virtual tour

Virtual Tour Features – New Small Photo Virtual Tour and Image Trimming

December 21, 2011 | Posted by Adam Small in Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features, Real Estate Virtual Tour | No Comments »

Real Estate Virtual TourAs part of our ongoing efforts to enhance and improve the Digital Home Info Real Estate Marketing Platform we have recently released a few new features.  A new small sized virtual tour that is ideal for displaying small images and auto-trim and correct photo processing.

The new small virtual tour has all of the same features as our larger animated virtual tour (Home Information, Google Maps, Mortgage Calculator, Appointment Scheduler, Auto-generated PDF Flyer, and photo browser) it is just optimized for smaller files sizes.  We have noticed that many of our agents use photos from their local IDX system and that these photos tend to be around 640px by 480px.  Although these looked good in the larger virtual tour, sometimes you could tell that a photo had been stretched to make it fit right.  So we created this version to match the need.  If you upload your own photos or your photos are large you can still use the larger virtual tour. We just wanted to provide another option so that you can get the most out of our service.

Something else we noticed with the IDX photos was that they sometimes contained whitespace (borders) around the edges.  So we set out to find a way to remove the whitespace without altering the photo.  This is where Auto Trim comes into the picture. Now you can simply click on the “Trim” link under each photo in your gallery and Digital Home Info will automatically remove the whitespace. This greatly improves the presentation of the virtual tour since the white is no longer there to detract from the overall presentation.

We will be blogging how to’s on both of these new features in the coming days so look for those soon.  If you have any suggestions or comments please let us know.

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One Click Share your Virtual Tour to your Facebook Fanpage

June 8, 2011 | Posted by Adam Small in FAQ, Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features, Real Estate Marketing Tip, Real Estate Tutorials | No Comments »

This quick tutorial explains how to use One Click Sharing to share your Virtual Tour links to your Facebook Fanpage instead of your personal profile.  You can watch the video above or follow the instructions below.

  1. Make sure that you are logged in to both Facebook and Digital Home Info.
  2. Starting with Facebook, click on the “Account” link in the upper right corner of the browser.
  3. Click on the “Use Facebook as Page” link.
  4. A window will pop up.  Select the Fanpage that you want to post the Virtual Tour or article to and click on the “Switch” button.
  5. This will make the Fanpage the active Facebook user.
  6. Go back to your Digital Home Info account.
  7. Click on “Listings” tab.
  8. Scroll down to the listing that you want to share.
  9. Click on Facebook share icon.
  10. This opens a new Facebook Sharing window with the Virtual Tour information and a space for you to add any additional information.
  11. Across the top left you should see your Fanpage name and in the top right you should see “Posting as this page.”
  12. Once you have added any additional information click on the “Share Link” in the lower right corner of the page.
  13. At this point the Virtual Tour has been posted to your Fanpage instead of your personal page.  If you refresh your Fanpage you should see the Virtual Tour as your latest post.
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5 Features of a Great Real Estate Virtual Tour

May 24, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog | 5 Comments »

Virtual Tours have become such an integral component of Real Estate Marketing, we thought we would provide a top 5 list of features to look for in your Virtual Tour Service provider and why they are important.

  1. Large Photos – Large photos allow viewers to get a better feel for the size and feel of a home.  Small photos, even very good ones, make it hard to see details and look for features a viewer wants.
  2. Share Features – There should be a number of sharing features on a virtual tour.  Viewers should be able to share with their friends and use social media sharing links.  This helps spread your message and information out as far and wide as possible.
  3. Appointment Scheduler – Allows the viewers to schedule an appointment to see the property.  This is a great way to collect prospect information in an indirect manner while providing an easy path for the viewer to meet you.
  4. Contact Me/Information - All of your contact information should be visible on the virtual tour at all times and there should be a contact form that the viewer can fill out to reach you.  An interested buyer is not going to hunt through a number of links to find your information.  They will find another agent if your information isn’t easily accessible.
  5. Agent Branding – Every agent has a brand.  They work for an broker, agency, or real estate company.  Each one has a unique brand.  Utilize this brand and piggy back your own branding on top of it.  The more consistent your message and branding the greater opportunity for recognition.

You may have noticed that most of these features are about using media to either get direct contact with a viewer or to share your information with someone the viewer knows.  You don’t know where your next buyer is going to come from and utilizing every opportunity to spread your message as far and wide as possible just makes sense.

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3 Ways REALTORS can use Text Messaging

May 4, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Tip | 6 Comments »

Text Messaging is an emerging technology in the Real Estate industry.  REALTORS are using it in many different ways.  We thought we would list 3 ways that REALTORS could use texting to generate leads.

  1. Mobile Flyers – Many mobile services (like Digital Home Info) offer a mobile real estate flyer that returns the property and agent information in a text message.  Many of them also offer an instant notification that provides the lead information to the agent.
  2. Mobile Virtual Tours - If your virtual tours are mobile optimized include a link to the mobile version at the bottom of mobile flyers and messages that you send to prospects.
  3. Text Card – A text message business card.  Puts your information on a prospects phone and provides you with their lead information at the same time.

These are just a few of the many ways that text messaging can be used by REALTORS.  Let us know how you are using text messaging by leaving a comment.

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Benefits of posting your Virtual Tour links to REALTOR.COM

May 2, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in FAQ, Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features | 6 Comments »

Since we just rolled out our new REALTOR.com® enhancement, we thought it would be a good idea to explain some of the benefits of posting your virtual tour links to REALTOR.com®.  Aside from the ~90,000,000 page views/month that REALTOR.com® receives, some of the benefits include:

  • Your complete Virtual Tour is linked to your listing on REALTOR.com® – This allows potential buyers to see all of your photos, your contact information, flyers and relevant information.  While at the same time distinguishing you from others that don’t link to their virtual tours.
  • Greater Distribution – Your listing link is displayed not only on REALTOR.com® but also on the entire REALTOR.com® distribution network which includes many national real estate portals such as homes.com, move.com, and national franchise brand sites such as ColdwellBanker.com, Century21.com, ERA.com, and REMAX.com.
  • Better Search Results – The volume of links generated through the REALTOR.com® distribution channel increases the chance of your home being found when potential buyers are searching the Internet.  All of these links connect back to your virtual tour leading potential buyers directly to you.

The list above is a small portion of the many benefits and marketing opportunities that Realtor.com provides.  If you are interested in learning more we recommend that you check out their site at realtor.com.

The REALTOR.com® logo is a registered trademark of the National Association of REALTORS®

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New Feature – REALTOR.COM Virtual Tour Link Posting

April 30, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in FAQ, Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features | 4 Comments »

Digital Home Info is excited to announce that we are now capable of posting Virtual Tour Links to REALTOR.COM.  This has been an often requested feature and we are pleased to make it available to our customers.

To use this feature simply click on the “Realtor.com” link in the Active Listings section of the management portal and follow the directions presented.

If you have any questions please feel free to call or email us.

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Real Estate Marketing Tip Track Your Results!

April 20, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Tip | No Comments »

Result tracking seems like an obvious thing.  Everyone should know to do it but many don’t.  I meet a lot of REALTORS and many of them can’t say how many leads they are getting from Virtual Tours, Print ads, or other efforts.  They are just spending to market and hoping that something brings in leads.

Depending on the medium there are a number of ways to track lead sources.

  • Google Analytics (Web Site)
  • Email Open/Click Analytics (Email)
  • Some marketing systems (like Digital Home Info) have built in analytics

By tracking where your leads are coming from you will be able to identify what is working and what isn’t.  You’ll also be able to determine where to increase your spending and where to cut back.

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Custom Virtual Tour Flyers

April 17, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features | 3 Comments »

Digital Home Info announces another enhancement to it’s Real Estate Marketing system. All of our customers now have the ability to upload a custom flyer for each listing.

We have added an “Add Custom Virtual Tour Flyer” section in the bottom left column of the Listing Editor. Simply choose the file you want to upload and press the “Save Flyer” button. You can change or remove the custom flyer at anytime.

If you choose not to upload a custom flyer we will still provide the default auto-generated pdf with every listing.

Let us know what you think!

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Unbranded Virtual Tours

April 16, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features | 4 Comments »

Many of our customers know that we are constantly releasing improvements to our Digital Home Info Real Estate Marketing system. Today we are releasing our latest enhancement to the service, Unbranded Virtual Tours. Every listing now has an unbranded virtual tour link that can be found in the Digital Home Info dashboard. The link is under the Social Media sharing icons in the Active Listings section.

This link can be clicked on to view your unbranded virtual tour and copied to other systems requiring unbranded virtual tour links.

Check it out and let us know what you think. We are always looking for great feedback and ways to improve our product.

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Real Estate Virtual Tour Photo Order

March 23, 2010 | Posted by Adam Small in Knowledge Base, Real Estate Marketing Blog, Real Estate Marketing Features | 1 Comment »

Based on feedback from some of our customers we have changed the initial ordering of uploaded photos. All photos are now uploaded with a default position of 1 instead of 0. This means that you only have to change the order of one photo to get the front of the home to be first in the virtual tours and syndication. Simply change your picture you want to be first from 1 to 0 and the rest of the photos will follow in random order. Want to set the exact order of all of your photos? Number them (beginning with 0) in the order you would like them to be seen. This change will not impact any photos already uploaded.

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