“Video is only appropriate when I have to sell/rent a very unique property.”

So out of the 80% of homebuyers that used the internet to shop for homes last year, the only ones that needed, or wanted, to see a video of the property were those buyers looking for a very unique property? Every property is a unique and special property in some way (just ask the homeowner…). Now if you simply just want to sell or rent a property or (perhaps more appropriately said) wait for a home to sell, then okay, video is not needed. If you have to sell or rent a property then you might want to reconsider what a good video can do for your marketing efforts…

“Video is only worthwhile for my most expensive listings (ROI).

Ah yes, “expensive” is the operative word here, isn’t it? “Expensive” to whom? The Buyer… the Seller… the agent? And expensive compared to what? Ads in the newspapers… the agents time doing fruitless open houses… the Seller’s holding costs for the next several months…?

Ultimately what is expensive is a home sitting unsold for months on end. With 80% of buyers looking on the internet for their next home, some of which that will buy without ever physically visiting the property don’t you think they are looking for as much information as they can get their hands on? How much confidence would you have in buying a property that only had 6 (or less) amatuerish photos as oppposed to one that had a Hi-Def Video walk-through coupled with 25+ pro-level photos…

Video tours will never be affordable, and will therefore always remain a niche marketing tool.

Affordable compared to what? Newspaper or magazine ads…? Hours of your time sitting open houses that no one shows up to…? If a $150- $200 investment is too much to shell out to potentially make a five-figure commission (or more), then perhaps you need to rethink your business model. You know that old saying, “You have to spend money to make money…?”, yeah, well, there is a reason it’s an old saying…

“Homes are rarely ‘tidy’ enough on production day for a video shoot to occur.”

Now while I can’t outright disagree with that statement, I still have to ask, “Whose fault is that, really?” As an agent and a professional, it’s my job to make the Seller understand how important staging and ‘uncluttering’ a home prior to the video/photo shoot is. If they don’t take my advice then I have either not done a good enough job explaining how a clean, staged home will ultimately benefit them or they simply do not care. In either scenario, this is not an excuse to do nothing at all. For the record, these are the same homes that are not ‘tidy’ enough to even take pictures or even do an open house. This issue should really be handled well before a shoot is scheduled…

Objections in any form are usually a buyers way of saying “You haven’t convienced me yet.” It doesn’t mean they don’t see some value, they just don’t see enough value. Although these objections are pretty tame compared to some of the legit issues (i.e. slow buffering times, bad compression, all the problems of amatuer video, etc.), you can still overcome them. And at the end of the day, once they see a quality video tour, the selling part gets a lot easier…