As an estate agent you probably know how competitive the industry is right now. More vendors are going multi agency and attracting the right buyers requires more effort than it once did.
Standing out is no longer a bonus, it’s a necessity!
Professional estate agency photography and floor plans are expectations of vendors and buyers alike. Both these things are vital to impressing vendors and winning instructions as well as attracting the right buyers.
In the battle to win more instructions, agents who can offer vendors property marketing packages that include:
will stand out and will win instructions over inferior agents who have lesser property marketing options.
How Can Matterport Boost Property Marketing?
Simple. Listings with 360 tours can attract up to 49% more leads and sell 5x faster. Going this extra mile will impress vendors and increase the chances of you winning instructions.
Before we delve into the world of Matterport, make sure your property photography is of the right quality for achieving your business objectives with these professional tips and tactics.
What Is A Matterport 360 Virtual Tour?
A Matterport tour is a smart viewing of a property. The different types of virtual tour enable potential buyers to get an even greater feel for a property and better visualise the space and themselves in it.
There are 3 types of Matterport offering:
- The Dollhouse View: This enables people to view the whole property at once from a 3d perspective.
- The Inside View: This is an interactive walkthrough that enables people to take a 360 tour & virtually “walk around” the property similarly to a real life viewing.
- The Floorplan View: This offer a birds eye view of the property.
We’re going to get into exactly how the Matterport process works in a moment, but as you can see it provides an opportunity to get a view of a property that you would only otherwise get from physically visiting it.
| #ProTip: Before carrying out your 3d virtual tour, make sure the property is properly prepared with this free Property Prep List. |
What Are The Benefits?
As we mentioned earlier, the offering of these tours has been shown to increase leads and speed up the selling process. This makes them very appealing to vendors.
By using Matterport tours you are:
- Creating an “Always Open” house that potential buyers can “view” at any time, from anywhere
- Giving buyers the ability to better decide if they actually want to view the property which saves you and the vendor the time wasted on pointless viewings.
- Standing out from the competition by offering an advanced form of property marketing that could increase views of your online listings by 20%.
Matterport is particularly beneficial with overseas properties or for overcoming challenges presented where potential buyers are not able to physically view because of proximity or restricted mobility.
How Does Matterport Work?
In order to use Matterport tours you do need specific equipment:
- A Matterport 360 Camera
- A tripod of eye level height
- An IOS device
- A Matterport subscription
Once you have these, you can either work with a Matterport Specialist or go for a DIY option. As it can take between 40-60 minutes just to take the camera scans of an average sized property, it’s generally easier for busy estate agents to work with a property photography service who offers Matterport tours.
Taking Matterport Scans:
In order to get the end product of the 360 tour or other view types offered by Matterport, you need scans of each portion of the property. These are taken using the Matterport 3d camera.
The basic steps are as follows:
- The Matterport Pro2 camera is set up on the tripod at eye level.
- The camera rotates to take a 360 scan of the space.
- Floors & Windows have to be marked manually in order to show accurately on your finished views.
- The scans are then uploaded to the Matterport Cloud for processing.
- The scans are returned in the formats shown earlier – usually within a few hours.
How Much Does Matterport Cost?
The price of having a professional carry out your scans and have them processed typically starts from £175. With this option, you wouldn’t need your own Matterport subscription as the professional service would complete this part of the process.
If however you went for a DIY option, the costs of using Matterport would look similar to this:
| Matterport Camera (Pro2) | £2830 |
| Monthly Matterport Subscription | £55-540+ per month |
| Suitable Tripod | £120-350 |
With all the property portals now allowing you to upload virtual tours into your listings, it’s easier to make them available to potential buyers. Whilst the tours shouldn’t be used instead of high quality photography, they truly are a potentially great addition to your marketing and one that will have positive effects on both sides of your business.
If you want to learn more about Matterport and how it can help you, talk to one of your pros now.
