Old Rule: Curb Appeal >> New Rule: Web Appeal August 5, 2010
Posted by caimagemaker in photography, real estate video, virtual tours.Tags: california image maker, photography, real estate video, video sharing, virtual tours
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Virtual Staging
Your home’s first impression may not be one that is face to face with a prospective buyer. The “Curb appeal” of yesterday is now the “Web appeal” of today. In today’s world, 90% percent of home buyers start their search online, as reported by the National Association of Realtors. The internet is the number one source consumers first learned about the home they purchase, 36% of home buyers first say their new home online. And the California Association of Realtors reports that the number one requested feature of online listings is media. These are impressive figures, and one that means your home needs to make a strong virtual impression.
Part of this impression is made through online photos and extends into virtual home tours and video. Showing your property is about creating a story line. A home buyer is looking for certain amenities and specifications during their buying process, but in addition, they are looking for a home that will give them the lifestyle they seek. To answer this need, you must make sure your property has an ambiance that is appealing. This requires a visual marketing strategy, and a properly staged home can tell this story. Today’s technology allows for even more dynamic visual presentation of vacant properties with virtual staging.
To create a virtual experience and ambiance, one must develop a plan. What is the demographic of your buyers? Is this a home that will interest empty-nesters, large families, or vacationers?
Once you have distinguished this, then consider what story each room should display. Today consumers expect rich media from online listings and the most effective way to engage consumers and tell the story is an online commercial, or eMercial Industry-wide media professionals agree that a well-scripted narration provides the emotional “sell”, enhancing the details provided by the visual images.
Photo blogging tips to grow your business August 4, 2010
Posted by caimagemaker in blogging, photography, real estate video, virtual tours.Tags: blogging, photography, real estate video, Video
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Los Verdes Golf Course
This article is your reminder. It’s August and hopefully you’re out and about in your market and neighborhood showing property or meeting with people. As long as you’re out there, bring a camera.
Sometime before next selling season — maybe during the time between Thanksgiving and New Year’s, or maybe in that panicky search engine optimization/social media/viral marketing epiphany you’ll have in March or April of next year — you’re going to wish you had a nice photograph of something in your town. Maybe record a little video, too, if you’re ambitious. But definitely start taking some snapshots of the areas where you work. Obviously, I’m not talking about specific houses — hopefully they’ll be off the market and sold. I’m talking about the things that make your neighborhoods and cities unique and cool. Things you might like to write about on your blog. Maybe not today, of course, but sometime in the next year.
Media the you create now will have a better chance of helping you put the best face on your neighborhoods and cities. Having these resources on-hand now can make your winter season content-creation work go much easier. It also will allow you to get a couple months’ jump for any seasonally focused posts you might do. For example, you can release your classic fireworks blog post a few months early, along with photos of the neighborhoods that have good views.
Here are a few tips to help get you started grabbing images that you can use throughout the next few months to help prepare you for next year’s selling season: Carry a camera with you all the time. If it’s your iPhone, that’s fine — you just need stuff for your blog. It’s more important that you have a camera than that you have the best camera. Start taking advantage of “golden hour,” the first hour and last hour of sunlight. If you’re an early riser, take advantage of that and shoot pictures just after dawn. This early light will give you some great stuff to work with. The last hour of sunlight may conflict with your dinner plans, so go out to eat someplace where you can take photos of the neighborhood.
Make a list of blog posts you might like to write over the winter for next season, and then go out and take supporting photographs. When you download the pictures to your computer, change the file names from something like DSC101009.jpg to something descriptive like Best-Coffee-Shop-in-Newport Beach.jpg. Make sure to include the city in the name of the file, a property tagged photos and video are very search engine friendly. Shoot a wide variety of subjects. The only thing keeping them all together would be that they are in the markets you work in. If you really can’t think of anything to shoot, go to your favorite place in your neighborhood. Then take a picture of the most interesting thing you see, walk 10 steps, take another picture and so on.
Don’t have time to take pictures now? Find a high school kid you trust, hand the kid your camera. Offer him or her some money to go take pictures of cool stuff in the neighborhood. You’ll end up with some useless stuff, but you’ll likely get something good out of it, too.
Social Media Tips to Market Homes June 9, 2010
Posted by caimagemaker in Facebook, Linked In, Twitter, virtual tours.1 comment so far
Social media’s not just for kids anymore. As the medium evolves, savvy business people and consumers are relying on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others for commercial and financial applications that go far beyond just friending your neighbor. Astute Realtors, along with home seller and buyers, are increasingly using social media to market properties in a sometimes frustratingly slow market. The advantage offered by social media is outreach to a wide-reaching audience, targeted to your specific topic.
Importantly, social media, like any effective sales program, does require a strategy. Launch into indiscriminate outreach and you’ll rapidly alienate your audience. In this brave new world, it’s important to first study the lay of the land before choosing your path.
1. Select your tools
To lay a foundation for a social media campaign, identify which social media channels will be most effective for you. To market a home, you could consider:
- Launching a website.
- Producing home-tour videos, uploaded to your site and to YouTube.
- Updating your Facebook page to let friends know the house is for sale.
2. Make the home the star
Creating a Facebook “Fan Page” to market an individual house or all your company’s listings is a strong way to showcase real estate. Post photos, video and information on Facebook, knowing that while many fans and friends are not currently in the market for a home, they’ll often forward the listing to friends who are. A listing that is passed from one Facebook page to another generates a great deal of exposure.
3. List the home on Facebook Marketplace
If your Facebook friends are using marketplace, it’s worth listing the property on Marketplace. Marketplace serves is Facebook’s classified ads which prompts your contacts that a listing has been posted.
4. Cast a lure
Is there something unique and exciting about the home? Use that information as a lure to create buzz. For example, a recent Twitter campaign drummed up interest by focusing on the fact that the residence was near many celebrity haunts. A few sample Tweets:
“Madonna just bought a town house two blocks away.”
“Justin Timberlake’s Southern restaurant is right around the corner.”
“Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha filmed ‘Sex and The City 2′ right around the corner.”
Each tweet included a link to the Realtor’s listing so people could learn more right away.
5. What makes it special?
Appeal to whatever is happening in other areas. Do you live in sunny Malibu? In early January when temperatures around the country are brutally cold, post Facebook and LinkedIn reminders that it is 70 and sunny in Malibu and provided a link to the listing. Is the home on a beautiful lot with grass and trees? Post information in large urban areas. Remember that old saw that “the grass is always greener on the other side” and attract attention by showing people what they could have.
6. Remember “strategy, strategy, strategy”
Facebook, Twitter and others can be tremendously valuable tools for selling a home. However, posting too often or repetitively can quickly turn into spam. Don’t post unless there’s something truly relevant to write about, like specific features, a large property, or other detail. Above all, tweeting and re-tweeting the same posts is almost guaranteed to thwart your own effort.
Repeated posts incite people to remove you from their distribution lists, which is counterproductive to establishing relationships via social media.
Ultimately, social media, used shrewdly, is a boon in the arsenal of real estate selling and marketing techniques. Put them to work effectively and enjoy the fruits of your labors.
Check us out online @ http://www.caimagemaker.com
Make money with Single Property Websites April 26, 2010
Posted by caimagemaker in real estate video, virtual tours.add a comment
What is a Single Property Website?
Although the definition exists in its name, a single property real estate website can often be confused with a traditional real estate website that you or your end users may be more accustomed to. That said, we thought it would be helpful to clearly define the most common characteristics of a single property website. Here are some of the top ones that you need to make sure that your single property currently has or will have (should you consider getting one after reading this post):
- Features a single home / property / parcel of land
- Sits on a unique domain name (usually the property address)
- Photo gallery of property images
- Virtual tour of the property being featured
- Map / directions
- Listing agent / broker information
- Lead generation form(s)
Common Question: Can a single property website be used as real estate stealth site?
Our answer is NO. The main reason for this is because a single property website usually represents a seller’s property and needs to have all of the necessary information available for prospective buyers. Adding unnecessary steps or questions to the process can often cause visitors to get confused and/or distracted. Save your stealth sites for your other lead generation efforts.
How to Use Single Property Websites Effectively
Before you go throwing up a website for every property in your inventory it is important that you understand how to effectively use a single property website. The last thing you want is an unmanageable list of web pages that represent every property in your inventory and that contain little to no search visibility or conversion value. These single property websites need to help you impress your seller and sell the home you’re featuring so make sure you use them optimally. Make sure you can check off the items below for your single property site.
Must-Have Features
- Aesthetically pleasing, conversion oriented design
- High quality property photos – images with zoom in / zoom out features are recommended
- High quality virtual tour(s) – video virtual tours are recommended
- Online map with location of property – Bing or Google Maps are recommended
- Well written copy and information about the property
- Open house alerts / calendar
- Unique .com domain – the property address or short description is recommended
Online Marketing Tips
- Syndicate your property to relevant real estate portals and websites (i.e. Trulia, Zillow, Realtor.com, etc)
- Post your virtual tours on video networks (i.e. YouTube, Vimeo, WellcomeMat, etc)
- Tweet about your property’s status updates and open houses
- Post images, videos and interesting facts about your property on social networks and blogs (i.e. Facebook, Blogger, WordPress, Twitter, etc)
- Optimize your single property site for natural / organic rankings with fundamental SEO
- Promote your property with sponsored ads (i.e. Google AdWords, Facebook Ads, etc)
