What the survey never asked: If I'd recommend the company, and what I'd say if I did (or how I would recommend against them). This national company, known for its transportation solutions, squandered a free opportunity to understand word of mouth.

Which leads us to what a good survey does to gather valuable customer feedback:

Its first question is: "Based on your recent experience with us, would you recommend us to your friends, family, colleagues, etc.?" Yes, no, or I don't know are the possible answers. (You could use the Net Promotoer methodology here, too.)

For example, based on the survey results, additional information can be sent to the customer (email, text or pdf/print) and internal followup campaigns can be launched at the agent/team, staff or manager level.

Finally, all of this information is stored in one place, your contacts (along with all of your other client activities).

Realogy Corporation, a global provider of real estate and relocation services, today reported results for the first quarter 2008. Specifically, first quarter 2008 net revenue totaled $1.05 billion; EBITDA was $4 million, modestly above the Company’s earlier guidance; and net loss was $132 million, due mainly to interest expense of $164 million.

“The first quarter of any year is historically our slowest from an earnings perspective almost entirely due to the seasonality of the residential real estate market,” said Richard A. Smith, Realogy’s president and CEO. “We still have most of our annual EBITDA opportunity in front of us and, of course, that’s where our focus lies.”

Smith continued, “Realogy’s first quarter 2008 operating results reflected the continued industry-wide slowdown in U.S. existing home sales but were partially offset by management’s focus on overhead, productivity and growth. In April, we saw some early indications that the improving year-over-year unit change trends being forecasted by the National Association of Realtors and Fannie Mae in the back half of 2008 may be starting to develop. While we expect to see some mixed results in the coming months, we are encouraged by these positive signs of activity in April.”

The dire headlines coming fast and furious in the financial and popular press suggest that the housing crisis is intensifying. Yet it is very likely that April 2008 will mark the bottom of the U.S. housing market. Yes, the housing market is bottoming right now.

How can this be? For starters, a bottom does not mean that prices are about to return to the heady days of 2005. That probably won't happen for another 15 years. It just means that the trend is no longer getting worse, which is the critical factor.

Most people forget that the current housing bust is nearly three years old. Home sales peaked in July 2005. New home sales are down a staggering 63% from peak levels of 1.4 million. Housing starts have fallen more than 50% and, adjusted for population growth, are back to the trough levels of 1982.

Furthermore, residential construction is close to 15-year lows at 3.8% of GDP; by the fourth quarter of this year, it will probably hit the lowest level ever. So what's going to stop the housing decline? Very simply, the same thing that caused the bust: affordability.

"You are exceptional. Worldly. Refined. You live life according to your definition. Uncompromising. . . . Finally, a building that captures your spirit and sophistication . . . "

If you read the above advertisement, for a condominium in Atlanta called CityPlace Buckhead, and thought that no reasonably educated person could be persuaded by such flattery to sign over a small fortune for a place to live, think again. Jorge Pérez, the chief executive of the Related Group and one of the country's foremost housing developers, has appeared on the Forbes 400 list of richest Americans for the past several years, thanks in part to just such blandishments.

Mr. Pérez's "Powerhouse Principles: The Billionaire Blueprint for Real Estate Success" reveals some of his other selling techniques. Mail invitations only to select buyers, for instance, so that they feel like part of an elite crowd. Tease them with information but refuse to let them buy a property until an appointed time. Make them wait outside a tent in the Florida sun for the opportunity to hear the sales pitch being offered inside.

You may not be able to beat the house in Sin City, but you just might be able to beat the housing market. At least that's how two real estate agents, Barbara and Marshall Zucker, are placing their bets.

As they watched the Las Vegas foreclosure rate skyrocket 169% from 2006 to 2007 - making Nevada the most afflicted state in the nation - they also noticed that 40% of all home sales were foreclosed properties. So in February the couple bought a 24-seat Ford (F, Fortune 500) bus for $40,000, named it the Vegas Foreclosure Express, and began offering locals and out-of-staters thrice-weekly tours of repossessed homes.

"As with any business, you have to change and adapt based on the market to succeed and survive," says Barbara, 48.

Related: The gospel according to Matthew:

The Coronado Club, in downtown Houston, is an unlikely place to contemplate the end of life as we know it. Plush and hushed, with solemn black waiters in crisp black jackets, the private enclave practically exudes wealth and stability. Captains of local industry enter and exit purposefully, commanding their usual tables, wearing the best suits. Everybody knows everybody else. The light is flattering. The wine room is nicely stocked.

But here is Matthew R. Simmons, the head of one of the largest investment banking firms in the world, stabbing at his salad greens and heatedly discussing the chaos to come when, as he has long predicted, global oil production peaks and for the rest of our time on earth we struggle and suffer and barely endure under a diminishing supply of fuel until it disappears entirely. This idea is known as “peak oil,” and Simmons is its most fervent, and fearsome, apostle. As he puts it, “I don’t see why people are so worried about global warming destroying the planet—peak oil will take care of that.”

The Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice have submitted a joint letter to the Supreme Court of South Carolina regarding proposed guidelines related to the practice of law involving real estate transactions. The proposed guidelines would specify several tasks that must be performed by an attorney, including performing all title work, preparing deeds, overseeing the drafting of documents pertinent to the loan closing, supervising the closing, and disbursing all funds related to the transaction, as well as performing title work and preparing deeds for a home equity line of credit.

Private-equity firm Apollo Management LP pushed to join the ranks of publicly traded investing shops Tuesday, filing for an initial public offering of stock valued at about $418 million. (Read the filing.)

The move should unlock billions of personal wealth for Apollo's three main owners -- Leon Black, Josh Harris, and Marc Rowan -- who founded the firm 18 years ago out of the wreckage of the Drexel Burham Lambert brokerage house.

The latest move nonetheless comes at an awkward time for their breed of money-management firms. Private-equity shops like Apollo were able to feast on easily available debt to fund a spate of huge corporate buyouts over the past three years. But many of those deals are already in trouble, such as Apollo's own $1.3 billion purchase of retailer Linens 'n Things and an ill-fated $6.65 billion purchase of real-estate firm Realogy Corp.

s what’s shaking the economic landscape just a simple banking crisis? Or is there – as so many feel, and as the tremors indicate – something more hidden just beneath the surface?

Let’s begin with a quick explanation from the ever-incisive Tyler Cowen. He notes:

"What is distinctive today is the drying up of market liquidity — the inability to buy and sell financial assets — caused by a lack of good information about asset values...Market prices have been drained of their informational value."

Bolding's mine - that's an excellent beginning.

But Tyler doesn’t talk about root causes: why have prices been drained of meaning, especially to an extent never seen before?

“I think finding out that it was McDonald’s was kind of a big shock for everyone,” said Geoff May, a player in Ontario who founded a Web site (olympics.wikibruce.com) on the game. “Obviously it’s McDonald’s, and not everyone likes them,” he said. “Personally, I don’t mind as long as we don’t get products forced down our throat. If we’re getting McDonald’s meals sold by characters, it’s going to be hard to suspend our disbelief.”

That’s part of the reason McDonald’s has remained behind the curtain thus far. A successful alternate-reality game relies on the players’ continuing interest.

“If an A.R.G. is too clearly corporate or commercial, the gamers will not want to engage,” said Tracy Tuten, an associate professor at Virginia Commonwealth University, who studies new-media marketing tools. “It’s very important that the game be written in a way where the branding is not obvious.”

McDonald’s has been careful to reflect that, Ms. Dillon said. “Above all, we want to be credible, authentic and respectful to this new audience,” she said.

With that in mind, development of the game was given to AKQA, a San Francisco marketing agency, and Jane McGonigal, a game developer.

When home sales fall, real estate commissions rise - or at least that's the popular theory.

But the conventional wisdom hasn't proven true during this downturn, according to little-noticed numbers released this month by Realogy Corp.

Realogy - the largest broker in Palm Beach County, in Florida and in the nation - said its average commission remained just under 5 percent in 2007, essentially unchanged from 2006.

Parsippany, N.J.-based Realogy owns Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate and Corcoran Group, and it runs the Coldwell Banker, Century 21, ERA and Sotheby's International Realty franchise systems.

Realogy says the average "commission side" - that's half of the commission - was 2.49 percent for Realogy franchisees (up from last year's 2.47 percent) and 2.47 percent for Realogy's corporate-owned offices (down from last year's 2.48 percent). That's in spite of higher marketing costs for listing agents and the disappearance of some of the discount brokers who were applying pressure to commissions.

Realogy doesn't comment about commissions, and during a conference call last week, CEO Richard Smith mentioned the numbers but gave no details.

Realogy's report left Realtors scratching their heads. South Florida brokers insist that commissions have soared to 6 percent or more in the past two years. After all, they say, when sellers grow desperate for a deal, they're willing to pony up.

Fidelity National Information Services Inc., which is seeking federal approval to spin off a unit that processes data for major mortgage providers, warned that its business could be harmed by heightened government inquiry into the U.S. lending crisis and new regulations that may result.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Fidelity National said that lawsuits or tighter regulations that may ensue from state and federal probes of mortgage-lending practices in response to the housing-market collapse "could have adverse consequences that could affect our business."