Christine Wade

Hi, everyone...just a quick rant here this morning...I know I can't be the only one out there who has their contact form (which is meant for client and preclient contact) abused by spammers. So I thought this would be a fun blog to see how many dumb things people hijack our contact forms for. Here's mine:

1. Job Applications! - I am a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, not a staffing service, I am not going to hire you! If I do occasionally need to outsource some work, I will do so to other professionals who I have met via online networking and who I have come to trust their integrity and the value of their work...not to spammers who hijack my contact form!
   
   
2. Adult Product Sales - Yes...I have gotten those emails through my contact forms...'nuff said!
   
3. What's Your Contact Form Nightmare??? Let's add it here!

Thanks for letting me rant!

TIP:

3 Tips on How to Get Comments on Your Blog

As a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, I am often asked about how to improve blog performance and how to get the readers to be interactive. Well, here are three tips to get you moving in the right direction:

1. If you're just starting out and your blog looks as sparse as the wide open terrain on the moon, then perhaps it is time to enlist the help of those closest to you within your sphere of influence. Send out an email announcing your blog and ask them to visit it and post a comment or two. Ask them to suggest other topics they would like to read about on your blog as well...you can use those suggestions when you get that inevitable writer's block. (Note: you really need to make sure you have posted at least a few times so that they actually have something to comment on when you do this.) Also, if your blog isn't brand new, but you never formally announced it and you would like to use this method, it should work great for you as well.
   
   
2. Once you have used method #1 and have a few comments at least on your blog, then it's time to move on to your general contact list. Send them an email announcing a contest on your blog, ask them to go visit your blog to register and ask them to read at least one post that interests them and comment...that comment is their registration for the contest. Make sure to do a blog post to announce the contest winner on your blog!!!
   
   
3. Write about topics of interest to your target audience...and then tweet those posts out and make sure to hashmark (#) that topic of interest so that it is searchable. For instance if I were to tweet this post, I would start the post with hashtag #REVA (short for "real estate virtual assistant") and perhaps you would use the hashtag #realestate on your posts... Ask your colleagues to retweet your posts. Put your posts as your update status on LinkedIn and Facebook. Social media is your friend. USE IT!

FAMOUS QUOTE:
"Do more than belong: participate. Do more than care: help. Do more than believe: practice. Do more than be fair: be kind. Do more than forgive: forget. Do more than dream: work."
~William Arthur Ward

TIPSY:

2007 California Grenache Rosé

The San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition is the largest competition of American wines in the world and local (to me anyway) South Coast Winery of Temecula, CA takes the highest award, the Sweepstakes Award, in the Pink wine class for this 2007 California Grenache Rosé, retailing at approx. $14.00 / bottle. Click the above link to go to their site and try a bottle today...it's light and refreshing and a great way to say goodbye to these last warm days of Summer...ok, I know it's fall...but it still feels like summer outside here!

OK - please post comments and tell me what types of "Tips" you would like to see covered here in the future!!! (You can post other comments too of course...like after you try the Grenache Rosé!)

I am so excited...I have been waiting to unveil my new Real Estate Virtual Assistant site for quite some time now and I think that we finally have all the kinks out of it!!!

I belong to a list of fabulous web designers who frequently post their work for site checks prior to launching their clients' new sites...and I get to see a lot of designers' work that way. Lots of them are great, but few of them speak to me...but one designer has, I admired her work for years, her work can be blunt and honest or stylish and elegant...and somehow, sometimes it can be both. I have always done my own website design and even blog customizations...but i always swore that if I ever outsourced my website, that it would be to her. And I did. And I am so happy that I finally did it for myself.

Her name is Shelly Cole, her site is BrassBlogs.com, and she is insanely wonderful! She can take my "wants" into consideration without allowing my "wants" to ruin the integrity and beauty of her design...she is definitely a gifted artist and a great business woman. If anyone is looking for a custom WordPress theme, I highly recommend her...in case you haven't noticed ;-)

Sometimes you just have to buy yourself something that you've wanted for soooooo long, you know what I mean?

Please visit my NEW website now and let me know what you think! Thanks!

TIP:

Sometimes you've just got to go old school. I was reading another blog post today about how even with all the technology around us, it is hard to get organized and stay on task...perhaps that article should have said "because of it"??? If you're like most of us, you have at your fingertips a computer with all sorts of software to help you stay organized, a PDA or smartphone, calendars, etc...but what good are they if you don't use them to stay on task?

I know that on my computer I have numerous programs that I can and do create To-Do lists with...I work well with them for a few days and then I figure it's just faster to get on with the work rather than keeping those programs updated...soon I have forgotten some important task that I had intended to accomplish. I now have my new iPhone as well...certainly can download numerous apps for To-Do lists on that as well. But I haven't. Because I know. Sometimes you've just got to go old school.

If I write my To-Do list down on a piece of paper, I get the satisfaction of crossing items off of it! I see it there staring me in the face as I am "twittering" away my time on Facebook ;-) Guilt is a powerful motivator. I can add to it and change it without having to click out of the program that I am working in when another item that I should add to it pops into my head...and most of all...for some darned reason...I actually use it!!!

So whether it's simply on a legal pad, a special notebook, an actual To-Do list form in your Dayrunner, etc...find something that you will enjoy keeping your To-Do list on...and To-Do it!!! And then your To-Do list can become your Ta-Da list!!! Create your list for the next day at the end of your work day, and then go over it first thing in the morning when you start working...add to it or change it as needed.

FAMOUS QUOTE: "Out of intense complexities intense simplicities emerge."
~Winston Churchill

TIPSY:

Karl Strauss Amber Lager

This is a really great lager...that just says "fall" to me. Now is the perfect time to enjoy one. It's a tad sweet (caramel)...but not sugary...if that makes any sense at all! This beer was the 2009 LA County Fair Gold Medal Winer. Read about it here.

1. Chill
2. Pop the top
3. Enjoy
4. 'Nuff said.
   

OK - please post comments and tell me what types of "Tips" you would like to see covered here in the future!!! (You can post other comments too of course...like after you try the Karl Strauss Amber Lager!)

I get asked all the time how to do certain things, so I've decided to start making very simple video tutorials as these things come up. Here's my first one, it's on how to create an automatically inserted signature in Gmail. There are some promising Add Ons for FireFox out there that will allow you to create multiple html signatures for each account that you have working within your Gmail account; however, the ones I have played with still seem to have some bugs that they need to get worked out. For instance, Blank Canvas Gmail Signatures looks great and may work nicely for a bit and then it will just disappear on you and you can't seem to get it back...even by logging out and back into Gmail. Who has time for that? So until they perfect the fancy, I will stick with old reliable here. I hope you enjoy it and please feel free to comment with any questions you may have!

The embedded video is really small...and since you need to read what's on my screen, it might be better to just go and watch it directly at YouTube.

Subscribe to my Tutorial Channel on YouTube®!