(Disclaimer: This article discusses some concepts that require an advanced knowledge of WordPress, PHP, CSS and other web development strategies. If you are not familiar with these topics, it is unlikely we will be able to help you implement them. If you do have questions, please hit the forums to discuss.)

More and more Realtors are realizing the benefits of creating a new website for each listing they have. The goal in creating a website that is dedicated to a specific listing is to create a powerful online marketing tool, increase search engine exposure, obtain top positions in the SERPs (search engine results pages) and provide an online presence for promoting the listing’s benefits through useful and informative content and beautiful images. We are going to discuss how to build and optimize your single property website and are throwing in a new twist on where your content should be located.

Benefits of Using Single Property Listing Websites:

1. They can be a powerful listing and marketing tool referenced online and offline in marketing materials to help increase listing exposure.
2. They increase listing owners’ confidence in you.
3. They can help you gain more listings and are one more selling point / benefit you can offer when trying to obtain listings or convert FSBO’s.

1) Choosing a Domain Name

The first decision to be made is choosing a domain name. The most common route is simply using the listing address as the domain name, for example, 123MainStreet.com. Many agents cite that they use the listing address as the domain because it provides a keyword rich URL which can be beneficial for SEO / ranking purposes. The truth is that having a keyword rich domain name for SEO purposes alone is becoming less and less important as time goes on (some would argue it is a non factor already), is only one SEO factor among many and as we will explain, there are more compelling reasons to use non-address based domain names.

Make It Easy to Remember. The primary reason you may not want to use the address as the domain name is marketability. Buyers are much more likely to remember “TatumRanchHome.com” as opposed to “1934ViaLindaWay.com”. This holds true whether they are glancing through a magazine and see your ad, are trying to remember the domain name from a flyer they have thrown away, or even more importantly, if they are trying to remember your domain name for the listing sign they happened to glance at as they drove by the listing.

Usability Trumps SEO. The bottom line is that you may not want to sacrifice the overall marketability and utility that an easy to remember domain name provides (this is true of any domain name in any vertical) for SEO purposes (keyword rich URL).

Jay Thompson also points out another strategy for choosing domain names, using generic or neighborhood / community based names such as “TatumEstates.com” or “IrvineEsplanade.com”. He points out that these names can be recycled over and over which can save the time and money invovled with registering a new address based domain for each new listing.

Read The Full Story »

1) Learn the ePerks Basics with the Seminal Piece on ePerks:

ePerks.com: A Case Study in Greed and Self-Imposed Brand Destruction

2) Read the Blog Post / Comments That Started It All:

ePerks- A Scam or A Gem?

3) Read the Cease & Desist Letter, Threats and Lawsuit from ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi:

Cease & Desist Letter: Chilling Effect: How A Behemoth Company Can Silence A Blogger

Threats from ePersk CEO Ben Behrouzi: Am I Being Sued By ePerks?

ePerks Lawsuit Against Vlad Zablotzkyy: ePerks Pulls the Trigger: I am being Sued

Read: BrokerScience Commentary on Suit

4) Read Vlad’s Response to Being Falsely Accused of Child Molestation:

How Far Do You Go To Silence A Blogger And When Does It Become Too Far?

5) Listen to the Shocking Ben Behrouzi Voice Mails:

ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi Voicemails Exposed: Threatens to Blackball and Sue Employee

6) Learn about the ePerks Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy:

ePerks IP Address Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy: When the Hunter Becomes the Prey

7) Read about Behrouzi’s Threats Against BrokerScience

Ben Behrouzi Insinuates Legal Action Against BrokerScience, Cites “Damages” and his confirmation to take action against BrokerScience on Inman. Read BrokerScience commentary on Inman piece.

ePerks: A Case Study in Brand Destruction:

(These are the “minions” ePerk’s Attorney infamously referred to in this Inman Article.)

ePerks v Vlad: Strategies to Avoid a Viral World War

ePerks – I Am Not A Minion Mr Cook

Im Mad As Hell-You Will Be Too When You Read About Vlad Zablotskyy and ePerks

ePerks & Freedom of Speech?

An Open Letter to Ben Behrouzi

Real Estate Radio USA Interviews Mary McKnight

Zablotskyy the Scrivener

Vlad Zablotskyy V. ePerks The Cliffs Notes Version

Vlad Zablotskyy – A Martyr for Reputation Management

A Dark Day for Bloggers Everywhere

In Support of Vlad Zablotzkyy

Do I look Fat in This Lawsuit?

Nominee for PR Blunder of the Year – ePerks

Why Real Estate Agents Are Bailing on ePerks

5 Ways to Support Vlad Zablotzkyy

Suport Vlad Zablotskyy in his defense against ePerks.com frivolous suit

Some companies are stupid, and eperks may be the stupidest

ePerks: A brand going down in flames

ePerks vs Blogger Vlad Zablotskyy, Freedom of Speech in Cyberspace at Stake

Suport Vlad Zablotskyy in his defense against ePerks.com frivolous suit

ePerks Sues Real Estate Blogger

ePerks Using Questionable Tactics

Ben Behrouzi’s Fair Darts

Blogger Is Sued for Business Disparagement

Write a post supporting your fellow real estate blogger, Vlad Zablotskyy, in his battle with ePerks and I will give you a blog

ePerks Sues Real Estate Blogger, Blogosphere Unites to Destroy the ePerks Brand

RSS Pieces provides a rundown of how ePerks is destroying its own reputation

Want money back at closing?

ePerks Sues Blogger Vlad Zablotzkyy

Spreading the word about eJerks

Spreading the word about Vlad Zablotskyy and his battle with ePerks – Free Speech Issue For The Blogging Community

Is ePerks.com’s Ben Behrouzi, infamous for trying to censor a real estate weblogger, stealing content from Mervyns and Chevron?

Support the Vlad Zablotskyy Legal Defense Fund: A real estate weblogger is being throttled by corporate bully ePerks.com. The free speech rights you will be fighting for are your own…

Memo to ePerks.com: You idiots! Trying to censor a real estate weblogger is a poor way to defend your reputation — such as it is…

ePerks To Sue Blogger – Freedom Of Speech Threatened

Looking for lawyers…

Blogger is Sued for Business Disparagement

Sometimes everybody’s gotta take a side

ePerks: What Were They Thinking?

ePerks to Vlad: I’m Gonna Pound You

Blogging and Freedom of Speech

Blogger Get “Cease and Desist” from ePerks

iHype & ePerks – How To Kill A Startup

Memorial Day and the Plight of a Blogger

Open Letter to ePerks.com

ePerks Shafts Realtors

Are ePerks Spammers?

Real estate rebates and referrals with a twist

ePerks & iHype – Legal Kneejerk – Sues Blogger

Other BrokerScience Coverage of Ben Behrouzi / ePerks / LeapFish / DotNext:

Ben Behrouzi Caught on Tape: Threatens to Blackball Employee on Voicemail

Vlad Zablotzkyy Defeats LeapFish / ePerks / DotNext CEO Ben Behrouzi

Ben Behrouzi, LeapFish CEO Caught Spamming TechCrunch

The Beginner’s Action Guide to Learning about Vlad Zablotkyy vs. ePerks / Ben Behrouzi

ePerks / LeapFish CEO Ben Behrouzi Threatens BrokerScience with Legal Action

ePerks IP Address Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy: When the Hunter Becomes the Prey

iHype.com Launch Coverage Here

Ben Behrouzi Updates Company “Values” and “Culture” Web Pages. Only One Problem: They’re Stolen

Beginning of the End: ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi Sues Blogger, Confirms No Strategy in Place

BrokerScience Acquires BenBehrouzi.com

Glenn Roberts Jr. at Inman has written a great article about Vlad’s plight and ePerks in which we were interviewed. It is worth noting that the exposure this article brings to ePerks is yet another clear defeat for ePerks and CEO Ben Behrouzi. Even if they had a possibility of a courtroom win, they and their brand are by and far the clear losers in any scenario involving litigation regardless of the outcome. Their actions are clearly an ego driven reaction and the results of having no strategy reflect that. The only victory they can obtain is by leaving the stage altogether and worrying less about others’ opinions and more about their customers.

From the Interview:

In an Inman News interview, Richardson said, “There is a principle involved of the ability of the blogger to express an opinion. To write a critical piece. That affects us all.”

He said he has been contacted by ePerks officials about his writings at the site, and he offered, “If anything is printed that’s wrong, we’ll print a retraction — make corrections.”

Richardson said that if he, too, is hit with a lawsuit from ePerks, he expects to prevail. “If you have to do it, you have to do it. When we win, we will have that much more leverage in the future when people come to us,” he said.

Read The Full Story »

Leapfish / Ben Behrouzi Bombshell

Since BrokerScience first began covering LeapFish and ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi, we have received a lot of reader submitted information in the form of: stories of first hand experiences with LeapFish / ePerks / Ben Behrouzi (as employees and customers), emails, voice mails, and other miscellaneous information and data relating to Ben and company. We have published virtually none of it and do not plan on publishing it in the future unless it is pertinent to the facts involved in our coverage. The following voice mails are an exception. They help establish a pattern of legal harassment by Ben Behrouzi that goes all the way back to his days at Reply.com.

One common theme among all current and former employees we speak to that have worked under Ben Behrouzi at Reply.com or ePerks.com is that they fear the consequences involved with sharing their story. The legal harassment and worse that ePerks critics such as Vlad Zablotzkyy (link removed due to page removal as part of terms of legal settlement with Ben), Dennis Pease and BrokerScience have endured are a testament to those concerns.

One person that is not afraid of Ben Behrouzi is former Reply.com employee Scott Chestnut. Scott worked under Ben Behrouzi (who was the Chief Technology Officer despite the fact that he was still in school working on a philosophy degree) as a Senior Network Engineer. While building out what was to be a million dollar network, Scott realized that working for Ben was an unworkable situation, so he walked out in frustration. The following voice mail from Ben Behrouzi chronicles Ben’s threats to blackball Scott and insure he is unable to gain employment, insinuating this will affect him for life and have deep reaching effects.

“My new goal in life is going to become to ruin your name across this entire East Bay……..you can take that to the bank, you can put your future kids or your girlfriend or whoever you want to put on it.” – ePerks CEO, Ben Behrouzi to employee that left the company

Ben Behrouzi Threatening to Blackball and “Ruin the Name” of Former Employee

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Later, Ben left another message regarding a vendor, CDW. He again makes false allegations and threatens legal action. Even though he claims he is in the process of preparing legal action, no legal action ever took place, an experience similar to what others have faced.

Read The Full Story »

Realtor.com is clearly in disarray. They not only refuse to acknowledge or communicate with their community, I have come to question whether or not they even recognize that a Realtor community exists. More importantly, I ask myself, if I were charged with rebuilding Realtor.com, reversing the brand and community damage and making a genuine effort to start a new relationship with Realtors, how would I do it?

A good starting point would be to review Loic Le Meur’s 10 Rules for Success. While the list is geared for startups, many of the ideas work just as well for established businesses.

1. Don’t wait for a revolutionary idea. It will never happen. Just focus on a simple, exciting, empty space and execute as fast as possible
2. Share your idea. The more you share, the more you get advice and the more you learn. Meet and talk to your competitors.
3. Build a community. Use blogging and social software to make sure people hear about you.
4. Listen to your community. Answer questions and build your product with their feedback.
5. Gather a great team. Select those with very different skills from you. Look for people who are better than you.
6. Be the first to recognise a problem. Everyone makes mistakes. Address the issue in public, learn about and correct it.
7. Don’t spend time on market research. Launch test versions as early as possible. Keep improving the product in the open.
8. Don’t obsess over spreadsheet business plans. They are not going to turn out as you predict, in any case.
9. Don’t plan a big marketing effort. It’s much more important and powerful that your community loves the product.
10. Don’t focus on getting rich. Focus on your users. Money is a consequence of success, not a goal.

(via Financial Times)

When you are passionate about what you do, good isn’t good enough. You know it can be done better and so you do it. There is no alternative.

Learn How to Make Signs the Greg Swann / BloodHound Way

Once daily posts halted for a week. 36 hour delay in acknowledging hack. 19 hours of downtime. No communication with the Realtor community as to whether their personal data was compromised or even an acknowledgment that the site was even hacked.

Previous Coverage: It all started here.

I just noticed BrokerScience articles coming up in an odd looking feed along with articles from Inman and Bloodhound, among others. I traced feed to this non working domain (update: it is now working) indicates it is the future home of a Feedburner “ Real Estate and Mortgage Blogging Group“. TechCrunch reported testing on feedburner blogging groups over a year and a half ago, so perhaps there is a roll out coming soon or perhaps just more testing. Although it’s hard to tell, this does not look like a user generated group, but if that’s the case, we will follow up.

Oddly enough a google search for “feedburner blogging groups” only returns the real estate and mortgage blogging group mentioned above.

UPDATE: Shortly after publishing this story, the above domain in question, was working and is down again. It looks like the Real Estate and Blogging Group is official. Unfortunately it looks like BrokerScience is not included in the final blogroll.

UPDATE 2: Link is down again….. testing it is. Here is a link for the google cache.

UPDATE 3: Dan Green confirmed this is a group he created but as of yet, creating groups is not a feature available to the public.

When BrokerScience published our analysis of ePerk’s brand destruction ( ePerks.com: A Case Study in Greed and Self-Imposed Brand Destruction ) on May 30th, we did not know that just nine days later, Vlad Zablotzkyy would be served with a lawsuit from ePerks/ CEO Ben Behrouzi.

Quite frankly, in light of the growing attention and coverage Ben Behrouzi’s cease & desist letter and legal threats to Vlad, we didn’t think Ben and company would be so foolish stupid as to continue in such a self defeating manner. We have a lot to learn. Ben has continued his tour de force of driving ePerks into the ground by threatening BrokerScience with legal action and following up with a lawsuit against Vlad which will ultimately prove to be his coup de grace.

Read The Full Story »

For the seventh day in a row Realtor.com is failing to communicate with its community regarding the hack that we first reported on June 4th. Realtor.com is approaching one week with no blog posts, no communication with its paid users and increasing doubt in its ability to run a blog, let alone one of the largest real estate portals in the world, Realtor.com. This is bad folks.

Another stunning story comes from 4Realz.net with news that weeks ago, following in Zillow’s footsteps, Realtor.com launched a new home estimates feature. Again, nobody noticed and nobody cared. Perhaps this is why Realtor.com thinks they can behave in the manner they have and  get away with it. The fact is that if nobody notices what you do or don’t do and you are a company with the reach and funding of Realtor.com / NAR, that should be a warning that you are not doing things right, not something to be used as a shield to hide behind.

The original posts that had spam injected to them have been removed. The daily blog posts have halted and communication about the situation is non-existent. This is turning uglier by the minute. Where is Blaine Cooke when you need him? {sarcasm}

In yet another blow to embattled ePerks and Brabus Ventures Corporation CEO, Ben Behrouzi, BrokerScience has acquired exclusive ownership of the following internet domain names:

• BenBehrouzi.com
• BenBehrouzi.net
• BehzadBehrouzi.com
• BrabusVentures.net
• BrabusVentures.org
• BrabusVentures.biz

Internet domain name case law provides that these names can be used in a capacity that does not create confusion in the market place. In the future they may be used to host and support a Defense Fund for bloggers that are sued by ePerks / Ben Behrouzi / Brabus Ventures Corporation. Have an idea for what we can use them for? Drop us a line!

We left BehnamBehrouzi.com (Ben’s legal name) for Ben if he so chooses to use it. We’ve also left most of the Behzad (Ben’s Brother, “Director of Product for Brabus Ventures”) domain names untouched. We are disappointed to report that Behzad’s preferred pseudonym (as anonymously reported by current ePerks employees), Kevin Morris is not available as a domain name.

Other BrokerScience Coverage of Ben Behrouzi / ePerks / LeapFish / DotNext:

Ben Behrouzi Caught on Tape: Threatens to Blackball Employee on Voicemail

Vlad Zablotzkyy Defeats LeapFish / ePerks / DotNext CEO Ben Behrouzi

Ben Behrouzi, LeapFish CEO Caught Spamming TechCrunch

The Beginner’s Action Guide to Learning about Vlad Zablotkyy vs. ePerks / Ben Behrouzi

ePerks / LeapFish CEO Ben Behrouzi Threatens BrokerScience with Legal Action

ePerks IP Address Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy: When the Hunter Becomes the Prey

iHype.com Launch Coverage Here

Ben Behrouzi Updates Company “Values” and “Culture” Web Pages. Only One Problem: They’re Stolen

Beginning of the End: ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi Sues Blogger, Confirms No Strategy in Place

BrokerScience Acquires BenBehrouzi.com

When ePerks.com CEO Ben Behrouzi originally hired blogger Vlad Zablotzkyy of Go-Beyond-MLS.com to write a paid review of ePerks.com, he never expected the barrage of user complaints that were posted in the comment section of Vlad’s blog and he never expected the fallout that would occur when he threatened Vlad and sent him a Cease & Desist letter to take down the comments.

While it is not uncommon for CEO’s to be upset with criticism that their companies receive, it is highly unusual, perhaps unheard of, for CEO’s to follow the path that Ben Behrouzi has in single handedly destroying his reputation, brand and likely becoming liable for slander and defamation. The secondary effect that is as the story continues to grow it only serves to increase his exposure to growing murmurs regarding a Class Action lawsuit by dissatisfied ePerks users. To date: 8 of the top 10 results in a Google search for “eperks.com”and likewise “ben behrouzi” point to content that has negative commentary or comments about ePerks and ePerks CEO Ben Behrzouzi.

This morning, Vlad Zablotzkyy was served with a civil action from Brabus Ventures Corporation (ePerks parent company, owned by Behnam Behrouzi) claiming unspecified damages for posting information on his blog about a false child molestation allegation that was made against him. Vlad made no accusations but simply presented anecdotal evidence indicating that ePerks was possibly linked to the false charges. The evidence showed that user names used by the person posting false child molestation allegations matched user names used by persons leaving comments on Vlad blog originating from ePerks.com corporate IP address.

Read The Full Story »

(Previous Realtor.com coverage – Realtor.com Hacked Day 1 / Realtor.com Hacked Day 2 / Realtor.com Hacked Day 3 )

In an unfortunate turn of events, Realtor.com has failed to acknowledge its website and or servers were breached and has failed to inform users whether or not personal data was compromised. This is disturbing on a number of levels. While the breach may have been as simple as a flawed wordpress plugin or much worse, nobody can know for sure due to Realtor.com’s failure to communicate.

Realtor.com Failure to Communicate Fallout:

• It signals to users that they are not valued and builds distrust and disloyalty in users.
• Fails to inform users if their data was compromised, on a legal basis, my guess is that users have a right to be informed as such.
• Is counterproductive to fostering community.
• Shows lack of leadership on the part of Realtor.com team members.
• Gives credence to criticism that Realtor.com does not act in members’ best interests.

Common Courtesy. After repeatedly informing Realtor.com that their website had been compromised, they failed to acknowledge our requests and failed to give us any feedback on the situation at hand. Oddly enough, despite their lack of communication with BrokerScience and Realtor.com users, their IP Address, 209.74.96.62, shows up as one of the most frequent visitors in BrokerScience traffic logs.

To be more specific, the IP Address of HomeStore.com shows up. It is not clear whether HomeStore is now considered a parent or partner of Realtor.com or whether it only shows up because the ARIN record has not been updated since 2001. It does, however, serve as a reminder of Realtor.com’s past and may provide a clue to the company culture that exists that would allow such a basic, preventable and unheard of gaffe to occur.

BrokerScience IP Address Traffic Log

NetRange:   209.74.96.0 - 209.74.127.255

OrgName:    Homestore.com, Inc
OrgID:      HOMEST-7
Address:    30700 Russell Ranch Rd
City:       Westlake Village
StateProv:  CA
PostalCode: 91362
Country:    US

Brabus Ventures (BrabusVentures.com), owned by embattled CEO Ben Behrouzi and parent company of ePerks.com, LeapFish and DotNextInc has updated it’s website and added new “Values” and “Culture” pages to combat the barrage of negative publicity their business practices have earned them. There is only one problem: the pages are STOLEN virtually verbatim from Chevron.com and Mervyns.com. Oh, the irony, in stealing “Values” and “Culture” pages.

This is no surprise, CEO Ben Behrouzi and his companies have a proven track record of engaging in unethical behavior and marketing and his latest debacle of adding “copyright infringement” to his resume are par for the course. This is a time that one would think, as CEO, he should be apologizing to the victims of his harassment and focusing on his failed startup, iHype.com which one of his employees humorously defended as a “soft launch” when it failed to launch as announced on June 2nd.

BrabusVentures.com Steals Culture Page from Mervyns.com

(Click Thumbnail Below For Full Size Image)

Screenshot of Original Mervyns.com Page (URL) / Screenshot of Offending BrabusVentures.com Page (URL)

BrabusVentures.com Steals Values Page from Chevron.com

(Click Thumbnail Below For Full Size Image)

Screenshot of Original Chevron.com Page (URL) / Screenshot of Offending BrabusVentures.com Page (URL)

Dissasemble. I really want to make this story go away, but it’s the gift that keeps on giving. I REALLY want to write some positive stories here.

While it is fairly common for content to be recycled on real estate and mortgage websites (especially privacy pages, legal pages, glossaries and even basic content that define general concepts) it is never ok for a CEO or Founder to steal a Mission Statement, Values Statement, or Definition of Company Culture. Never. Ever.

These are the documents that define the moral, ethical and business code of your company and are the basis for the culture that is created through the actions and leadership of company founders and management. These are to be created with care, sensitivity and purpose. Without positive core beliefs, philosophies and morals, one is truly lost.

UPDATE: BrabusVentures.com has been abandoned due to bad press with no redirect or mention to the new site at Dotnextinc.com.

Other BrokerScience Coverage of Ben Behrouzi / ePerks / LeapFish / DotNext:

Ben Behrouzi Caught on Tape: Threatens to Blackball Employee on Voicemail

Vlad Zablotzkyy Defeats LeapFish / ePerks / DotNext CEO Ben Behrouzi

Ben Behrouzi, LeapFish CEO Caught Spamming TechCrunch

The Beginner’s Action Guide to Learning about Vlad Zablotkyy vs. ePerks / Ben Behrouzi

ePerks / LeapFish CEO Ben Behrouzi Threatens BrokerScience with Legal Action

ePerks IP Address Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy: When the Hunter Becomes the Prey

iHype.com Launch Coverage Here

Ben Behrouzi Updates Company “Values” and “Culture” Web Pages. Only One Problem: They’re Stolen

Beginning of the End: ePerks CEO Ben Behrouzi Sues Blogger, Confirms No Strategy in Place

BrokerScience Acquires BenBehrouzi.com