Searching High and Low

RECA relies on the website as the main tool in communicating information in order to meet our mandate to protect consumers and to provide services that enhance and improve the real estate industry and the business of industry professionals.*

In order to keep consumers, industry professionals, and other stakeholders informed, RECA publishes comprehensive information on our website concerning the real estate industry in Alberta.

Understanding that our different audiences vary in their understanding of the real estate industry, we publish information targeting each audience with the information and language that helps build their understanding.

While this means that there is a substantial amount of information available, it also means that it can sometimes be difficult to find what you’re looking for.

In 2018, RECA redesigned reca.ca to be mobile-friendly, easier to navigate and have an improved search function. The new website was a definite improvement, but the search function was still not at the level that was truly useful to our users.

In the summer of 2019, our communications team sent out a survey to ask you about the communications you receive from us. While you rated reca.ca as our best communications tool, you also let us know that it could be easier to search and navigate, and that an archive of RECA News would be helpful.

Many of you commented specifically on the still ineffective search engine:

• better search engine, wider parameters
• the site contains A LOT of information. It’s not always easy to guess where what I’m looking for might be classified
• better search function, I often cannot locate what I am looking for
• more searchability features, particularly for larger documentation like the act, and forms etc
• the search feature needs to be more specific, it often comes up with information not at all related to what one is looking for, very cumbersome
• better search capabilities such as partial phrases, not exact wording
• make it easier to find information
• search function sucks so bad I haven’t tried using it for a long time

And some of you suggested that it should also be easier to find additional communications from the website:

• Have [RECA News] archives available for viewing and searching
• What happened to the RECA blog?
• I’d put all the other communication sources on it

We appreciate your honest feedback and are committed to improving our communications tools. Based on your input, we have:

• made updates to reca.ca search engineWe refined the search parameters to ensure that the results are more accurate. And, in addition to viewing the page title, you can also read a summary of the page to get a better sense of which page is best suited for your needs.

  You can also easily see what information is in a website post versus what information is in a PDF available for download.

• compiled information from various platforms under reca.caYou can now find all information your query—whether webpage, RECA News, Regulator Articles, etc.—with one simple search.

  We combined RECAblog with RECA News. Don’t worry though, if you’ve got the old recablog.ca link bookmarked, it’ll still work! It just now takes you to the updated RECA News landing page.

And, while we were at it, we updated the look and usability of the online versions of The Regulator, RECA News, as well as Ask Charles consumer articles.

The improved reca.ca search function has already received positive feedback! If you have ideas on how we can further improve reca.ca, we’d love to hear from you! Simply email us at communications@reca.ca.

*As per the Real Estate Act, “business of an industry member” means the trades of a real estate broker, the activities of a real estate appraiser referred to in clause (u.1) or the dealings of a mortgage broker undertaken by an industry member