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One of the worst nightmares for a Realtor is losing a sale. And that may happen, say, if a potential buyer drives past a home, stops to take a tour only to find it locked and decides, "There's no way it looks that great inside." Then that customer drives away, deciding not to do more research through the Realtor's contact information on the lawn sign.
Video can bridge that gap, says David Harbour, Realtor and founder of NOVA Green Team, a group of Northern Virginia-based eco-friendly real estate agents. In his latest plan to use video to sell homes, Harbour is creating individualized online video tours that pull up through the mobile Web when potential buyers snap a picture of a 2D barcode displayed at a property.
Target Marketing: Why did you start using video to market yourself?
David Harbour: I analyzed the way Realtors do business, and we kill a lot of trees [with] fliers, postcards and newspapers and magazines. And it was hard to track, as well. … I kind of changed direction of the focus of my real estate business and I also said, 'I'm also going to change the direction of my marketing.' And so [online video] had a more environmentally friendly approach. …
… Online technology is more personable; it's a more complete message. And I can use it over and over and over again. So the ROI for me on my marketing budget was a lot better. Plus it kind of separated me from the pack … and my clients were passing on my videos. … So it gave me a brand awareness.
TM: How do you decide what content to put in the videos, how often to record them, what third party sites to place them on and how to distribute them to prospects and customers?
DH: Well, I try and do two things when I'm putting out a video. One is, just to give potential prospects a little information about me, my background and my job experience. … Some of it's on my website, some of it's on a YouTube channel, NOVA Green TV. The other one is an idea that I thought about, which would be a collaboration with other real estate-related companies … It's a way of marketing myself without marketing myself. And I get to highlight other companies, which will in turn … promote this video because it's kind of banging their drum. And, guess what? I'm on the other side of that video. …
… A lot of these videos are crossovers. So if I did a piece on myself, even if it's for other vendors that I'm working with in a B-to-B situation, or if it's for clients or prospects, they're universal. The same holds true if I'm interviewing real estate-related companies, because consumers—as well as other businesses—would like to know about them. So they're kind of interchangeable.
As far as the distribution, I do it in a number of different ways; obviously, the plain old popping it up on Facebook, [LinkedIn], that stuff. But I've hooked up with one of the video distribution companies. And I'm able to take that video—and, first, I'll do a targeted mailing, e-mail newsletter "announcing a new episode" or "another video's been posted" directly to all my direct prospects and clients. Then I'll do a larger blast, which I can send out to 80-plus social media websites in a 24-hour period.
… That mass blast does two things: One, obviously, it gets me everywhere. But, also, from an SEO point of view, Google looks at it and I put in all kinds of key search terms that Google then recognizes and says, 'Oh, OK. This has importance.' …
TM: Are your videos educational?
DH: Well, some are. … What I'm trying to do is everything from financing to traditional real estate stuff to actual green features, where I'm interviewing a eco-friendly moving company or doing an environmentally friendly settlement company. So I'm doing some of those things that I think would be important to Joe Q. Buyer and public.
TM: Are any of those videos geotargeted?
DH: … I can. On some of the sites, they actually have requests on, "Where's the location of the video coming from?" …
TM: What sort of response are you seeing?
DH: It's drastically reduced my marketing costs. … It's reduced it $10,000 [per year] … But it also has opened up other doors for marketing, such as magazine articles, newspaper articles and a RE/MAX international [promotional video].
TM: What are some other ways videos aid in your direct marketing efforts?
DH: Part of being a real estate agent, or I guess part of being any other service provider company, is just constantly not only staying in the face of your clients and prospects, but also giving them value-added stuff. So when the time does come, you're at the tip of their tongue. These videos that are constantly being posted on social media websites that they're getting hit with everyday are just little taps on the shoulder that have really helped out tremendously. So much so that it's branching off into giving me other avenues of marketing that I didn't have before, i.e. HGTV's asked me to do some stuff. …
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