This post will be mostly of interest two types of people:
- The nerdy set of agents, especially those using the Diverse Solutions IDX product dsSearchAgent.
- Our existing home search users who have a sense of adventure and like to try new things.
The boys at Diverse Solutions are busy spinning up the latest and greatest enhancements to their home search solution, and we’ve been given the opportunity to test is out.
If you are a registered user of our current home search, your existing login and password should work on the Beta version.
You can find the Beta version here. It’s also available under โSearch for Homesโย in the nav bar under the header graphic.
And of course the existing version is still here.
What is different between the current home search and the new Beta version home search? Diverse Solutions provides some details:
Interface has been completely updated with a more up-to-date design style
Client register and login links have been moved to a more prominent location
The search panel:
- There is now a universal search box.
- You can search by county, city, community, area, tract, zip code, address and MLS#.
- The search box is more intuitive than before with its auto-complete suggestions.
- There is no longer a search button. It has been replaced with a prominently displayed view results button that recalculates and displays the number of results as you adjust the various criteria.
- Sliders and text boxes have been restyled.
- There is now a base set of criteria that is preset and underneath is list of additional criteria that can added if they wish to narrow their search further.
- Parking, property status and has photos criteria have been added.
The results panel:
- First and foremost you will notice that we have done away with the scrolling buttons. We have replaced it with an intuitive scroll box that allows for faster browsing and no scrolling on smaller low resolution monitors.
- We have also reformatted each result to be less cluttered and more legible
The map panel is similar to how we had it before with the exception of moving a few things around and hooking up the instant results to map movement.
The details panel:
- This panel has been completely redesigned to be less cluttered and more readable by putting the most important information for consumers up top.
- There is a lot more space devoted to photos now with the ability to see all the photos without leaving the page for quick viewing.
- In addition, there is a large "View Large Photos" button clearly visible that will bring up a newly designed large photo viewer.
- We have added a "Have Questions" button so that consumers can easily contact you.
- Previous and next buttons have been added for easier browsing through the search results. As a consumer progresses through the results will scroll along with them.
- We have added various ways for them to share property with the "Share" feature at the top (note: Facebook will be added shortly).
- When the details panel is being viewed there are two new areas that have been added under the results panel — one is a contact form and the other is a mortgage calculator.
Screen shot of the current version of the Diverse Solutions Phoenix Home Search:
Screen shot of the beta version of the Diverse Solutions Phoenix Home Search:
Feel free to give the Beta version a spin! There may be bugs, and some assorted goofiness. In brief testing, most issues I’ve found are minor, and mostly only seen when using Internet Explorer (reason #12,862 to get off IE and onto a less problematic web browser). I know the crack coders at DS are hard at work squashing bugs and working on the IE issues. If you see any wonkiness, feel free to drop a comment here or on the beta version page and I’ll forward them to the development team.
The Phoenix Real Estate Guy was started by Jay Thompson, and I have a little blogging problem... he liked to say...
Parking as a search parameter has been a long time coming. Glad to hear of its inclusion. Do you know if this version will play any better with mobile browsers?
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Paul – I haven't heard (or tried) anything with mobile. I doubt it, as it's designed for a web page.
Agreed about searching by parking. But for the life of me, I don't see that selection actually in the search. Have submitted that to the developers.
Panel for searching parking spaces allows for Garage Spaces and Total Spaces – – but it only shows up for our main BETA page (for SoCal MLS). We'll try to have this added to the ARMLS version of our BETA shortly.
This new design looks really clean. I am in the process of having a custom IDX site designed right now. I wish my board would allow 3rd party solutions like this. I really like REW's new 3.0 design that they are putting in their template sites now, but my MLS board will not allow it. I think a great search is the #1 thing consumers are looking for in a site. Madisonville Texas Real Estate
I'll never understand MLS's and boards that don't allow agents to use some of the tools that are available. They benefit agents, as well as home buyers and sellers. Seems like a no-brainer. And it's absurd how some boards and MLS's handcuff their PAYING members….
Love the new look, Jay! I may give it a whirl. Thanks for the heads-up.
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You're quite welcome Debe! I'm a Diverse Solutions fan boy. More importantly, I get a lot of user feedback that they like it too…
Jay looks nice. Must talk to Ricardo. Your updated blog looks fresh and new, too.
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Thanks Kevin! I'm sure Ricardo can give you the full scoop. And I appreciate your comments about the new blog look. It was a lot of work, and it's always scary to change something that's working. But so far, so good!
Hey Stay hunkered down there in AZ. It's a hotbed of drama.
Drama? Here? Never…. ๐
Hey Jay, is this allowing for google indexing? I'd upgrade from IDX express in a new york minute if it did!
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Jonathan – it's still a script that is framed in, so it's not indexed. But Diverse has a great plugin for WordPress that does produce indexable pages. It's not really for searching, but you can integrate indexable listings into posts, or build community and zip code lists that produce indexable content. Scroll down and look at the links in the black footer area on this page. Those are all links that use the IDXPress plugin from Diverse Solutions to create indexable listings.
Oh wait, duh, you're already using DS's IDXpress…. so you know how it works.
But IDXPress isn't, and was never intended to be, a replacement for an IDX search. It's more of a compliment to an IDX search. Personally, if I had to pick one or the other, I'd go with the search. The IDXPress plugin is really good stuff for adding indexable content to a WordPress site, but it's not a full blown search — which is what most people looking for homes on the internet want and need.
Jay, It's just like any other form of customer service…if it's done right, I enjoy shouting it from the rooftop! Great job for DS you're doing here.
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Looking good!
More reasons to love Diverse Solutions. I love IDXPress!
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Thanks for sharing this Jay! It needed to be re-freshed for sure. I see that Paul already pointed out there is no way of adding number car garage. The only other thing that look/sounds funny to me is the "Price Drop" category seems like it should be called "Price Reductions" or something. Don't know if they can remove something for our state but it seems a bit ridiculous to have a Walk Score in a city like ours. Searched for a home and the Walk Score was was 22, seems like it would be better to just not have it all together. Our state does not have many places that are conducive to utilize the Walk Score. Those are my 2 cents on it, again thanks for sharing!
Shawn – you can turn off the display of the WalkScore on the admin side. I basically have everything turned on right now for testing…
We are liking the “Price Reductions” naming; I’ll see if I can get our developers to swap that out this week.
Hi Jay. I am also a fan of DS and what they are doing, but I feel the price is a bit steep personally. Double what most of them are out there. They couldn't really answer my question why they were twice as much as the one I was currently using. They basically just said it was a better product.
Since you have an in with DS I have a few questions for you. Realtor to Realtor ๐ Do you think they will ever allow me to choose just 1 bedroom not 1+? I do saved searches and would like to save a search with 1 beds or 2 beds etc and I also have clients that only want 1 bedroom units due to their price range because one you hit a 2 bed in that same price range the bedrooms are tiny.
Also, is it only garage parking that they search for or outdoor parking as well? We have a majority of outdoor spaces with our condos and it would be great to search for units with parking.
And finally, do you know if you can change the size of the display? My site doesn't have the width to support something that wide.
Thanks for any help you may be able to supply or insight you may have in regards to my concerns.
Joe
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re: pricing: Our product is easy to use, fast, and encourages lead capture by providing your visitors a more engaging solution than the competition. For some people, it’s big differences like our hybrid text criteria and map-based interface that shows instant results without page reloading, for others it’s the pre-built searches, and customizable slideshows, featured listing maps, and mini-search modules. You can definitely find features of our product in the competition, but we feel we’ve combined all the features that agents care most about into our product. We also provide email, phone, and live chat customer support, plus regular updates based on feedback. Combined, we feel we offer the best product available and our price reflects that. Hopefully this new version can help solidify any doubts you may have about the value of dsSearchAgent.
re: beds: With our current (and new 3.0) version, you can create custom links in our admin (or by futzing with a URL string) to search by max beds. We may be able to add this to the front end for your visitors to use, but for now you would have to add a link to your site directing people to your custom pre-built search that included max bedrooms. Here is an example link that only shows listings with exactly 1 bedroom: http://v3.idx.diversesolutions.com/#MinBeds=1&…
re: garages: Our new version allows for searching by number of “Garage Spaces” (either detached, attached, or both) and/or “Total Spaces”, which would include street parking if that was listed as parking by the listing agent. You can test for yourself on the link above as well.
re: display size: Our new version will resize down to about 720px wide. Any space narrower than that and your visitors will need to scroll inside the frame.
I hope this helps!
Joe –
No idea about the "1+" bedrooms thing, but I do know DS is very receptive to customer input…
I haven't seen the implementation of the parking yet (they have to update the back end of the system first), so can't comment to that.
The search itself will squeeze/stretch to fill available space. I use a "no sidebar", full width page in order to make it as large as possible, but I've seen DS IDX implemented on much narrower pages.
Hi Jay,
the beta IDX page crashed IE 8…. recovered, then crashed again 3 times…. fun to watch hahaha. I’ll check it out with Firefox later. I’m a Diverse Solutions fan for about 2 years but I also hate their back end client management…but that’s another story. I’m hoping 3.0 will rejuvinate my love for DS ๐
I got the Print is Dead skin only to find out you switched from it 3 days after I got it !! was it something I said ? Your new design looks smashing ! Best of luck with it and if you don’t mind, I’ll steal….errrr borrow a few more of your ideas. ๐
Thanks !
Joe Montenigro
HI Jay, I played around with the beta version and it definitely is much more intuitive and user friendly. I am looking forward to being able to incorporate it into my sites. I love the fact that the mls number is now prominent under the address (it was pretty hidden before). Also the lead capture possibilities are much higher with the beta. The big yellow Schedule a Showing button is a big improvement. Even the Contact Us widget on the left is better. Thanks for a glimpse at what is coming.
This new search is really great! In Maine we also face the situation with being handcuffed by the MLS regarding 3rd party providers. We are working to hopefully make changes in this regard. Currently our MLS software is with MarketLinx (which only works in IE)!
I am interested in the back end of DS product – managing client relationships when they sign up for a search. Maybe you (or someone from DS) can comment on this. Or maybe one of your readers, who has experience with the MarketLinx client gateway can provide some insight.
Will this solution always be a framed script?
Jay,
Looks good. I like all the updates. I was going to put it up on my site as well, but decided in the end that less decisions to make would be better for my clients and prospects. Ha ha!
As soon as they say it’s out of beta I will point my search page to the new one.
These two are KEY I think:
There is no longer a search button. It has been replaced with a prominently displayed view results.
The map panel is similar to how we had it before with the exception of moving a few things around and hooking up the instant results to map movement.
Plus the ability to search by county…duh!
Wow man. This looks great! Definitely going to give this a try and write a post about it.
Keep up the great work! :]
Hi Jay,
Your site looks great and your industry leadership was a factor for me in selecting Diverse Solutions last month. I am a fan of Diverse Solutions and really only have a couple of issues. dsIDXpress related searches (i.e., the Quick Search Widget and other one-click searches that I set up) lead to a results page that seems to be a dead end – the results page does not allow for a “modify my search” capability where it would take a user back and retain their search parameters. Also would like to see a function added to the dsIDXPress search results that would take a user to Advanced Search if desired. Have you encountered this issue and how do you handle? Thanks, Dave
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