Did your tour do that? - Photo Credit: superstock.com
Virtual tours are an extremely valuable tool when marketing a home or community. Most buyers are online looking at homes because they want to learn about a home before visiting it – pictures, videos, home descriptions, maps, floor plans, community details, options, standard features – buyers want these details. Virtual tours can be the best way to teach buyers about a home, but a bad virtual tour may end up being an enormous waste of resources and send a buyer elsewhere.
Virtual tours should be exciting, informative, and more important than anything else, they need to pique a buyer’s interest in the home. Too many details are just that, too much; why would a buyer want to view a home they just inspected online? Virtual tours need to do nothing more than showcase the best parts of a home and convince a buyer that they want to know more. In my opinion, a good virtual tour will have a call to action, you’ve got a buyer’s attention, why not ask for their business?
not another virtual tour with boring music…
Alright, I guess music isn’t the worst idea in the world, but I think a voice telling the buyer about the home’s features, upgrades and specs will produce better results. I’d avoid music for a few other reasons too: one, most music used on virtual tours puts me to sleep, two, much of the free music is free for a reason, and three, I’ve ended a few tours early because I can’t stand some songs. I’ve only found one song that everyone likes. If music is a must, it might be a good idea to let the buyer choose the song – a few tours I’ve experienced had a few songs to choose from; this made the tour better.
stop talking so much…
Virtual tours with a narrator can be a great way to tell the buyer about the home’s features and important details. However, a narrator doesn’t need to explain everything about the home; an on-site agent is in the best position to do that, they’ll know more about the likes and dislikes of the home buyer. Your narrator may bring too much attention to a detail that the buyer doesn’t care for; if the buyer’s online, they may bounce, but if they’re at the home, they may be more accepting. Talk about the highlights and main features, nothing else.
quick and exciting…
I haven’t seen a virtual tour that I’d deem “exciting”, but I think a video with the same tone and feel as the Lennar video below would be. I think the video is both exciting and entertaining; it kept me interested and I could easily watch it a few times. Most importantly, a home with a quick and exciting virtual tour will stick out.
easy to customize…
Exciting videos aren’t in everyone’s budget, if you’re that someone, break your video up. Virtual tours that separate videos into small chunks make it easy for a buyer to view rooms independently and customize their experience; they can see what they want, when they want. The last thing you want is a video that slowly drags a buyer from entrance to exit; I can’t imagine spending 10 minutes watching a virtual tour that I can’t control, can you? Here’s a virtual tour of a Winchester Home in Maryland that does a good job of breaking the tour up into small chunks; it allows the user to control what they see and at what speed they see it.
Olson Homes does a great job with their community tours too, here’s a link to a virtual tour of Juliette Walk in Buellton, California.
it’s really just a commercial, right?
Your virtual tour is an advertisement for your home or community, it’s basically a commercial. Would you produce and distribute a commercial with boring music, too many details and no call to action? Virtual tours are an important marketing tool and offer an opportunity to impress a home buyer. Make the virtual tour more about showing a home’s best features and less about showing the entire home. There’s a lot of noise online, use your virtual tour to send a clear message about the home, and ask each viewer for their business while you have their attention, you may not have another opportunity.
See Also:
Virtual Tours of New Homes in Gilbert
Million Dollar Home Virtual Tours
Home Selling Tips
Special Thanks to Jennifer for her recommendation in the comments below!
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I think you have to be very careful with video. A good video can do wonders, but a video can ruin your efforts to market a property.
I agree that you need to be careful with virtual tours, but if done correctly they are a wonderful tool! I love the idea of using commentary instead of boring music, but I feel that is where most people would go wrong by putting too much information out there. Potential buyers still need to have a reason to go see it in person.
“Just enough” is far better than “too much”. Don’t go overboard and don’t duplicate the same information twice. Too many times I’ve seen virtual tours with still pictures of the exact same photos in the mls listing, thus making it redundant. The virtual tour should capture those details not included in the normal photos. And if you’re shooting a video, it needs to be HD. HD flip camcorders are available under 200 bucks, but try to find one with image stabilization. I would recommend hiring someone, or find a student at the local university willing to do it for a lot less (sometimes they do fantastic work with great equipment).
Virtual tours can be a double-edged sword. Their purpose is to tease prospective buyers by showing your listing’s best assets in the hope they make the decision to physically visit the property. However, not everyone on the web is viewing virtual tours with good intentions. There are criminals who have discovered the ease of casing a property using this technology. When producing virtual tours try to avoid filming electronics, jewelry, art work, antiques and other lucrative and easily removable items.
Bruce Dietz´s last blog ..Awesome 4 BR 3BA All Brick Rancher in Columbia County
Lennar has always been ahead of the herd in their online marketing efforts. A few new home builders are doing some video, but not a lot of them. A virtual tour is almost obselete now with the ease of video posting. The old 3d shorts are giving way to full HD videos instead.
Charles@Las Vegas Real Estate´s last blog ..Las Vegas Property Auctions – Deal or No Deal?
I like the comment about needing to peak a buyer’s interest. This is what it’s all about. Using drab graphics and music is detrimental to the tour and defeats the purpose of the virtual campaign. You have to peak enough interest to get buyers to respond with some action, which hopefully turns into a closing.
Chapel Hill Real Estate´s last blog ..Message to Buyers & Sellers
The word is “piqued” interest….not “peaked”. You might want to change that.
Main Entry: 1peak
Pronunciation: \?p?k\
Function: noun
Etymology: perhaps alteration of pike
Date: 1530
1 : a pointed or projecting part of a garment; especially : the visor of a cap or hat
2 : promontory
3 : a sharp or pointed end
4 a (1) : the top of a hill or mountain ending in a point (2) : a prominent mountain usually having a well-defined summit b : something resembling a mountain peak
5 a : the upper aftermost corner of a fore-and-aft sail b : the narrow part of a ship’s bow or stern or the part of the hold in it
6 a : the highest level or greatest degree b : a high point in a course of development especially as represented on a graph
7 : widow’s peak
synonyms see summit
Thanks Jennifer, we’ve changed the post; I appreciate your recommendation.