This is our first blog post/product announcement for 2012. So a delayed Happy New Year to you all! Hopefully the commercial estate industry will continue to improve in 2012 and build from CRE momentum we saw in Q4 2011.

Rofo has introduced many improvements and changes to the site over the past few weeks. Most notably we improved the navigation and ease of search. Our original design allowed for basic search based on cities and states. That’s an easy way to organize commercial listings data but not really how users want to conduct a search. I may want to search by intersection, neighborhood, current address, landmark. Well, now you can. We also stuck the search bar in the header of the site so you can easily perform a new search from any landing page.

The second major upgrade has been to our search results pages. This is perhaps getting too detailed but now a search for 5500 Stewart Ave. in Fremont will take you to all of the other listings and tenant requirements nearby in Fremont.

Lastly, related to search, is a new option for agents and brokerage firms to promote their brand. We’re pleased to announce some recent work we completed with NAI Kilpatrick. All of their listings are branded and all of their brokers can display branded listings and updates on their Linkedin profiles. Linkedin usage by the commercial real estate industry has really taken off and we’ve seen a tremendous amount of interest and installations of our app (the app puts your listings on your Linkedin profile page).

We’re unveiling some other major upgrades this week and next which will greatly enhance how commercial real estate brokers can further promote their expertise and activity.

As always, we welcome and appreciate the feedback and ideas for improvement.

-Alan

Exterior shot of our new location on Maiden Lane in San Francisco. You can see Union Square in the background.

Rofo is currently searching for a new office space. It’s a time consuming and thankless task. There’s a lot of choice, too many spaces to tour, and not enough information online to weed out the bad matches.

It’s ironic. Rofo is in the business of simplifying the search for commercial real estate. We spend each and every day thinking about ways to make the discovery process easier. How do you gather and assemble all of the listings? How do you capture really good descriptive content that allows you to make an apples to apples comparison? How do you avoid touring the bad spaces?

There are some ways to solve this using technology. But ultimately it comes down to social interaction and getting recommendations from knowledgeable people who have already been there. But how do you find those people?

Rofo’s answer to this: create a leasing profile and post it to Rofo.

Every month thousands of businesses post their requirements on Rofo. And every month thousands of proposals/recommendations are sent and connections are made.

The reason it works is that no two space requirements are the same. The space size, the budget, the timing, the amenities, the important deal terms – they are all different. And when you search office space listings online it is not clear which space will meet the majority of your needs and which landlords actually have a reputation for performing on their obligations.

It all starts with you – the searcher. Take the time to be as descriptive as you can about your requirements. Do you have a budget? Do you know your projected headcount? Do you know generally where you want to commute to? Put as much of this down and the quality of your connections will only improve.

Rofo will be rolling out even more functionality in the coming weeks to help with making the right connections. Stay tuned…

T3 Advisors out of Boston (and now Silicon Valley) is a firm that specializes in representing the real estate requirements of technology companies. They’re also a really innovative crew when it comes to the use of technology, social media and the internet to grow and support their business.

As a ‘tenant rep’ or ‘buy-side’ brokerage firm without real estate listings, there’s an inherent challenge in promoting your real estate expertise and brand. One of the many things T3 is doing is using the Real Estate Pro app for Linkedin to promote their real estate updates and past successes. Its a great use of the app on one of the most important and measurable professional networking environments.

We welcome T3 as a new customer and partner and we’re very excited that our technology is playing a part in their overall marketing efforts.

World Business Chicago, the economic development department for the city, unveiled a new app called Site Selector this week. The site mashes up real estate listings with other city specific data to help businesses navigate the beginning stages of their location search. We’re always very excited to get involved in innovative projects like these and feel fortunate that we connected early on with their team. Please go a check out the site and tell your city’s economic development department to have a look and get inspired.

You can read more articles about it in our news section.

Today we announced a new partnership with ABCN and are really excited about the value it will add to our platform. The press release appears below but I also want to explain what it all really means for our users.

Choice: ABCN has a global network of members. Their members offer flexible office space solutions for entrepreneurs, small teams, and small businesses. They have such a large member base, chances are there’s a location in your market.

Flexibility: They also offer part time offices where you can rent space based on limited use (this is often referred to as a virtual office). This is great for the business that may have a distributed team that only needs to meet a few times per month, etc.

Service: When you contact ABCN through Rofo they can present you with a variety of solutions from their members. A much better experience than contacting each office one by one.

Here’s the full release:

ABCN and ROFO Partnership Will Boost Services to Mobile Clients

The Global Business Center Network and Leading Real Estate Technology Company
Establish New Relationship, Maximizing Value to Customers

September 2011 (Irvine, CA): Alliance Business Centers Network and Rofo are joining forces in hopes that their combined resources and strengths will improve how each company services its target customers. The announced partnership between the two companies will bring a range of office space, virtual office and technology solutions to small business entrepreneurs and mobile professionals worldwide.

“We are delighted at this ability to work so closely with the team at Rofo to bring significant benefits to Alliance Network members and to our clients,” remarked Frank Cottle, Chairman of ABCN and Alliance Virtual Offices. “We are also actively planning a number of other projects with Rofo and look forward to these future opportunities to better service the market.”

Through the new relationship with Rofo, Alliance will continue its expansion into new markets and improve its ability to serve its current membership. The partnership will position Alliance members to gain additional exposure for their business centers and related service offerings on Rofo’s award-winning platform which includes, Real Estate Pro, the company’s one-of-kind application for Linkedin. For the thousands of businesses and entrepreneurs using Rofo to solve their office space location needs, the partnership with Alliance means more choices, access to a dynamic global network and flexible virtual and serviced office space solutions.

“We’re honored to be working with Alliance in creating unique value-added solutions for our customer base and visitors,” stated Alan Bernier, CEO of Rofo. “Finding the right location for one’s business is a critical and often long-lasting decision. During a challenging business climate when reliable solutions are needed most, Alliance’s global network of office space solutions will provide for greater flexibility and choice for Rofo customers. We are very optimistic about our current projects together and look forward to finding new ways we can create value in the future.”

About Alliance Business Centers Network
Alliance Business Centers Network is a global leading provider of executive suites, fully serviced offices and meeting rooms. Also, through Alliance Virtual Offices, it offers a range of virtual office services to small businesses, entrepreneurs and mobile professionals. The worldwide business center network is represented with more than 600 locations in over 40 countries.

About Rofo
Founded in 2007 and based in San Francisco, CA, Rofo is a leading real estate technology company. Its flagship product, Rofo, is a real estate and office space search engine, (www.rofo.com). The privately-held company displays listings from local landlords, regional and national brokerage firms, such as Cushman & Wakefield, and institutional landlords such as Hines. With its application, Real Estate Pro, the company is the first and only real estate app on LinkedIn and it launched the first-ever U.S. commercial real estate augmented reality app for iPhone and Android devices. To learn more about Rofo, visit www.rofo.com.

Rofo was selected by the city of San Francisco as a partner to help promote the up and coming Central Market neighborhood. This neighborhood has received a lot of press attention recently with high profile tenants like Twitter, Burning Man, and most recently Zendesk signing significant leases as part of a broader initiative to improvement the district.

The city approached Rofo about collaborating to help promote additional business relocation to Central Market. We were naturally excited to participate as a civic partner. We had also recently launched a customizable listings widget to power any website. The city was able to cut and paste a line of code and easily add available properties to their new neighborhood website.

The city then approached local landlords and brokers with vacant office spaces, warehouse spaces and retail spaces and who were interested in further promotion and exposure of their buildings. The effort seems to be paying off with nearly a dozen inquiries within 30 days of the launch.

We look forward to rolling out and announcing some similar programs with other cities and economic development groups in the weeks ahead.

The countdown to 200,000 listings added to Rofo is officially on. Not really sure what we’ll do when we hit the milestone and we welcome any ideas. As for now, the plan is to pull a Jeter: hug it out for a moment and then get back to work.

We’re particularly proud of this mark because these listings are home grown and naturally fed. We have great partners, customers and users who have decided that Rofo is where they want their listings. Building the number one platform for businesses on the move is our way of saying thanks (as well as the tens of thousands of qualified tenant tours).

Listing 195,260 was added by our new friends Mack Cali – a 167,000 square foot headquarters building in Greenbelt, MD. Welcome to Rofo and we’ll do our best to promote it!

We’re coming up on a year since Rofo launched Real Estate Pro for the LinkedIn platform. We’ve seen tremendous use and adoption of an app that, at the time of launch, was completely new and different. Many sources told us, and I quote, “brokers and agents aren’t engaged with their listings online and they’re not on LinkedIn.”

Fortunately, we’re seeing something quite different – brokers engaged with their data and real estate professionals recognizing the importance of LinkedIn in the development of their business. I’m connected to a few brokers on LinkedIn and, throughout the week, I’ll see listing updates and deal announcements generated through the app. Its an easy way to generate updates and to stay top of mind with your trusted connections.

We’ve made some significant changes and improvements to Real Estate Pro – our real estate app for LinkedIn. With 8 months of great product feedback, thousands of new users each month, and a very engaged professional audience we’re excited to announce and highlight some key new features/improvements.

Making it even easier to add real estate listings

Everything is now self-contained within the app. No longer do you need to leave LinkedIn to add, edit or delete your listings. Simply click on ‘Add Listing’ and input the basic information about the listing you are marketing. Hit ‘next’, upload a photo, and then click ‘feature on profile page’. Now your listing will appear on your profile page and, more importantly, your professional network will see your update and stay informed of your professional activity. In a profession that relies so heavily on networking and referrals the benefits are immediate and tangible.

Add an image

Feature on profile page

The process is similar for building your resume of completed deals/transactions

Select ‘Add a deal’ and input the highlights of your completed work and your expertise.

Data feeds

We now also offer various xml and excel feed formats for brokerage firms who want to simplify the data input for their professionals. Our feeds support any listing type. We also now support a ‘transaction feed’ for brokerage firms to promote and announce completed sale and lease transactions.

International listings – we’re almost there!

We’ve seen a tremendous amount of international demand given LinkedIn’s worldwide members – now in excess of 100 million with incredible international growth. We’re working hard on an updated version of the app to support real estate professionals outside of the US. We hope to announce international support in the second quarter along with some early international partners so stay tuned…

Many thanks again to our early partners like Cushman & Wakefield, CBC Worldwide, Regus and Hines and the thousands of real estate professionals who have had an important voice in improving our app.

We’d love to get your feedback too. The app is FREE to use, takes 2 seconds to install, and is found here on LinkedIn.