There was a recent news piece on the NY1 News Real Estate Report about the power of using video in real estate advertising. You can read the article and view the news piece here. The popularity of online video is rising and its effectiveness as a marketing tool is growing, regardless of your industry. Since the NY1 news piece was focused on real estate, and IMI Software does provide a real estate web design service we wanted to talk about this a little as it relates to our real estate web design service.
Online video is a very effective social media tool. It's easily distributed across many social networking sites using common social sharing tools such as RSS, featured on your own website and included with a property details page. It's a great promotional tool, not just for the particular property, but for you as a real estate agent. A colleague or friend could easily film you as you walk through a property discussing all the great features and attributes. Not only is the property showcased but so are you and your personality. It's a much more effective way to make a connection with the viewer than simply through a photo and bio on your agent page. Video cameras are so commonplace these days you could even use a mobile device with video capabilities to capture the video. Of course, as with most things, the more professional and polished the video piece, the more polished and professional you will come across as well.
IMI Software real estate websites come equipped with a private listings database. When entering a property we include a couple of fields related to video. You simply select you video source (YouTube, Facebook, Google Video) and then the video id. That's it. The video will be embedded onto the property detail page. We also provide a video gallery component to easily add and organize videos and a blogging platform that also allows you to added various media files. These are all great tools to help you promote your property listings and yourself.
Corey Bezerman, an IMI Software real estate website client in Bridgehampton, NY, has utilized this feature on one of his listings. Though not showcasing himself in this particular video, he is showcasing on of his properties. You can view the property detail page here.