URBALO

A week ago, Vflyer has launched a service called WatermarkPlus. The service lets you add you own graphics to any image you upload to the site. You can add graphic and text elements to your pictures using an easy 3-step process. The nice part is that no registration is required, just upload the picture, choose the style of watermark you want, save the photo and impress your client with the new marketing skills you have just acquired.

The idea behind this application? Vflyer says:

“Watermark Plus is an image enhancing service offered as part of vFlyer that allows users to merchandize and enhance photos and images by adding text, graphics, logos and watermarks to them - quickly and easily. The service allows online sellers to:

• Protect photos by adding visible watermarks and logos
• Enhance photos to attract interest from buyers by adding sales, product and pricing information
• Brand photos and include contact information by adding company logos or personal photographs”

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FIVE-YEAR GROWTH: 1,571.8% REVENUE: $40.4 MILLION NO. OF EMPLOYEES : 450

Last year, Chicago residential real estate brokerage @properties Inc. dropped $65,000 to rent Wrigley Field for a few hours so its brokers could swing bats and run bases in the firm’s annual softball tournament. The event, like the regular bowling leagues and movie nights @properties hosts, was designed to encourage collaboration and collegiality among brokers in the otherwise cutthroat field of real estate.

“We try to do things that make people feel a part of a team,” says Thaddeus Wong, 37, who co-founded the company and manages it with Michael Golden, 38. That camaraderie, they say, has helped fuel the exponential growth of the company, which they started in 2000 after leaving Property Consultants Realty.

“Once agents get to know each other, they socialize more and they talk about what they are doing,” Mr. Golden says. Soon, they are doing business together. “We work hard to foster that,” he adds. Last year, 40% of the firm’s real estate listings were sold to buyers represented by @property agents.
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