You have seen the typical real estate video tours. You know what I am talking about: a bunch of photos strung together with some stock music playing in the background. And the photos are not even high quality in a lot of them. I hope I have not offended anyone yet.
But the fact is that luxury real estate videos in 2014 should be more advanced than that. Even if you do not have a huge budget, it is 2014! There are a million ways (okay maybe thousands) to put together a high-quality video today in this age of technology.
Scott Haws and Matt Rollins of NARR8 Media hit on these points in their presentation this year at The Key, the luxury real estate forum that we put on every year. They actually hit on a lot more points that relate to luxury real estate video tours, and told the audience tons of ways to make a quality video that will help you sell a home. These are my favorite tips from their presentation.
1. Tell a Story! — As Scott says, “every house has a story, and it is your job to sell that story to buyers.” For example, a 1700s era Princeton Estate has so many stories to tell…if those walls could talk. Of the many stories that this home could tell, we found that it was owned by a former president of Princeton who was friends with Ben Franklin and George Washington, and that Washington and his wife dined in the home. Now that is a story! We added those tidbits to the video tour of the property.
2. Plan Your Real Estate Video Tour — Any great story has a peak. It is kind of the payoff for watching any video. Find the peak in your real estate video first and work that into the story. Find The One Thing. Is it the views? Is it the gardens or the pool? Find that one thing and focus on it.
3. Video Apps — As we said, not everyone has a huge budget, but you can still do quality video on a small budget, or no budget at all. Rather than paying someone to string together photos in that old style real estate video slide show, use your smartphone and do it yourself. Try Vizzywig, Magisto, or Video Shop for free or low cost apps to use in editing smart phone videos.
4. Sound Focus — Visual makes sense. It is a video after all. But you can also affect people through sound. Feature the rushing water of those great fountains or the birds chirping at a horse farm property. Sounds can often have a longer lasting effect than just visual. “Music is 50% of the battle,” according to Matt.
5. YouTube — The video hosting platform is the 4th largest search engine in the world, trailing only Google, Yahoo, and Bing. It gets 1 billion unique visitors per month and 6 billion hours of video is viewed per month. One in six people in the world are on the social network every month. The numbers are staggering. It makes sense to have real estate videos on YouTube. (Shameless plug: check out Concierge Auctions on YouTube).
6. Internet Video is Trending Up — YouTube views increased by 50% from 2012 to 2013. By 2017, 69% of all global consumer internet traffic will be videos. Online videos are the fastest growing ad format. Again, with the increase and up trend of online videos, it makes sense to have your real estate videos out there.
Our advice – if you are going to do luxury real estate video tours then do them well. Follow these seven tips (or at least some of them) and other agents, potential buyers, sellers…they will all be impressed with the effort and result. It may not happen overnight (though it could). But high quality videos set you apart as a top agent, and will lead to increased business. And one thing to remember – VIDEO IS FUN!
For the full presentation of NARR8 Media on luxury real estate videos and the other speakers at The Key see our YouTube page. For more on the auction process click below.