Tell A Friend About eNeighbors

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Want to tell a friend about eNeighbors? Just complete this form and we’ll email the details to whoever you’d like.

This can be useful if you want eNeighbors in your neighborhood and want to share the idea with your HOA board or other residents. If you don’t know where to find your board’s contact information, try your paper directory. Their information is usually listed in the front of the directory.

If you have a property management company, you might also call them and ask who your board president is so you can email him/her about eNeighbors.

And finally, if you like things on paper, you can print out our PDF brochure to share with others.

Can Online Advertising Be Useful?

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The Future of Online Advertising (FOOA) conference wrapped a couple weeks back, and I’ve been reading a lot of summaries and commentary about the different sessions and the overall direction of online advertising.

Not surprisingly, the topic of video was very hot. YouTube and Google made sure of that. And of course, the traditional TV networks are in full support of a medium that they are at least somewhat familiar with, but the trend that I thought was more relevant to us here at eNeighbors was the demand that online direct marketing be even more measured and tracked than it already is, and secondly, that the media and channels provide accountability.

With so many different online channels (e.g., blogs, videos, social networks, etc.) to use for your ad campaign, picking the right ones are going to be determined by how measureable and accountable a particular channel is willing to be.

Additionally, the content aggregators that are stripping content from their source only complicates the measurability situation. So, I think the question for how to determine effectiveness will ultimately end up with figuring out where and how people want to receive their content. And if (and that’s a big “if”) when they do receive that content in their personalized fashion, they are willing to put up with advertising.

The key is relevance. If I’m looking for a new grass treatment company for my lawn, then I’ll welcome all the ads I can get for lawn companies. But the icing on the cake will be whether I can quantify those ads in regards to value.

So, what we need is useful aggregator of content that is personal and relevant. And when I need it, provides me with a useful way to find and assess a service provider for whatever my need might be.

Good luck.

TechStars: My Take

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Update: David Cohen’s perspective is here. Jeff Rohrer, another entrepreneur, has a good synopsis too.

I attended a TechStars event tonight that was open to the public. We didn’t apply to be apart of TechStars but I kind of wish I had.

The panel discussion was excellent, but more than anything it was great to be in a room full of other entrepreneurs going through the exact same thing that I am.

The topic of the night was “How to fund your startup”. I walked away with the following:

  1. Bootstrap it – The panel was full of people who fund entrepreneurs and make a lot of money doing it. Ironic though that their advice was to NOT take money from them, or at the very least, to put it off as long as possible. I also found it interesting that most of the people on the panel started their first company with “10 bucks” (Brad Feld) or “100 bucks” (David Cohen) or “-10 million” (Gary Held).
  2. Be creative – There were a couple of really colorful and interesting business stories that the panel shared as examples of how to be creative. Basically, there’s no one right way to raise money. Do what makes sense. That may seem obvious, but so many times I see others (myself included) looking for a road map. While there are some general guidelines, ultimatley, you just have to figure it out.
  3. Real entrepreneurs eat ramen noodles – Lifestyle choices are a big part of starting a company. You have to be willing to eat ramen noodles for a while to get things off the ground. Lisa Rutherford likes you to “max out your credit cards” too because it shows passion, committement and belief in who you are and what you’re doing.
  4. Keep costs low, but focus on growing revenue – Part of funding your startup is keeping the money that you have, so you want to keep your costs as low as possible. At the same time, you have to grow, which usually means spending money. Balance is the key here. You don’t want to tighten up to the point that you stop growth. This can be scary sometimes as it may mean having to spend your last few dollars.
  5. The right advisors are invaluable – You have to find the right advisors with experience in your industry. Ideally, someone who can help you with a big probelm that you’re facing. The best advisors will never ask you for compensation, but let’s be fair, if they’re providing real value, you should invite them to participate in the upside by way of a small equity position. Be careful not to populate the back of your business plan with a list of big names that hardly know you. This may look good on paper, but you’re missing the point of an advisory board. You must develop personal relationships with each one so they have a vested interest in you and what you’re doing.

David Cohen also did an excellent job moderating the panel and keeping the discussion focused. I wanted to say thanks to him and the panel for putting this together. I really appreciate what you guys do.

The only bummer was that the MyBlogLog guys (acquired by Yahoo!) weren’t there for the panel discussion. Apparently they’ve been hanging around TechStars. I really wanted to meet them. (Update: Eric Marcoullier posted in the comments. Looks like he may be back in Boulder sometime.)

Keep an eye on the TechStars Blog for a video of the event.

eNeighbors Stats: 5/15 – 6/13

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We are showing excellent positive growth patterns, and we continue to get positive feedback from our customers on how much they love using the tool, and how it makes communicating with their neighbors so easy.

Traffic data:

69,847 page views – 27% increase (over last 30 days)
7,482 visits – 36% increase (over last 30 days)
5 minutes avg visit duration – 5% increase (over last 30 days)

17 neighborhoods online
1,708 registered users at 1608 unique addresses

With 6,659 potential addresses in the neighborhoods that have signed up so far, we are at 24% adoption rate for our entire resident base.

The newsletter adoption rate is holding true as well with only 12 residents (out of 1708) opting out of receiving the email newsletter.

Total user-generated content since launch (about 3 months):

News posts: 198
Events: 124
Groups: 41
Classifieds: 259

Keep in mind that some of these neighborhoods have only been using their site for less than a month so far.

Overall, we are in really good shape. If we hit our goal of 50+ neighborhoods by the end of the year, we could easily be at 700,000 page views per month from 15,000 registered users in early 2008.

Build or buy?

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Someone asked me why they should subscribe to eNeighbors instead of building their own neighborhood website. I get this a lot, so I thought it made sense to publish it here.

Here’s why you should subscribe to eNeighbors, instead of building your own neighborhood website:

  1. Permanence – Even if you have the technical expertise to build your own website, what happens when you move? eNeighbors will always be there to support your neighborhood.
  2. Updates – eNeighbors continually makes improvements to its product. Subscribing to eNeighbors ensures that you get the latest and greatest.
  3. Convenience – Why hassel with hosting, domain name registration, backup, and security? Let us do the work for you.
  4. Support – We provide e-mail support for your entire neighborhood.
  5. Savings – For $82.99/mo. you get access to a proven product with a robust feature set, world-class email support for every resident of your neighborhood, and you can reduce the cost of neighborhood communication by eliminating your costly newsletter.
  6. Registration – Building a website is one thing, getting the neighbors to use it is another. Our registration process will get the majority of your neighborhood online.
  7. Certainty – eNeighbors has a proven product with a tested user-interface. You know exactly how much it will cost and that it will work.
  8. Money Back Guarantee – We’ve never had to refund a client yet, but if you aren’t completely satisfied with eNeighbors, we’ll refund your money in the first 30 days of use.
  9. Why wait? – eNeighbors can have your site up within 5 days. Building your own site will take months.
  10. The Network – When you sign up with eNeighbors, you join a network of other neighborhoods that also use our service. Our customers provide us with valuable suggestions that you can take advantage of. For example, one person told us they want the ability to post classifieds in other neighborhoods. Great idea.

Ultimately, eNeighbors is more than a website, it’s a communication solution for your neighborhood. Does your neighborhood really need website? Not really. You need better communication.

eNeighbors: High Relevancy

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Transparent Real Estate has a good post on hyperlocal websites as it relates to the real estate industry.

To sum it up, eNeighbors has the most highly relevant user-base to which a realtor can advertise.

Let me stress that eNeighbors is not a tool for realtors. Our customers are neighborhoods and their residents. Of course, that’s what makes us such a desirable target for realtors.

I’ve had several realtors ask me if they can pay for their neighborhood to get an eNeighbors website and my answer is always no. In order for a neighborhood website to be of value, we must establish a relationship with the board of directors or other neighborhood leadership.

However, if you’re a realtor and you want to get your neighborhood online. I would suggest that you email the board president and let them know about eNeighbors. Ask them to consider it at their next board meeting and forward them the eNeighbors website address – www.eNeighbors.com for more information.

Once the neighborhood is online, you can advertise for free in the classified section if you’re a resident. You can also sponsor the website to maximize your exposure whether you’re a resident or not.

eNeighbors Features: News

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The “news” feature is next up in my profile of eNeighbors’ services. Everyone likes to be informed, and we use CNN, Yahoo and MSN to keep up on all the world, national and even city-level news, but what about the news that’s happening in your own back yard, literally.

The News feature is the most versatile of the communication tools. You can use it to alert the community to upcoming events, post details about neighborhood activity, remind residents of safety protocols, or simply use it to start an online conversation.

1. Anyone can post a News item.

2. Anyone can leave a comment on the posted News item (this helps to generate an online discussion by allowing real-time feedback).

3. The top 3 most recent News items appear on the Home page.

4. When you post a News item, it is viewable by anyone in your neighborhood that has registered on the website.

5. Finally, each News item is automatically put into the eNewsletter and sent to every neighbor that has chosen to receive the newsletter either daily, weekly, or monthly.

Contact us today to get more info on signing up your neighborhood for eNeighbors

eNeighbors Mailer

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eNeighbors is taking the hassle out of mailing website Welcome Letters to your neighborhood. We can now complete the mailings on your behalf.

Not only does this make it more convenient than ever for your neighborhood to “go online”, but it may also save you time and money.

You have two options: (1) Postcard, or (2) Security Envelope.

Postcard ($0.75/piece) Envelope ($1.09/piece)
100 pieces $100 $134
300 pieces $250 $352
500 pieces $400 $570
1000 pieces $775 $1115

*All prices above include the $25 processing fee. Note that special circumstances may exist that alter the quoted prices.

If you’re new to eNeighbors you can learn more about our sign up process on our website.

eNeighbors Features: Classifieds

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We’ve recently put together a small sales team and subsequently developed some training materials to get the guys up to speed on all the features of eNeighbors. So, I thought I’d follow suit here on the blog and post a series of entries tied to the different features that eNeighbors offers a neighborhood.

First, there are 5 core communication features that we offer:

1. News
2. Events / Calendar
3. Groups
4. Classifieds
5. Bulletins

In addition, there are other more standard web features:

1. Online Resident Directory
2. Contact Form
3. Architectural Request Form
4. Resources (this is for all your HOA documents)

The first feature, I’ll cover is Classifieds since it has been our most popular so far. As of this morning, there have been 253 classifieds posted on eNeighbors from about 15 different neighborhoods in the past 10 weeks.

1. Classifieds are free

2. It’s so easy to post a classified, you can do it in about 2 minutes. All you have to do is click “Post a Classified”, type up your ad, preview it, and then click “publish.” Your ad is instantly added to the site for everyone to view.

3. The top 3 most recent classifieds appear on the Home page.

4. When you post a classified, it is viewable by anyone in your neighborhood that has registered on the website.

5. There are 4 different categories you can post to:
– For Sale
– Wanted
– Neighborhood Services?
(things like babysitting, pet sitting, yard work, etc.)
– Professional Services
(things like, Mary Kay, tax services, house painting, etc.)

6. Finally, each classified post is automatically put into the eNewsletter and sent to every neighbor that has chosen to receive the newsletter either daily, weekly, or monthly.

Contact us today to get more info on signing up your neighborhood for eNeighbors