Selling a Home in the Digital Age

by Phoebe Chongchua

A new study says that photos can increase “the perceived value” of your home by about 13 percent. Another statistic shows that approximately 21 percent of buyers view videos of homes for sale on online.
If all of this sounds like the house-hunting process has changed, you’re exactly correct. Homes can be searched for from anywhere in the world. You can share your favorite home photos and videos using social media websites like Facebook, Youtube, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, and a variety of cloud-based software and mobile apps.

Buyers no longer have to carry around dozens of flyers, business cards, and brochures. They still can, and do collect them but the digital era is changing how much emphasis sellers place on various marketing strategies.

With this in mind, combining and using new and old techniques will help you gain exposure and increase foot-traffic to your home.

The open house. An open house can now be a virtual open house with a 360-panoramic view captured in a video but that won’t replace the traditional open house. As much as I am a fan of using videos to sell homes, you still have to have open houses to allow potential buyers to come in and spend some time in your home. That’s when you have some baked cookies with the pleasant aroma wafting throughout the house. Your print flyers and agent’s business cards should also be available.

However, you can also have a video of your home tour playing on your flat screen TV. If you have had a professional video shot of your home, let it play in the background on one of your TVs. The way buyers see a home in person and view it on TV, is a completely different experience. Showcasing your video on a large TV, shows you, the homeowner, really placed value on marketing and highlighting your home’s best features. Also, sometimes buyers will miss something. If they catch a glimpse of the TV with, for instance, a really cool kitchen upgrade being showcased, they’ll go back and take an in-person look.

Print materials. Just because we’re in a digital era doesn’t mean we need to throw out all the old strategies. Some buyers really like to hold a hardcopy of a flyer that’s showing the listing for sale. It’s akin to some people still wanting to hold newspapers or books in their hands rather than read the news on an electronic device.

So have your high-quality printed materials available at your open house and while the home is open for showings. But make sure they have a few items on them that are relevant to the new digital era.

Make sure they have a QR code. This is a code that looks similar to the ones you see on products at the grocery store. These codes can be scanned using a mobile device that has a (free) QR Reader installed. The code can open to a specific website that has more information about your home. Pictures, videos, and more details. Your agent can help you determine the best digital materials to have on the website that it will hyperlink to so that you’ll increase interest in your home.

Social media contact information. In the old days, a name, email, and phone and fax numbers were all that you’d see on flyers and business cards. Today, your agent will have many more icons showing how potential buyers can get in touch. This is a very good thing. The more connected your agent is, the greater the opportunities. Social media is like word-of-mouth selling but on steroids. It works while you and the agent sleep. Your agent can send out a tweet, post your listing on numerous social networks and that post can be shared over and over throughout the Internet. Greater exposure equals greater opportunity for potential offers.

Combining the use of old and new marketing strategies to sell your home in a digital era will help make sure buyers on-and-off-line, find your house.