The first thing that stands out to me is the speed. This phone is FAST (thanks to the 1GHz Snapdragon processor). You can have multiple apps running at the same time with no lag time in performance. Another area where the Droid Incredible rises above most smartphones is the camera. Sporting an 8-megapixel lens and dual LED flash, the Incredible takes excellent photos indoors and outdoors along with the ability to shoot up to 720p video (with an upgrade coming soon). There is also a TV out option that allows you to hook the phone up to your television allowing you to view anything that is on your phone, such as YouTube videos or games on your television.

For all my iPhone fans, this phone has a similar sexy, sleek look as the iPhone. With one button at bottom of the phone and the light weight feel of the phone, it is the one phone that comes closest to the design of the iPhone. With that being said, there are differences between the Incredible and the iPhone. The feature I use most with the Incredible is that of a modem for my laptop. By connecting the phone to my laptop via the USB cable and accessing the free app “Easy Tether” or “PdaNet”, I can utilize the data plan on Verizon without having to pay extra money for an air card. In the next update for the phone there will be the ability to share the phone as a mobile Wi-Fi hotspot (how cool is that)!! The customization of Android phones is fantastic. With the ability to have countless home screens and have customized widgets and apps at your disposal makes Android the one phone where you can make the phone “your own”.

If you are a Google fan/user, then this is the phone for you. This phone seamlessly integrates with your Gmail account, calendar, contacts, and even your Google browsing history on your phone. There is even an app called “LinkPush” that will allow you to send any page that you are viewing in Chrome over to your phone’s browser. Facebook and Twitter integration is handled through HTC’s app titled “Friend Stream”. This app handles all of your feeds in one place allowing easy access to your Social Networking accounts.

The navigation system of Google Maps is second to none. I love the ability to push a button and speak either the address or name of a business and be right on my way. With live traffic updates and having every business listed in Google available at my disposal, why would I ever need to use my TomTom ever again? I don’t, so I sold it and don’t miss it!

Although the Android Market (the store to download free and paid apps) is still fairly young, there are over 70,000 apps. Some of my favorites are Astro (must have), Carrr Matey (car locator), Compass, Easy Tether (must have), History Eraser, IMDB, Kindle, Lookout, ESPN Score Center, Scanner Radio, Swype (must have), Slacker, Sound Hound, Where, WeatherBug, and What Zip (good for you for real estate).

Blog courtesy of our Guest Blogger:  Bruce Craig, Regional Marketing Consultant, Move Inc.,

Posting the question on our Facebook Fan Page distributed the update to all our Fan’s personal walls – as of today that’s just over 7,000 Facebook profiles. That alone is a great start to the distribution of content and socialization with others. But let’s say that that update was actually a blog post automatically pulled from your real estate blog site and it wasn’t just posted within Facebook but it was also automatically posted on Twitter at the same time? And on top of that it was posted on your LinkedIN account profile… Now how many eyeballs have you got on your content? In my books, these four sites are the crux of Real Estate and where all your content MUST be distributed each time you update your blog or one of your social networking profiles/pages.

All this can be done automatically, within just a few minutes of your time, but saving you many more in the long run. Here’s a run down of how this can be achieved:

Blog Post to Facebook Fan Page

Here’s one of my favorite Facebook Applications in full effect!  NetworkedBlogs is a great application that can be easily added to your Blog site and tied to your Fan Page (it can also be tied to your Profile on Facebook, but DON’T!  Remember – Profile = Personal, Fan Page = Business).    Watch the following short video to see how this is done – step-by-step:

Facebook Fan Page to Twitter

This can be accomplished in many ways, but since we are already in Networkedblogs Application and it can be done directly in here, this is the way I would recommend:

Twitter to LinkedIN

Again, this can be accomplished in many ways, but for the sake of argument, here’s how I would recommend doing it:

HDhat’s Apple Iphone 4 wide angle lens modification and sample real estate video tour.
Some important notes about the videos below.

*All the videos below have been “stabilized and smoothed” in the HDhat.com editing process. So the finished product you see here is much smoother than the raw footage from the cameras.

*We did not brighten or tweak the colors in any of the videos during the editing process.

*We did change camera settings on the higher end Sony HX-1 so that we were able to capture nice bright video.

*The Iphone 4 because of its lightweight and small size was the most difficult to capture stable video so we used a simple stabilizer bar from http://www.videotourstabilizerbar.com

NOW LETS GET ON TO THE VIDEOS TO COMPARE………

Iphone 4 with .45x Wide Angle Lens

How to add a wide angle lens to your Apple Iphone 4 plus a video tour for comparison.

Kodak Zi8 with a .5x wide angle lens

Sony HX-1 with a .45x wide angle lens

The .45x lens for the Sony HX-1 is available in the HDHat.com Store

**HDHat.com is the world’s largest real estate video tour editing company.
Outsource your real estate video editing to the professionals at HDhat.com
Order a Wide Angle Lens for the Sony Cybershot HX-1
Order a Video Stabilizer Bar – Great for compact and portable video cameras
Review of the Kodak Zi8
Additional Real Estate Video Tips

Originally Posted at: Iphone 4 with wide angle lens Real Estate Video Sample – HDHat.com

He may have had a huge following, but he didn’t have any way to contact them now that his Fan Page was gone – all those tens of thousands of people were simply following his page – most hadn’t provided anyway for him to reach out to them other than writing a post on his Fan Page wall – and now his wall was gone!

Hey, this isn’t a post to tear down Jon and/or his short-fallings. Not at all.   Anyone could have had this happen to them.  But, this massive hit to his business was not only a huge learning curve for him, but for everyone who is using Fan Pages as a means of gaining more real estate business earnings. This post is about utilizing Facebook and your Fan Page in the most “tech savvy agent” way you can, and should be!

Gaining leads through opt-ins via Facebook, or any online resource, may not be on the forefront of your mind when you’re posting your blogs or adding an update to your Fan Page wall, but it MUST be! Below we’re going to give you a list of three ways you can obtain contact information from your social networking sites, both for future use and in case you get hit by Facebook’s dreaded hand of death!

1. Contact Forms

Obvious?  Yes.  But other than on your main real estate website, do you have them prominently available for your potential client’s to provide you with their information?  9 out of 10 agents will say “no” to this question.  We wrote a great post that many of you may have already put into place on your Fan Page about how to add a great, customizable Fan Page contact form.  If you haven’t done it yet, go do it now!

2.   RSS Feeds

RSS feeds are an awesome way to not only gain prospective leads contact info, but also to automatically set them up to receive updates from you without you having to do ANYTHING.  When adding your RSS feed to your blog and then your Fan Page, you have obtained your lead’s contact name and email address, and every time you add a blog post to your blog site (like this one), they will receive your information within an hour or so.  You can learn more about this within our “Have Blog, Will Read?” post.

3.   Deliverables

Giveaways have always been a proven way to get people to hand over to you what you want from them – and in this case – give them something of value and they will give you something of value in return.  How many times have you been to a conference where you have the opportunity to win something that you really have wanted and all you have had to do is give your contact information?  Ok, sometimes you haven’t really wanted what they have to offer, but if you won something or even gained something from it, it maybe worth your while to leave your contact information, right?

Think about what kind of deliverables you can offer your potential clients:   Whether it is free reports on market conditions, free dinner for two at Benihana’s for the person that gives you the most referrals this month, or a gift for helping you name your new blog site competition… the ideas are endless, and each idea will attract a different contact and new prospective leads.

Speaking of which, we’re going to be having a webinar next week to give you some great insight and tools you can use within Search Engine Optimization that is open for any and all to join – if you would like to be notified of when it will be and have an exclusive invitation be mailed to you, please enter your email address at the very top of this blogsite (“Become A Savvy Agent”) and we’ll be happy to send it along!

HDhat’s initial testing of the Iphone 4 has revealed that it is a great choice for a real estate video tour camera, however certain minor and simple modifications will be necessary.

1) The Iphone 4 will need a wide angle lens.

HDhat.com has tested a very inexpensinve .45x wide angle lens on the Iphone 4 with great success. We will publish the modification method here on TechSavvyAgent.com and our Blog soon.

2) The Iphone 4 will benefit greatly from a simple stabilizer system which will also be quite simple to accommodate.

Neither the wide angle modification or stabilizer will require the Iphone to be modified or touched in anyway.

3) There are also other benefits that derive from the addition of a wide angle lens to the Iphone 4 both in video capture and editing.

For instance the addition of a quality wide angle lens to the Iphone 4 produces a big difference in the contrast ratio, the saturation, white balance and stability. So be sure to watch for our upcoming post titled “How to modify your Iphone 4 with a wide angle lens – a simple, inexpensive modification to dramatically improve your Iphones video capture“.

Some important notes about the videos below.

*All the videos below have been “stabilized and smoothed” in the HDhat.com editing process. So the finished product you see here is much smoother than the raw footage from the cameras.

*We did not brighten or tweak the colors in any of the videos during the editing process.

*We did change camera settings on the higher end Sony HX-1 so that we were able to capture nice bright video.

*The Iphone 4, because of its lightweight and small size, was the most difficult to capture stable real estate video tours. A simple stabilizing system will eliminate this and allow for capture that will compare and rival many higher end video cameras.

Some conclusions:

*The Sony HX-1 which is the highest priced of the 3 captured the best and most stable footage.

*The Kodak Zi8 captured considerably darker footage and adjusted to changing light conditions slower than the Iphone and the HX-1

*The addition of a wide angle lens and a simple stabilizing system will allow the Iphone 4 to outperform the Kodak Zi8 and in some cases produce results comparable to much higher end cameras.

NOW LETS GET ON TO THE VIDEOS TO COMPARE………

Iphone 4 with no wide angle lens

Kodak Zi8 with a .5x wide angle lens

Sony HX-1 with a .45x wide angle lens

Lens available in the HDHat.com Store

Outsource your real estate video editing to the professionals at HDhat.com
Wide Angle Lens for the Sony Cybershot HX-1
Video Stabilizer Bar
Review of the Kodak Zi8
Additional Real Estate Video Tips

Originally Posted at: Iphone 4 Real Estate Video Sample – HDHat.com