Ask the agent

Should I lead with video instead of photos in real estate?

Nobody clicks the video page

Everyone tells you video is where the money is. Fine. It is also where the empty page is, and she finds the empty page before she finds the money.

Our own analytics prove it. The photo pages get the traffic. The video page sits there.

Photos are what she is buying on day one. That is the job she has, a listing going live, and photos are the thing that has to exist by then. Dom has photos down. That is the whole asset. A photographer with photos down and no video portfolio has exactly what an agent needs on day one.

Lead with the thing you cannot show yet and you throw that away. You send her to an empty page, and she does not wait for you to build it. She goes to the next site.

Video is the Trojan horse

So where does video go? Not on the front. In the cart. The front of the site is for the thing she trusts you for. The cart is for the thing she has not tried yet. Mix them up and you lose both.

Photos at 100% on the front. No discount on what she came for. She picks a package without video, and HD PhotoHub offers her video at half off, right there in the order.

You are not pitching video cold. She already said yes. I spent ten years on her side of the table, and she will not buy video at $1,000 on a cold message. After yes, it is coming out of a $9,000 check.

Sell twenty days of posting

And here is why she takes the upgrade. It is not one video.

Horizontal, vertical, multiple cuts. About 20 assets out of one shoot. One video is a thing she posts once and forgets. Twenty cuts is a content calendar she did not have to build.

That is 20 days she does not have to think about what to post. She is not buying a video. She is buying a month of not thinking about Instagram.

The cart line, word for word: "We’re killing it in the photos. We just added video. First-time clients get 50% off." Say it in the cart, after the packages without video, and nowhere else.

Straight answers

Should real estate photographers offer video?

Yes, after the yes. Photos at full price up front, then video at half off in the cart once she has picked a package. Never lead with it cold.

How do I sell video to real estate agents with no video portfolio?

Don’t lead with it. Book the photo job, and let the cart offer video at 50% off to first-time clients. She already trusts you, so the empty page never comes up.

What should a real estate video package include?

Twenty days of posting. Horizontal, vertical, multiple cuts, about 20 assets from one shoot. She is buying posts, not a single video.

Related questions

• How do I price photos, video and drone as one package?
• How do I sell video with no video portfolio?
• Do real estate agents actually want video, and which kind?

Julian Lundgren sold real estate for ten years before he shot a listing for money. He runs Cineminn, a Minneapolis real estate photography studio, and writes these answers from the agent’s side of the table. Send a question to info@cineminn.com.