Virtual Tour Services in Seattle

The Growing Acceptability for Virtual Tours in the 2022 Marketing Industry

Finding a marketing strategy that appeals to all parties – agent, seller, and buyer – is key to real estate marketing success. Traditionally, visual marketing serves different audiences differently. Since 2D photos brought definitive value to agents, buyers, and sellers for a long time, they have long been the industry standard. Potential home buyers can be emotionally engaged by attractive images of a house. In addition to impressing buyers who want to know their homes will be marketed in the best light possible, they can also win agents’ listings. Real estate photography will continue to be an important part of any real estate marketing campaign, as camera technology improves on both DSLR cameras as well as those on smartphones. However, technology is constantly evolving. Beautiful real estate photos are only one part of a successful equation for buyers and sellers in today’s market. Virtual tours in 3D are the next step.

Facilitating First Home Buyers

Homehunters start their search online more than half of the time. The number of individuals seeking homes that are not close to their current location is increasing. Younger, digitally savvy first-time buyers increasingly want to get a true sense of the home’s real appearance and feel beyond static pictures. Modern buyers report that the two things they desire most from an online listing are high-quality, large photos and a virtual tour in 3D.

An 80% of real estate agents and sellers responded to a recent survey stating that their clients would like to spend less time staging their property. The same percentage of respondents (77%) say that after a staging and photography shoot is completed, they find a feature that was missed during the shoot. A number of virtual tour services in Seattle give agents and sellers the ability to create open houses that are always staged perfectly. Having this information available can help attract more leads to subsequent open houses and better qualify them. Listings with dynamic visual content generate 403% more leads for agents.

Let’s look at the numbers. In any real estate marketing package, large, high-quality images are essential. An agent who offers 3D visual tours can, however, differentiate themselves from the competition by offering a dynamic, interactive tour. In addition, it has been proven that offering this service will generate more leads. Because potential buyers have virtually viewed the home, they are more likely to buy. Additionally, agents can pay more attention to interested, knowledgeable buyers than listing properties. These virtual tour services in Seattle and several listing portals have invested a lot of resources in adding a 3D virtual tour filter for buyers, making 3D virtual tours easier to find for their end-users.

A successful customer journey is reflected in the following numbers:

• 40% more clicks on listings with virtual tours than listings without.
• 75% more email inquiries on properties with virtual tours versus those without.
• VR generates 49% more qualified leads compared to non-VR means.
• 95% more phone inquiries on properties with virtual tours.

These successes can be attributed to the fact that 3D virtual tours engage buyers in a way that words and photos cannot. These tools offer a visual representation of a property and enhanced emotional engagement through ‘location intelligence’. As opposed to an open house or home visit, a 3D virtual home tour allows the prospect to explore the features that make a house or apartment feel like home at any time from wherever they are located. In a highly competitive market, the experience factor is crucial for agents and sellers to win listings and build a business. In addition, it’s a modern, enjoyable, and memorable way to show more details about a home quickly, efficiently, and effectively.

In addition to being proficient salespeople, agents must be proficient marketers as well. Dynamic real estate marketing is being employed to delight sellers and make a home listing an unforgettable experience for buyers. By utilizing 3D virtual tour technology, you will be able to increase your competitiveness in your market, and your success with prospective customers. 3D and VR photography solutions provide a more realistic view of properties. All of the benefits of the best photos are combined in one shoot, and you can help to immerse buyers into a property’s experience, so they can connect emotionally as well as intellectually with it.

Real Utility

Travel agencies, airlines, and tourism boards have used VR technology for marketing destinations for years. Ralph Hollister, a tourism analyst and author of a report on the VR travel industry, says that COVID-19 will allow [virtual reality] to overcome its image of a gimmick. A surge in popularity is being seen for virtual travel experiences.

Ascape’s Verdict

Valery Kondruk, CEO of VR travel company Ascape, has reported a 60 percent rise in downloads since December (traditionally the busiest month) and a double-digit increase since January. Education and nursing home workers are showing greater interest in the company’s VR programs, Kondruk says, even as airlines and travel agencies have paused their licenses.

Hollister’s and Samuel’s Analysis

Still, there’s a big difference between treating virtual reality like a destination and using it to “try before you buy”. It’s just not there yet. VR videos in 360-degrees are viewed using headsets (like Oculus Rift) or apps (like Google Cardboard). In addition to being expensive, heavy, and uncomfortable to wear for more than 30 minutes, the headsets can also cause nausea. Hollister says the apps don’t have any of these problems but aren’t as good as they could be. Another problem is limited sensations. Virtual reality experiences tend to be short, only lasting a few minutes-hardly the equivalent of an entire vacation. Videos focus on sounds and sights but not much on smell, touch, or taste. Samuel Greengard, author of Virtual Reality, says that some researchers are working on VR experiences that are ever more immersive, including haptic suits. In spite of the fact that a full-body suit with enhanced sensory experiences may improve the appearance of videos of the Amazon or Antarctica, it still cannot fulfill the more fundamental needs that spur us to travel.

Countering Overtourism

It may be necessary to use virtual tours instead for people who usually celebrate outdoors. We will be able to witness a technology that experts have developed as an eco-friendly solution to the overtourism problem. Most of the world is covered by travel restrictions, so many would-be adventurers are using virtual reality (VR) to visit Machu Picchu or the Galapagos Islands. Some of the unexpected ecological benefits that the coronavirus lockdown has made apparent-including cleaner air and water-underline the potential for this technology to lower tourism’s carbon footprint.

The Urge to Wander

There is no such thing as a local tourist or a business traveler. Typically, tourists are less directed in their explorations, preferring instead to discover and experience new things. According to Erick Ramirez, a philosopher at Santa Clara University who studies virtual reality, “this simply cannot be recreated in virtual reality.”.

Imagine that you could hook yourself up to an “experience machine” and feel happy for the rest of your life. This is how he compares the future of virtual travel. Ramirez says that “nobody would want to be hooked up to such a thing,” according to Robert Nozick, who developed the experiment. There are some types of tourist experiences whose value lies in the doing, not just in the seeing and hearing, and VR would be hard-pressed to replicate such experiences. Besides wanting to do things, we also want to make decisions about them. In a fundamental sense, virtual travel is constructed by others and fed to us; the extent to which it can be filmed and engineered is up to us. Among guided tours, Ramirez calls this one “the most authoritarian.”

If someone goes to India for real, they can choose what they see and where they go. This gives them a chance to be surprised and to learn. A person watching a video of India might not be able to appreciate certain aspects that a VR company obscures to make the experience more pleasant. To pick on someone, Ramirez says that a tour designed by Elon Musk would look very different from one designed by a working-class Indian living in India. As we embark on these touristy VR experiences, it is important to keep that in mind.”

A Client’s Experience

During a stay in Vancouver, British Columbia, a client of some VR company gave feedback that he had the opportunity to demo VR travel using the Oculus Rift. Four years later, when he visited the real place, he found that the demo was beautiful and similar to the real place. However, there were a few differences as well. Among the differences was the sense of touch and the cold air on his skin. There was a great deal of difference between what he experienced in VR and what he experienced in person. In person, the experience happened exclusively to him, he had full control over what he heard and saw, and if he wanted, he could see something else as well.

Experts’ Opinion

Several of the world’s earliest cave paintings can be found in southern France, but the works are too fragile to open to the public. In spite of this, a replica of the original can be found only four miles away. According to Ramirez, virtual reality could be applied in a similar way — and even in a more accessible manner — to sites around the world. Compared to other technologies, VR can have a unique role to play in recreating historical attractions, agrees Hollister from Global Data. Ascape CEO Kondruk says the company has been working with Vietravel, a major Vietnamese travel agency, to recreate parts of Vietnam where the government restricts travel to tourists.

In the end, virtual reality’s impact on travel will depend on new technology’s development and application. As of now, advances have been incremental rather than at a scale likely to disrupt the travel industry or lead to a reduction in travel-related CO2 emissions once the pandemic is over. However, virtual reality could enable travelers to come closer to faraway destinations, and in doing so encourage them to adopt more sustainable practices wherever they may visit (or not visit) in the future.

Emirates and Hawaiian Airlines

The trend has been embraced by airlines. You can pretend you’re at the onboard bar by sipping a real cocktail while watching a virtual tour of Emirates’ Airbus A380 planes. Hawaii Airlines launched a series of video tutorials that teach Hawaiian languages and how to make poke bowls like those at the Koko Head Café in Honolulu.

Google Arts & Culture

Virtual reality became a gateway to the world as travelers stayed at home due to the pandemic. You can find photos and 360-degree videos of more than 2,500 landmarks at Google Arts & Culture, including the Louvre, the Tate Modern, and Mount St. Helens in the U.S. The company added new virtual tours this spring after rushing to add virtual tours before global lockdowns. YouTube concerts and walking tours relating to Mahler’s New York were made available on Google’s YouTube channel in April, for example.

Ancient Egypt

Now even bucket-list experiences can be viewed live online, such as a virtual tour of Ramses VI’s tomb and the northern lights from Manitoba’s Churchill Northern Studies Center. Virtual tours will be a great equalizer when it comes to Egypt’s Valley of the Kings, which can’t be compared to a real-life visit. You have a wide variety of escape options when all you need is Wi-Fi to see the world.

Airbnb

As a result, Airbnb in a short period of time transitioned into the digital world with its popular guided trips that users host, called Airbnb Experiences. Catherine Powell, Airbnb’s global head of hosting, says, “We wanted to make sure we could deliver the magic of connection and authenticity with an online experience.” Activities include preparing tacos with a Mexican chef, sightseeing across Buenos Aires, or drinking sangria with drag queens in Lisbon.

The Future

Despite its limitations, virtual reality still offers intriguing possibilities, even if it will never replace traditional travel. This form of escape might appeal to the more environmentally conscious (especially those who are sensitive to flight-shaming) if the technology becomes sophisticated enough. People who cannot physically visit certain landmarks can experience parts of the world via virtual reality. In addition, it can make otherwise inaccessible places more accessible.

This article was originally published on momentumvirtualtours