Bulletins – Hawaii Information Service

After a great deal of hard work, we are pleased to announce that we will soon be releasing our new and improved IDX product!  A great deal has been achieved on the back-end to accomplish a few simple but very important goals on the front-end for the benefit of you, our members, as well as your customers.  In short, here is what you can expect:

Stay tuned for a detailed breakdown of all the features and functions of the enhanced IDX.  For a quick reference guide, please click on the thumbnail below to see what you can expect from the new EZ, Mid and Full IDX packages.

Now Available:  Virtual Tours and Photo Descriptions

In an effort to provide your customers with the fullest experience possible when they visit your website, we have executed another VOW feed upgrade.  Effective immediately, you will have access to virtual tours and photo descriptions for all listings that appear in the feed.*  
 
To get you started, we will be generating a full dump of all Active and Contingent listings every day.  This full dump file will be available to you from 3/26/2009 to 4/10/2009.  Here are the specifications on the new data files that will be added to the VOW feed that will contain virtual tours and photo descriptions for the listings:
 
Full Dump File (only available 3/26/2009 – 4/10/2009)

• This Full Dump text file will be named photoToursAndDescFULLDUMP.txt and will be put into your ftp directory as a separate file.  You can use this file to populate your existing database with the virtual tours and photo descriptions of listings that are currently Active or Contingent.  After applying this full update, you can use the photoToursAndDesc.txt file that will be generated daily to keep your tours and photo descriptions up to date.

Daily incremental Update File

• There will be a separate text file generated in the VOW feed that will be named “photoToursAndDesc.txt and will contain any photo’s descriptions and any virtual tours for listings if available.
• These descriptions and tours will be given for all listings that are included in the feed on a given run.  Meaning all listings that are in the VOW feed should have a matching record in the new photoToursAndDesc.txt file if that particular listing has photos or a virtual tour.
• This new photoToursAndDesc.txt file will be included in the data .zip files that are currently in the feed for each island.  The zip files are named “vowfeedKauai.zip” for Kauai data or “vowfeedHawaii.zip” for Hawaii data.

*Provided this information is available.

If you are interested in upgrading your FTP feed you will need to schedule a time with HIS during which your webmaster can do this.  We have time slots available next week Wednesday, February 25th – Friday, February 27th. 
 
Only a limited number of people can update their FTP feed each day, so please contact Erin Shaw today to reserve your spot:
 
E-mail: erin@alohaliving.com
Direct: 808.748.8759
Toll Free: 1.800.628.3121 ext. #159
 
 
When you RSVP, please note which upgrade your webmaster will be doing:
 
1. Get daily photo updates for listings entered from here on out.
 
2. Download the “Full” photo set if you want photos for every active listing on the market entered before and after this enhancement.
 
3. If you do not want to upgrade at this time, you are welcome to stick with featuring just six photos with each listing as your site does now.
 
*For technical questions, please contact Michael Torres at michael@alohaliving.com.  This upgrade is included in your current service at no additional charge from HIS.
 

QUESTIONS?
Contact Colleen Yasuhara at (808) 748.8751 OR 800.628.3121 ext. #151
colleen@alohaliving.com

We know how important it is that your customers be able to find everything they need right on your website, which is why OVER THE NEXT TWO WEEKS, we will be able to increase the number of pictures that will appear per listing, from 6 up to 25 photos.  You will have three options with this FTP upgrade:
1. Get daily photo updates for listings entered from here on out.
 
2. Download the “Full” photo set if you want photos for every active listing on the market entered before and after this enhancement.
 
3. Stick with featuring just five photos with each listing as your site does now.
 
Keep an eye out throughout this week as we will be sending more detailed information for you and your webmaster on how to go about upgrading your FTP feed to accommodate the photo capacity increase.  For technical questions, please contact Michael Torres at michael@alohaliving.com. 
 
*This upgrade is included in your current service at no additional charge from HIS.

QUESTIONS?

Contact Colleen Yasuhara at (808) 599.4224 OR 800.628.3121 ext. #151
colleen@alohaliving.com
 
Hawaii Information Service
680 Iwilei Rd, Suite 777
Honolulu, Hawaii 96817

We know how important it is that your customers be able to find everything they need right on your website.  Because of this, we are constantly working on developing and implementing new ways to improve our products and services for both you and your clients.

Most recently, we increased the number of photos our VOW (Virtual Office Website) customers can feature with the listings on their sites from six to 25, enabling them to showcase properties more thoroughly.

What is our VOW offering all about? VOW is a raw data feed that we provide to you (or a third party web developer or service provider) that contains the data for every single listing that has ever hit the market — active or otherwise.  With VOW, you can display active, sold, and off the market listings and data however you wish on your own website.  The data feed is updated daily so the information is always fresh, and with the recent increase in the number of included photos, even more complete.

VOW offers the richest set of data, but because it isn’t self contained like our IDX (Internet Data Exchange) products, you do need someone to help you manage it.

Don’t have the resources for VOW?  We offer three IDX solutions so that you don’t have to worry about designing or hosting listing information on your website. Our EZ IDX, Full IDX, and Custom IDX packages allow you to display current listings on your website with various levels of customization.  All you do is sign up and choose which package you want, and we do the rest to make sure it looks great and provides your clients useful information on all active listings.

Questions?  Want to learn more about your IDX options?

Colleen Yasuhara
Account Manager
808-748-8751 – Direct
800-628-3121 #151
808-524-6874 – Fax
www.alohaliving.com
www.hawaiiinformation.com
colleen@alohaliving.com