WAV Group has studied the effectiveness of video marketing for brokers over number of years. By and large, firms are not seeing the level of engagement on video marketing that justifies the trouble or expense. Having a video on YouTube with 2 or 3 views is not a conveyance of success.
The promises of video marketing are pretty significant. By using video, a property is marketed more dynamically than photo and text marketing. Videos are processed by the brain 60,000 times faster than text. Simply stated, it’s a better consumer experience. Prima facie – people enjoy a video television experience over a magazine or newspaper experience. Homebuyers spend more time looking at the property (minutes rather than seconds) at a much higher cognitive level. The average consumer with an Internet connection watches roughly 206 videos per month according to Nielsen.
Brokers are also failing to syndicate the branded and unbranded videos effectively. WAV Group audits portray that unless the insertion of the videos into the MLS is done automatically, Realtors® or staff do not consistently complete the chore. IDX syndication of virtual tours drives a lot of views, and done correctly will provide some additional SEO benefits that can accrue to the broker website in the form of back links. Moreover, the branded virtual tours are not being syndicated well on third party listing websites like Realtor.com, Zillow, Trulia, Homes.com or others. Again, syndication drives views.
Social media also plays a significant role in video engagement. We do not propose that brokers automate the publication of property videos on the wall of their social media pages. Rather, we suggest that you build a channel for videos and socialize the channel. If you pollute your wall with automated tour publishing, you will find that consumers will abandon. According to research by Usurv, Consumers are 39 percent more likely to share content if it’s delivered via video, and 36 percent more likely to comment and 56 percent more likely to give that video a coveted “like.”
Brokers and agents would serve themselves well to deliver performance on their YouTube page by boosting the views with a few ad dollars. We have seen some interesting results whereby a broker who tags and advertises their videos correctly can actually display an ad as a pre-roll on a competitors’ video. That’s fun, and not very expensive. On average, video advertising is only about $0.02 per view.
If you follow WAV Group founders on social media, you know that they have worked to build the YouTube channel of Alexandra Lund, nickname Sparkles. What started out as an effort to gain experience “on camera,” as turned into a small media company with more than 20,000 subscribers, over 2 Million views, a steady stream of advertising income, and brand endorsement agreements with a number of leading retailers. YouTube has rewarded her with access to their YouTube Creator Space – a full on video production houses located in Los Angeles and across the globe (https://www.youtube.com/yt/space/los-angeles.html). Moreover, YouTube now promotes her videos.
If you need a hygienic check up of your video strategy, contact WAV Group.
