Newest dsSearchAgent IDX Features for You and Your Competitors
It’s been a looooong time coming, but it’s time for me to put on my new-feature-dude cap again and share with you a whole bunch of new features that we’ve been quietly adding to our dsSearchAgent IDX solution over the past two months or so. I’m only allowed to talk to the outside world everyone once in a while before I have to get back to coding, so I hope to make the most out of this time before I’m banished back to my closet office.
Search by communities and tracts
Website visitors can now search for properties with certain communities, tracts, and neighborhoods (everyone seems to have different names for them). For example, you can now search for that killer home in Boston’s Beacon Hill community or Seattle’s Queen Anne community. In many MLS’s, this means that you can also search for homes in 55+ communities, specific condo tracts, and neighborhoods that span multiple cities.
Ultimately, we decided that the best place to put the community / neighborhood / tract search is in with our city and zip search box. We kept the same auto-complete technology we were using before, so you’ll now see all the different names and types of locations when you start typing in the location box.
Search by year built
You can now search for properties by the year they were built. It’s possible to limit the search to new properties, historic properties, or anywhere in between with this sweet new tool. Looking for that old, dilapidated junker you’ve been just dying to snap up? Now you can find it that much easier!
If you’ve chosen to use sliders in your IDX, you can choose how far you want the low end of the spectrum to go; the high end is automatically updated for you every year.
City marker statistics
Even though our city markers were great before, they’re “el fantastico” now! (Like my Spanish? I’ve always been good at it.) When you hover over any city marker, you’ll now see some quick stats about the city based on the default property types that are checked for you when you or your clients visit the IDX. The great benefit of these quick stats is the ability for out-of-area visitors to quickly get an idea about the pricing in the different areas without having to spend the time exploring and researching each one.
Full size photos!
Based on popular demand, we’ve added complete support for the full-size photos that come from the MLS. To see these photos, just go to any property you wish and click on the “View full-size photos” link immediately beneath the mini-slideshow. You’ll see a slick new full-size slideshow open up, and in it you’ll see all of the photos for that listing in the original form that they were provided in by the MLS. Just think, you’re finally able to see all of the superfine details of this “investor dream” to “purcahse (sic) and re build”.
Better zoom support
Previously, dsSearchAgent would only zoom to your search area if you either entered a single city in the city search box or if the number of properties that matched your search was less than 250. With the enhanced zoom support, dsSearchAgent now zooms to the area that matches your search no matter what you in put the location search box and no matter what other search criteria you specify. Hopefully this will make it much easier for you and your visitors to always be able to relate each search with a visual representation of that search on the map.
Sold properties!
Although this feature is only for members of SoCal MLS at the moment, we’re very excited to tell you that we’re working to get sold property data from each MLS and integrate it into dsSearchAgent! Now, when the owner of each IDX solution has it enabled, sold properties will be displayed immediately beneath the map whenever active listings are also plotted on the map. To see what I mean, hop over to this demo account and zoom into an area that you find interesting. Once you’ve zoomed in far enough, you should see the sold properties display pop into view; using it should be pretty self-explanatory.
Virtual tours for all
We’ve gone through every single one of the MLSs that we service and added support for the virtual tours feed that they provide. Now, if the agent that lists a property has provided a virtual tour (or more than one), you’ll see a link that says “View virtual tour(s)” immediately beneath the “View full-size photos” link. Each virtual tour will open in it’s own window, so your visitor will never be taken away to someone else’s site.
dsAgentChat in contact module
Ever since we completely revamped our dsAgentChat instant messaging application, we’ve been striving to integrate it into all of our products. We’re happy to announce that it’s now part of each of our clients’ IDX solutions! You can easily customize dsAgentChat so that visitors can chat with you via your cell phone, via the dsAgentChat desktop application, or via the dsAgentChat administrative area. Remember that all of our products come bundled with dsAgentChat for free, so there’s no extra cost for you to kick the tires on this really fancy technology.
Alrighty, that’s all for now. I’m off to work on some more cool features that will bring you riche$ beyond your wilde$t dream$. If you have any ideas for features that you’d love to see added to dsSearchAgent (or any of our products for that matter), or if you otherwise have a snide remark to share with us, feel free to post it in the comments. Don’t worry, we probably won’t laugh at you.