The whole point of hiring a professional Oklahoma City real estate photographer is not to sell homes – the point is to sell the agents who are selling the homes.
That may sound a bit odd, but that concept underlies the reason that real estate agents need to hire a professional real estate photographer for every shoot, even if homes are flying off the market.
Why?
Here are three reasons:
Reason #1. Your marketing defines your brand.
When we mention your brand, we’re talking about how you are perceived by prospective clients.
What assumptions do prospective clients make about you as a real estate agent when they see your marketing?
All they have to base their first impression on is the marketing material they see when they check out your listing. That means that your marketing campaign plays a critical role in how you are perceived. Home sales may not be completely affected by less-than-stellar real estate photos, but they definitely make an impact on prospective homebuyers’ opinions of agents.
They’ll likely compare one agent’s magazine-quality photography with another's amateur photos before they make their decision on an agent. It’s not a stretch to say that they’ll probably go with the agent that did everything possible to make their listings stand out.
They’ll know that they are in good hands.
Reason #2. It's an investment in the future.
The housing market has been hot recently, and homes have been selling quickly. Sometimes in a matter of minutes after hitting the market. However, it will change. It always does. It may be a gradual change, or it may be a sudden, full stop. When it does slow down, it is going to take much longer for homes to sell.
Let’s pretend that we’re already there.
There are far fewer new listings and it is a buyer’s market. Sellers are going to be much more selective about who they hire to represent them. They’re going to need a good real estate agent because they don’t want their home to sit on the market for 60 days or more. They’re not going to want to have to do price drops or risk losing the home they want to purchase.
Who are they going to call?
Ghostbusters!
Okay, maybe not.
They’ll go online and find someone in their area.
What are they looking for in an agent?
An air of mystery, soft hands, and a tender, loving voice.
Oh, wait, scratch that. I forgot what we were talking about.
Let’s start that part over.
And go…
The very first thing a home seller will probably do is research local agents’ sales records. Then, they’ll scroll through previous listings to look at the real estate photos and video, and any other marketing the agent has provided on past listings.
That is where some sellers stop. They ask themselves the following question:
“Do I want an agent that treats my listing like this agent has treated their other listings?”
If the photos don’t look great, the answer is probably going to be something like “No”, “absolutely not”, “Nope”, “hard pass”, or just “Nuh-uh!”
Some may dig further or go strictly by numbers, but it’s not a risk worth taking.
Reason #3. Sellers talk.
Imagine this conversation between a recent seller and their neighbor:
Anna: Congratulations! Your home sold! How do you feel about the process?
Tammy: A.Maze.Ing! It sold in two days. Even though the market is super hot right now, our agent went all in. She absolutely crushed it from the word “Go”.
Anna: Outstanding! Who was your real estate agent?
Tammy: We went with Kristy White. She could have easily cut corners in this seller’s market but she was deliberate in everything that she did. She hired professional real estate photographers to take interior, exterior, drone, and twilight photos and video for our property.
Anna: They still do that here?
Tammy: Some do. Some don’t. We looked at a ton of other listings in Oklahoma City. Some looked like they were obviously taken by the agent, or whatever. We were blown away when we found Kristy’s listings. We thought that the quality of the photos her photographer took was amazing! It wasn’t just the photos, but the fact that she was willing to hire a professional real estate photographer to present our property in the best possible light. That’s what really impressed us. She definitely has our recommendation.
Can you imagine how things would play out if Kristy had taken her own photos?
Tammy still would have sold her home, but the conversation would have been centered around the market rather than the quality of the real estate agent. In that scenario, Kristy White would have been an afterthought.
Will your sellers rave about you and your real estate photographer after they sell their home or will they just talk about how quickly they sold their home? Or both?
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