fee, and no licence will be issued. Note that "accountable institutitons" refers to the Agency and not the individual Agent.

For a copy of an additional flyer from FIC entitled FICA Update for Estate Agents click here

A very sad day for the Real Estate Industry - The Trainer Vol 74 Jan 2011

WHAT A SAD START TO THE YEAR FOR ALL ESTATE AGENTS

Unfortunately, the real estate calendar has started off on a terribly sad note for the industry as a whole.

Just as we were receiving all this wonderful publicity about how we were lifting ourselves up and turning our ‘industry’ into a ‘profession’, the entire real estate world has been turned up side down as it is going to be checked up on to see if everything is in order.

Let’s look on the positive side however. Turn lemon into lemonade – is this glass half empty or is it half full?

If you get a visit from the Auditors and you get a clean bill of health – what a wonderful advert for your company – very much like getting a Tax Clearance Certificate from SARS – ultimate proof that everything is in order.

A good suggestion would be that the EAAB or the Auditors themselves issue a certificate [or even a letter on their letterhead would suffice] stating that everything is perfect order so that this can be displayed in Reception and on your Websites.

Maybe this has been thought of and put in place already; I know if I received a visit and was given the “OK” I would want to shout it from the rooftops.

Unfortunately, people tend to forget about all the good guys and tar everyone with the same brush so I think it is important that you are able to prove that your company is “squeaky clean” so to speak.

Remember, if you have done nothing wrong – you have absolutely nothing to worry about.

JILL CORFIELD
S.A.'s No One
Real Estate Trainer
083 324 3434

Although there is throughout South Africa a strong interest in real estate agency work and a real desire to take it on – often as a second or third career – and although many who feel this way are well qualified in other fields, there is now a perception “out there” that the new, more stringent educational requirements debar those who have not qualified from being involved until they have achieved the obligatory qualifications...

2010 saw the South African property sector having to face a range of situations and factors that called for adjustments on a scale seldom experienced before in this sector, said Bill Rawson, Chairman of Rawson Properties, in a recent end of year summary.

“Even leaving out many of the less important changes of 2010, we can look back on a year in which estate agents were forced to adapt to many new situations,” said Rawson...

New online facility tracking major property market indicators launched, freeing property professionals from the time-consuming task of trawling countless websites for the vital information they need.

South Africa’s most comprehensive online source of property data, the South African Property Transfer Guide (SAPTG), now publishes a convenient, up-to-date summary of the main economic indicators that relate to the property market. Freely available to the public via its website (www.saptg.co.za), the SAPTG Property Market Indicators page means that interested parties no longer have to spend hours trawling countless websites to find the important information they need...