Free “must have” tools

These are free tools that we use in our business to improve productivity and real estate marketing efforts.

Issuu – prepare a marketing piece, a flyer, presentation or a neighborhood information brochure using a word processor or MS Publisher and upload to Isuu. Easy, quick and very effective. Here is an excellent example of a real estate listing presentation which could be ebedded in your blog or website.

Dropbox is the easiest way to share and store your files online, running in the background on your desktop. Worry-free syncing, your files automatically sync to your computers and the web. Sign in and access your files from any browser or mobile device.

Netvibes lets you customize your browser’s start page with email, blog and website feeds (RSS), messaging, Facebook profile and much, much more. Spend less time searching and more time working.

Xobni makes information much easier to find. When a new email arrives, the sender's full communication history appears in the Xobni sidebar, including past conversations, attachments and contact details. Xobni also includes a blazing fast email search tool. The really cool part is you can see if your message sender is on Facebook or Linked in – you can then click over directly and add them as a friend.

MobileAppLoader is a free iPhone application that will embed your IDX searches into a formatted template so your buyers can search for homes on your iphone – we reviewed the product here. The user can add you directly to their contacts list from the app.

Evernote allows you to stop forgetting things. Capture everything now so you will be able to find it all later. Evernote makes this information accessible and searchable at any time, from anywhere. Everything you put into Evernote is always synchronized across your PDA, notebook and desktop PC.

Google Analytics allows you to learn more about where your visitors come from and how they interact with your site. You'll get the information you need to write better ads, strengthen your marketing initiatives, and create higher-converting websites. Ties in neatly with Google's Website Optimizer. Find out which page designs, headlines, and graphics convert the most visitors.

Google Docs & Spreadsheets: Don’t bother spending hard-earned money for the latest version of MS Word. Create, upload, share and edit word and spreadsheet documents online using Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

AVG Free Edition Basic antivirus and antispyware protection for Windows. 80,000,000 users. The most downloaded software on CNET's Download.com

Remember The Milk reminds you to take care of important tasks, so you’ll never forget when a project is due. An intuitive interface makes managing tasks fun. Set due dates easily with next Friday or in 2 weeks. Ties in nicely with an Iphone app so you can take your lists anywhere.

FaxZERO Sometimes you just have to send a fax. Use FaxZERO to send a fax anywhere in the US or Canada for free.

LogMeIn allows you to access your computer’s desktop anywhere. Interface look just like you are sitting at your remote machine. Logmein now has an iPhone app that allows you to access your machine on your phone too.

Ping.fm is a simple service that makes updating your social networks a snap. You can even email your updates to ping.fm from your mobile phone.

Eyejot sends video messages as sending email. Login to your account, record or upload your video, and send! The recipient gets a friendly email message telling them they have a new video message, and they can watch it with a single click.

Added August 2009:

Polaris is a desktop widget that interacts with your Google Analytics account and displays todays results (Analytics dosn't). With 8  reports it's the easiest way keep keep track of visitor counts and search engine keywords your data always instantly available.

PrinterFriendly is a plugin which automatically removes ads, navigation, and all the junk you don't want to print including images, saving on  paper and ink. Creates PDF's on the fly too! Simple point & click enrichment of your blog posts (and emails). 

Zemanta suggests tags, links, photos, and related articles for your blog. This is a browser addon for Firefox and Internet Explorer.

 Woopra is another desktop application that will show you which pages visitors are and have looked at, in real time too! Get a sense of what is working and what is turning off your visitors when they bail from you site.

://URLFAN  cultivates the content of millions of RSS feeds in an experiment  to discover popular websites, by parsing billions of pieces of information. The service will can alert you of mentions about your site, somewhat similar to the popular Google Alert service.

CopyGator monitors your RSS feed and find where your content has been republished (ie stolen!) in the blogosphere, building an overview page you can view to see how/when/where your content is being duplicated, quoted or plagiarized. See the little Gator logo at the bottom of this page? It turns red if we have been plagarized – cool huh?

Added November 2009:

LinkTiger  hunts your website for broken links 7 days a week, 365 days a year! Provides a quick overview of the status of all links on your websites with a intuitive dashboard plus emails alerting you to broken links.

Mon.itor.us is a free, yet powerful website, server and traffic monitoring service with an intiuitive Interface, no setup, servers, and maintenance costs . Manage your or your customers network from anywhere. Instantly reports your site outage and response time by email.

Fishbowl  brings Facebook to your desktop in new ways – lets you personalize how you read your newsfeed, update status, comment, like, browse and upload photos.

Some of these tools offer paid subscriptions for more advanced features.

Let us know here if there are any cool tools we have not yet covered!

We highly recommend these two must have books:

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