RISMEDIA, July 11, 2008-Point2 Technologies Inc., one of the real estate industry’s largest independent providers of website and listing syndication software for real estate professionals released findings from its 2008 Point2 Agent Photo Effectiveness Study, “Rich Listings; Rich Agents.”
The study set out to examine the impact of photos in driving real estate transactions, as part of a broker’s or agent’s online marketing efforts.
Results strongly suggest that adding more photos generates better response to real estate listings, reconfirming trends observed in a 2007 study also by Point2.
The study tracked three trends: consumer views, interest and leads. All increased significantly as the number of still photos related to the listings increased.
Listings that did not include any photos performed very poorly, generating little consumer response and business. Specifically, the study showed that listings with zero photos attract, on average, a mere 0.02% of the detailed listing views that listings with 21 to 36 photos enjoy.
Listings that featured a single photo fared significantly better.
“Once again the data indicates that online home shoppers want rich content, specifically in the form of more photos, otherwise they intend to move on to the next listing,” said Carey Tufts, director of Marketing, Point2 Technologies. “Especially in today’s market, home sellers and their agents do not have to take this risk. The data sends a powerful message. With more than 80 percent of home buyers continuing to do their research online, agents must attach more photos to their listings for them to stand out and attract more potential buyers.”
Key Findings
Compared to listings with only one photo, those with 21 or more photos generated more than triple the number of “Detailed Views,” more than double the amount of interest, and double the number of leads.
Compared to listings with no photos, those with 21 or more photos generated more than fifty-five times the number of detailed views, nearly twenty-seven times the amount of interest, and eight hundred and ninety-eight times the number of leads.
Views, interest and leads jumped 20% or more as the number of photos increased from 15 to 16.
Performance in terms of detailed views, interest and leads generated trended up almost identically during the test period.
Added Tufts, “The days of putting out little information in the hopes that buyers will phone in to learn more are gone. Strategies have to shift. There are many technology solutions real estate professionals can leverage – Point2 Agent for example allows up to 36 photos per listing, and we hope to motivate members to improve upon their current average of 9.2 photos per listing. Buyers, sellers and real estate professionals alike stand to benefit.”
Methodology
All For Sale properties entered by real estate professionals into the Point2 Agent website network over the first quarter of 2008 were included in the study, for a sample of well over 100,000 active listings. The study covered a wide variety of economic regions across every U.S. state, every Canadian province and several other countries around the world.
The sample of listings was analyzed based on the number of photos that each listing included. The number of photos added was then plotted against three key variables:
Views – tracked how many times a listing was viewed online;
Interest – measured how many unique visitors interacted with a listing, such as going beyond the initial set of photos to view the listing’s virtual tour, complete a mortgage calculation or, access more details about the property; and,
Leads – recorded the number of unique visitors who went on to contact the listing broker or agent.
For more information, visit www.Point2.com.
