Completed Drupal site or project URL: https://crs.comProject Overview

The Council of Residential Specialists is a professional network of nearly 33,000 residential real estate professionals from across the United States and around the globe. CRS provides agents with the tools, resources and strategies they need to help them guide buyers and sellers through the residential sales process.

Essential components of this project include the ability to handle a wide variety of members, online learning, e-commerce and geospatial search. Although most of this functionality was defined during the planning phase, some components were added later. The flexibility of the Drupal platform was therefore intrinsic to the success of the project.

The website's target audiences ranges from current CRS Designees and potential CRS members to consumers looking for a CRS certified realtor.

User Features

Membership is a primary function of the site. A user can progress through several levels of membership after paying a fee and taking courses.

On the site, a user can:

• Take part in portal and social network features that foster member interaction
• Add other members to their network
• Register for courses
• Participate in forums
• Read blogs about residential real estate topics
• Search for CRS Chapters, Committees and Course Instructors
• Update his/her public user profile
• Make easy membership fee payments
• Review course history and grades
• Download course material and other CRS resources

Much of the site’s content is also shared with the general public where any visitor can read the blogs and comments from members. Visitors can also use the “Find a CRS” feature, complete with interactive map, in order to search for a Certified Residential Specialist in any area of interest around the world. Visitors are welcome to join CRS as a non-paying student and start the path to full membership. The site brings CRS into a whole new dimension of user interaction, engagement, and membership satisfaction.

Key modules/theme/distribution used: Drupal CommerceSearch APISearch API Solr SearchACLGeolocation FieldChaos tool suite (ctools)Organizations involved: CommonPlaces, Inc.Team members: lemuelsantosbcmaloneyMMachniksuthyEricLondon