In this comprehensive video, Nathan Cool, an expert in real estate photography, shares his top five tips for boosting a real estate photography business as we transition from 2023 to 2024. Drawing on the trends and developments of the past year, Nathan provides insightful advice aimed at helping photographers navigate the evolving landscape of real estate marketing. His tips cover a range of strategies, from targeting the right clients to leveraging new technological tools, all tailored to enhance the effectiveness and profitability of a real estate photography business in the new year.
Summary of Nathan Cool’s Video on Real Estate Photography Tips for 2024:
- Focus on High-Volume Agents: Due to recent legal actions against the National Association of Realtors and large brokerages for misrepresentation of commission payments, many agents are shifting focus from representing buyers to seeking listings. Nathan advises concentrating on high-volume agents rather than low-volume ones, although he notes that new agents with potential shouldn’t be overlooked.
- Offer Social Media Packages: With the National Association of Realtors recommending more social media promotion, Nathan suggests photographers should offer social media packages. This approach not only helps sell properties but also boosts the agent’s profile, providing an upsell opportunity.
- Add Value with Floor Plans and Virtual Staging: The most requested add-ons in 2023 were floor plans and virtual staging. Nathan recommends offering simple, cost-effective floor plans and using tools like ApplyDesign.io for easy virtual staging, as staged homes are preferred by buyers.
- Continuous Improvement: The real estate market is competitive, and clients will be more discerning. Nathan urges photographers to use slower periods for practice and improvement, enhancing their skills to stand out.
- Persistence is Key: The top tip is persistence. With the market undergoing changes and competition intensifying, focusing on quality and persisting through tough times is crucial for success. Nathan encourages photographers to leverage this time to surpass their competitors in quality.
Nathan concludes by emphasizing the importance of staying abreast of market changes and continually adapting strategies for success in real estate photography. He also mentions his online courses and books for those seeking further guidance.
Transcript
So now that we’re coming to the end of the year 2023, going into 2024, I want to give you my five top tips to help boost your real estate photography business going into this new year based off of what’s happened during 2023, some of the trends that are starting to take place and the way things are starting to trend as we move into 2024.
Let’s start at the bottom and we’ll work our way up to the top of these five top tips. At the bottom five, the fifth one is spend less time on low volume agents and more time targeting the higher volume agents.
The reason being is because of that recent litigation this last year in 2023, where the National Association of Realtors and some other large brokerages were found guilty in court. Now, of course, they’re going to appeal all this, but of billions of dollars worth of damages because of what was considered misrepresentation of the commissions that are being paid to buyer represented agents.
So as you may recall from another video that I did earlier, I’ll have a link to that down in the description of this video where I talked about that recent litigation and what that really meant because now I can tell you firsthand, not just for myself, but from other colleagues around the country here in the United States, that a lot of agents are backing off on representing buyers because it could get very difficult for them in the near future to get decent commissions out of that.
So what’s going to be happening, it’s already starting to happen actually, is that there’s more of a battle to try to get listings. Listings are a surefire bet for any real estate agent where representing buyers, it could have been a lot easier and you’d be guaranteed an income, but with that recent litigation and there’s a lot more lawsuits that are starting to come out since that larger one, well that could also be put in jeopardy.
So the tip number five here is to definitely target the higher volume agents that are Not the lower volume agents. Now that doesn’t mean that you should not work with new real estate agents because they might hold hope that they could be a high volume listing agent.
A way to tell is if that agent contacts you and you look them up and they don’t yet have a web page or they don’t even have a picture of themselves in their profile on some of the bigger listing sites like realtor .com or zillow .com that means that that agent is not being serious about representing sellers So if they do have a listing, it’s probably a one -off.
They’re not gonna survive during this bigger shakeout that’s starting to happen with realtors since the litigation. Tip number four, working our way up, is to start working on social media packages. So recently, the National Association of Realtors has been recommending that their agents start working on more social media promotion.
Now, it’s not so much that you’re going to be selling a house on Instagram or on Facebook. What it does do is it’s going to help sell that agent. And this is a two -fold situation. One, yes, you have an upsell opportunity by being able to offer social media packages to your clients.
But the second -fold issue to that is in the same vein, reminding those agents during your sales pitch for this when you’re doing an upsell opportunity is that it’s not always just the photos or video or whatnot from the media that sells the property.
It also sells the agent. So when an agent is looking to get into this competitive listing market to represent these sellers from item number five, they have to be able to show that they’re worthy to really gain a high commission.
So as this pool of realtors continues to get a little bit of a shaky ground because not all will be representing buyers in the near future, then these selling agents, these agents representing sellers need to show that they can really up their game, that they have the best.
So social media being something that the National Association of Realtors is suggesting to their realtors, their members to do, you have the opportunity to do not just Instagram reels, but also other type of videos, and in the same vein that it’s going to be a high -quality product, that you can also provide high -quality photos as well.
Tip number three is to concentrate on two add -ons that have the most bang for the buck. and they are the most requested out of 2023 and even 2022. Statistics have shown this, and you know I’ve had a video on this earlier as well, that the two main add -ons are simply floor plans and also virtual staging.
Now floor plans, you don’t need to do Matterport or iGUIDE, although those are good because they also have tours, but a simple 2D floor plan that costs you $15 US with fixed furniture from Cuba Casa, simple, easy.
You can easily then upsell that for $100 or more for these floor plans. And yes, I do know that it’s simple enough that agents are doing it, but the smart agents know that they don’t want to spend their time being content creators, where you can do that in, since you know Photoshop, You could edit a JPEG if you needed to change some of the word in or whatnot.
So anyways, definitely floor plans as the first one, but virtual staging. So easy to do now, so flexible. I use Apply Design software online. I’ve got plenty of videos of that on my YouTube channel here as well.
But with that, they’ve shown, and this is also National Association of Realtors, and Zillow also shows that home buyers preferred to see a virtually staged home or at least a staged home. So it gave them a feeling of relatability.
When they see an empty house, an empty apartment, empty condo, they don’t really know exactly, well, how am I supposed to set up my furniture in here? What’s this really, this layout? It’s different from their existing home.
So having something staged really does help sell. Statistics have shown that, and that’s something been popular and also pushed by the National Association of Realtors with their members over this last couple years.
So think about it, if it’s not staging, you can do virtual staging. It is very easy to do. Once again, I use ApplyDesign .io and all of links to all that down in the description of this video as well.
Tip number two is to practice to improve. Everything I’ve talked about with these other tips shows that it’s gonna be a continual competitive market with realtors and other types of clients that will be more discerning.
So they’re gonna be discriminating against you and others because they have to up their game. They’re gonna expect you to up your game as well. So especially during the downtime, usually during the winter market, you’ve got a lot more time to then practice.
Now, I admit things changed a lot, especially here. This has been the busiest winter I’ve ever had and it’s because of probably a few things. One, we have these lower interest rates and it’s a lot more stuff is coming on the market.
If you’re not busy, then that means that you can take though this opportunity during this slow season or during any slow season really and start practicing. Doesn’t matter. matter where you are, where you live, you’ve got something you can practice on.
So practice, practice, practice. Start working to improve so that you can start standing out because the next tip, my top tip is the most important and it’s going to rely on this. And that top tip, my number one tip, it’s one simple word.
Hear me out on this because it really has just the tip of the iceberg when I say it, but there’s a lot underneath of it. It’s persistence. Here’s what’s happening right now is there’s been a shake -up in the market.
It’s not just with the realtors and the lawsuits that have come out by the National Association of Realtors against them and paying these big fines and against the brokerages, but it’s also been a tough market to get listings to begin with.
Now yes, just recently into the fall and the winter interest rates dropped and then it was just a flood more of listings coming on the market. But what’s happened is that it’s been hard, not just for yourself, if your business has been slow, welcome to the club.
A lot of other photographers, real estate photographers, have been that way. But that’s all starting to change. But during this shakeup, what’s happened is, it’s affected not just you, it’s affected your competition.
That includes the photo mills. So if you’re working against high volume competitors, I guarantee you, they aren’t looking at the most important thing, which is quality, and to persist in making it. So you have to persist through this.
You have to survive it. And how do you survive through these times? It’s to get good and to get really, really good. You have to be better than the competition, and now is your time to take advantage of that, to leverage this opportunity in the market that while it’s down, and your competition could be hurting, to start leapfrogging over them in quality.
Now, if you’re unsure about your quality, there’s things that you still wanna learn. As you know, I can help you with that. I do have my online courses on real estate photography, doing pro level work, and I also have my books on real estate photography, some of which have been best sellers as well.
And I have links to all that down in the description of this video. And lastly, as we go into 2024, things will inevitably change, they always do. And that’s why I try to stay on top of the market. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have been doing real estate photography for as long as I have.
And yes, I do have this YouTube channel and my courses and my books, but I still do real estate photography full time. And it’s a great income if you can stay ahead of the market, and that’s what I’m trying to help you do as well.
But in either case, I’ll keep an eye on the market, and I’ll keep you posted.